“Peace, my brethren,” said the Sub-Prior; “and may it please your lordship, venerable father, upon my petition, to allow this headstrong youth a day for consideration, and it shall be my part so to indoctrinate him, as to convince him what is due on this occasion to your lordship, and to his family, and to himself.”
“Your kindness, reverend father,” said the youth, “craves my dearest thanks—it is the continuance of a long train of benevolence towards me, for which I give you my gratitude, for I have nothing else to offer. It is my mishap, not your fault, that your intentions have been frustrated. But my present resolution is fixed and unalterable. I cannot accept the generous offer of the Lord Abbot; my fate calls me elsewhere, to scenes where I shall end it or mend it.”
“By our Lady,” said the Abbot, “I think the youth be mad indeed—or that you, Sir Piercie, judged of him most truly, when you prophesied that he would prove unfit for the promotion we designed him—it may be you knew something of this wayward humour before?”
“By the mass, not I,” answered Sir Piercie Shafton, with his usual indifference. “I but judged of him by his birth and breeding; for seldom doth a good hawk come out of a kite's egg.”
“Thou art thyself a kite, and kestrel to boot,” replied Halbert Glendinning, without a moment's hesitation.
“This in our presence, and to a man of worship?” said the Abbot, the blood rushing to his face.
“Yes, my lord,” answered the youth; “even in your presence I return to this gay man's face, the causeless dishonour—which he has flung on my name. My brave father, who fell in the cause of his country, demands that justice at the hands of his son!”
“Unmannered boy!” said the Abbot.
“Nay, my good lord,” said the knight, “praying pardon for the coarse interruption, let me entreat you not to be wroth with this rustical—Credit me, the north wind shall as soon puff one of your rocks from its basis, as aught which I hold so slight and inconsiderate as the churlish speech of an untaught churl, shall move the spleen of Piercie Shafton.”
“Proud as you are, Sir Knight,” said Halbert, “in your imagined superiority, be not too confident that you cannot be moved.”