THE RESCUE.

_By Miss Roberts._

"King Stephen was a worthy peer."


The hall was lofty, sculptured round with armorial devices, and hung with
gaily-embroidered banners, which waved in the wind streaming from the
crannies in windows which had suffered some dilapidation from the hand of
time. Minstrel harps rang throughout the wide apartment, and at a board
well covered with smoking viands--haunches of the red deer, bustards,
cranes, quarters of mutton, pasties, the grinning heads of wild boars,--and
flanked with flagons of wine, and tankards of foaming ale, sat King
Stephen, surrounded by the flower of the Norman nobles, whose voices had
placed him on the English throne. In the midst of the feast, the jovial
glee of the wassailers was interrupted by the entrance of a page, who,
forcing his way through the yeomen and lacqueys crowding at the door, flew
with breathless haste to the feet of the king, and falling down on his
knees, in faltering accents delivered the message with which he had been
intrusted. "Up, gallants," exclaimed the martial monarch, "don your
harness, and ride as lightly as you may to the relief of the Countess of
Clare, she lies in peril of her life and honour, beleaguered by a rabble of
unnurtured Welsh savages, who, lacking respect for beauty, have directed
their arms against a woman. Swollen with vain pride at their late victory,
(the fiend hang the coward loons who fled before them,) they have sworn to
make this noble lady serve them barefoot in their camp. By St. Dennis and
my good sword, were I not hampered by this pestilent invasion of the Scots,
I would desire no better pastime than to drive the ill-conditioned serfs