resh, honest, sensible young face, a clear skin, and dark
eyes that could be very merry when she would let them, and her whole air
and dress were trimness itself, with an inclination to the choicest
materials permitted to an alderman's daughter.

Things were going on so smoothly that the alderman was taken by surprise
when all the good wives around began to press on him that it was
incumbent on him to lose no time in marrying his daughter to her cousin,
if not before Lent, yet certainly in the Easter holidays.

Dennet looked very grave thereon. Was it not over soon after the loss
of the good grandmother? And when her father said, as the gossips had
told him, that she and Giles need only walk quietly down some morning to
Saint Faith's and plight their troth, she broke out into her girlish
wilful manner, "Would she be married at all without a merry wedding?
No, indeed! She would not have the thing done in a corner! What was
the use of her being wedded, and having to consort with the tedious old
wives instead of the merry wenches? Could she not guide the house, and
rule the maids, and get in the stores, and hinder waste, and make the
pasties, and brew the possets? Had her father found the crust hard, or
missed his roasted crab, or had any one blamed her for want of
discretion? Nay, as to that, she was like to be more discreet as she
was, with only her good old father to please, than with a husband to
plague her."

On the other hand, Giles's demeanour was rather that of one prepared for
the inevitable than that of an eager bridegroom; and when orders began
to pour in for accoutrements of unrivalled magnificence for the King and
the gentlemen who were to accompany him to Ardres, there to meet the
young King of France just after Whitsuntide, Dennet was the first to
assure her father that there would be no time to think of weddings till
all this was over, especially as some of the establishment would have to
be in attendance to repair casualties at the jousts.

At this juncture there arrived on business Master Tiptoff, husband to
Giles's sister, bringing greetings from Mrs Headley at Salisbury, and
inquiries whether the wedding was to take place at Whitsuntide, in which
case she would hasten to be present, and to take charge of the
household, for which her dear daughter was far too young. Master
Tiptoff showed a suspicious alacrity in undertaking the forwarding of
his mother-in-law and her stuff.

The faces of Mas