ever at the conclusion, in which, with many excuses, Frank said that he had, at the special entreaty of the said Budæus, set out with him down the Danube stream to Buda, that he might, before finishing his travels, make experience of that learning for which the Hungarians were famous throughout Europe. And after that, though he wrote again and again to the father whom he fancied living, no letter in return reached him from home for nearly two years; till, fearing some mishap, he hurried back to England, to find his mother a widow and his brother Amyas gone to the South Seas with Captain Drake of Plymouth. And yet, even then, after years of absence, he was not allowed to remain at home. For Sir Richard, to whom idleness was a thing horrible and unrighteous, would have him up and doing again before six months were over, and sent him off to Court to Lord Hunsdon.
There, being as delicately beautiful as his brother huge and was strong, he had speedily, by Carew's interest and that of Sidney and his Uncle Leicester, found entrance into some office in the Queen's household; and he was now basking in the full sunshine of Court favor, and fair ladies' eyes, and all the chivalries and euphuisms of Gloriana's fairy-land, and the fast friendship of that bright meteor Sidney, who had returned with honor in 1577, from the delicate mission on behalf of the German and Belgian Protestants, on which he had been sent to the Court of Vienna, under color of condoling with the new Emperor Rodolph on his father's death. Frank found him when he himself came to Court in 1579 as lovely and loving as ever; and, at the early age of twenty-five, acknowledged as one of the most remarkable men of Europe, the patron of all men of letters, the counsellor of warriors and statesmen, and the confident and advocate of William of Orange, Languet, Plessis du Mornay, and all the Protestant leaders on the Continent; and found, moreover, that the son of the poor Devon squire was as welcome as ever to the friendship of nature's and fortune's most favored, yet most unspoilt, minion.
Poor Mrs. Leigh, as one who had long since learned to have no self, and to live not only for her children, but in them, submitted without a murmur, and only said, smiling, to her stern friend—"You took away my mastiff-pup, and now you must needs have my fair greyhound also."
"Would you have your fair greyhound, dear lady, grow up a tall and true Cotswold dog, that can pull down a stack of ten, or one of those smooth-skinned poppets which the Florence ladies lead about with a ring of bells round its neck, and a flannel farthingale over its loins?"
Mrs. Leigh submitted; and was rewarded after a few months by a letter, sent through Sir Richard, from none other than Gloriana herself, in which she thanked her for "the loan of that most delicate and flawless crystal, the soul of her excellent son," with more praises of him than I have room to insert, and finished by exalting the poor mother above the famed Cornelia; "for those sons, whom she called her jewels, she only showed, yet kept them
