"Robin Tremayne" (continued 3)

Isoult laughed, but Robin was grave as a bishop, and plainly deemed himself affronted.

“That is your affair, Dr Thorpe,” said he, demurely, “and this is mine, an’t like you.”

“A pretty plain hint to mind mine own business, whether it like me or no,” replied the old man, with a little merry laugh. “Well, Robin, hie after. Are ye agreed? and is the wedding-day fixed? Shall it be Midsummer Day? Give me a jolly piece of the cake, as what else thou dost; and Isoult! mind thou set it mighty thick with plums.”

“Dr Thorpe,” said Robin, his patience woefully tried, “I wish you would let me be. I was talking with my mother.”

“Say on!” answered he. “I will strive hard to set mine old legs a-dancing at thy wedding, though I promise not a galliardo (a dance wherein high leaps were taken, requiring great agility). My word on’t, it shall be a jovial sight! Hast seen the tailor touching thine attire? Purple satin, or cramoisie?” (Crimson velvet.)

Robin’s forbearance was plainly worn out. He rose and walked toward the door.

“Nay, lad, come!” called the old man. “I meant not in deed to grieve thee. Come back, Robin, and I will cease flouting thee, if it trouble thee. Come back, thou silly child!”

Robin turned back, after a moment’s thought, and sat down on the settle he had left.

“I take your word for it, Dr Thorpe,” he said, soberly. “But think you it not too grave a matter for jesting?”

“Grave!” cried Dr Thorpe. “What, wouldst thou have it spoken of like an execution?”

“I cry you mercy, Doctor,” said Isoult, now joining in; “but in this matter I do take part with Robin. It alway seemeth me that men (ay, and women too), do speak with too much jesting and lightness touching this matter, which should be right serious. A man’s choice of a wife is a choice for life, and is hardly to be talked of, meseemeth, in the same fashion with his choice of a partlet (neck ruff). I pray you, pardon me if in so speaking, I fail aught in the reverence due unto your years.”

“Why, dear child,” saith he, “thou wist more of the matter than I, which was never married; so talk away, and I will hold my peace, and trouble my master the bridegroom no further. Say on, Mr Robert Tremayne.”

“Methinks enough is said,” answered Robin, staidly. “I await my mother’s answer.”

“Which may scarce be given in a moment, Robin,” said Isoult, “nor without talk with mine husband thereupon. Moreover, Mr Rose shall have a word to say touching the matter.”

John was hardly allowed to speak on his return from the law courts, before he had heard Isoult’s story. He received the news at first as something irresistibly comic, but the next minute he grew grave, and evidently began to consider the matter seriously.

“I would fain hear thy thought hereon, Jack,” said his wife, “for methinks I do see in Robin his manner that this is no lad’s fantasy only, as Dr Thorpe did suppose, but a set purpose, that must be fairly faced, and said yea or nay to.”

“We must not forget, dear heart,” was John’s answer, “that though we are unto him in place of elders (parents), Robin is truly his own master, even afore he be of full age. He is not our ward in law, neither in articles nor apprenticeship; and he hath but himself to please. And even were we to let (hinder) him now (when I doubt not his natural kindly and obedient feeling for us should cause him to assent thereto), yet bethink thee that in a year and an half, when he cometh to his mature age, he shall be at liberty in every way. There be many husbands in the realm younger than he; and truly, I see no way but leaving him to his will, so soon only as we can be satisfied that it is no mere passing fantasy that swayeth him, but that his heart and mind are verily set and engaged therein. Remember, we have no right over him; and think yet again, that his choice (so far as I am able to judge) is a thorough good one. I see not what else may be done.”

“But he did refer him unto our judgment by asking me thereon,” said Isoult.

“Truth,” he answered; “wherein he showed his own judgment and wisdom, and himself to be a good and gentle lad, as he is alway. The more reason, sweet heart, that our judgment should be gracious, and should lean unto his wishes, so far as we may in right dealing and love unto himself consent thereto. And in good sooth, I see no cause for dissent.”

“Then,” said Isoult, somewhat surprised, though she scarcely knew why she should have expected any other decision, “thou wilt speak unto Mr Rose?”

“Certainly,” said he, “if Robin desire it.”

“And we really shall have a wedding!” said Isoult.

“I said not that, dear heart,” answered John, smiling.

“Mr Rose may refuse consent; or were he to give it, methinks I should allgates (at all events) move (wherein I would look for Rose to agree with me) that it should not be by and bye (immediately); but to wait until Robin be fairly settled in his calling.”

The calling which Robin had chosen was holy orders. He was studying divinity, and Bishop Ridley had already promised to ordain him when he should arrive at the proper age, if he were satisfied as to his fitness on examination. Mr Rose directed his reading—a fact which had caused him to be thrown rather more into Thekla’s society than he might otherwise have been, in his frequent visits to West Ham, and occasional waiting required when the Vicar happened to be absent. “But, Jack!” cried Isoult, with a sudden pang of fear, “supposing that the King were to die issueless (as God defend!) and the Lady Mary to come in, and set up again the mass, and—”

“And the Bloody Statute,” he answered, reading her thought. “Then we should have a second Walter Mallet.”

“And Thekla to be Grace!” murmured Isoult, her voice faltering. “O Jack, that were dreadful! Could we do nought to let it?”

“Yes,” he said in a constrained tone. “We might do two things to let it. Either to hinder their marriage, or to let Robin from receiving orders.”

“But thinkest thou we ought so?”

“I think, sweet wife,” answered he, tenderly, “that we ought to follow God’s leading. He can let either; and if He see it best, whether for Robin or for Thekla, that will He. But for myself, I do confess I am afeard of handling His rod. I dare not walk unless I see Him going afore. And here, beloved, I see not myself that He goeth afore, except to bid us leave things take their course. Dost thou?”

“I see nothing,” she answered; “I feel blind and in a maze touching it all.”

“Then,” said he, “let us ‘tarry the Lord’s leisure.’”

It was finally settled between John and Isoult that the former should see Mr Rose after the evening service on the following Sunday, when he was to preach at Bow Church, and speak to him on the subject of Robin and Thekla. So after the service they all returned home but John; and though no one told Robin why he stayed behind, Isoult fancied from the lad’s face that he guessed the cause. It was a long time before John’s return. Isoult dismissed Esther to bed, determining to wait herself; and with some indistinct observation about “young folk that could turn night into day,” Dr Thorpe took up his candle and trudged up-stairs also. Robin sat on; and Isoult had not the heart to say anything to him; for she saw that his thoughts were at Bow Church, not occupied with the copy of Latimer’s sermon on the Plough, which lay open before him.

At last John came, with a slow, even step, from which his wife augured ill before he entered the room. He smiled when he saw Robin still there.

“Ill news, Father!” said Robin. “You need not to tell me.”

“Thou art a sely prophet, lad,” answered John, kindly. “At this time I have no news at all for thee, neither good nor ill, only that Mr Rose giveth no absolute nay, and doth but undertake to think upon the matter, and discourse with Mrs Rose. Is that such ill news, trow?”

“Thank you,” answered Robin in a low voice. “You did your best, I know. Good-night.”

And he lifted his candle and departed. But Isoult thought the lad looked sad and disappointed; and she was sorry for him.

“Well, Jack, how spedst thou?” said she, when Robin was gone.

“Ah, grandmother Eva!” replied Jack, smiling. “Wouldst know all?”

“Now, Jack!” said she, “flout me not for my womanly curiosity, but tell me. I am but a woman.”

“Pure truth, dear heart,” answered he, yet smiling. “Well, I had to await a short space, for I found Thekla with her father, and I could not open the matter afore her. So at last I prayed her of leave (asked her to go) (seeing no other way to be rid of her), for I would speak with Mr Rose privily. Then went she presently away, and I brake Robin’s matter.”

“And what said he?”

“He looked more amazed than thou; and trust me that was no little.”

“But what said he?” repeated Isoult.

“He said he had never thought touching the marriage of Thekla, for he looked thereon until now as a thing afar off, like as we of Robin. But (quoth he) he did suppose in all likelihood she should leave him sometime, if God willed it thus; but it should be sore when it came. And the water stood in his eyes.”

“Looked he thereon kindly or no, thinkest?”

“I am somewhat doubtful,” and John dropped his voice, “though I would not say so much to Robin, whether or no he looketh kindly on her marrying at all. Thou wist, sweet heart, for thou heardst him to say so much,—that he hath some thought that there shall yet be great persecution in this land, and that Gospellers shall (in a worldly and temporal sense) come but ill off. And to have Thekla wife unto a priest—I might see it liked him very evil for her sake. Yet he dimitted it not lightly, but passed word to talk it over with his wife: but he said he would never urge Thekla to wed any, contrariwise unto her own fantasy.”

The Monday morning brought Mrs Rose. Isoult felt glad, when she saw her, that John had taken Robin with him to Westminster. The two ladies had a long private conference in Isoult’s closet or boudoir. Mrs Rose evidently was not going to stand in the way; she rather liked the proposed match. She had strongly urged her husband to tell Thekla, which, against his own judgment, he had at last consented to do. For Thekla’s mother regarded her as a marvel of wisdom and discretion, while her father, being himself a little wiser, thought less of her wonderful powers, though he admitted that she was very sensible—for her years.

“She is a good child—Thekla,” said Mrs Rose, in her foreign manner; “a good child—but she dreameth too much. She is not for the life, rather a dreamer. She would read a great book each day sooner than to spin. But she doth the right; she knoweth that she must to spin, and she spin. But she carrieth her thoughts up a great way off, into strange gear whither I cannot follow. See you, Mistress Avery, how I would say? I, I am a plain woman: I make the puddings, I work the spinning—and I love the work. Thekla, she only work the spinning and make the puddings, because she must to do it. She will do the right, alway, but she will not love the work.”

Isoult quite understood her, and so she told her.

“She do not come after me in her liking,” pursued she, “rather it is her father. And it is very good, very good to read the great books, and look at the stars, and to talk always of what the great people do, and of what mean the prophet by this, and the saint by that: but for me it is too much. I do not know what the great people should do. I make my puddings. The great people must go their own way. They not want my pudding, and I not want their great things. But Thekla and Mr Rose are both so good! Only, when they talk together, they sit both of them on the top of my head; I am down beneath, doing my spinning.”

Nothing more was heard until Wednesday. Then, before Isoult was down in the morning, having apparently risen at some unearthly hour, Mr Rose presented himself, and asked for John. The two went out of doors together, to Robin’s deep concern, and not much less to Isoult’s, for she had her full share of womanly curiosity in an innocent way.

At last she saw them come up the street, in earnest conversation. And as John turned in at the door (for Mr Rose would not follow) she heard him say almost mournfully, “Alack! then there is no likelihood thereof. Good morrow!”

“Not the least,” Mr Rose replied; and then away he went down the street.

“An augury of evil!” murmured Robin, under his breath.

“What dost thou with evil this morrow, Robin?” asked John, cheerily, coming into the room. “Be of good cheer, dear lad; the Lord sitteth above all auguries, and hath granted thee the desire of thine heart.”

Robin rose, and the light sprang to his eyes.

“Thekla Rose,” pursued John, “seeth no good cause why she should not change her name to Tremayne. But bide a minute, Robin, man; thou art not to be wed to-morrow morning. Mr Rose addeth a condition which I doubt not shall stick in thy throat.”

“What?” said Robin, turning round, for he was on his way to leave the room.

“But this,” said John, lightly, “that will soon be over. Ye are not to wed for three years.”

Robin’s face fell with a look as blank as though it had been thirty years.

“How now?” asked Dr Thorpe, coming in from the barber. “Sir Tristram looketh as woebegone as may lightly be. I am afeard the Princess Isoude hath been sore cruel.”

John told him the reason.

“And both be such ancient folk,” resumed he, “they are afeard to be dead and buried ere then. How now, Robin! take heart of grace, man! and make a virtue of necessity. Thou art neither seventy nor eighty, nor is Mistress Thekla within a month or twain of ninety. Good lack! a bit of a younker of nineteen, quotha, to be a-fretting and a-fuming to be let from wedding a smatchet of a lass of seventeen or so, until either have picked up from some whither a scrap of discretion on their green shoulders!”

“Thekla hath but sixteen years,” said John; “and Rose thinketh her too young to be wed yet.”

“So should any man with common sense,” replied Dr Thorpe. “Why, lad! what can a maid of such tender years do to rule an house? I warrant thee she should serve thy chicken at table with all the feathers on, and amend thy stockings wrong side afore!”

“Nay,” said Isoult, laughing; “her mother shall have learned her something better than that.”

“Get thee to thine accidence,” said Dr Thorpe to Robin. “Hic, haec, hoc, is a deal meeter for the like o’ thee than prinking of wedding doublets!”

“Dr Thorpe!” answered Robin, aggrievedly, “you alway treat me as though I were a babe.”

“So thou art! so thou art!” said the old man. “But now out of thy cradle, and not yet fit to run alone; for do but see what folly thou hadst run into if Jack and Mr Rose had not been wiser than thou!”

Robin’s lip trembled, and he walked slowly away. Isoult was sorry for the lad’s disappointment, for she saw that it was sore; yet she felt that John and Mr Rose were right, and even Dr Thorpe.

“Rose saith,” resumed John, “that he thinketh not his daughter to be as yet of ripe judgment enough to say more than shall serve for the time; and he will therefore have no troth plighted for this present. In good sooth, had not her mother much urged the consulting of her, methinks he should rather have said nought unto her of the matter. ‘But (quoth he) let three years pass, in the which time Robin shall have years twenty-two, and Thekla nineteen; and if then both be of like mind, why, I will say no further word against it.’”

“Bits o’ scraps o’ childre!” said Dr Thorpe, under his voice, in a tone of scorn and yet pity which would sorely have grieved Robin, had he not gone already.

“Be not too hard on the lad, old friend,” urged John, gently. “Many younger than he be wed daily, and I take it he hath had a disappointment in hearing my news. I thought best not to make too much thereof in the telling; but scorn not the lad’s trouble.”

“I want not to scorn neither the lad nor the trouble,” answered the Doctor. “I did but tell him it was folly; and so it is.”

After this, for a while, there were fewer visits exchanged between the Minories and West Ham; and Robin found himself quietly set to the study of larger books, which took longer to get up than heretofore, so that his appearances at the Vicarage were fewer also. When the families did meet, it was as cordially as ever. Manifestly, Mr Rose’s feelings were not a whit less kindly than before; but he thought it better for Robin that his affections should not be fed too freely.

“Jack,” said Isoult, suddenly, “what discoursedst thou with Mr Rose o’ Wednesday morn, whereof I heard thee to say there was no likelihood? Was it touching this matter of Robin?”

John had to search his memory before he could recall the incident.

“Dear heart, no!” he said, when he had done so; “it touched my Lord of Somerset.”

On the last day of July, Esther, going to the market, came in with news which stirred Isoult’s heart no little. Thomas Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, had died on the previous day, at his house in London, to which he had been confined by order of the King.

“An ill man and an unkindly,” wrote Isoult in the diary she always kept, “specially unto them which loved the Gospel. But how those tidings taketh me back to the days that be over and gone! For the last time that ever I saw this man was that black third of March, the year of our Lord 1542, when the King that then was, sent him to bear his diamond and message unto my dear master (Lord Lisle) in the Tower. Can I ever forget that even?

“Of this Thomas Wriothesley I dare say nothing. I would think rather of him whose voice I did hear last after his, in the commending of his blessed and gentle spirit into the hands of God. How many times sithence that day have I thanked God for him! Ay, Lord, we thank Thee for Thy saints, and for Thy care and guidance of them. For the longer I do live, the surer am I that Thy way Home is not only the right way, but for each of Thine, the only way. I take it, we shall not think of the thorns that tare us, nor shall we be ready for tears over the sharp stones that wounded us, in that day when I and my dear-loved Lord may sing to Thee together—‘Thou hast redeemed us, O Lord God of truth!’”

Mrs Underhill walked into the Lamb, one warm afternoon in the beginning of August, and remained to four-hours. And of course the conversation turned before long upon the Protestant controversy with Rome. In the Hot Gospeller’s family, it rarely kept off that subject for many minutes together.

“Mother!” said Kate, when she was gone, “what meaneth Mistress Underhill by confession? She said it was bad. But it is not bad, is it, for me to tell you and Father when I have done wrong?”

“No, sweeting, neither to tell God,” answered Isoult. “Mrs Underhill meant not that, but spake only of confession unto a priest.”

“Thou must know, Kate,” explained Robin, “that some men will tell their sins unto any priest, in the stead of seeking forgiveness of God in their own chamber.”

“But what toucheth it the priest?” asked the child.

“Why, never a whit,” he answered.

“If the man have stole from the priest,” resumed she, “it were right he should tell him; like as I tell Father and Mother if I have done any wrong, because it is wrong to them. But if I had disobeyed Mother, what good were it that I should ask Mr Rose to forgive me? I should not have wronged him.”

“She hath a brave wit, methinks, our Kate,” observed Isoult to Robin, when the child had left the room.

Robin assented with a smile; but Dr Thorpe was so rude as to say, “All mothers’ geese be swans.”

The smile on Robin’s lips developed into laughter; Isoult answered, with as much indignant emphasis as her gentle nature could indulge in, “Were you no swan to yours, Dr Thorpe?”

Dr Thorpe’s reply disarmed all the enemy’s forces.

“Ah, child, I never knew her,” the old man said, sadly. “Maybe I had been a better man had I known a mother.”

It was not in Isoult Avery, at least, to respond angrily to such a speech as that.

Before mid-winter was reached, the swans were increased by one in the house in the Minories. On the 29th of November, a baby daughter was born to John and Isoult Avery; and on the 4th of December the child was christened at Saint Botolph’s, Mr Rose officiating. The name given her was Frances. The sponsors were the Duchess of Suffolk, for whom Mrs Rose stood proxy; and Lady Frances Monke, whose deputy was Mrs Underhill; and, last and greatest, the young King, by Sir Humphrey Ratcliffe, Captain of the Gentlemen Pensioners, and a Gospeller. The mania for asking persons of distinction to stand as sponsors was at its height during the reigns of the Tudor sovereigns. Every one of them was godfather or godmother to countless multitudes of his or her subjects, though they rarely, if ever, acted in person. We shall find on a later page, that even “the nine days’ queen,” Lady Jane Grey, was not without this distinction during her momentary reign.

During the illness of Isoult—for she was so ill that for some days Dr Thorpe considered her life in danger—the breach, if it may be called so, with West Ham was made up. Both Mr and Mrs Rose were in constant attendance at the Minories, and Thekla came with them several times, her charge being the children, so that Esther might be entirely free to wait on her sick mistress. The subject was not discussed again, but from this date, on both sides, it appeared to be quietly taken for granted that Robin and Thekla henceforward belonged to each other. The Underhills, too, were very kind, Mrs Underhill undertaking to sit up with her invalid friend for several nights.

On the 13th of February 1551, Dr Gardiner was fully deprived of his bishopric. The Gospellers hoped it was for ever, but it will shortly be seen how deceived they were.

And at Easter the holy table in Saint Paul’s Cathedral was carried down below the veil that had been hung up to hide from the non-communicants the consecration of the elements, and set north and south; for, as yet, the customary place of the table was east and west.

Strange tales were told this Lent of fearful and marvellous visions and sights seen by many persons. Beside Merton Abbey, and in other places, men in armour were seen in the air, who came down to the earth and faded; and in Sussex were three suns shining at once. John Avery made himself merry over these rumours, in which he had no faith. “The three suns,” said he, “were but some matter of optical philosophy, which could readily be expounded of such as were learned in it; and for the men in armour, when he saw them he would believe them.” Dr Thorpe considered the wonderful sights omens of coming ill, but from Esther they won very scant respect.

In May the party from the Lamb dined with Mr Holland, at whose house they met Mr Rose, and Mr and Mrs Underhill. The last-named gentleman could talk of nothing but the expected marriage of the young King with a Princess of France. This Princess was the hapless Elizabeth, afterwards affianced to Don Carlos, and eventually married to his father, the wretched Philip the Second. At this time she was just five years old.

“But,” said Isoult, “she shall be a Papist, trow?”

“She shall be a Papist of mighty few years old,” said Mr Underhill, laughing; “and we will quickly make a Protestant of her. I hear she is a mighty pretty child, her hair dark and shining, her eyes wondrous bright, and her smile exceeding sweet.”

“Sweeter than Thekla Rose’s?” asked Mrs Underhill, herself smiling.

“Scantly, methinks,” answered Mr Underhill. “How like to a man’s fantasy of an angel doth that maid look!”

Robin looked very unlike an angel, for he appeared extremely uncomfortable, but he said nothing.

From the King’s marriage they came to that of the Princess Mary; and Mr Underhill—who, being a Gentleman Pensioner, with friends at Court, was allowed to speak with authority—gave the name of her projected bridegroom as “the Lord Lewis of Portugal. Wherein,” pursued he, “Father Rose and I may amend our differences, seeing that she should first be called to renounce the succession.”

Mr Rose smiled, and said, “A happy ending of a troublous matter, if it were so.”

But, as the reader well knows, the troublous matter was not doomed to have so happy an end.

The next topic was the new Act to allow the marriage of priests. All the party being Gospellers, were, of course, unanimous upon this subject. But Mr Underhill, who was not in the family secrets, unfortunately took it into his head to clap Robin rather smartly on the back, and congratulate him that he might now be a priest without being necessarily a bachelor. Poor Robin looked unhappy again, but still wisely remained silent, not relishing the opening of the subject in Mr Rose’s presence. But Mr Rose only smiled, and quietly suggested that it would be well for Mr Underhill to satisfy himself that he was not making his friends sorrier instead of merrier, by coming down upon them with such personal assaults. John, by way of corollary, intimated in an aside to Isoult, that the gentleman in question “had a sore heavy hand when he was in right earnest.”

The night after this day was one not soon forgotten in London. In the still darkness came an earthquake—that most terrible of phenomena held in God’s hand, whereby He saith to poor, puny, arrogant man, “Be still, and know that I am God.” Isoult awoke to hear sounds on all sides of her—the bed creaking, and below the dishes and pans dancing with a noisy clatter. In the next chamber she heard Walter crying, and Kate asking if the end of all the world were come; but John would not permit her to rise and go to them. And she also heard Esther talking with them and comforting them in a low voice, so she was comparatively satisfied. The baby, Frances, slept peacefully through all.

The next morning Kate said,—“Mother, were you affrighted last night with the great rocking and noise?”

“A little afeard lest some of us should be hurt, sweet heart, if any thing should chance to fall down, or the like; but that was all.”

“I thought,” said she, “that the end of the world was come. What should have come unto us then, Mother?”

“Why, then,” replied Isoult, “we should have seen the Lord Jesus Christ coming in the clouds, with all the angels.”

“Well,” answered Kate, thoughtfully, “I would not have been afeard of Him, for He took up the little babes in His arms, and would not have them sent away. If it had been some of them that desired for to have them away, I might have been afeard.”

“Ay,” said Dr Thorpe, looking up from his book, “the servants are worse to deal withal than the Master. We be a sight harder upon one the other than He is with any of us.”

The Averys were visited, a day or two after the earthquake, by an old acquaintance of Isoult, the companion—“servant” he was called at that time—of Bishop Latimer. Augustine Bernher was by nation a German-Swiss, probably from Basle or its vicinity; and unless we are to take an expression in one of Bradford’s letters as figurative, he married the sister of John Bradford.

Like every one else just then, Bernher’s mind was running chiefly on the earthquake. He brought news that it had been felt at Croydon, Reigate, and nearly all over Kent; and the question on all lips was—What will come of it? For that it was a prognostic of some fearful calamity, no one thought of doubting.

Whether the earthquake were its forerunner or not, a fearful calamity did certainly follow. On the 7th of July the sweating sickness broke out in London. This terrible malady was almost peculiar to the sixteenth century. It was unknown before the Battle of Bosworth Field, in 1485, when it broke out in the ranks of the victorious army; and it has never been seen again since this, its last and most fatal epidemic, in 1551. It is said to have been of the character of rheumatic fever, but its virulence and rapidity were scarcely precedented. In some cases death ensued two hours only after the attack; and few fatal instances were prolonged to two days. On the tenth of July, the King was hurried away to Hampton Court, for one of his grooms and a gentleman of the chamber were already dead. The fury of the plague, for a veritable plague it was, began to abate in London on the 20th; and between the 7th and 20th died in the City alone, about nine hundred persons (Note 2). Nor was the disease confined to London. It broke out at Cambridge—in term time—decimating the University. The Duchess of Suffolk, who was residing there to be near her sons, both of whom were then at Saint John’s, hastily sent away her boys to Bugden, the Bishop of Lincoln’s Palace. But the destroying angel followed. The young Duke and his brother reached Bugden on the afternoon of July 13; and at noon on the following day, the Duchess was childless.

The suspense was dreadful to those who lived in and near London. Every day Isoult watched to see her children sicken—for children were the chief victims of the malady; and on the 15th, when Walter complained of his head, and shivered even in the July sun, she felt certain that the sword of the angel had reached to her. The revulsion of feeling, when Dr Thorpe pronounced the child’s complaint to be only measles, was intense. The baby, Frances, also suffered lightly, but Kate declined to be ill of any thing, to the great relief of her mother. So the fearful danger passed over. No name in the Avery family was inscribed on the tablet of death given to the angel.

John Avery was very indignant at the cant names given by the populace to the sweating sickness. “The new acquaintance”—“Stop-gallant”—“Stoop, knave, and know thy master”—so men termed it, jesting on the very brink of the grave.

“Truly,” said he, “’tis enough to provoke a heavier visitation at God’s hand, when His holy ears do hear the light and unseemly manner wherein men have received this one.”

“Nor is the one of them true,” replied Dr Thorpe. “This disorder is no new acquaintance, for we had it nigh all over one half of England in King Henry’s days. I know I had in Bodmin eight sick therewith at one time.”

When this terror was passing away, an event happened which rejoiced the Papists, and sorely grieved the Gospellers.

On the 5th of April previous, after the deprivation of Gardiner, Dr Poynet had been appointed Bishop of Winchester, and 2000 marks in land assigned for his maintenance. The new Bishop was married; and soon after his elevation, it transpired that his wife had a previous husband yet living. Whether the Bishop knew this at the time of his marriage does not appear; but we may in charity hope that he was ignorant. He was publicly divorced in Saint Paul’s Cathedral on the 28th of July; to the extreme delight of the Papists, in whose eyes a blot on the character of a Protestant Bishop was an oasis of supreme pleasure.

The Gospellers were downcast and distressed. Isoult Avery, coming in from the market, recounted with pain and indignation the remarks which she had heard on all sides. But John only smiled when she told him of them.

“It is but like,” said he. “The sin of one member tainteth the whole body, specially in their eyes that be not of the body. Rest thee, dear heart! The Judge of all the earth shall not blunder because they do, neither in Bishop Poynet’s case nor in our own.”

“But,” said Isoult, “we had no hand in marrying Bishop Poynet.”

“Little enough,” he answered. “He shall bear his own sin (how much or little it be) to his own Master. If he knew not that the woman was not free, it is lesser his sin than hers; and trust me, God shall not doom him for sin he did not. And if he knew, who are we, that we should cast stones at him, or say any thing unto him (confessing and amending) beyond ‘Go, and sin no more’?”

“Nay,” she said, “it is not we that flout him, but these Papistical knaves which do flout us for his sake.”

“Not for his sake,” replied John, solemnly; “for an Other’s sake. We know that the world hated Him before it hated us. Bishop Poynet is not the man they aim at; he is but a commodious handle, a pipe through which their venom may conveniently run. He whom they flout thus is an other Man, whom one day they as well as we shall see coming in the clouds of Heaven, coming to judge the earth. The question asked of Paul was not ‘Why persecutest thou these men and women at Damascus?’ It is not, methinks, only ‘Inasmuch as ye did’ this good, but likewise ‘Inasmuch as ye did’ this evil, ‘unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye did it unto Me.’”

The next thing which aggrieved the people was an order for the abatement of the coinage. Henceforward, the nine-penny piece was to pass for sixpence, the groat or four-penny piece for twopence, the two-penny piece for a penny, the penny for a halfpenny, and the halfpenny for a farthing. Yet notwithstanding this, or perhaps in consequence of it, the price of provisions rose instead of falling.

“Why,” said Dr Thorpe, “this is plainly putting an hand in a man’s pocket, and robbing him of half his money!”

“Softly, good friend!” interposed John. “You would not call the King’s Grace a robber?”

“The King’s Grace is the King’s Grace, and may do as it liketh him,” said Dr Thorpe, a little testily; “’tis yonder rascally Council whereof I speak, and in especial that cheating knave of Warwick. I would we had my Lord of Somerset back, for all he is not a Lutheran, but a Gospeller. He never thrust his hand into my pocket o’ this fashion.”

“Ah!” replied John, laughing, “touch a man’s pocket, and how he crieth apace!”

“A child newly burnt dreadeth the fire, Jack,” answered the old man. “This is not the first time we have had the King’s coin pulled down. I am as true a man to the King as any here; but I have taken no oath to that dotipole (blockhead) of Warwick; and if he play this game once too oft, he may find he hath fished and caught a frog.”

“I count,” suggested John, soberly, “that my Lord of Warwick’s testers shall not pass for any more than ours.”

“What matters that to him, lad,” cried Dr Thorpe, “when he can put his hand into the King’s treasury, and draw it out full of rose nobles? The scurvy rogue! I would he were hanged!”

John laid his hand very gently and lovingly on the old man’s shoulder.

“Would you truly that, friend?” said he, softly.

“A man meaneth not alway every thing he saith,” replied Dr Thorpe, somewhat ashamed. “Bring me not to bar, prithee, for every word, when I am heated.”

“Dear old friend,” John answered, softly, “we shall stand at one Bar for every word.”

“Then I shall look an old fool, as I do now,” said he. “Sit thee down, lad! and hold that soft tongue o’ thine. I can stand a fair flyting (scolding: still a Northern provincialism) or a fustigation (beating), but I never can one of those soft tongues like thine.”

John sat down, a little smile playing round his lips, and said no more.

One day in October, Mr Underhill dined at the Lamb. He brought news that at Hampton Court, that day, the Earl of Warwick was to be made Duke of Northumberland; the Marquis Dorset (Henry Grey, husband of the late Duke’s elder daughter), Duke of Suffolk; the Lord Treasurer (William Paulet, Lord Saint John), Marquis of Winchester; and Mr William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke.

“Duke of Northumberland!” cried Dr Thorpe, fairly roused at this news. “Duke of Blunderhead! Had the King made him Duke of Cumberland I had little marvelled. Wherefore did his Grace (saving the reverence due) not likewise make me Duke of Truro or Marquis of Bodmin? I have been a truer man unto his Highness than ever my Lord of Warwick, and have done the kingdom a sight less harm.”

“Less harm, quotha!” laughed Mr Underhill. “Why, friend, if all were made dukes and marquises that have done no harm to the kingdom, we should have the Minories choke-full of noble houses.”

“We should have mighty few of the Lords keeping their titles,” said Dr Thorpe, grimly.

A few days later, Dr Thorpe, having gone to the barber’s near Aldgate, returned with a budget of news, as was usual when he came from that quarter.

“What will you give me for my news?” cried he, as he came in. “Rare news! glorious news!—for all knaves, dolts, and runagates!”

John entered likewise just after him.

“I will give you nought, Doctor, at that rate,” said Isoult, laughing.

“I know it, friend,” replied John, so sadly that her mirth vanished in a moment. “It is a woeful blow to the Gospel. Isoult, the Duke of Somerset and my Lord Grey de Wilton are committed to the Tower.”

“The Duke of Somerset again!” she cried. “But my Lord Grey de Wilton!—what hath he done?”

“Served the King well in Cornwall,” answered John; “I know of nothing worse.”

“’Tis that idiot, knave, dolt, and dizard (fool) of a Northumberland,” cried Dr Thorpe in great indignation. “I would the whole Dudley race had never been born! Knavery runs in their blood—’twill not out of them!”

“There are a few honest men in England—but a few,” said John, mournfully, “and two of the foremost shall lie this night in the Tower of London. And for what? Is it because my Lord Grey hath many times shed his blood for England (the royal blood of England herself which runneth in his veins (Note 3)), that now England herself shall shed it on Tower Hill? Is it because my Lord of Somerset hath given her the best laws she had for many a day, that now she will needs strain her laws to condemn him? Shame upon England if it be so! She shall not be held guiltless for it either before God or men.”

“And yestereven,” continued Dr Thorpe, “was my Lady of Somerset sent also to the Tower, for the great crime, I take it, of being wife unto her husband. And with her a fair throng of gentlemen—what they have done I wis not. Maybe one of them sent the Duke a peacock, and another doffed his bonnet to the Lord Grey.”

“The Duchess, too!” exclaimed John, turning to him. “I heard not of her committal. What can they lay to her charge?”

“Marry, she must have trade on the tail (train) of my Lady of Northumberland last Garter day,” scornfully answered Dr Thorpe. “Were not this a crime well deserving of death?”

“Surely,” said Isoult, “my Lady of Warwick (Note 4) will plead for her own father and mother with her father of Northumberland?”

“Plead with the clouds that they rain not!” said he, “or with a falling rock that it crush you not. Their bosoms were easier to move than John Dudley’s heart of stone.”

“And what saith the King to it all, mewondereth?” said Isoult.

“Poor child!” answered Jack, “I am sorry for him. Either he pleadeth in vain, or else they have poured poison into his ears, persuading him that his uncle is his dire foe, and they his only friends (the last was the truth). God have pity on his gentle, childly heart, howsoever it be.”

“More news, Isoult!” said Dr Thorpe, coming home on the following Thursday. “’Tis my Lord Paget this time that hath had the great misfortune to turn his back upon King Northumberland, while the knave was looking his way. We shall have all the nobles of the realm accommodated in the Tower afore long.”

“Ah me!” said Isoult, with a shiver, “are those dreadful ’headings to begin again?”

“Most likely so,” answered he, sitting down. “And the King’s Grace hath given his manor of Ashridge unto his most dear sister the Lady Elizabeth. I marvel, by the way, which of those royal ladies shall ride the first unto Tower Hill. We are getting on, child! How the Devil must be a-rubbing his hands just now!”

In the midst of these troubles came the Queen Dowager of Scotland, Marie of Guise, to visit the King; upon which rumours instantly arose that the King should even yet marry the young Queen of Scots. But Mary Stuart was never to be the wife of Edward Tudor: and there came days when, looking back on this day, Isoult Avery marvelled that she could ever have thought such events troubles at all. The clouds were returning after the rain.

In came Dr Thorpe from evensong on the Sunday night.

“One bit more of tidings, Isoult!” said he in his caustic style. “’Tis only my Lord of Arundel—nothing but an Earl—let him be. Who shall be the next, trow?”

“Mean you,” said she, “that my Lord of Arundel is had to the Tower?”

“To the Tower,” replied he, “ay; the general meeting-place now o’ days.”

“I wonder how it is with my Lady of Arundel,” said Isoult.

“Why,” answered he, “if she would get in likewise after her lord, she hath but to tell my Lord of Northumberland to his face that he may well be ’shamed of himself (a truer word was never spoke!) and she shall find her there under an hour.”

During the following month came an invitation to dine at West Ham. There, beside the party from the Lamb, were Mr and Mrs Underhill and Mr Holland. The conversation turned on politics. It was the usual topic of that eventful decade of years.

Mr Rose said,—“I know one Master Ascham, now tutor unto my Lady Elizabeth’s Grace, which hath also learned the Lady Jane Grey, and hath told me how learned and studious a damsel is she; and can speak and read with all readiness not only French, and Spanish, and Italian, but also Latin and Greek: and yet is she only of the age of fourteen years. And so gentle and lovely a maid to boot, as is scantly to be found in the three kingdoms of the King’s Majesty.”

“How had she served for the King?” inquired John.

“Right well, I would say,” answered Mr Rose. “But men say she is destined otherwhere.”

“Whither, I pray you?” said Mr Holland.

“Unto a son of my Lord of Northumberland, as ’tis thought,” he answered.

Whereupon, hearing the name of his enemy, as though touched by a match, Dr Thorpe exploded.

“A son of my Lord of Northumberland, forsooth!” cried he. “Doth earth bear no men but such as be sons of my Lord of Northumberland? Would the rascal gather all the coronets of England on his head, and those of his sons and daughters? ’Tis my Lord of Northumberland here, and there, and everywhere—”

“Up-stairs and down-stairs, and in my Lady’s chamber,” sang Mr Underhill, in a fine bass voice; for even in that musical age, he was renowned for his proficiency in the art.

“In the King’s chamber, certes,” said Dr Thorpe. “I would with all mine heart he could be thence profligated.” (Driven out.)

“Methinks I can see one in the far distance that may do that,” said Mr Rose in his grave manner. “At the furthest, my Lord of Northumberland will not live for ever.”

“But how many sons hath he?” groaned Dr Thorpe. “‘Such apple-tree, such fruit’ If the leopard leave ten or a dozen cubs, we be little better for shooting him.”

“My Lord Henry, allgates, is no leopard cub,” said Mr Underhill. “I know the boy; and a brave, gallant lad he is.”

“Go on,” said Dr Thorpe. “The rest?”

“My Lord of Warwick,” pursued he, “is scarce the equal of his brother, yet is he undeserving of the name of a leopard cub; and my Lord Ambrose, as meseemeth, shall make a worthy honourable man. For what toucheth my Lord Guilford, I think he is not unkindly, but he hath not wit equal to his father; and as for Robin (the famous Earl of Leicester)—well, you shall call him a leopard cub an’ you will. He hath all his father’s wit and craft, and more than his father’s grace and favour; and he looketh to serve as a courtier.”

“He shall carry on, then, in his father’s place,” said Dr Thorpe, with a groan.

“Methinks he shall either make a right good man, or a right bad one,” answered Mr Underhill. “He hath wit for aught.”

“And who,” said Dr Thorpe, “ever heard of a Dudley a good man?”

“Is that the very gentleman,” asked Mrs Rose, “that did marry with the great heir, Mistress Robsart?”

“Ay,—Mrs Amie,” answered Mr Underhill; “and a gentle one she is. A deal too good for Robin Dudley.”

“Must we then look to my Lord Robert as the Cerberus of the future?” said Mr Rose, smiling.

“The Devil is not like to run short of servants,” answered Dr Thorpe, grimly. “If it be not he, it will be an other.”

The clouds returned after the rain; but they gathered softly. Unheralded by any suspicion on the part of England as to the fate which it bore, came that fatal first of December which was the beginning of the end.

Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, was arraigned that day in Westminster Hall. And round the doors England pressed, yet in more hope than fear. A mere farce, she thought: he must be acquitted, of course. She prepared to welcome him home in triumph.

With such feelings in her heart—for was she not a part of England?—Isoult Avery stood at her door about six o’clock that evening, waiting for John’s return from the trial which was the one occurrence of the day. Robin had gone with him; but Dr Thorpe remained at home. For a time there was nothing but silence. The usual hum of the City was stilled: everybody was at Westminster. From Goodman’s Fields the cows came lowing home; now and then a single person, intent on business with which nothing might interfere, passed quickly up the Minories; the soft chime of the bells of Saint Katherine floated past the Tower wall, for the ringers were practising after evensong; and one great gun rang out sharply from the Tower, to inform the world that it was six o’clock. Five minutes afterwards, a low sound, like the roll of distant thunder, came from the City side of Aldgate. It grew louder every moment. It became first a noise, then a roar. At last the sound was articulate and distinguishable.

“A Somerset! a Somerset!” (Note 5.)

But what had happened? Were they voices of Papists, or of Gospellers?

All at once they came pouring out of Aldgate. In front colours were flying and fifes screaming, and behind ran the crowd, their voices drowning the fifes. Isoult began to think of retreating and closing her door, when she caught sight of Gillian Brent (a fictitious person), her neighbour’s daughter, who was struggling frantically to reach her mother’s house, being nearly carried off her feet by the press of people. Gillian, with much difficulty, fought her way through, and reached Isoult, who had beckoned her to take refuge with her. She came in almost breathless, and sank upon the settle, completely worn out, before she had strength to speak. When she was a little recovered, Gillian said—

“My Lord Protector is quit (acquitted) of all ill, Mistress; and therefore the folk be thus glad.”

“In very deed!” said Isoult, “and therefore am I right glad. But, Gillian, are you certain thereof?”

“Nay,” said she; “I do know no more than that all the folk say so much.”

Two hours more passed before John came home.

“Well, Jack!” said Dr Thorpe, so soon as he heard his foot on the threshold, “so my Lord of Somerset is quit of all charges?”

“Who told you so much?” inquired John.

“All the folk say so,” answered Isoult.

“All the folk mistake, then,” answered he, sadly. “He is quit of high treason, but that only; and is cast for death (Note 6) of felony, and remitted again unto the Tower.”

“Cast for death!” cried Dr Thorpe and Isoult together.

Avery sat down with a weary air.

“I have been all this day in Westminster Hall,” said he, “for I saw there Mr Bertie, of my Lady of Suffolk’s house, and he gat space for me so soon as he saw me; and we stood together all the day to listen. My Lord of Somerset pleaded his own cause like a gentleman and a Christian, as he is: verily, I never heard man speak better.”

“Well!” said Isoult, “then wherefore, thinkest, fared he ill?”

“Ah, dear heart!” replied he, “afore a jury of wolves, a lamb should be convicted of the death of a lion.”

“Who tried him?” asked Dr Thorpe.

“My Lord of Northumberland himself hath been on the Bench,” said John, “and it is of the act of compassing and procuring his death that my Lord of Somerset is held guilty.”

“Knave! scoundrel! murderer!” cried Dr Thorpe, in no softened tone. “Jack, if I were that man’s physician, I were sore tempted to give him a dose that should end his days and this realm’s troubles!”

“Good friend,” said John, smiling sadly, “methinks his days shall be over before the troubles of this realm.”

“But is there an other such troubler in it?” asked he.

“Methinks I could name two,” said John; “the Devil and Dr Stephen Gardiner.”

“Dr Gardiner is safe shut up,” he answered.

“He may be out to-morrow,” said John. “And if not so, the Devil is not yet shut up, nor shall be till the angel be sent with the great chain to bind him.”

“Nay, Jack! the wise doctors say that was done under Constantine the Emperor, and we have enjoyed the same ever sithence,” answered he.

“Do they so?” replied John, somewhat drily. “We be enjoying it now, trow?—But the thousand years be over, and he is let out again. And if he were ever shut up, methinks all the little devils were left free scope. Nay, dear friend! before the Kingdom, the King. The holy Jerusalem must first come down from Heaven; and then ‘there shall be no more pain, neither sorrow, nor crying.’”

When the two were alone, John said to his wife—“Isoult, who thinkest thou is the chief witness against my Lord of Somerset, and he that showed this his supposed plot to the King and Council?”

“Tell me, Jack,” said she. “I cannot guess.” He said, “Sir Thomas Palmer, sometime of Calais.”

“God forgive that man!” cried Isoult, growing paler. “He did my dear master (Lord Lisle) to death,—will he do my Lord of Somerset also?”

“‘Ye shall be hated of all men for My name’s sake.’ They that are so shall have their names written in Heaven.” Avery spoke solemnly, and said no more.

Note 1. Crowns were coined with either a rose or a sun on the obverse; and were distinguished accordingly.

Note 2. 872 (Machyn’s Diary, page 8); 938 (News Letter, Harl. Ms. 353, folio 107).

Note 3. The line of Grey de Wilton is the youngest branch of the royal House of York.

Note 4. John Earl of Warwick, eldest son of Northumberland, had married Anne, eldest daughter of Somerset.

Note 5. This ancient English shout is always spelt thus; but there is reason to think that the first word was sounded ah.

Note 6. Convicted. The Duke was acquitted on the first count, of high treason; and the people, hearing the announcement, “Not Guilty,” supposed that the trial was ended, and the Duke completely acquitted.

Chapter Six.

A Crime which was a Blunder.

“We pass: the path that each man trod Is dim, or shall be dim, with weeds. What fame is left for human deeds In endless age? It rests with God.” Tennyson.

No ill befel Lord Grey de Wilton. There was but little laid to his charge,—only a journey to the North, preceding the Duke of Somerset, to discover who were his friends. Perhaps the Council was ashamed to shed the blood of the man who had but lately put down the rising in Cornwall, and joined in raising the siege of Exeter. Whatever the cause were, he was quietly acquitted on the 19th of December, and suffered to go home.

In came Dr Thorpe, shortly before Christmas, carrying in his hand a new shilling.

“See thee!” said he, “Isoult, look well hereon. Seest it?”

“Well, what of it, Doctor?” said she. “I have seen many afore.”

“Dost mark it?” inquired he.

“Ay,” she answered, marvelling what he meant.

“Well,” pursued he, “thou art not to speak evil of it.”

“I am not like,” said she, innocently, “for these new shillings be lesser and neater than the broad shilling, and they like me the rather.”

“Well,” responded he, “take thou heed. ‘Forewarned is forearmed.’”

“But what mean you. Dr Thorpe?” asked the puzzled Isoult.

“Nay, nay, now!” answered the old man. “This dolt, my Lord of Northumberland—they must have missed rocking of him in his cradle!—this patch, look thou, hath taken offence at the canting name men have given to these new shillings.”

“Why,” said she, “what name gave they them?”

“Forsooth,” replied he, “‘ragged staffs;’ and thou wist what that meaneth.”

“What, a quip on my Lord of Northumberland’s arms?” answered Isoult.

“Yea, justly,” said he; “and this sweet companion loveth not to have his arms spoke about. So here is a proclamation—come out of the Court of Fools, as I live!—that no man henceforward shall speak evil of the new coin upon penalty. Didst ever hear such a piece of folly?”

“Ay,” interposed John, who sat reading in the chimney-corner, “and heard you how Master Latimer hath offended? Some time agone, preaching before the King, he chanced to repeat the device of the new shilling (that coming pat, I take it, to his matter) to wit, ‘Timor Domini fons vitae.’ And here quoth he, ‘We have now a pretty little shilling, in deed a very pretty one. I have but one, I think, in my purse; and the last day I had put it away almost for an old groat.’ And so plucked it out of his purse, and read the device to the people, with the signification thereof. Now (would you crede it?) there was murmuring against Mr Latimer of my Lord of Northumberland’s following, that he had reviled the new shilling, and contemned it for no better than an old groat.”

“I do protest!” cried Dr Thorpe, “the world is gone mad!”

“Saving you and me,” said John, gravely.

“I scantly know, Jack,” answered he, shaking his white head. “Methinks I shall not save you nor me long.”

One of the strangest things in this strange world is the contrasts perpetually to be found in it. While Somerset lay thus under sentence of death, the Lord of Misrule passed through London. He was George Ferris, an old friend of the Hot Gospeller, and a warm Protestant himself; yet it would be a tolerably safe guess to assert that Ferris was a Lutheran. Scarcely would a Gospeller have filled that position on that day.

Perhaps the relics of Dr Thorpe’s Lutheranism were to blame for his persistent determination to have Twelfth Day kept with all the honours. He insisted on cake and snap-dragon, and was rewarded for his urgency by drawing the king, while Kate was found to be his queen. Their mimic majesties were seated in two large chairs at one end of the parlour, the white-haired king laughing like a child, while the little queen was as grave as a judge. The snap-dragon followed, for which a summary abdication took place; and greatly amused was the old man to find Walter in abject fear of burning his fingers, while Kate plunged her hand into the blue flaming dish with sufficient courage for any knight in Christendom. The evening closed with hot cockles, after which Esther took possession of the children, declaring, with more earnestness than was her wont, that they must and should not stay up another minute.

“Verily,” said the old Doctor, when they were gone, “if the childre must be had away, then should I follow; for I do feel in myself as though I were a little child to-night.”

“So you have been, methinks,” responded Isoult, smiling on him, “for assuredly they had enjoyed far less mirth without you.”

And now the dark cloud closed over England, which was to be the one blot on the reign of our Josiah. Poor young King! he was but fourteen; how could he tell the depth of iniquity that was hidden in those cold blue eyes of the man who was hunting the hapless Duke of Somerset to death? Probably there was only one man who fully fathomed it, and that was the victim himself. And his voice was sterling in England no more.

Words fail in the attempt to describe what the Duke’s execution was to the Gospellers. There was not one of them, from the Tyne to the Land’s End, who for the country’s sake would not joyfully have given his life for the life of Somerset. He was only a man, and a sinful man too; yet such as he was, speaking after the manner of men, he was the hope of the Gospel cause. To every Gospeller it was as the last plague of Egypt; and to judge by the lamentations to be heard in all their houses, it might have been supposed that “there was not an house where there was not one dead.” It is not often that a whole land mourns like this. Among her sons England has not many darlings, but those that she has, she holds very dear.

The morning of the 22nd of January came.

“Know you, Mrs Avery,” asked Esther, “if the Duke of Somerset is like to be had afore the Council again, and when it shall be? I would like much to see that noble gentleman, if I might get a glimpse of him.”

Isoult referred the question to John, but he said he had heard nothing; he was going to Fleet Street, and would see if he could find out. But before he set out there came a rapping on the door, and when Ursula opened it, there stood Mr Rose.

“Welcome!” said John to him. “Come in and give us your news.”

“There shall be better welcome for me than them,” he said, in his sad grave manner. “Know you that even this day doth my Lord of Somerset suffer?”

“Is there no help for it?” said Dr Thorpe, sternly.

Mr Rose answered sadly,—“There is alway help from God; but His help is not alway to be seen of men. From men, in this matter, there is none help whatever, remembering that he who should give it is my Lord of Northumberland. You may ask the lion to have mercy on his new-caught prey, but not John Dudley upon Edward Seymour. There is but this one barrier betwixt him and—”

Mr Rose did not finish in words, but a slight motion of his hands over his head (Note 1) showed well enough what he meant.

“But you count not that he would aim—” began Dr Thorpe.

Another motion of Mr Rose checked his further utterance.

“He that hath the thing in deed, doth sometimes all the better without the name thereof,” he said quietly.

“Where dieth he?” saith John, in a low voice.

“Upon Tower Hill,” Mr Rose replied.

“I would like,” he answered, “to see him once more, and hear what he will say.”

“You cannot,” said Mr Rose. “There hath been commandment issued that all householders (except specially summoned) shall keep their houses, upon sore pain, betwixt six and eight of the clock this morrow, until all be over. List! there goeth six of the clock now. I thought to have gone somewhat further on my way, but now I must needs abide with you these two hours.”

So they sat down and talked, mournfully enough, until the clock struck seven; and then Mr Rose, rising from his chair, said, “Brethren, let us pray.” John drew the bolts, and the curtains over the windows, and all knelt down.

This morning England’s heart was throbbing with pain; to-morrow she would be mourning for her dead son. The only man whom England trusted was dying on Tower Hill! And this group—atoms of England, and parts of England’s heart—without such guards as these, they dared not pray for him.

Thus Mr Rose prayed:—

“O Lord, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders! whose way is in the sea, and whose path in the great waters, and whose footsteps are not known! We kneel before Thee this dread morrow, to beseech Thee on behalf of Edward Seymour, by Thy grace and providence Duke of Somerset. For causes unknown to us, but known to Thine unfathomable wisdom, Thou hast given leave to his enemies to triumph over him; and in Thy wise, and good, and just allowing and ordering of men’s ways, he is as this day cast for death. We know, O Lord, that Thy judgments are right, and that Thou in faithfulness dost afflict and chasten man, whether for sin, or for correction and instruction in righteousness. Therefore we would not beseech Thee to remove Thine hand from him—as, even at the last moment, Thou wert able to do—but rather so to order this Thy very awful providence, that he may be strengthened for death, and enabled to put his whole trust in Thy mercy, and in the alone merits of the bitter cross and passion of Thy Son our Lord. Suffer him not to depart from Thy fear, nor to lose his full and entire confidence in Thy mercy. Let not the malice of the Devil, neither the traitorousness and perfidiousness of his own evil heart, cause him to fall short of Thy heavenly calling. O Lord God most holy, O Lord God most mighty, O holy and merciful Saviour, suffer him not, in his last hour, for any pains of death, to fall from Thee!”

He paused a moment, and all responded—“Amen.” Yet he rose not. But while they knelt, from within the wall of the Tower enclosure came a sudden tumult, rushings to and fro, and shouts and cries of “Jesu, save us!” After a few minutes all was quiet.

And when all was quiet, Mr Rose went on.

“Lord, bow down Thine ear, and hear! Open, Lord, Thine eyes, and see! Reveal unto this dying man the glory of Thy kingdom, the beauty of Thyself, that so he may count all things but loss that he may win Christ. Open unto him the gates of pearl, which the righteous shall enter into—make him to shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of Thee, O Father. Grant him to endure this his cross for Thy love, and in Thy strength, and after to reign with Thee in glory evermore.”

He made another pause—a longer one; and again all responded, “Amen.” During his silence came another roar from Tower Hill; but all was again silent (Note 2). The minutes passed slowly to the kneeling group. It seemed a long time ere he spoke again.

“O Lord, shed Thy peace over the last moments of this our brother in the Gospel of Christ—in Thy kingdom and patience. Let Thy servant depart in peace. Suffer not Satan to harass and annoy him, nor the thought of his own sins to grieve and shake him. Fix his mind firmly upon Thee and on Thy Christ. O holy and merciful Saviour, suffer him not, at his last hour, for any pains of death, to fall from Thee!”

As Mr Rose uttered the last word, the Tower guns rang out, clear and sharp, on the frosty morning air. Few sounds ever thrilled so straight to the Gospellers’ hearts as that. None uttered another word while they knelt. Even the Amen was silent now. They might pray no more for Edward Duke of Somerset.

Slowly, one after another, all rose. All still, in silent mourning, they waited till the great clock of Saint Botolph’s rang out eight times. The next minute every door in the street was opened, and men were pouring out in a mass toward Aldgate. Then Mr Rose, with a heavy sigh, rose and held out his hand. That action unloosed the tongues of the party.

“Ah! God be his rest!” said Dr Thorpe, meditatively. “He did not alway the right, but—”

“Do you?” answered Mr Rose, pointedly enough, with a quick flash in his eyes.

“As said poor King Harry, ‘Kingdoms are but cares,’” said John (Note 3). “He hath found a better now.”

“He hath found a better, I am assured,” answered Mr Rose, “and is now singing the new song before the Throne. Methinks he doth not wish himself back now.”

“I marvel,” suggested Dr Thorpe, half sorrowfully, yet a little scornfully, “how he and the Queen Katherine shall get along the one with the other in Heaven?”

“I count, old friend,” answered John, “that the Lutheran Queen and the Gospelling Duke will each be taken up too much with the mercy that hath forgiven his sins, to have any leisure for counting up those of the other.”

“Well, they will lack something of the sort,” replied the old man.

“How can there be disagreement where each seeth clear?” said Mr Rose, “or how any disliking in the presence of the Mediator?”

Dr Thorpe made no answer, but he shook Mr Rose’s offered hand warmly; and when he was gone, he said, “That is a good man. I would I were a better.”

“Amen!” responded Avery, “for us all.”

About the middle of March came Annis Holland to pay her farewell visit to Isoult. She was a quiet, gentle-looking woman, rather short, and inclining to embonpoint, her hair black, and her eyes dark grey. She was to start for Spain on the 22nd of the same month, under the escort of Don Jeronymo, a Spanish gentleman in the household of the Duchess of Suffolk. The city to which she was bound was Tordesillas, and there (where the Queen resided) she was to await the orders of the Marquis of Denia, who was her Majesty’s Comptroller. Annis promised to write to her friend twice every year, while she remained abroad.

A few days after Annis’s departure, there was a dinner-party at the Lamb. The guests were Mr and Mrs Underhill, Mr and Mrs Rose, Thekla, and Mr Holland.

Mr Underhill brought bad news. The King had fallen ill of small-pox, and Parliament was likely to be prorogued, since he could no longer be present at the debates. The idea that the royal presence might overawe the members, and the consequent absence of the Sovereign from the House excepting for state ceremonies, are no older than the Restoration. The Plantagenet and Tudor Kings sat in their Parliaments as a matter of course.

After dinner, Mr Holland, who was fond of children, set Kate on his knee, and won her heart by permitting her to chatter as freely as she pleased. Robin and Thekla crept into a quiet corner by themselves; Mrs Underhill made Esther her especial companion; and the rest sat round the fire.

“What think you,” said Dr Thorpe to Mr Underhill, “should now hap, if (which God of His mercy defend!) this sickness of the King were to prove mortal?”

“How mean you?” Mr Underhill answered, “that the King should or should not provide his successor?”

“Why,” replied Dr Thorpe, “will he shut out his sisters?”

“There are that would right gladly have him to do so.”

“Whom aim you at there?”

“My Lord of Northumberland and other,” said he.

Dr Thorpe exploded, as was usual with him, at Northumberland’s name.

“What, the Duke of Blunderhead?” cried he. “Ay, I reckon he would like well to be John the Second. Metrusteth the day that setteth the fair crown of England on that worthless head of his, shall see me safe in Heaven, or it should go hard with me but I would pluck it thence!”

“I never can make out,” answered Mr Underhill, laughing, “how you can be a Lutheran, and yet such an enemy to my Lord of Northumberland, that is commonly counted head of the Lutheran party, at the least in the sense of public matters.”

“Nay, my word on’t!” exclaimed he, “but if I thought the Devil, by that his proxy, to be head of the Lutheran party, in any sense or signification whatsoever, I would turn Gospeller to-morrow!”

Mr Underhill roared with laughter. John said, aside to Mr Rose,—“He is not far from it now.”

“Come, you are over hard on Jack Dudley,” said Mr Underhill. “He is an old friend of mine.”

“Then I wish you joy of your friends,” replied Dr Thorpe, in a disgusted tone: adding after a minute, “I yet look for your answer to my question.”

“I am no prophet,” answered he, “neither a prophet’s son; but it needeth not much power of prophecy to see that a civil war, or something very like it, should follow.”

“In either case?” suggested Avery.

“In the case of the King making no appointment,” he said, “very likely: in the case of his so doing, almost certain.”

“Eh, my masters!” continued Dr Thorpe very sadly, “when I was born, seventy-one years gone, the Wars of the Roses were scantly over. I have heard my father tell what they were. Trust me, rather than go through such a time again, I would be on my knees to God to spare it unto us,—ay, night and day.”

“But in case no devise of the succession were made,” said John, “the Lady Mary’s Grace should follow without gainsaying, I take it.”

“Not without gainsaying,” answered Mr Rose. “My Lord of Northumberland knoweth full well that he could not reign under her as he hath done under King Edward. Remember, she is no child, but a woman; ay, and a woman taught by suffering also.”

“And every Lutheran in the kingdom would gather round him,” added Mr Underhill.

“Round John Dudley?” cried Dr Thorpe. “Hang me if I would!”

“Saving your mastership,” said Mr Underhill, laughing, and making him a low bow.

“And every Papist would go with the Lady Mary,” said John. “It were an hard choice for us. How think you? Which way should the Gospellers go?”

“Which way?” cried Mr Underhill, flaring up. “Why, the right way! With the right heir of England, and none other!”

“I asked not you, Ned Underhill,” answered John, smiling. “I know your horse, and how hard you ride him. I wished to question Rose and Holland.”

Mr Rose did not answer immediately. Mr Holland said, “It were an hard case; yet methinks Mr Underhill hath the right. Nothing can make right wrong, I take it, neither wrong to be right.”

“Truth: yet that is scarce the question,” responded Avery. “Rather is it, if the King made another devise of the crown, who should then be the right heir?”

“Ah! now you are out of my depth,” answered Mr Holland. “This little maid and I understand each other better. Do we not so, Kate?”

“Well, Rose?” inquired John.

“Prithee, get Mr Underhill out of the house first,” interposed Dr Thorpe, laughing.

“Or we shall have a pitched battle. I would like nothing better!” said Mr Underhill, rubbing his hands, and laughing in his turn.

“Brother,” said Mr Rose, turning to him, “the wisdom that cometh from above is peaceable.”

“But first, pure!” answered Mr Underhill, quickly.

“There were little of the one, if it should lack the other,” responded he.

“Come, give us your thought!” cried Mr Underhill. “I will endeavour myself to keep mine hands off you, and allgates, if I grow very warlike, Avery and Holland can let me from blood-shedding.”

“When I find myself in the difficulty, I will,” replied Mr Rose, with his quiet smile.

And no more could Mr Underhill obtain from him: but he said that he would demand an answer if the occasion arose.

The King had no sooner recovered from the small-pox than he took the measles; and the Parliament, seeing no hope of his speedy amendment, broke up on the 15th of April.

Mr Rose stepped into the Lamb that evening.

“There is a point of our last week’s matter, that I would like your thought upon,” said Avery to him. “Granted that the Gospellers should make a self party, and not join them with Lutherans ne with Papists, touching public matters, where, think you, look we for a leader?”

Mr Rose shook his head. “We have none,” said he.

“Not my Lord Archbishop?”

“Assuredly not; he is by far too gentle and timid. We lack a man that could stand firm,—not that should give up all short of God’s Throne for the sake of peace.”

“Nor my Lord of London?”

“Dr Ridley is a bolder man than his superior; a fine, brave follow in every way: yet methinks he hath in him scantly all the gear we lack; and had we a command for him, I misdoubt greatly if he should take it. He is a man of most keen feeling and delicate judgment.”

“My Lord of Sussex?”

“Gramercy, no! Nature never cut him out for a general.”

“Mr Latimer, quondam of Worcester?”

“As fiery as Ned Underhill,” answered Mr Rose, smiling; “indeed, somewhat too lacking in caution; but an old man, with too little strength or endurance of body—enough of soul.”

“Nay, then, I see but one more,” continued Avery, “and if you say nay to him also, I have done. What think you of my Lord’s Grace of Suffolk?”

“‘Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel,’” he answered. “A man weak as any child, and as easily led astray. If he be your head, Avery, I would say it were scarce worth to turn out for the cause. You would have an halter round your neck in a week.”

“Well,” responded John, “I cannot see any other.”

“I cannot see any,” was Mr Rose’s answer.

“Then we have no leader!” said Dr Thorpe, despondently.

Dr Thorpe was beginning to say “we” when he meant the Gospellers.

“We have no leader,” said Mr Rose. “We had one—an Heaven-born one—the only man to whose standard (saving a faction) all England should have mustered, the only man whose trumpet should have reached every heart. And but three months gone, his blood reddened the surfeited earth upon Tower Hill. Friends, men may come to look upon that loss as upon a loss never to be amended. Trust me, we have not seen the worst yet. If it should be as you guess—and that may well be—there shall yet be a bitterer wail of mourning, yet a cry of agony ringing to the Heaven, for the lack of Edward Seymour.”

“Ay, I am afeard the black clouds be not done opening themselves yet,” sadly replied John.

“I think they have scantly done gathering,” answered he. “The breaking, the tempest, cometh on apace. But it is not yet come.”

“When shall it come, think you?” said Dr Thorpe.

“Shortly,” he answered. “A word in your ear: the King is more grievous sick than men wot of. He may tide over this his malady; very like he will. But he hath no power within him to do battle with such disorders. His strength is worn out. He is scarce like to outlive an other.”

“Nay, my master! Worn out at fourteen!” cried Dr Thorpe.

“Men reckon time by days; God by endurance,” said Mr Rose, mournfully. “And this boy hath borne, these three years, more than you or I wot of. The sword is too sharp for the scabbard. It may be we have hardly known how to rate his true worth; or it may be that his work is over. Either way, it shall not be long now ere he enter into God’s rest and his. Ay, I know it is a woeful saying, yet again I say it: King Edward is worn out at fourteen. We may not seek to keep him; but this I am assured—the angel’s call to him shall be the signal for a fearful contest in the realm he leaveth. God defend the right! and God strengthen and comfort us, for I warn you we shall need it.”

“Alack! when shall all this end?” sighed Isoult.

“When Christ cometh again,” answered Mr Rose.

“No sooner?” she cried.

“No sooner,” said he. “There may be gleams of light before then; but there can be no full day ere the Sun arise. There may be long times of ease and exemption from persecution; but there can be no stable settlement, no lasting peace, till He appear who is our peace. He that is born after the flesh must persecute him that is born after the Spirit. ‘If ye were of the world, the world would love his own.’ It is because we are not of the world that the world hateth us. Sister, let us comfort ourselves and one another with these words. Christ will not fail us; see we that we fail not Him. We may yet be called to go with Him, both into prison and to death. It may be that ‘the Lord hath need of us’ after this manner. If it be so, let us march bravely in His martyr train. We must never allow His banner to fall unto the dust, nor tremble to give our worthless lives for Him that bought us with His own. If we can keep our eyes steady on the glory that shall follow, the black river will be easier to cross, the chariot of fire less hard to mount. And remember, He can carry us over in His arms, that the cold waters touch not so much as our feet.”

When Mr Rose was gone, John said, his voice a little broken,—“Will he be a martyr?”

“God avert it!” cried Isoult.

“Child!” said Dr Thorpe, solemnly, “’tis of such stuff as his that martyrs be made.”

But the King’s work was not yet quite finished. He recovered from his double illness.

The Londoners were terrified in the beginning of June by what they regarded as a fearful sign from Heaven—a shower of what is commonly known as “red rain.” In their eyes it was blood, and a presage of dreadful slaughter. The slaughter followed, whatever the shower might mean. The last year of rest was at hand.

“What say you to my Lord of Northampton?” suddenly inquired John Avery of Mr Rose, one morning when they met in the Strand.

It was an odd and abrupt beginning of conversation: but Mr Rose understood its meaning only too well. The thoughts of the Gospellers were running chiefly now on the dark future, and their own disorganised condition.

“What had Nehemiah said in the like accident to Sanballat?” was his suggestive answer.

The Papists, who were not disorganised, and had no reason to fear the future, were busy catching dolphins,—another portent—which made their appearance at London Bridge in August.

The new service-book, as its contemporaries called it—the second Prayer Book of Edward the Sixth, as we call it—was used for the first time in Saint Paul’s Cathedral, on All Saints’ Day, November 1, 1552. Bishop Ridley’s voice was the first that read it, and he took the whole duty himself; and preached in the choir, habited only in his rochet. In the afternoon he preached at the Cross,—what was then called a long sermon—about three hours. My Lord Mayor, who ought to have been present, was conspicuous by his absence. When remonstrated with, that dignitary observed that “Bishop Ridley’s sermons were alway so long, that he would be at no more, for he was aweary of so long standing.” Wherein my Lord Mayor anticipated the nineteenth century, though it sits out the sermon on cushions, and rarely is called upon to lend its ears for one-third of the time which he was expected to do. Dr Thorpe was not far wrong in the conclusion at which he arrived:—that “my Lord Mayor’s heart passed his legs for stiffness.”

The early winter of 1552 brought the first letter from Annis Holland.

“To the hands of my right worthy Mistress and most singular dear friend, Mistress Avery, dwelling at the sign of the Lamb in the Minories, without Aldgate, by London, give these.

“My right dearly beloved Isoult,—After my most loving commendations remembered, this shall be to advertise thee of my safe landing in the city of Santander, in Spain, and my coming unto the Queen’s Highness’ Court at Tordesillas. So much as to set down the names of all the towns I have passed, betwixt the two, will I not essay. It hath been a wearyful journey and a long, yet should have been a pleasant one, but for the lack of victual. The strangest land ever I did see, or think to see, is this. The poor men hereaway dwell in good houses, and lack meat: the rich dwell in yet fairer, and eat very trumpery. I saw not in all my life in England so much olive oil as in one week sithence I came into Spain. What I am for to live upon here I do marvel. Cheese they have, and onions by the cartload; but they eat not but little meat, and that all strings (a tender piece thereof have I not yet seen); and for ale they drink red wine. Such messes as they do make in their cooking like me very ill, but I trow I shall be seasoned thereto in due time.

“The first night we came to this city, which is sixteen days gone. Master Jeronymo (that hath showed me much courtesy, and had a very great care of me) brought me into the house of a gentleman his kinsman, whose name is Don Diego de Mendoza (fictitious person), (which is to say, Master James Mendoza). This Don Diego is a rare courtier, all bows, smiles, and courtesies; and Madam Isabel his wife (fictitious person) cometh not far behind. And (which I cannot away with), she is not called Doña Isabel de Mendoza, after the name of her husband but cleaveth to her own, as though she were yet a maid, and is called of all men Doña Isabel de Alameda. Methought this marvellous strange; but this (Master Jeronymo telleth me) is the custom of his country, and our fashion of names is to the full as strange to them. So when we came into the house (which is builded with pillars around the court, and a fountain in the midst, right fair to see) Master Jeronymo leadeth me forward, and courtesieth well-nigh down to the ground. Quoth he to Don Diego,—‘Señor and my cousin, I beseech the high favour of kissing your hand.’ And to Doña Isabel,—‘Señora and my cousin, I entreat you to bestow upon me the soles of your feet.’ (Note 5.) Verily, I marvelled at such words; but Doña Isabel in return louteth down to the earth, with—‘Señor, I am your entirely undeserving scullion. I beg of you the unspeakable honour to present me to the serenity of the most highly-born lady beside you.’ Marry (thought I) how shall I ever dwell in a land where they talk thus! But I was not yet at the end of mine amaze. Master Jeronymo answers,—‘Señora, this English damsel, which hath the great happiness to kiss your feet, is the most excellent Señora Doña Ines (Note 6) de Olanda (marry, I never thought to see my name cut up after such a fashion!) that shall have the weight of honour to be writer of the English tongue unto our most serene Lady the Queen Doña Juana.’ Then Madam Isabel louteth down again to the floor, saying,—‘Señora, I have the delightsomeness to be your most humble and lowly serving-maid. This your house is wholly at your disposal’—‘Master Jeronymo (quoth I in English), I pray you tell me what I must say?’—‘Say (answereth he) that you are the Señora’s highly favoured slave, and are not worthy to stand at the threshold of her door.’

“Eh, Isoult, dear heart, what a land is this!

“Master Jeronymo said unto me afterward that this his cousin would be very good unto me in her meaning; for the Spaniards say not that of their house being yours, without they mean much grace and kindness unto you.

“Well, after this, Madam Isabel took me away with her into an other chamber, where she gave me a cup of red wine and some cakes, that were not ill to take. And in this chamber were great cushions spread all about the floor, like unto the mattress of a bed; the cushions of velvet and verder (a species of tapestry), and the floor of marble. Upon these she desired me to repose me for a season; and (saith she) ‘At seven of the clock, mine excellent cousin Don Jeronymo and my lord Don Diego, and I your servant, shall take you up to the Castle, into the most ineffable presence of the most glorious Lord Marquis of Denia.’ O rare! (thought I.) If the Queen’s Comptroller be so glorious and of so ineffable a presence, what shall his mistress be? So when even came (my Señora Madam Isabel having meantime reposed and slumbered on the cushions), I shifted me into my best and richest apparel for to enter this ineffable presence, and went up unto the Castle, Don Diego leading me by the hand, and Madam Isabel coming after with Master Jeronymo. This was but across the court; for no sooner had I reached the door, than what should I see but two mules, richly-caparisoned, there standing. I was somewhat surprised, for the Castle is but a stone’s throw from the house; but Master Jeronymo, seeing my look, whispereth unto me that in Spain, ladies of any sort (ladies of rank) do ride when they go of a journey, be it but ten yards. Methought it scarce worth the trouble to mount the mule for to ’light off him again so soon: howbeit, I did as I was bid. Madam Isabel suffered her lord to lift her upon the other; and away hied we for the Castle, our cavaliers a-walking behind. When we ’light, and the portcullis was drawn up, Master Jeronymo prayeth the porter to send word unto the ineffable Lord Comptroller that the English damsel sent hither by the most noble Lady, Doña Catalina (so they call my Lady of Suffolk’s Grace) doth entreat for leave to kiss the dust under his feet. This is their country mode; but I do ensure thee I had been little gladded for leave to kiss the dust; and it doth yet tickle mine ears whensoever I hear it. So up the stairs went we, through a fair court bordered with orange-trees, into a brave chamber hung about with silk, and all over the floor a carpet of verder spread. Here we awaited a season; at the end whereof come in three or four gentlemen in brave array, before the foremost whereof all we bowed down to the ground. This was mine ineffable Lord Marquis. A tall, personable gentleman he is, something stiff and stately.

“‘Señora,’ saith he, inclining him unto us, ‘you are welcome as the light!’

“And raising him up, he called in a loud voice for the Señora Gomez. Come forth from the chamber beyond, a middle-aged dame, apparelled in black.

“‘Take this lady to her chamber,’ saith he. ‘Doña Ines is her name. And remember what I told you!’

“So I took my leave of Master Jeronymo, and of Don Diego and Doña Isabel, with many protestations and loutings; and again making low reverence unto my Lord Marquis, away hied I with Madam Gomez. She led me on by so many lobbies, one after the other, that methought we should never make an end and come to a chamber; but once, when I would have spoken, she checked me with a finger on the lip. At last she turned into a fair large chamber, well hung and garnished. She shut to the door, and then her lips unclosed.

“‘Here, Señora, is your chamber,’ saith she. ‘Two small alcoves for sleeping be on the right, for yourself and your bower-woman; you have been looked for of long time, and she awaiteth you. I will send her to you when I depart.’

“‘I thank you,’ quoth I. ‘May I pray you of her name?’

“‘Her name,’ she answered, ‘is Maria Porcina’ (the which should in English be Mary Little-pig. Methought it an unfair name). ‘It will please you,’ she went on, ‘to speak but lowly, seeing your chamber is nigh unto those of our Lady.’

“I thought that should please me but little. ‘Señora,’ quoth I, ‘shall I have the honour to see the Queen’s Grace at supper, think you?’

“The Señora Gomez looked at me; then she went to the door and drew the bolt, and let back the curtain that was over the door. This done, she came back and sat in the window.

“‘Señora,’ she saith, in a voice little above a whisper, ‘to the world outside we do not tell secrets. But unto a damsel so wise and discreet as your serenity, I will not fear to speak freely.’ (Much, methought, she knew of my discretion!) ‘You desire to know if you shall see our Lady this even. No; you will never see her.’

“‘But,’ said I, ‘I am come hither to read and write English for her Highness.’

“‘You are come to read and write for the Lord Marquis,’ she answered; ‘not for her.’

“‘Certes,’ said I, ‘that was not told me.’

“‘It is never told to any,’ she replied.

“‘But what is the secret, I pray your excellency?’ I asked. ‘Is the Queen’s Highness sick, that she is never seen?’

“‘She is mad,’ answered she.

“‘God have mercy on her!’ cried I.

“‘Y la Santisima!’ (And the most holy Virgin!) saith she. ‘That is what is said to the world. Be you ware, Doña Ines, that you gainsay it not.’

“‘Mean you that it is not true?’ cried I.

“‘I mean,’ quoth she, ‘that my Lord Marquis of Denia is master here, and is an ill one to offend. Say as he saith—that is our rule.’

“‘Then,’ said I, ‘there is somewhat behind, which men may not know.’

“‘Behind!’ she saith, with a low crafty laugh that it liked me not to hear. ‘Ay, there is Don Carlos the Emperor, son of our Lady, behind the Lord Marquis. Have a care what you do and say. Con el Rey y la Inquisicion, chiton! (which is a Spanish saw (proverb), meaning, Be silent touching the King and the Inquisition.) And if you speak unadvisedly of the one, you may find you within the walls of the other. I speak in kindness, Señora, and of what I know. This palace is not all bowers and gardens. There be dungeons beneath those bowers, deep and dark. Santa Maria defend us! You tread on mines—hold your peace!’

“‘I thank you, Señora, for your warning,’ answered I. ‘Go with God!’

“‘And rest with Him!’ she answered. (‘Vaya (or quede) usted con Dios.’) (In this fashion do the Spaniards take their leave.) Then she left me.

“Isoult, dear heart, I am well assured herefrom that this is an evil place, and my Lord of Denia an ill man. But there is yet more to tell thee.

“When I went down to supper, I there found my Lord and Lady of Denia; Fray Juan de Avila, confessor to her Highness; and her Grace’s bower-women, whose names be Doña Ximena de Lara (fictitious), a young damsel (I hear), of very high degree, that is stately and silent; Doña Catalina de la Moraleja (fictitious), a middle-aged dame, grave and sedate; Doña Leonor Gomez, of whom I have spoken; and Doña Rosada de Las Peñas (fictitious), a young maid of gentle and kindly look. And if thou wouldst have their names in English—Ximena, I cannot interpret therein, for it is a name particular unto these parts; but the others should be Katherine (Note 7) and Eleanor, and Rose. Doña Leonor Gomez, I do find, will be saddest of any when my Lord’s or the confessor’s eyes be upon her, but will talk away like very water let out when she hath one alone.

“It was some days ere I was called to any work. The Tuesday thereafter, my Lord Marquis sent for me, to read a letter come to him from England. ’Twas but filled with compliments and fair words—scarce worth the sending, methought. Very grave is this Lord Marquis, yet extreme courteous withal. As I stood a-reading come in Fray Juan.