story-telling--nature could not resist an anachronism of a few years for
such a story. The only other wilful alteration of a matter of time is
with regard to the Duke of Burgundy's interview with Henry. At the time
of Henry's last stay at Paris the Duke was attending the death-bed of his
wife, Michelle of France, but he had been several times in the King's
camp at the siege of Meaux.

Another alteration of fact is that Ralf Percy, instead of being second
son of Hotspur, should have been Henry Percy, son of Hotspur's brother
Ralf; but the name would have been so confusing that it was thought
better to set Dugdale at defiance and consider the reader's convenience.
Alice Montagu, though her name sounds as if it came out of the most
commonplace novelist's repertory, was a veritable personage--the heiress
of the brave line of Montacute, or Montagu; daughter to the Earl of
Salisbury who was killed at the siege of Orleans; wife to the Earl of the
same title (in her right) who won the battle of Blore Heath and was
beheaded at Wakefield; and mother to Earl Warwick the King-maker, the
Marquis of Montagu, and George Nevil, Archbishop of York. As nothing is
known of her but her name, I have ventured to make use of the blank.

For Jaqueline of Hainault, and her pranks, they are to be found in
Monstrelet of old, and now in Barante; though justice to her and Queen
Isabeau compels me to state that the incident of the ring is wholly
fictitious. Of the trial of Walter Stewart no record is preserved save
that he was accused of '_roborica_.' James Kennedy was the first great
benefactor to learning in Scotland, and founder of her earliest
University, having been himself educated at Paris.

The Abbey of Coldingham is described from a local compilation of the
early part of the century, with an account of the history of that grand