THE TRUE MAID OF HONOUR. he considered must be the manners and language of Essex and Suffolk peasants, together with the extraordinary dress of the troop, astonished the rustics, who were inclined then to take them for foreign gipsies. " The Queen and the Duchess of Buckingham were both little dumpy women," says Miss Strickland, "and herMajesty, with her darkhair, olivecomplexion and large blackeyes, might, perhaps, have borne some likeness, in her short red petticoats, to a foreign gipsy ; but then the graceful figure and fair face of Frances, Duchess of Richmond, she who as la belle Stewart had been the star of the Court, must ill have assorted with such a gaberdine." The mystery was, unfortunately for Catherine, speedily unravelled ; for a person in the crowd, who had seen her at a public state dinner, recognised her, and, proud of his knowledge, proclaimed his discovery. All the people then flocked to stare at the royal masquerader ; the Court party flew to their horses as fast as possible, but as many of the country folks as had horses mounted with their wives, children, sweethearts, or neighbours behind them, " to get as much gape as they could," till they reached the gates of Audley End. In her new situation, Margaret Blagge, sober, steadfast, and demure, comported herself with a prudence and discretion most exemplary. Amid the glare and glitter of a Court life, within the precincts of a palace, she laid down for herself a stringent set of rules, which she carefully observed. 21
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