“Help me with this chair, Ned,” quoth my little cousin, and I dragged the great chair for her between the two portraits, when she climbed up on it, and stood thus between them. “Tell me, Cousin Ned, am I like her?” she cries. Truly there was a marvellous likeness, they both wearing white satin and lace, though there was pearls in my Lady Brandon’s dark hair in the stead of the cherry-coloured ribbons; nor did I find in her countenance that intrepidity and firmness that was displayed in my little cousin’s, and which she hath, I take it, from that gallant cavalier my lord her father. “Well, Cousin Ned?” cries Dorothy, tired of standing. “_O matre pulchrâ filia pulchrior_,” quoth I, with a low bow. “Speak to me in good English,” cries she, pouting. “’Tis but to say (as you very well know) that my lady your mother was fair, but you are fairer, little Doll.” “Nay,” cries she, “I won’t be called that. Sure I an’t Miss Doll any more. Sir Harry saith I am to be called Mrs Dorothy always, for I am nearly eleven. Oh, Cousin Ned, is it true that you are going to the Indies?” “Ay, sweet Doll,” says I; “to furthest Ind, and to the kingdoms of Cathay, perhaps.” “You are ever teasing me,” she saith. “I would I had a fan here, that I might give you a tap therewith, Master Ned. But I will have one some day. When you come back from your voyages and adventures, I shall be a court lady, like my Lady Penelope Harrington, so”--and she held up her hand like a fan, and made great eyes over the edge on’t at me. “God forbid!” cried I, in a grievous heat. “And why, prithee?” she asked, somewhat angered. “My mother was a court lady, so why not I?” “That was in better days,” says I, much disquieted by her speech, yet little caring to tell her what I meant; “but now times are changed. I can’t tell you much, little Doll, but this I will say, that rather than know you such as my Lady Penelope is now become, I would see you in your grave.” “Then I won’t be like her,” says Dorothy, putting her hand in mine, “for when you have wrought all your great deeds you are coming back to marry me, Ned, an’t you?” “Ay,” said I, “so that I find you a gentle and comely maiden, caring for my father, and seeking no court gaieties. I would not, with my goodwill, wed a court lady.” “As you will,” says she. “And you will bring me back a parrot, Cousin Ned, and a pearl chain for to wear on Sundays, and an _escrotore_[6] of Indian work wherein to keep my jewels?” “Ay so,” quoth I; “and when I go to London, as this next month, I will send you a fan and a cherry-coloured girdle for to hold it withal, as fine as any in the county, if you will give me one of your knots whereby to choose it.”