No sooner was the business done, and the capture fairly effected, than the eccentric character of the knight of Charlecote again displayed itself. He had borne himself manfully during the fight, and as one worthy of his crusading ancestors, but his hauteur and reserve immediately succeeded to the violence of action.
Drawing together his people, he gave directions for the removal of the wounded into the town, where their hurts could be looked to. After which he mounted his horse, and calling for a cup of wine, he lifted his hat, and drank to the health of the Queen, the discomfit of the Spaniards, and the confusion of all Jesuits. After which he turned his horse's head from the Checquers, now filled with the idle and the curious, who had managed to extinguish the fire, and rode off towards Charlecote.
"Nay, but how am I to dispose of these prisoners, Sir Thomas?" said the head bailiff, stopping him as he passed. "I should also like to learn the exact nature of the matter which hath led to this capture and the death of these people around us here."
"Of that you will better learn," said Sir Thomas, dryly, "by applying to your townsman there—Lawyer Grasp; and all further circumstances connected with them, I opine you will speedily be made acquainted with by the Queen's council, as I am myself led to believe by what Master Grasp hath informed me."
So saying, Sir Thomas bowed to the head bailiff, and rode away from the scene of his achievements.
CHAPTER XVIII.
A REVEL AT CLOPTON.
On the night which followed the action we have described, and which the inhabitants of Stratford long afterwards called the fray of the Checquers, Sir Hugh Clopton held an old accustomed feast at his house. The entertainment was given in honour of his daughter's birthday, the maiden having just completed her seventeenth year; and on this interesting occasion most of the old knightly families of the county of Warwickshire graced the scene. There came the Astleys of Hill Moreton, the De la Wards of Newton, the Clintons of Badsley, the Walshes of Mereden, the Blenknaps of Knoll, the Wellesbourns of Hastang, the Comptons of Compton Winyate, the Sheldons of Beoley, the Attwoods, and many other nobles, whose names now, like those once owning them, in all the pride of ancestral honours, are obliterated from the muster-roll of the living, and long forgotten in the very domains which owned them as lords; and last, though by no means least, came the knight of Charlecote and his lady, and their two lovely daughters.
It was indeed a goodly assemblage of the rank, youth, and beauty of the county of Warwick of that period. The old folks stately in manner and formal in costume; the men, looking in their starch ruffs, short cloaks and trunks, quaint cut doublets and peaked beards; and the women, in their jewelled stomachers and farthingales, like so many old portraits stepping forth from their frames; whilst the youth of both sexes, in all the bravery of that age of brave attire, glittered in silks and satins, gold and embroidery, bright jewels and richly mounted weapons. Nothing, indeed, could exceed the gallant look of the cavaliers who trod a measure in the dance, except it were the loveliness of their bright partners. Those youthful and fresh female buds of England, so celebrated for their native beauty; fair, and blooming, and swan-like in their graceful carriage—"earth-treading stars, that make dark heaven bright."