never deliver him up or permit the eye of father or mother to be blessed with the sight of him until Sir Alain should have abandoned the traitor Stephen and have joined the rightful queen of England; and that if he long failed so to do, the boy would be sent beyond sea and immured in an Angevin castle, where all traces of him would be for ever lost, and where, doubtlessly, he would soon perish. "But if," said the letter, "Sir Alain de Bohun will follow the loyal and wise example of his once friend Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe and come join the queen, her grace will receive him with honour, and Sir Ingelric will forget that which is passed, and the boy shall be restored, and the little maiden likewise, and they shall be contracted in marriage, and the queen will give a rich dower to Alice out of her own royal domains, and Sir Ingelric and Sir Alain may live neighbourly and happily together as aforetime." Sir Alain, who could write as well as read, replied in few words that his conscience forbade his breaking oaths to King Stephen; that he could not change sides either through fear or through interest; that he could not subject his lance to the distaff, or believe that the warlike baronage of England would ever live quietly under the rule of a woman; that he must trust to God and his saints for the protection of his only child, as also for the well-being of his not less than daughter; and that if it were the will of Heaven that the children, who had been brought up so lovingly together, should be conjoined at some future day in holy matrimony (of which in happier days there had been some talk between him and the little maiden's father), it would not be in the power of empress or queen to prevent it. "If," said Sir Alain de Bohun in terminating his epistle, "if, oh Matilda! thou shouldest so far forget the tender feelings of a woman and mother as to do harm to mine only son, and thereby bring my wife with sorrow to the grave, God will so strengthen mine arm in battle as to enable me to take a fearful vengeance upon thy party and upon some that are nearest to thee. But thou wilt not do that which thou sayest. So let me have no more secret, tampering missives. When Thamesis flows backward from Caversham to Oxenford instead of pursuing its course to the everlasting sea, then, but not until then, will Sir Alain de Bohun prove false to his oath and traitor to King Stephen."