fore Anthony--"these he brought to England. God
bless and reward him for it!" she added fervently.... "I do not see
Burghley. Eh! but he is old and gouty these days; and loves a cushion and
a chair and a bit of flannel better than to kneel before her Grace. You
know, she allows him to sit when he confers with her. But then, she is
ever prone to show mercy to bearded persons.... Ah! there is dear Sidney;
that is a sweet soul. But what does he do here among the stones and
mortar when he has the beeches of Penshurst to walk beneath. He is not so
wise as I thought him.... But I must say I grow weary of his nymphs and
his airs of Olympus. And for myself, I do not see that Flora and
Phoebus and Maia and the rest are a great gain, instead of Our Lady and
Saint Christopher and the court of heaven. But then I am a Papist and not
a heathen, and therefore blind and superstitious. Is that not so, Master
Anthony?... And there is Maitland beside him, with the black velvet cap
and the white feather, and his cross eyes and mouth. Now I wish he were
at Penshurst, or Bath--or better still, at Jericho, for it is further
off. I cannot bear that fellow.... Why, Sussex is going on the water,
too, I see. Now what brings him here? I should have thought his affairs
gave him enough to think of.... There he is, with his groom behind him,
on the other chestnut. I am astonished at him. He is all for this French
marriage, you know. So you may figure to yourself Mendoza's love for him!
They will be like two cats together on the barge; spitting and snarling
softly at one another. Her Grace loves to balance folk like that; first
one stretches his claws, and then the other; then one arches his back and
snarls, and the other scratches his face for him; and then when all is
flying fur and blasphemy, off slips her Grace and does what she will."

It was an astonishing experience for Anthony. He had stepped out from his
workaday life among the grooms and officers and occasional glimpses of
his lonely old master, into an enchanted region, where great personages
whose very names were luminous with fame, now lived and breathed and
looked cheerful or sullen before his very eyes; and one who knew them in
their daily life stood by him and commented and interpreted them for him.
He listened and stared, dazed with the strangeness of it all.

Mistress Corbet was proceeding to express her views upon the foreign
element that formed half the pageant, when the shrill musi