Which advice Charlie, at that time thirteen years old, gravely promised to follow.  He had naturally inherited his father’s sentiments, and believed the Jacobite cause to be a sacred one.  He had fought and vanquished Alured Dormay, his second cousin, and two years his senior, for speaking of King James’ son as the Pretender, and was ready, at any time, to do battle with any boy of his own age, in the same cause.  Alured’s father, John Dormay, had ridden over to Lynnwood, to complain of the violence of which his son had been the victim, but he obtained no redress from Sir Marmaduke.

“The boy is a chip of the old block, cousin, and he did right.  I myself struck a blow at the king’s enemies, when I was but eight years old, and got my skull well-nigh cracked for my pains.  It is well that the lads were not four years older, for then, instead of taking to fisticuffs, their swords would have been out, and as my boy has, for the last four years, been exercised daily in the use of his weapon, it might happen that, instead of Alured coming home with a black eye, and, as you say, a missing tooth, he might have been carried home with a sword thrust through his body.

“It was, to my mind, entirely the fault of your son.  I should have blamed Charlie, had he called the king at Westminster Dutch William, for, although each man has a right to his own opinions, he has no right to offend those of others—­besides, at present it is as well to keep a quiet tongue as to a matter that words cannot set right.  In the same way, your son had no right to offend others by calling James Stuart the Pretender.

“Certainly, of the twelve boys who go over to learn what the Rector of Apsley can teach them, more than half are sons of gentlemen whose opinions are similar to my own.

“It would be much better, John Dormay, if, instead of complaining of my boy, you were to look somewhat to your own.  I marked, the last time he came over here, that he was growing loutish in his manners, and that he bore himself with less respect to his elders than is seemly in a lad of that age.  He needs curbing, and would carry himself all the better if, like Charlie, he had an hour a day at sword exercise.  I speak for the boy’s good.  It is true that you yourself, being a bitter Whig, mix but little with your neighbours, who are for the most part the other way of thinking; but this may not go on for ever, and you would, I suppose, like Alured, when he grows up, to mix with others of his rank in the county; and it would be well, therefore, that he should have the accomplishments and manners of young men of his own age.”

John Dormay did not reply hastily—­it was his policy to keep on good terms with his wife’s cousin, for the knight was a man of far higher consideration, in the county, than himself.  His smile, however, was not a pleasant one, as he rose and said: 

“My mission has hardly terminated as I expected, Sir Marmaduke.  I came to complain, and I go away advised somewhat sharply.”