Nick colored up, quite taken aback. “I do na know, sir,” said he; “mother learned me part, and the rest just came, I think, sir.” The master-player, his whole face alive and eager, now stared at Nicholas Attwood as fixedly as Nick had stared at him. It was a hearty little English lad he saw, about eleven years of age, tall, slender, trimly built, and fair. A gray cloth cap clung to the side of his curly yellow head, and he wore a sleeveless jerkin of dark-blue serge, gray home-spun hose, and heelless shoes of russet leather. The white sleeves of his linen shirt were open to the elbow, and his arms were lithe and brown. His eyes were frankly clear and blue, and his red mouth had a trick of smiling that went straight to a body’s heart. “Why, lad, lad,” cried Carew, breathlessly, “thou hast a very fortune in thy throat!” Nick looked up in great surprise; and at that the master-player broke off suddenly and said no more, though such a strange light came creeping into his eyes that Nick, after meeting his fixed stare for a moment, asked uneasily if they would not better be going on. Without a word the master-player started. Something had come into his head which seemed to more than fill his mind; for as he strode along he whistled under his breath and laughed softly to himself. Then again he snapped his fingers and took a dancing step or two across the road, and at last fell to talking aloud to himself, though Nick could not make out a single word he said, for it was in some foreign language. “Nicholas,” he said suddenly, as they passed the winding lane that leads away to Kenilworth—“Nicholas, dost know any other songs like that?” “Not just like that, sir,” answered Nick, not knowing what to make of his companion’s strange new mood; “but I know Master Will Shakspere’s ‘Then nightly sings the staring owl, tu-who, tu-whit, tu-who!’ and ‘The ousel-cock so black of hue, with orange-tawny bill,’ and then, too, I know the throstle’s song that goes with it.” “Why, to be sure—to be sure thou knowest old Nick Bottom’s song, for isn’t thy name Nick? Well met, both song and singer—well met, I say! Nay,” he said hastily, seeing Nick about to speak; “I do not care to hear thee talk. Sing me all thy songs. I am hungry as a wolf for songs. Why, Nicholas, I must have songs! Come, lift up that honeyed throat of thine and sing another song. Be not so backward; surely I love thee, Nick, and thou wilt sing all of thy songs for me.” He laid his hand on Nick’s shoulder in his kindly way, and kept step with him like a bosom friend, so that Nick’s heart beat high with pride, and he sang all the songs he knew as they walked along.