The Flemings were not disposed to turn their backs; their tactics were of a very simple kind. If the attack was made in front, four from each side drew up in a moment, to support their leaders. If in the rear, three on each side drew up for the defence; and if on either side, there were seven on each side perfectly prepared. This little oblong square was formed with dexterity and resolution, and evidently discomposed the gipsies at the very first step; for when the leaders moved on, the King of the Gipsies receded instinctively. In another moment, however, his word of command was given, and his men came on, with bludgeons, stones, and iron hooks, to the attack. One or two gipsies only appeared to have fire-arms, and of these they made so much parade that it was strongly suspected that they were unloaded, or that they dare not fire them off. A volley or stones, however, soon came rattling among the Flemings, who from that moment moved on with a front rank of ten horsemen and a flank of eight, undismayed by the numbers of their antagonists. The very first volley of their leaden missiles had all the effect of a discharge of musketry. The balls were thrown with such precision that men fell as if they were shot; and the immediate recoiling of them, so as to send another shower, as quickly as a man could pick up a stone, was what these fellows did not wait for. They fled immediately, the King of Brentwood Forest among them, whilst the brave Flemings, passing over the bodies of their stunned foes, moved on without further molestation to Chelmsford. The only man injured in their party was their guide, who, being knocked from his horse by a blow on the forehead from a stone thrown by the gipsies, was carried into the town of Chelmsford, and there left with the Abbot of the monastery. Wolsey now became the conductor of the party, and, greatly pleased with their conduct, he felt a pride and pleasure in introducing such men into his native town. Messrs. Hall and Baldry were the parties to whom they were engaged, and our young scholar did not fail to speak of them by letter to his uncle, Edmund Daundy, in terms of such commendation as they deserved. They arrived without any other molestation, and Dame Joan received her son, for the last time, into her house, and found him grown a greater man than she had ever known him, but at that time far from happy or cheerful. She never knew him to smile upon her after that day. 'Mother,' said Wolsey on his arrival, 'I am come to perform a promise extracted from me, in your own presence, on the memorable evening of my gallantry, when the ox shin-bone did execution upon the head of the mastiff.' 'What was that, my son?' 'To be present at the marriage of Ellen De Freston--ay, and more, not only to see her given in marriage, but to unite her with my friend Latimer.' 'Oh, why, my son, why perform the ceremony? I know you have loved Ellen, but--'