'You are to fancy that the music of a sudden wavers away. Chris Hatton, Captain of her bodyguard, quits the table all red and ruffled, and Gloriana's virgin ear catches the clash of swords at work behind a wall. The mothers of Sussex look round to count their chicks--I mean those young game-cocks that waited on her. Two dainty youths have stepped aside into Brickwall garden with rapier and dagger on a private point of honour. They are haled out through the gate, disarmed and glaring--the lively image of a brace of young Cupids transformed into pale, panting Cains. Ahem! Gloriana beckons awfully--thus! They come up for judgment. Their lives and estates lie at her mercy whom they have doubly offended, both as Queen and woman. But la! what will not foolish young men do for a beautiful maid?' 'Why? What did she do? What had they done?' said Una. 'Hsh! You mar the play! Gloriana had guessed the cause of the trouble. They were handsome lads. So she frowns a while and tells 'em not to be bigger fools than their mothers had made 'em, and warns 'em, if they do not kiss and be friends on the instant, she'll have Chris Hatton horse and birch 'em in the style of the new school at Harrow. (Chris looks sour at that.) Lastly, because she needed time to think on Philip's letter burning in her pocket, she signifies her pleasure to dance with 'em and teach 'em better manners. Whereat the revived company call down Heaven's blessing on her gracious head; Chris and the others prepare Brickwall House for a dance, and she walks in the clipped garden between those two lovely young sinners who are both ready to sink for shame. They confess their fault. It appears that midway in the banquet the elder--they were cousins--conceived that the Queen looked upon him with special favour. The younger, taking the look to himself, after some words gives the elder the lie; hence, as she guessed, the duel.' 'And which had she really looked at?' Dan asked. [Illustration: 'Admiral Boy--Vice-Admiral Babe,' says Gloriana, 'I cry your pardon.'--P. 41.] 'Neither--except to wish them farther off. She was afraid all the while they'd spill dishes on her gown. She tells 'em this, poor chicks--and it completes their abasement. When they had grilled long enough, she says: "And so you would have fleshed your maiden swords for me--for me?" Faith, they would have been at it again if she'd egged 'em on! but their swords--oh, prettily they said it!--had been drawn for her once or twice already. '"And where?" says she. "On your hobby-horses before you were breeched?" '"On my own ship," says the elder. "My cousin was vice-admiral of our venture in his pinnace. We would not have you think of us as brawling children." '"No, no," says the younger, and flames like a very Tudor rose. "At least the Spaniards know us better."