el gave Dick the letter and bade him speed
to the Moat House. And again, some half an hour after Dick's departure,
a messenger came, in hot haste, from my Lord of Risingham.

"Sir Daniel," the messenger said, "ye lose great honour, by my sooth!
The fight began again this morning ere the dawn, and we have beaten
their van and scattered their right wing. Only the main battle standeth
fast. An we had your fresh men, we should tilt you them all into the
river. What, sir knight! Will ye be the last? It stands not with your
good credit."

"Nay," cried the knight, "I was but now upon the march.--Selden, sound
me the tucket.--Sir, I am with you on the instant. It is not two hours
since the more part of my command came in, sir messenger. What would ye
have? Spurring is good meat, but yet it killed the charger.--Bustle,
boys!"

By this time the tucket was sounding cheerily in the morning, and from
all sides Sir Daniel's men poured into the main street and formed before
the inn. They had slept upon their arms, with chargers saddled, and in
ten minutes five score men-at-arms and archers, cleanly equipped and
briskly disciplined, stood ranked and ready. The chief part were in Sir
Daniel's livery, murrey and blue, which gave the greater show to their
array. The best armed rode first; and away out of sight, at the tail of
the column, came the sorry reinforcement of the night before. Sir Daniel
looked with pride along the line.

"Here be the lads to serve you in a pinch," he said.

"They are pretty men, indeed," replied the messenger. "It but augments
my sorrow that ye had not marched the earlier."

"Well," said the knight, "what would ye? The beginning of a feast and
the end of a fray, sir messenger"; and he mounted into his saddle. "Why!
how now!" he cried. "John! Joanna! Nay, by the sacred rood! where is
she?--Host, where is that girl?"

"Girl, Sir Daniel?" cried the landlord. "Nay, sir, I saw no girl."

"Boy, then, dotard!" cried the knight. "Could ye not see it was a wench?
She in the murrey-coloured mantle--she that broke her fast with water,
rogue--where is she?"

"Nay, the saints bless us! Master John, ye called him," said the host.
"Well, I thought none evil. He is gone. I saw him--her--I saw her in the
stable a good hour agone; 'a was saddling a grey horse."

"Now, by the rood!" cried Sir Daniel, "the wench was worth five hundred
pound to me and more."

"Sir knight," observed the messenger, with bitterness, "whil