“Willingly, my boy. Thine aunt hath said so much of them in her letters, that I almost think I can see the six stalwart lads gathered round her, with the one fair girl they are all so fond and proud of. First, then, there is Thomas, good steady lad, as for old times’ sake they call him still, though he must be near his thirtieth year now. He is his father’s right hand and faithful helper. Next comes Harry, the soldier; he has volunteered, I told you, in aid of the persecuted Protestants in the Low Countries. Your uncle can send him thither better furnished forth than many a peer’s son. Will, the third in age, is ’prentice to Master Nevet, the jeweller.” “’Prentice!” cried Walter in high disdain. “O mother! Only think of one of our blood standing at the door of a shop, and crying ‘What do ye lack; what do ye lack, my masters?’ as Sir John Carr says the London ’prentices are wont to do.” Mrs. Grey looked steadily at her son with her clear, soft blue eyes, and said, flushing faintly, “Then what think you, Walter, of one of our blood sitting up whole nights to work English broidery on the robes of a Geneva citizen’s dame, carrying them to her with her own hands afterwards, and taking thankfully the silver she gave in payment?” “And did you do that, mother?” asked Walter, with softened look. “What dreadful times they must have been!” “Not dreadful _then_, for God sent them, and each day had but one day’s burden to bear. But sometimes now they seem dreadful to look back upon.—Of whom was I speaking? Of Will? George the sailor comes next in age. And I suspect Master James will never rest till he follows the same way of life,—for all his father’s talk of needing his help himself.” “Has James then told his father that he wants to go to sea?” asked Walter abruptly, and in a tone more blunt and eager than that in which he usually addressed his mother. “He has spoken of his wishes more than once, I believe; but he obeys his father, as in duty bound.—Take care, Walter; you will spoil my book. Pity lads are not taught to sew, since it is hard to keep idle hands out of mischief.—After James comes the fair maiden Lilias, the pet and pride of all her brave brothers; she will be about thy age, I reckon. Lastly, there is little Ned, the scholar of the family; he was thirteen at Christmas. Be kind to Ned, Walter, and let him look to you as to an elder brother; for I wot his father means to send him to Oxford, and you may be a good friend to him there, being the elder by three years. There,—that is finished, and makes the eighth of your new shirts.—Be very careful, Walter, whom you trust for the washing of them; for cambric and Holland are light to rend and ill to mend.” “Yes, mother,” said Walter, with a sigh.