blown wild about your ears like a daft woman's, and your kirtle
all over mortar and smut. My certie, you would be a bonnie lady
to be Queen of Love and Beauty at a jousting-match.'

'You are no better, Jeanie,' responded Eleanor.

'That I ken full well, but I'd be shamed to show myself to
knights and lairds that gate. And see Mary and all the lave
have their hands as black as a caird's.'

'Come and let Andie's Mary wash them,' said that little
personage, picking up fat Andrew in her arms, while he retained
his beloved crab's claw. 'Jeanie, would you carry Johnnie, he's
not sure-footed, over the stair? Annaple, take Lorn's hand over
the kittle turning.'

One chamber was allotted to the entire party and their single
nurse. Being far up in the tower, it ventured to have two
windows in the massive walls, so thick that five-and-twenty
steps from the floor were needed to reach the narrow slips of
glass in a frame that could be removed at will, either to admit
the air or to be exchanged for solid wooden shutters to exclude
storms by sea or arrows and bolts by land. The lower part of
the walls was hung with very grim old tapestry, on which
Holofernes' head, going into its bag, could just be detected;
there were two great solid box-beds, two more pallets rolled up
for the day, a chest or two, a rude table, a cross-legged chair,
a few stools, and some deer and seal skins spread on the floor
completed the furniture of this ladies' bower. There was,
unusual luxury, a chimney with a hearth and peat fire, and a