"But not so strange as I have to tell you, my lord," was my reply.
He gave a start at my words. "What ails you, man?" he asked, "you are wounded, your clothes are bloody."
"Of that presently, my lord," I said hastily. "Know you that the Pretender lands at Veryan Bay to-night, and that the lovers of the Stuarts have a thousand men armed to receive him?"
He started back like a man who had received a prick with a sword. "What mean you?" he cried.
I repeated my words, and gave him further particulars.
"You are sure of this?"
I assured him that I was.
"I would that Sir John Grenville were here," he said to himself, "this is sore sudden."
"There is need of immediate action, my lord," was my reply, "and the country looks up to you."
My words seemed to arouse his mind to activity.