"As for thee, Anne," continued the earl, "it is a pity that monks cannot marry,--thou wouldst have suited some sober priest better than a mailed knight.

'Fore George, I would not ask thee to buckle my baldrick when the war-steeds were snorting, but I would trust Isabel with the links of my hauberk." "Nay, Father," said the low, timid voice of Anne, "if thou wert going to danger, I could be brave in all that could guard thee!" "Why, that's my girl! kiss me! Thou hast a look of thy mother now,--so thou hast! and I will not chide thee the next time I hear thee muttering soft treason in pity of Henry of Windsor." "Is he not to be pitied ?--Crown, wife, son, and Earl Warwick's stout arm lost--lost!" "No!" said Isabel, suddenly; "no, sweet sister Anne, and fie on thee for the words! He lost all, because he had neither the hand of a knight nor the heart of a man! For the rest--Margaret of Anjou, or her butchers, beheaded our father's father." "And may God and Saint George forget me, when I forget those gray and gory hairs!" exclaimed the earl; and putting away the Lady Anne somewhat roughly, he made a stride across the room, and stood by his hearth.

"And yet Edward, the son of Richard of York, who fell by my father's side--he forgets, he forgives! And the minions of Rivers the Lancastrian tread the heels of Richard of Warwick." At this unexpected turn in the conversation, peculiarly unwelcome, as it may be supposed, to the son of one who had fought on the Lancastrian side in the very battle referred to, Marmaduke felt somewhat uneasy; and turning to the Lady Anne, he said, with the gravity of wounded pride, "I owe more to my lord, your father, than I even wist of,--how much he must have overlooked to--" "Not so!" interrupted Warwick, who overheard him,--"not so; thou wrongest me! Thy father was shocked at those butcheries; thy father recoiled from that accursed standard; thy father was of a stock ancient and noble as my own! But, these Woodvilles!--tush! my passion overmasters me.

We will go to the king,--it is time." Warwick here rang the hand-bell on his table, and on the entrance of his attendant gentleman, bade him see that the barge was in readiness; then beckoning to his kinsman, and with a nod to his daughters, he caught up his plumed cap, and passed at once into the garden.
"Anne," said Isabel, when the two girls were alone, "thou hast vexed my father, and what marvel?
If the Lancastrians can be pitied, the Earl of Warwick must be condemned!" "Unkind!" said Anne, shedding tears; "I can pity woe and mischance, without blaming those whose hard duty it might be to achieve them." "In good sooth cannot I! Thou wouldst pity and pardon till thou leftst no distinction between foeman and friend, leife and loathing.

Be it mine, like my great father, to love and to hate!" "Yet why art thou so attached to the White Rose ?" said Anne, stung, if not to malice, at least to archness.