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"This is the proper way to raise children. By
my hilt! I could not have trained them better had I the ordering
of it myself."
"What is it then?" asked Hordle John. "They stand very stiff,
and I trust that they have not been struck so."
"Nay, they are training their left arms, that they may have a
steady grasp of the bow. So my own father trained me, and six
days a week I held out his walking-staff till my arm was heavy as
lead. Hola, mes enfants! how long will you hold out?"
"Until the sun is over the great lime-tree, good master," the
elder answered.
"What would ye be, then? Woodmen? Verderers?"
"Nay, soldiers," they cried both together.
"By the beard of my father! but ye are whelps of the true breed.
Why so keen, then, to be soldiers?"
"That we may fight the Scots," they answered. "Daddy will send
us to fight the Scots."
"And why the Scots, my pretty lads? We have seen French and
Spanish galleys no further away than Southampton, but I doubt
that it will be some time before the Scots find their way to
these parts.


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