“Well, well, twenty if you like! but one more favored than the rest? the properest sort of man at saddle, gun, line, wrestle, toast, song, or dance? honest, straightforward, beautiful, as dad says the angels are he saw painted on the walls at Rome. Speak I truth, eh, Chockey?” “Madam, that you do.” “And this paragon so worshiped his Peggy as, when she went off a-three months since to visit her godmother in Kent, he vowed by all the saints in the calendar he’d scarce survive until her return. False or true, eh, Chockey?” My Lady Peggy punctuated this query by an accurate aim and hit, on the top of her waiting woman’s head, with an especially large plum. “True, Madam,” dodging the fruit, and still with an eye on the road. “And then, back comes My Lady Peggy, cutting short her stay in Kent, where she had much pleasure, to tell the truth, in the society of a very fine young nobleman.” “Lawk, Madam! another?” interrupted the faithful Chockey. “Another, Chock,” vouchsafes her mistress. “Sweet, sweet Sir Robin McTart!” “Oh, My Lady!” cries the girl, vainly endeavoring to conceal a smile. “Aye, Chock,” proceeds Peggy, “I say again, a sweet and most entrapping young man.” “Madam, a squint eye, a wry nose, an underlip that hangs, a pair of fox-teeth, and a chin that’s gone a-huntin’ for his throat!” “Tut, tut! Chock,” laughs Lady Peggy, leaning back in her leafy bower, “what’s all that to a nimble wit, a galloping conversation, and a faithful heart?” Lady Peggy’s tone is as light as the May breeze blowing her soft locks about her lovely blooming face, full of mockery, witchery,—and then a bit of a sigh, low as flowers’ whispers, and up with her drooped head higher than before, as in the half mannish tone her twinship and long play-fellowship with her brother have given her, she adds curtly— “D’ye see aught coming yet, Chock?” “No, My Lady, not yet,” answers the girl ruefully. Peggy bites her lips until they hurt. “As I was a-sayin’, Chock, your mistress cuts short her visit, sends word to her lover she’ll be home o’-Thursday, and, as I live! to-day’s the Monday after, and him still on the way! See him!” Peggy’s white teeth close tight, and her eyes flash, and her little hands clench. “Not I! Let him come now an’ he goes again faster than he ever traveled. The vain coxcomb! the deceitful, cozening, graceless poppet! He’ll ne’er set eyes on her he used to call his Peg again, or I die for’t.” And Peggy jumped to the ground. “Madam! Madam!” exclaims Chockey, pointing joyfully to a cloud of dust far up the highway. “Look! Yonder comes Sir Percy! Don’t I know? Ain’t I watched his long roan any day this twelve month a-turnin’ by the lodge?” Lady Peggy seizes Chockey’s arm, and runs breathless to the house; in, a-scrambling up the broad stairs to her chamber; a-pulling out of drawers from their chests; a-hunting of ribbons and fallals, combs, brushes, kerchiefs, perfumes, patches, powder, whatever else besides!