advice in a hurry.

His uncle Everard enjoyed a perusal of the manuscript in his absence.




CHAPTER II

UNCLE, NEPHEW, AND ANOTHER

The Honourable Everard Romfrey came of a race of fighting earls, toughest
of men, whose high, stout, Western castle had weathered our cyclone
periods of history without changeing hands more than once, and then but
for a short year or two, as if to teach the original possessors the
wisdom of inclining to the stronger side. They had a queen's chamber in
it, and a king's; and they stood well up against the charge of having
dealt darkly with the king. He died among them--how has not been told.
We will not discuss the conjectures here. A savour of North Sea foam and
ballad pirates hangs about the early chronicles of the family.
Indications of an ancestry that had lived between the wave and the cloud
were discernible in their notions of right and wrong. But a settlement
on solid earth has its influences. They were chivalrous knights
bannerets, and leaders in the tented field, paying and taking fair ransom
for captures; and they were good landlords, good masters blithely
followed to the wars. Sing an old battle of Normandy, Picardy, Gascony,
and you celebrate deeds of theirs. At home they were vexatious
neighbours to a town of burghers claiming privileges: nor was it
unreasonable that the Earl should flout the pretensions of the town to
read things for themselves, documents, titleships, rights, and the rest.