“This I did hear last time there was a boat come in, that the Queen, that mother of mischief, had tried to lay hands on our Lord of Salisbury, and that he and your Duke of York had soundly beaten her and the men of Cheshire.” “Yea, at Blore Heath; and I thought to win my spurs on the Copeland banner, but even as I was making my way to it and the recreant that bore it, I was stricken across my steel cap and dazed.” “I’ll warrant it,” muttered his father. “When I could look up again all was changed, the banner nowhere in sight, but I kept my saddle, and cut down half a dozen rascaille after that.” “Ha!” half incredulously, for it was a mere boy who boasted. “That’s my brave lad! And what then? More hopes of the spurs, eh?” “Then what does the Queen do, but seeing that no one would willingly stir a lance against an old witless saint like King Harry, she gets a host together, dragging the poor man hither and thither with her, at Ludlow. Nay, we even heard the King was dead, and a mass was said for the repose of his soul, but with the morning what should we see on the other side of the river Teme but the royal standard, and who should be under it but King Harry himself with his meek face and fair locks, twirling his fingers after his wont. So the men would have it that they had been gulled, and they fell away one after another, till there was nothing for it but for the Duke and his sons, and my Lords of Salisbury and Warwick and a few score more of us, to ride off as best we might, with Sir Andrew Trollope and his men after us, as hard as might be, so that we had to break up, and keep few together. I went with the Duke of York and young Lord Edmund into Wales, and thence in a bit of a fishing-boat across to Ireland. Ask me to fight in full field with twice the numbers, but never ask me to put to sea again! There’s nothing like it for taking heart and soul out of a man!” “I have crossed the sea often enow in the good old days, and known nothing worse than a qualm or two.”