Elizabeth's humour had changed; and to-day she seemed set on humiliating him before the nobles who hated him, before the people who had found in him the cause why the Queen had not married, so giving no heir to the throne.

Perturbed and charged with anger as he was, however, the combat now forward soon chained his attention.

Not in many a year had there been seen in England such a display of skill and determination.

The veteran Knight Tilter, who knew that the result of this business meant more than life to him, and that more than the honour of his comrades was at stake--even the valour of England which had been challenged--fought as he had never fought before, as no man had fought in England for many a year.

At first the people cried aloud their encouragement; but as onset and attack after onset and attack showed that two masters of their craft, two desperate men, had met, and that the great sport had become a vital combat between their own champion and the champion of another land--Spain, France, Denmark, Russia, Italy ?--a hush spread over the great space, and every eye was strained; men gazed with bated breath.
The green turf was torn and mangled, the horses reeked with sweat and foam, but overhead the soaring skylark sang, as it were, to express the joyance of the day.