When the cloth was drawn, and sack and sugar became the order of the day, and the queen’s health had been duly drunk with all the honours, Frank rose.

“And now, gentlemen, let me give you a health which none of you, I dare say, will refuse to drink with heart and soul as well as with lips—­the health of one whom beauty and virtue have so ennobled that in their light the shadow of lowly birth is unseen—­the health of ’The Rose of Torridge,’ and a double health to that worthy gentleman, whosoever he may be, whom she is fated to honour with her love.”

Whereupon young Will Cary, of Clovelly Court, calls out, “Join hands all round, and swear eternal friendship, as brothers of the sacred order of the—­of what, Frank Leigh?”

“The Rose!” said Frank, quietly.

And somehow or other, whether it was Frank’s chivalrous speech, or Cary’s fun, or Amyas’s good wine, or the nobleness which lies in every young lad’s heart, the whole party shook hands all round, and vowed on the hilt of Amyas’s sword to stand by each other and by their lady-love, and neither grudge nor grumble, let her dance with, flirt with, or marry with whom she would; and, in order that the honour of their peerless dame and the brotherhood which was named after her might be spread through all lands, they would go home, and ask their fathers’ leave to go abroad wheresoever there were “good wars.”

Then Amyas, hearing a sneeze, made a dash at the arras behind him, and, finding a doorway there, speedily returned, dragging out Mr. John Brimblecombe, the stout, dark-skinned son of the schoolmaster.

Jack Brimblecombe, now one-and-twenty and a bachelor of Oxford, was in person exceedingly like a pig; but he was a pig of self-helpful and serene spirit, always, while watching for the best, contented with the worst, and therefore fattening fast while other pigs’ ribs stare through their skins.

He had lingered in the passage, hovering around the fragrant smell; and, once there he could not help hearing what passed inside, till Rose Salterne’s name fell on his ear.  And now behold him brought in red-handed to judgment, not without a kick or two from the wrathful foot of Amyas Leigh.

“What business have I here?” said Jack, making answer fiercely, amid much puffing and blowing.  “As much as any of you.  If you had asked me in I would have come.  You laugh at me because I’m a poor parson’s son, and you fine gentlemen.  God made us both, I reckon.  I tell you I’ve loved her these three years as well as e’er a one of you, I have.  Make me one of your brotherhood, and see if I do not dare to suffer as much as any of you!  Let me but be your chaplain, and pray for your luck when you’re at the wars.  If I do stay at home in a country curacy, ’tis not much that you need be jealous of me with her, I reckon.”

So, presently, after a certain mock ceremonial of initiation, Jack Brimblecombe was declared, on the word of Frank Leigh, admitted to the brotherhood, and was sent home with a pint of good red Alicant wine in him, while the rest had a right merry evening.  After which they all departed—­Amyas and Cary to Ireland, Frank to the court again.  And so the Brotherhood of the Rose was scattered, and Mistress Salterne was left alone with her looking-glass.