Israel frankly confessed it, and told his whole story. The knight
listened with much interest; and at its conclusion, warned Israel to
beware of the soldiers; for owing to the seats of some of the royal
family being in the neighborhood, the red-coats abounded hereabout.

"I do not wish unnecessarily to speak against my own countrymen," he
added, "I but plainly speak for your good. The soldiers you meet
prowling on the roads, are not fair specimens of the army. They are a
set of mean, dastardly banditti, who, to obtain their fee, would betray
their best friends. Once more, I warn you against them. But enough;
follow me now to the house, and as you tell me you have exchanged
clothes before now, you can do it again. What say you? I will give you
coat and breeches for your rags."

Thus generously supplied with clothes and other comforts by the good
knight, and implicitly relying upon the honor of so kind-hearted a man,
Israel cheered up, and in the course of two or three weeks had so
fattened his flanks, that he was able completely to fill Sir John's old
buckskin breeches, which at first had hung but loosely about him.

He was assigned to an occupation which removed him from the other
workmen. The strawberry bed was put under his sole charge. And often, of
mild, sunny afternoons, the knight, genial and gentle with dinner, would
stroll bare-headed to the pleasant strawberry bed, and have nice little
confidential chats with Israel; while Israel, charmed by the patriarchal
demeanor of this true Abrahamic gentleman, with a smile on his lip, and
tears of gratitude in his eyes, offered him, from time to time, the
plumpest berries of the bed.