"Ay, there’s the banner of my Lord Woodville--he’ll not be far behind," said the Abbot, as another little band mounted the hill, the centre figure carrying a little square flag on the end of a lance, which gaily waved its red and white colours as the horseman moved to the swing of his steed. It was a very pretty sight. The wide-extending view, over broad pasture and swelling down, the distance hidden by a grey haze; the yellow road, leading straight across the green grass of the down, for the summer was hardly begun, while the gleaming weapons, white surcoats, and fluttering banners, mingled with the brilliant red of the crosses, and the blazon on the flag, contrasted well with the deep blue of the cloudless sky, fading away to the warm haze of the horizon. Gaily the grasshoppers chirped among the wild convolvulus on the roadside, the bees hummed over the clover, and the larks were soaring joyously in the azure overhead. Ralph gave a sigh of enjoyment--life was already beginning. The little party sat motionless on their steeds, the Abbot having reined up his horse at the junction of the two roads. Ralph sat on his horse beside him, and Humphrey, the other lay brother, and the sumpter horses, were grouped behind them--while behind them again was the poor man, leaning against the pony on which his daughter sat, who had, however, frequently insisted on her father taking her place. Suddenly the Abbot remembered them. "Beshrew me," he said, "I wish thy lady mother had not saddled me with these beggars; it beseemeth not a prelate like me to have such rapscallions attending on him." The girl noticed the impatience of the Abbot, and partly heard his muttered words. "Come, father, let us get hence before the others come; we but disgrace the noble Abbot and his fair nephew." "Nay, nay, stay now," said the Abbot testily, relenting a little when he heard the soft voice of the girl. "’T would look worse an thou wert now to slip off as though I were ashamed of thee. Even stay and brave it out. After all, ’twill look seemly that I be busied in the protection of the poor and houseless. Ay, marry! ’twill please my Lord Woodville who ever jibeth at the pride of Mother Church, as he calleth it, when I appear in the state befitting the Abbot of the first house of our order in England, and patron of the Chapel of St Nicholas in his own castle of Carisbrooke. Prythee stay: ’twill be well!" The advanced guard had now reached the place where the others were awaiting them. The Abbot recognised the sergeant-at-arms who led the little band. "Why, how now, Tom o’ Kingston, who’d have thought to have met thee here to-day?"