, and gave him my bracelet, which
you see he wears in his helm."

"I recall somewhat of the story," the king said, "and will question
my Lady Vernon further anon; but see, the combatants are filing off to
their places."

With flags flying and trumpets blowing young Pembroke led his forces
into the castle. Each of his ten knights was followed by an esquire
bearing his banner, and each had ten men-at-arms under his immediate
order. Two of them, with twenty men, remained in the outwork beyond the
drawbridge. The rest took their station on the walls, and towers,
where a platform had been erected, running along three feet below the
battlements. The real men-at-arms with the machines of war now advanced,
and for a time worked the machines, which made pretence at casting great
stones and missiles at the walls. The assailants then moved forward and,
unslinging their bows, opened a heavy fire of arrows at the defenders,
who, in turn, replied with arrows and cross-bows.

"The 'prentices shoot well," the king said; "by our lady, it would be
hot work for the defenders were the shafts but pointed! Even as it
is the knocks must be no child's play, for the arrows, although not
pointed, are all tipped with iron, without which, indeed, straight
shooting would be impossible."

The return fire from the walls was feeble, and the king said, laughing,
"So far your knight, fair mistress, has it all his own way. I did not
reckon sufficiently upon the superiority of shooting of the London lads,
and, indeed, I know not that I ought not in fairness to order some of
the defenders off the walls, seeing, that in warfare, their numbers
would be rapidly thinned. See, the assailants are moving up to the two
towers under shelter of the fire of the archers."

By this time Aylmer, seeing that his followers could make no effectual
reply to the arrow fire, had ordered all, save the leaders in full
armour, to lie down behind the parapet. The assailants now gathered
thickly round each tower, as if they intended to attempt to cross by the
bridges, which could be let down from an opening in the tower level with
the top of the wall, while archers upon the summit shot fast and thick
among the defenders who were gathering to oppose them.

"If the young Pembroke is wise," the king said, "he will make a strong
sally now and fall upon one or other of the parties."

As he spoke there was a sudden movement on the part of the assailants,
who, leaving the foot of