"There is high dispute among the natural philosophers at Leyden whether it be true that some trees produce flowers but no fruit, and others fruit without flowers. My father bids me ask your answer to these questions following: Do oaks and beeches bear no flowers? Do the elm, poplar, and box bear neither flower nor fruit? He is reconciled to having you as a son-in-law, partly by the quickness and sureness with which you see and observe! Said he to me but yesterday, 'If Frank were here, I believe I could prove that fruit is preceded by blossom far more often than has been supposed.' Yes; he called you 'Frank.' How I wish you were here, instead of preparing for Sweden and all the chances and horrors of the battlefield! Is it utterly impossible for you to come here before you join the army of King Gustavus?" When I had read and re-read my letter, and while I was giving my aunt the news it contained, and the messages for herself, Dick Portington came in to bid me to a supper the next evening at the White Hart, where a number of old friends would meet, to wish me a good voyage, and drink to our next merry meeting. Although I had no great inclining to a banquet on the last evening before my departure, I could not bring my mind to offend my well-wishers by a refusal. Dame Hind outdid herself in the provision she made for the feast, which was spread in the "court-room," the same in which Commissioner Tunstall had trouble with the wasps. Squire Stovin presided, whose ancestor was chief of the bowmen in the army of the Conqueror at Senlac Field. He was accounted one of the wisest and boldest gentlemen of the Isle. With him was his son George, a little older than I, and a good comrade. There were present also Squire Mell of Belton, and his son, who had stood by me at Belshaw, and Dick Portington and his father, the Squire of Tudworth, and some other gentlemen (twelve or more) whose names have not appeared in my pages, besides a few men of humbler condition, among them being Daft Jack and my man Luke. Over supper the talk at our table ran on the affairs of the nation; the seizure of our ships by the Duke of Epernon, and the coming war with France; the mystery of the policy of the King, or rather of the Duke of Buckingham. Some one voiced the opinion that the favourite had deep designs, incomprehensible to the vulgar. Squire Stovin laughed in contempt. "Say 'contradictory to all the adages of common folk' and I am with you. 'You cannot have your cake and eat your cake,' runs the saw; Buckingham thinks he can. He believes the sky will rain potatoes, if he wishes it. He rules England just as much as the weathercock on my barn rules the wind." "We may hope for better days, think you not," asked Squire Mell, "since the judges have at last taken a stand, and declared the new loan illegal?"