One almost rejoices to read such an answer to the fulsome language which
drew it out. This correspondence runs through several such epistles. The
Council complain of the rudeness and coarse behavior of Captain Allen,
and particularly of his traducing Lord Baltimore's government and
attempting to excite the people against it. Lord Effingham professes to
disbelieve such charges against "an officer who has so long served his
King with fidelity, and who could not but know what was due to his
superiors."

Occasionally this same faithful officer, Captain Allen himself,
reappears upon the stage. We catch him at a gentleman's house in
Virginia, boasting over his cups--for he seems to have paid habitual
tribute to a bowl of punch--that he will break up the government of
Maryland, and annex this poor little Province of ours to Virginia: a
fact worth notice just now, as it makes it clear that annexation is not
the new idea of the Nineteenth Century, but lived in very muddy brains
a long time ago. I now quit this correspondence to look after a bit of
romance in a secret adventure.


CHAPTER VIII.

A PLOT.


We must return to the Manor of New Connaught upon the Elk River.

There we shall find a sorrowful household. The Lord of the Manor is in
captivity; his people are dejected with a presentiment that they are to
see him no more; his wife is lamenting with her children, and counting