appeared, likewise, a participator in the general content.  The stranger had indeed cause to rejoice, for he was upon the fairest errand.  He bad wooed and won the gentle heiress of a proud, but good-hearted Gloucestershire baron—­he had wooed and won her, too, with the full consent of father, kinsmen, and friends, and he was now on his way to the baron’s castle to arrange with his betrothed the ceremonial of the nuptials.  Ride on, thou gallant knight, ride on, and swifter too; for though the day will be yet early when thou arrivest, thou wilt find thyself expected within the Gothic enciente of the Baron de Botetourt’s dwelling.  A banner waves from the topmost tower to do thee honor and welcome; there walks, too, by the battlements, one whose night has been sleepless because of thee, whose thoughts and whose whole existence centre in thee, whose look firmly attaches to the road that brings thee to her.  Ride on then speedily, Sir Knight, to the happiness thy virtue and thy deeds have so well deserved.

This lover is no ordinary suitor:  he is of mingled Saxon and Norman noble blood, the recent companion-in-arms of Richard Coeur de Lion.  His name is Ralph de Sudley, and though he has passed his thirtieth year, the effect of long toil and war scarcely appears upon his handsome and still very youthful countenance.  Yet the knight has seen and endured much:  he has been with Richard at the siege and capture of Acre, and at the battle of Azotus.  When Conrad of Montferrat fell by the dagger of the assassins, Sir Ralph took a prominent part in the stormy debates which ensued among the Crusaders.  He even proposed with his men-at-arms, and those who would follow him, to invade the territory of the Lord of the Mountain, and to avenge in his blood the death which that king of murderers had caused to be done to Conrad.  This event made so deep an impression on his mind, that he still took every opportunity of urging upon his own and other Christian governments the necessity of extirpating these eastern assassins.  On his return from the crusades, Sir Ralph found the daughter of his friend, the Baron de Botetourt, just verging into beauteous womanhood.  The glory of his reputation, and the graces of his person, gained her heart at once; the Lady Alianore, though much his junior in years, loved the knight fondly and devotedly.

Sir Ralph has reached the portcullis of the castle; the wardour and men-at-arms are there to receive him with full honors, though he comes privately, without his armor or his followers:  he wears the civil but costly dress of the period, with no other weapon than a slight sword at his side.  But the baron will have each advent of his future son-in-law welcomed as an approach of state.

“Grammercy, Sir Baron,” observed the knight, as after passing through a crowd of domestics, he grasped his host’s hand upon the threshold, “one would imagine me Richard of England himself, or rather Saladin, that greatest and most gaudy of Oriental Soldans, to see this pompous prelude to my disjune with your lovely daughter and yourself.”