“Poor lad! he is in woeful case!” answered the representative of the enraged British Lion. “What with soul and body, he must have borne well-nigh the pangs of martyrdom this night. ’Tis enough to make one’s heart bleed but to look on him. And to hear him moan to himself of his mother, poor heart! when he thinks him alone—at least thus I take his words: I would, rather than forty shillings, she were nigh to tend him.”
From which speech it will be seen that when Rachel did “turn coat,” she turned it inside out entirely.
“Good lack, Aunt Rachel! what is he but an evil companion?” demanded irreverent Blanche, with her usual want of respect for the opinions of her elders.
“If he were the worsest companion on earth, child, yet the lad may lack his wounds dressed,” said Rachel, indignantly.
“And a Papist!”
“So much the rather should we show him the betterness of our Protestant faith, by Christian-wise tending of him.”
“And an enemy!” pursued Blanche, proceeding with the list.
“Hold thy peace, maid! Be we not bidden in God’s Word to do good unto our enemies?”
“And a perturbator of the Queen’s peace, Aunt Rachel!”
“This young lad hath not much perturbed the Queen’s peace, I warrant,” said Rachel, uneasily,—a dim apprehension of her niece’s intentions crossing her mind at last.