Have the red roses of Lancaster ever failed from the thorns of our gardens? Has the royal blood ceased to throb in English hearts? The ancient roots are still alive to-day, through decades of centuries the time-honoured chivalry of this dear realm flowers perennial from the ancient soil. The English archers, the English mariners, the English engineers--time changes the instruments, not the English hand. And that the heir apparent of the Imperial Throne rode three hundred miles in forty hours, is testimony that England is England still beyond the accident of the centuries. Lancaster had been badly hurt in the fight with the _Gigantic_, and now, after eleven days of neglect, the wrench and bad contusions on his near shoulder made him delirious with pain. Ranges of hills to cross, and floods to ford, by dip and curve, by tortuous-winding vales, field, woodland, park, and moor, the road went swinging on. There were cathedral cities by the way, great country seats, commons of golden gorse, old road-side inns, orchard-screened villages. The young Prince saw nothing but the course, felt nothing but his pain, knew nought but his errand, his mission to the Queen. Wet to the skin he felt no cold or any discomfort from the lashing rain, but in his fever and delirium, dreamed, talked to himself, crooned songs, or followed imaginary hounds. He could not remember afterwards how he found the way, where he had baited Oregon, where fed or rested. It was sunset when he cantered down through Reading, the dun horse reeling--and forty miles to go. Red shone the glare through a gap in the wind-torn clouds, red was the glow on mire-stained horse and man, red on the sky to eastward where London lay. Two hours later he had traversed the outer suburbs and entered Windsor. Still was the red glow lingering in the east. He was passed through the castle gate and in the outer ward he rested Oregon. The Governor held his stirrup when he left, the Governor's wife gave him a stirrup cup, the poor knights of Windsor--seventeen old men, sending their message of love to Margaret. So Lancaster crossed the Thames and entered London. The dun horse kept his splendid rolling lope, but drooped his head and jarred his rider now--with yet another twenty miles to go. The elms of Eton were swaying overhead, there were the playing fields, yonder the school--and Lancaster's heart was singing. As Oregon splashed by, he waved his helmet--a red gleam caught the silver. He turned into a long, dark avenue, villas on either hand, screened by young plane trees--lightless, desolate. Then followed mile after mile of town more lonely than the fields; street after street, dead, silent, horrible, and always the red glow quickened in the east. Was it the dawn already, the dawn breaking on an abandoned world?