One night was spent at Durham, the parent of Coldingham, and here Malcolm felt at home, far more grand as was that mighty cathedral institution. There it stood, with the Weir encircling it, on its own fair though mighty hill, with all the glory of its Norman mister and lovely Lady-chapel; yet it seemed to the boy more like a glorified Coldingham than like a strange region. 'The peace of God rests on the place,' he said, when Sir James asked his thoughts as he looked back at the grand mass of buildings. 'These are the only spots where the holy and tender can grow, like the Palestine lilies sheltered from the blast in the Abbot's garden at Coldingham.' 'Nay, lad, it were an ill world did lilies only grow in abbots' gardens.' 'It is an ill world,' said Malcolm. 'Let us hear what you say in a month's time,' replied the knight, lightly: then dreaming over the words. A few days more, and they were riding among the lovely rock and woodland scenery of Yorkshire, when suddenly there leaped from behind a bush three or four young men, with a loud shout of 'Stand.' 'Reivers!' thought Malcolm, sick with dismay, as the foremost grasped Sir James's bridle; but the latter merely laughed, saying, 'How now, Hal! be these your old tricks?' 'Ay, when such prizes are errant,' said the assailant and Sir James, springing from his horse, embraced him and his companion with a cordiality that made Malcolm not a little uneasy. Could he have been kidnapped by a false Englishman into a den of robbers for the sake of his ransom? 'You are strict to your time,' said the chief robber. 'I knew you would be. So, when Ned Marmion came to Beverley, and would have us to see his hunting at Tanfield, we came on thinking to meet you. Marmion here has a nooning spread in the forest; ere we go on to Thirsk, where I have a matter to settle between two wrong-headed churls. How has it been with you, Jamie? you have added to your meine.' 'Ah, Hal! never in all your cut-purse days did you fall on such an emprise as I have achieved.' 'Let us hear,' said Hal, linking his arm in Sir James's, who turned for a moment to say, 'Take care of the lad, John; he is a young kinsman of mine.'