[#] The Flemings wore a green cross, the French a red, the English a white one. The proverbial "Red Cross Knight," therefore, strictly speaking, could not be an Englishman.
I wonder if the angels like smells which we think disagreeable. If they do, of course that would account for it. Yet one cannot imagine an angel with soiled feathers.
I suppose Guy would say that was another of my queer ideas. Oh, I am so delighted that we have heard from Guy!
Monseigneur says I must have lots of new dresses to take with me. I have been wishing, ever so long, for a fine mantle of black cloth, lined with minever: and he says I shall have it. And I want a golden girdle, and a new aumonière.[#] I should like a diaper[#] gown, too,—red and black; and a shot silk, blue one way, and gold the other.
[#] The bag which depended from the girdle.
[#] This term seems to have indicated stuff woven in any small regular pattern, not flowers.
My gracious Lord asked me what gems I would best like.
"Oh, agate or cornelian, if it please your Nobility," said I, "because they make people amiable."
He pinched my ear, and said he thought I was amiable enough: he would give me a set of jacinths.[#]
[#] These gems were believed to possess the properties in question.