Chapter 23

---Ours is the skie,
Where at what fowl we please our hawk shall flie.
RANDOLPH.

One bright September morning, old Raoul was busy in the mews where
he kept his hawks, grumbling all the while to himself as he
surveyed the condition of each bird, and blaming alternately the
carelessness of the under-falconer, and the situation of the
building, and the weather, and the wind, and all things around
him, for the dilapidation which time and disease had made in the
neglected hawking establishment of the Garde Doloureuse. While in
these unpleasing meditations, he was surprised by the voice of his
beloved Dame Gillian, who seldom was an early riser, and yet more
rarely visited him when he was in his sphere of peculiar
authority. "Raoul, Raoul! where art thou, man?--Ever to seek for,
when thou canst make aught of advantage for thyself or me!"

"And what want'st thou, dame?" said Raoul, "what means thy
screaming worse than the seagull before wet weather? A murrain on
thy voice! it is enough to fray every hawk from the perch."

"Hawk!" answered Dame Gillian; "it is time to be looking for
hawks, when here is a cast of the bravest falcons come hither for
sale, that ever flew by lake, brook, or meadow!"

"Kites! like her that brings the news," said Raoul.

"No, nor kestrils like him that hears it," replied Gillian; "but
brave jerfalcons, with large nares, strongly armed, and beaks
short and something bluish--"

"Pshaw, with thy jargon!--Where came they from?" said Raoul,
interested in the tidings, but unwilling to give his wife the
satisfaction of seeing that he was so.

"From the Isle of Man," replied Gillian.

"They must be good, then, though it was a woman brought tidings of
them," said Raoul, smiling grimly at his own wit; then, leaving
the mews, he demanded to know where this famous falcon-merchant
was to be met withal.

"Why, between the barriers and the inner gate," replied Gillian,
"where other men are admitted that have wares to utter--Where
should he be?"

"And who let him in?" demanded the suspicious Raoul.

"Why, Master Steward, thou owl!" said Gillian; "he came but now to
my chamber, and sent me hither to call you."

"Oh, the steward--the steward--I might have guessed as much. And
he came to thy chamber, doubtless, because he could not have as
easily come hither to me himself.--Was it not so, sweetheart?"

"I do not know why he chose to come to me rather than to you,
Raoul," said Gillian; "and if I did know, perhaps I would not tell
you. Go to--miss your