The company assembled might have been about thirty in number, of which half-a-dozen, perhaps, were in the ecclesiastical dress of the time; while the others wore the habiliments then appropriated to cavaliers or gentlemen, with very little difference from those as worn in the times of the Charleses in England, except that the cloak had been discarded, and the more substantial roquelaure substituted in its place. Most of the party were men who had not yet arrived to middle age, if we except the clericals, who were much more advanced in life; and any one, who had ever fallen in with the smuggling lugger and its crew, would have had no difficulty in recognising many of them, in the well-attired and evidently high-born and well-educated young men who were seated or standing in the room. Among them Sir Robert Barclay was eminently conspicuous; he was standing by the fire conversing with two of the ecclesiastics. "Gentlemen," said he at last, "our worthy Father Lovell has just arrived from St. Germain; and, as the most rapid communication is now necessary, he is empowered to open here and before us every despatch which we bring over, before it is transmitted to head-quarters, with permission to act as may seem best to the friends of his majesty here assembled." The fact was, that King James had lately completely given himself up to religious exercises and mortification, and any communication to him was attended with so much delay, that it had been considered advisable to act without consulting him; and to avoid the delay consequent on the transmission of communications to Paris, the most active parties had determined that they would, for the present, take up their residence at Cherbourg, and merely transmit to their friends at St. Germain an account of their proceedings, gaining, at least, a week by this arrangement. Thee party assembled had many names of some note. Among the ecclesiastics were Lovell, Collier, Snatt, and Cooke; among the cavaliers were those of Musgrave, Friend, and Perkins, whose relatives had suffered in the cause; Smith, Clancey, Herbert, Cunningham, Leslie, and many others. When Sir Robert Barclay approached the table, the others took their seats in silence.