“What about that lady?”
“Whether she has staid at our house all this time; and when she will be my sister; and ever so many things.”
Joanna got answers, such as they were: but it was not quite certain that no sound could be heard beyond the curtain; so the words were carefully guarded; and those most to the point were whispered. This started a new question.
“You are not ashamed to talk with me, because I am your little sister,—are you? I knew you would laugh at such a thought; and I told them so; but some of the girls said that grown gentlemen always are ashamed of being confidential with their sisters,—especially if they are small, like me.”
“That is sometimes true, but not always,” Christopher explained. “But you have not told me about Madam Lisle. Do you know where she is?”
“I should think she is at home. She rested here for a night last week; and she said she was going home because people should be at their own posts, and ready for anything that may happen in such times; and that they should not put their friends into danger. The Bishop would have had her stay at Wells; but she thought the widow of a chief Commonwealth man was not a fit guest for a bishop at this time.”
“Did she say anything about the rising?” asked Christopher, in his lowest voice. “Anything about those of us who are engaged in it?”
“Only that she did not know what to think. She meant to go home and pray for the right and the truth; and a person so old might, she hoped, take a little time to watch and learn, and be satisfied about who should be the real true Protestant king.”
“Our father is not nearly so old as she,” observed Christopher; “and that is what he thinks it right to do.”
“But you, Kit? King Monmouth is your king?”
“O yes; he is my king.”
“Ah! to be sure! He is everybody’s king. Madam Lisle could not doubt if she was with us here to-night,—could she?” As her brother did not answer, Joanna went on: “Nobody can doubt,—you cannot doubt,—can you?”
“Not for a moment as to what I ought to do; and that is all that matters. But, child, you must go now.”
“I will,” said the obedient little sister. All she wanted further was to know when she should see Kit again,—how long he would stay in Taunton,—when he would go home,—and whether he would carry a message to Mistress Elizabeth. She learned now that, when a gentleman became a soldier, he put his goings and comings into other people’s hands. On the whole, Christopher thought he should hardly talk with any of his sisters again till the Duke of Monmonth should be really king.
“Nor with Mistress Elizabeth?”
“Nor with Mistress Elizabeth,” he answered, cheerfully.
CURIOSITIES OF CYPHER.
In 1680, when M. de Louvois was French Minister of War, he summoned before him, one day, a gentleman named Chamilly, and gave him the following instructions:
“Start this evening for Basle, in Switzerland; you will reach it in three days; on the fourth, punctually at two o’clock, station yourself on the bridge over the Rhine, with a portfolio, ink, and a pen. Watch all that takes place, and make a memorandum of every particular. Continue doing so for two hours; have a carriage and post-horses awaiting you; and, at four precisely, mount and travel night and day till you reach Paris. On the instant of your arrival, hasten to me with your notes.”
De Chamilly obeyed; he reached Basle, and on the day, and at the hour appointed, stationed himself, pen in hand, on the bridge. Presently a market-cart drives by, then an old woman with a basket of fruit passes; anon, a little urchin trundles his hoop by; next an old gentleman in blue top coat jogs past on his grey mare. Three o’clock chimes from the cathedral-tower. Just at the last stroke, a tall fellow in yellow waistcoat and breeches saunters up, goes to the middle of the bridge, lounges over, and looks at the water; then he takes a step back and strikes three hearty blows on the footway with his staff. Down goes every detail in De Chamilly’s book. At last the hour of release sounds, and he jumps into his carriage. Shortly before midnight, after two days of ceaseless travelling, De Chamilly presented himself before the minister, feeling rather ashamed at having such trifles to record. M. de Louvois took the portfolio with eagerness, and glanced over the notes. As his eye caught the mention of the yellow-breeched man, a gleam of joy flashed across his countenance. He rushed to the king, roused him from sleep, spoke in private with him for a few moments, and then four couriers who had been held in readiness since five on the preceding evening were despatched with haste. Eight days after the town of Strasbourg was entirely surrounded by French troops, and summoned to surrender: it capitulated and threw open its gates on the 30th September, 1681. Evidently the three strokes of the stick given by the fellow in yellow costume, at an appointed hour, were the signal of the success of an intrigue concerted between M. de Louvois and the magistrates of Strasbourg, and the man who executed this mission was as ignorant of the motive, as was M. de Chamilly of the motive of his.
Now this is a specimen of the safest of all secret communications, but it can only be resorted to on certain rare occasions. When a lengthy despatch is required to be forwarded, and when such means as those given above are out of the question, some other method must be employed. Herodotus gives us a story to the point: it is found also, with variations, in Aulus Gellius.
“Histiæus, when he was anxious to give Aristagoras orders to revolt, could find but one safe way, as the roads were guarded, of making his wishes known: which was by taking the trustiest of his slaves, shaving all the hair from off his head,