From time to time, during the march of the two preceding days, some of the rumours which, true and false alike, always run through a country in a state of agitation, had reached Lord Walton's party, speaking of troops marching hither and thither in the neighbourhood. Now it was a detachment from Lord Essex's army; now it was a body of men crossing the country, to reinforce Waller; now it was a body of militia called out by parliamentary commissioners from the district or the county through which they were passing. But Lord Walton paid little attention to these reports, having taken every necessary precaution, by throwing out several small parties in front, at the distance of about two or three miles, to guard against surprise, and secure his onward course towards Coventry. When any rumour reached him, indeed, which bore more strongly the semblance of truth than the rest, and was corroborated by his own knowledge of the position and designs of the various persons to whom it referred, he would ride forward to the head of the line, and converse for a few minutes with a thin, bony, grave-looking personage in black, who bore few signs of being a military man, except his large boots of untanned leather, his heavy steel-mounted sword, and the pistols at his saddle-bow. Thus, when they had got about half way across the plain, and a horseman galloped up from the right, leaping one or two narrow ditches by which it was intersected, and then, not able to cross the wider trench which separated the road from the turf, riding along by the side of the troop, and making signs to Charles Walton that he had something to communicate, the young nobleman accordingly reined in his horse, and suffering his party to pass on, lingered behind till they were out of ear-shot. "Well, Master Hurst," he then asked, "what is your news? I was sorry you would not join us; but I am glad to see you here." "I told Langan I would follow you, my lord," replied the new-comer; "but I had to put my house in order, and sell some hay, for it does not do to go soldiering in these times without money in one's pocket, and I had but short notice. However, my lord, you had better be on your guard; for, as I came over the moor, I found a boy keeping sheep out there between the wood and the water, and, wishing to know whereabouts you were, for I could not see you at that time----" "You did not mention my name, I hope," said Lord Walton. "Oh, no, my lord," answered the horseman; "I took care not to do that: I only asked if he had seen a body of soldiers, without saying horse or foot. So the boy said, 'Oh, yes; that there were five hundred and fifty lying behind the wood,' for he had counted them, seemingly--like a flock of sheep. Then I asked him how many horse there were; to which he replied by saying, 'Two,' and that all the rest had guns and bandoliers and steel caps, except a few, who had long pikes in their hands."