Page:Traditional Tales of the English and Scottish Peasantry - 1887.djvu/61

Rh at my bridle-rein, and before and behind me upwards of a score of armed cavaliers, I had proceeded along the mountain-side about a mile, when a horn was winded at a small distance in our front. We quickened our pace; but the way was rough and difficult, and we were obliged to go a sinuous course, like the meanderings of a brook, round rock and cairn and heathy hill, while the horn, continuing to sound, still seemed as far ahead as when we first heard it. It was about twelve o'clock; and the moon, large and bright and round, gleamed down from the summit of a green pasture mountain, and lighted us on our way through a narrow wooded valley, where a small stream glimmered and sparkled in the light, and ran so crooked a course as compelled us to cross it every hundred yards. Walter Selby now addressed me in his own singular way: 'Fair Eleanor, mine own grave and staid cousin, knowest thou whither thou goest? Comest thou to counsel how fifty men may do the deeds of thousands, and how the crown of this land may be shifted like a prentice's cap?' 'Truly,' said I, 'most sage and considerate cousin, I go with thee like an afflicted damsel of yore, in the belief that thy wisdom and valour may reinstate me in my ancient domains, or else win for me some new and princely inheritance.' 'Thou speakest,' said the youth, 'like one humble in hope, and puttest thy trust in one who would willingly work miracles to oblige thee. But ponder, fair damsel: my sword, though the best blade in Cumberland, cannot cut up into relics five or six regiments of dragoons, nor is this body, though devoted to thee, made of that knight-errant stuff that can resist sword and bullet. So I counsel thee, most discreet coz, to content thyself with hearing the sound of battle afar off, for we go on a journey of no small peril.' To these sensible and considerate words I answered nothing, but rode on, looking, all the while, Walter Selby in the face, and endeavouring to say something witty or wise. He resumed his converse: 'Nay, nay, mine own sweet and gentle cousin—my sweet Eleanor—I am too proud of that troubled glance of thine to say one word more about separation'; and our horses' heads and our cheeks came closer as he spoke. 'That ballad of the pedlar—for pedlar shall the knight be still to oblige thee—his ballad told more truth than I reckoned a minstrel might infuse into verse. All the Border cavaliers of England and Scotland are near us or with us; and now for the game of coronets and