"Then pray you, Mistress Frideswide, do me so much grace as to write outside your letter, that you do beseech her, for the love of you, to grant that the bearer thereof shall ask of her."
Frideswide looked, as she felt, astonished.
"Mistress Frideswide," said the Duke sadly, "you are here, as I, cut off from home and friends. But you have hope to return thither when God will, and I have none. My maid, I have one only child, that is the very jewel of my heart, and they keep her from me. (He did not say who "they" were.) If you will do so much for me, I will myself deliver your letter, an' it may be compassed, and pray your good sister to let me have a word with my darling."
Frideswide Marston looked up into the sad earnest eyes, and then, without another word, stooped down and added the request to her letter. There was more wet on the cover than ink, when she had done.
CHAPTER V.
HIS LITTLE NAN.
"Some feelings are to mortals given
With less of earth in them than Heaven;
And if there be a human tear
From passion's dross refined and clear,
A tear so limpid and so meek
It would not stain an angel's cheek,
'Tis that which pious fathers shed
Upon a duteous daughter's head."
—SIR WALTER SCOTT.
"Be sure, Jane, to tell Valentine that I will have my gown of motley velvet ready for my wearing on the morrow; and bid him set silver buttons thereto—and good plenty."
"Please it your Grace, Master Valentine did desire of me that I should say unto you that he could not make ready the gown of motley as to-morrow, nor afore Thursday come."
"Could not?" The Duchess of Exeter's chiselled eyebrows were slightly raised. "Could not? But he must."