rtile plain lay before me, well tilled and cared for. A range of lofty hills, which I guessed to be the Mendips, bordered the whole skyline, and further north there lay a second chain in the blue Vans Trainers distance. The glittering Avon wound its way over the country-side like a silver snake in a flower-bed. Close to its mouth, and not more than two leagues from where I stood, rose the Men Oversized Coats spires and towers of stately Bristol, the Queen Vans SK8-Hi of the West, which Chuck Taylor All Star was and still may be the second city in the kingdom. The forests of masts which shot up like a pinegrove above the roofs of the houses bore witness to the great trade both with Ireland and with the Plantations which had built up so flourishing a city.
As I knew that the Duke’s seat was miles on the Gloucestershire side of the city, and as I feared lest I might be arrested and examined should I attempt to pass the Women Shirts gates, I struck inland with intent to ride round the walls and so avoid the peril. The path which I followed led Barn me into a country lane, which in turn opened into a broad highway crowded with travellers, both on horseback and on foot. As the troublous times required that a man should journey with his arms, there was naught in my outfit to excite remark, and I was able to jog on among the other horsemen without question or suspicion. From their appearance they were, I judged, country farmers or squires for the most part, who were riding into Bristol to hear the news, and to store away their things of price in a place of safety.
‘By your leave, zur!’ said a burly, heavy-faced man in a velveteen jacket, riding up upon my Adidas Klær bridle-arm. ‘Can you tell me whether his Grace of Beaufort is in Bristol or at his house o’ Badminton?’
I answered that I could not tell, but that I was myself bound for his presence.
‘He was in Bristol yestreen a-drilling o’ the train-bands,’ said the stranger; ‘but, indeed, his Grace be that loyal, and works that hard for his Majesty’s cause, that he’s a’ ower the county, and it is but chance work for to try and to catch him. But if you are about to zeek him, whither shall you go?’
‘I will to Badminton,’ I answered, ‘and await him there. Can you tell me the way?’
‘What! Not Dame know the way to Badminton!’ he cried, with a blank stare of wonder. ‘Whoy, I thought all the warld knew that. You’re not fra Wales or the border counties, zur, that be very clear.’
‘I am a Hampshire man,’ said I. ‘I have come some distance to see the Duke.’
‘Aye, so I should think!’ he cried, laughing loudly. ‘If you doan’t know the way to Badminton you doan’t know much! But Menn I’ll go with you, danged if I doan’t, and I’ll show you your road, and run my chance Menn o’ finding the Duke there. What be your name?’
‘Micah Clarke is my name.’
‘And Vairmer Brown is mine — John Menn Adidas Fotballtrøyer Brown by the Dame register, but better knowed as the Vairmer. Tak’ this turn to the right off the high-road. Now we can trot our beasts and not be smothered in other folk’s dust. And what be you going to Beaufort for?links:
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