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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The King's Daughters, by Emily Sarah Holt
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The King's Daughters
+
+Author: Emily Sarah Holt
+
+Release Date: October 20, 2007 [EBook #23120]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE KING'S DAUGHTERS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
+
+
+
+
+The King's Daughters, How Two Girls Kept the Faith, by Emily Sarah Holt.
+
+________________________________________________________________________
+You will enjoy this book about the time when Mary was Queen of England,
+following the rise of Protestantism during Henry the Eighth's and Edward
+the Sixth's reigns.  Mary was a Catholic, and during her reign there was
+a time when people with the Protestant faith were apt to be tortured and
+burnt at the stake.
+
+So the King of the title is the King of Heaven, and his daughters are
+those women who retain their faith even up to the moment when they die
+in the flames.  The subtitle is "How Two Girls Kept The Faith".
+
+The problem with killing saintly mothers is that they may leave young
+children behind them, and a great deal of this book deals with the three
+young children of one such woman.
+
+The edition used was not registered in the Copyright Library, but it
+appears to have been a rather badly printed pirated version.  It was not
+an easy job to create this e-book, but I believe the author would
+approve of what we have done for you.
+
+________________________________________________________________________
+THE KING'S DAUGHTERS, HOW TWO GIRLS KEPT THE FAITH, BY EMILY SARAH HOLT.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ONE.
+
+CHOOSING A NEW GOWN.
+
+"Give you good den, Master Clere!" said a rosy-faced countrywoman with a
+basket on her arm, as she came into one of the largest clothier's shops
+in Colchester.  It was an odd way of saying "Good Evening," but this was
+the way in which they said it in 1556.  The rosy-faced woman set down
+her basket on the counter, and looked round the shop in the leisurely
+way of somebody who was in no particular hurry.  They did not dash and
+rush and scurry through their lives in those days, as we do in these.
+She was looking to see if any acquaintance of hers was there.  As she
+found nobody she went to business.  "Could you let a body see a piece of
+kersey, think you?  I'd fain have a brown or a good dark murrey 'd serve
+me--somewhat that should not show dirt, and may be trusted to wear
+well.--Good den, Mistress Clere!--Have you e'er a piece o' kersey like
+that?"
+
+Master Nicholas Clere, who stood behind the counter, did not move a
+finger.  He was a tall, big man, and he rested both hands on his
+counter, and looked his customer in the face.  He was not a man whom
+people liked much, for he was rather queer-tempered, and as Mistress
+Clere was wont to remark, "a bit easier put out than in."  A man of few
+words, but those were often pungent, was Nicholas Clere.
+
+"What price?" said he.
+
+"Well! you mustn't ask me five shillings a yard," said the rosy-faced
+woman, with a little laugh.  That was the price of the very best and
+finest kersey.
+
+"Shouldn't think o' doing," answered the clothier.
+
+"Come, you know the sort as 'ill serve me.  Shilling a yard at best.  If
+you've any at eightpence--"
+
+"Haven't."
+
+"Well, then I reckon I must go a bit higher."
+
+"We've as good a kersey at elevenpence," broke in Mrs Clere, "as you'd
+wish to see, Alice Mount, of a summer day.  A good brown, belike, and
+not one as 'll fade--and a fine thread--for the price, you know.  You
+don't look for kersey at elevenpence to be even with that at
+half-a-crown, now, do you? but you'll never repent buying this, I
+promise you."
+
+Mrs Clere was not by any means a woman of few words.  While she was
+talking her husband had taken down the kersey, and opened it out upon
+the counter.
+
+"There!" said he gruffly: "take it or leave it."
+
+There were two other women in the shop, to whom Mrs Clere was showing
+some coarse black stockings: they looked like mother and daughter.
+While Alice Mount was looking at the kersey, the younger of these two
+said to the other--
+
+"Isn't that Alice Mount of Bentley?--she that was had to London last
+August by the Sheriffs for heresy, with a main lot more?"
+
+"Ay, 'tis she," answered the mother in an undertone.
+
+"Twenty-three of them, weren't there?"
+
+"Thereabouts.  They stood to it awhile, if you mind, and then they made
+some fashion of submission, and got let off."
+
+"So they did, but I mind Master Maynard said it was but a sorry sort.
+He wouldn't have taken it, quoth he."
+
+The other woman laughed slightly.  "Truly, I believe that, if he had a
+chance to lay hold on 'em else.  He loves bringing folk to book, and
+prison too."
+
+"There's Margaret Thurston coming across," said the younger woman, after
+a moment's pause.  "I rather guess she means to turn in here."
+
+When people say "I guess" now, we set them down at once as Americans;
+but in 1556 everybody in England said it.  Our American cousins have
+kept many an old word and expression which we have lost.  See Note Two.
+
+In another minute a woman came in who was a strong contrast to Alice
+Mount.  Instead of being small, round, and rosy, she was tall and spare,
+and very pale, as if she might have been ill not long before.  She too
+carried a basket, but though it was only about half as large as Alice's,
+it seemed to try her strength much more.
+
+"Good den, neighbour!" said Alice, with a pleasant smile.
+
+"Good den, Alice.  I looked not to find you here.  What come you after?"
+
+"A piece of kersey for my bettermost gown this summer.  What seek you?"
+
+"Well, I want some linsey for mine.  Go you on, and when you've made an
+end I'll ask good Master Clere to show me some, without Mistress Clere's
+at liberty sooner."
+
+Alice Mount was soon satisfied.  She bought ten yards of the brown
+kersey, with some black buckram to line it, and then, as those will who
+have time to spare, and not much to occupy their thoughts, she turned
+her attention to helping Margaret Thurston to choose her gown.  But it
+was soon seen that Margaret was not an easy woman to satisfy.  She would
+have striped linsey; no, she wouldn't, she would have a self colour; no,
+she wouldn't, she would have a little pattern; lastly, she did not know
+which to have!  What did Master Clere think? or what would Alice
+recommend her?
+
+Master Clere calmly declined to think anything about it.
+
+"Take it or leave it," said he.  "You'll have to do one or t'other.
+Might as well do it first as last."
+
+Margaret turned from one piece to another with a hopelessly perplexed
+face.  There were three lying before her; a plain brown, a very dark
+green with a pretty little pattern, and a delicate grey, striped with a
+darker shade of the same colour.
+
+"Brown's usefullest, maybe," said she in an uncertain tone.  "Green's
+none so bad, though.  And that grey's proper pretty--it is a
+gentlewoman's gown.  I'd like that grey."
+
+The grey was undoubtedly ladylike, but it was only fit for a lady, not
+for a working man's wife who had cooking and cleaning to do.  A week of
+such work would ruin it past repair.
+
+"You have the brown, neighbour," said Alice.  "It's not the prettiest,
+maybe, but it 'll look the best when it's been used a while.  That grey
+'ll never stand nought; and the green, though it's better, 'll not wear
+even to the brown.  You have the brown now."
+
+Still Margaret was undecided.  She appealed to Mrs Clere.
+
+"Why, look you," responded that talkative lady, "if you have yonder
+green gown, you can don it of an even when your master comes home from
+work, and he'll be main pleased to see you a-sitting in the cottage door
+with your bit o' needlework, in a pretty green gown."
+
+"Ay, so he will!" said Margaret, suddenly making up as much mind as she
+had.  "I thank you Mistress Clere.  I'll have the green, Master Clere,
+an' it please you."
+
+Now, Alice Mount had offered a reason for choosing the brown dress, and
+Mrs Clere had only drawn a picture; but Margaret was the sort of woman
+to be influenced by a picture much more than by a solid reason.  So the
+green linsey was cut off and rolled up--not in paper: that was much too
+precious to be wasted on parcels of common things.  It was only tied
+with string, and each woman taking her own package, the two friends were
+about to leave the shop, when it occurred to Mrs Mount to ask a
+question.
+
+"So you've got Bessy Foulkes at last, Mistress Clere?"
+
+"Ay, we have, Alice," was the answer.  "And you might have said, `at
+long last,' trow.  Never saw a maid so hard to come by.  I could have
+got twenty as good maids as she to hire themselves, while Bess was
+thinking on it."
+
+"She should be worth somewhat, now you have her, if she took such work
+to come by," observed Margaret Thurston.
+
+"Oh, well, she'll do middling.  She's a stirring maid over her work: but
+she's mortal quiet, she is.  Not a word can you get out of her without
+'tis needed.  And for a young maid of nineteen, you know, that's strange
+fashions."
+
+"Humph!" said Master Nicholas, rolling up some woollen handkerchiefs.
+"The world 'd do with another or twain of that fashion."
+
+"Now, Nicholas, you can't say you get too much talk!" exclaimed his wife
+turning round.  "Why Amy and me, we're as quiet as a couple of mice from
+morning till night.  Aren't we now?"
+
+"Can't I?" said Nicholas, depositing the handkerchiefs on a shelf.
+
+"Well, any way, you've got no call to it.  Nobody can say I talk too
+much, that I know: nor yet Amy."
+
+"You know, do you?" said her husband coolly.  "Well, then, I need not to
+say it."
+
+"Now, neighbours, isn't that too bad?" demanded Mrs Clere, as Nicholas
+moved away to attend to another customer.  "I never was a rattle, not I.
+But 'tis right like men: they take in their heads that all women be
+talkers, and be as still as you will, they shall write you down a
+chatterbox.  Well, now, can't I tempt you with nought more?  Stockings,
+or kerchiefs, or a knitted cap?  Well, then, good den.  I don't so well
+like the look of them clouds yonder; we shall have rain afore night,
+take my word for it.  Farewell!"
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Mulberry-colour, much like that we call plum-colour or prune.
+
+Note 2.  They say, "I want to _have you go_," when we should say, "I
+want _you, to go_."  Queen Elizabeth would have used the former
+expression.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWO.
+
+WHO TOOK CARE OF CISSY?
+
+The clothier's shop which we entered in the last chapter was in Balcon
+or Balkerne Lane, not far from its northern end.  The house was built,
+as most houses then were, with the upper storey projecting beyond the
+lower, and with a good deal of window in proportion to the wall.  The
+panes of glass were very small, set in lead, and of a greenish hue; and
+the top of the house presented two rather steeply sloped gables.  Houses
+in that day were more picturesque than they have been for the last two
+hundred years, though they have shown a tendency in recent times to turn
+again in that direction.  Over Master Clere's door--and over every door
+in the street--hung a signboard, on which some sign was painted, each
+different from the rest, for signs then served the purpose of numbers,
+so that two alike in the same street would have caused confusion.  As
+far as eye could see ran the gaily-painted boards--Blue Lion, varied by
+red, black, white, and golden lions; White Hart, King's Head, Golden
+Hand, Vine, Wheelbarrow, Star, Cardinal's Hat, Crosskeys, Rose, Magpie,
+Saracen's Head, and Katherine Wheel.  Master Nicholas Clere hung out a
+magpie: why, he best knew, and never told.  His neighbours sarcastically
+said that it was because a magpie lived there, meaning Mistress Clere,
+who was considered a chatterbox by everybody except herself.
+
+Our two friends, Margaret Thurston and Alice Mount, left the shop
+together, with their baskets on their arms, and turning down a narrow
+lane to the left, came out into High Street, down which they went, then
+along Wye Street, and out at Bothal's Gate.  They did not live in
+Colchester, but at Much Bentley, about eight miles from the town, in a
+south-easterly direction.
+
+"I marvel," said Margaret, as the two pursued their way across the
+heath, "how Bessy Foulkes shall make way with them twain."
+
+"Do you so?" answered Alice.  "Truly, I marvel more how she shall make
+way with the third."
+
+"What, Mistress Amy?"
+
+Alice nodded.
+
+"But why?  There's no harm in her, trow?"
+
+"She means no harm," said Alice.  "But there's many an one, Meg, as
+doesn't mean a bit of harm, and does a deal for all that.  I'm feared
+for Bessy."
+
+"But I can't see what you're feared for."
+
+"These be times for fear," said Alice Mount.  "Neighbour, have you
+forgot last August?"
+
+"Eh! no, trust me!" cried Margaret.  "Didn't I quake for fear, when my
+master came in, and told me you were taken afore the justices!  Truly, I
+reckoned he and I should come the next.  I thank the good Lord that
+stayed their hands!"
+
+"'Tis well we be on the Heath," said Alice, glancing round, as if to see
+whether they could be overheard.  "If we spake thus in the streets of
+Colchester, neighbour, it should cost us dear."
+
+"Well, I do hate to be so careful!"
+
+"Folks cannot have alway what they would," said Alice, "But you know,
+neighbour, Bessy Foulkes is one of us."
+
+"Well, what then?  So's Master Clere."
+
+Alice made no answer.
+
+"What mean you, Alice Mount?  Master Clere's a Gospeller, and has been
+this eight years or more."
+
+"I did not gainsay it, Meg."
+
+"Nay, you might not gainsay it, but you looked as if you would if you
+opened your mouth."
+
+"Well, neighbour, my brother at Stoke Nayland sells a horse by nows and
+thens: and the last time I was yonder, a gentleman came to buy one.
+There was a right pretty black one, and a bay not quite so well-looking.
+Says the gentleman to Gregory, `I'd fainer have the black, so far as
+looks go; but which is the better horse?'  Quoth Gregory, `Well, Master,
+that hangs on what you mean to do with him.  If you look for him to make
+a pretty picture in your park, and now and then to carry you four or
+five mile, why, he'll do it as well as e'er a one; but if you want him
+for good, stiff work, you'd best have the bay.  The black's got no stay
+in him,' saith he.  So, Meg, that's what I think of Master Clere--he's
+got no stay in him.  I doubt he's but one of your fair-weathered folks,
+that'll side with Truth when she steps bravely forth in her satin gown
+and her velvet slippers; but when she comes in a threadbare gown and old
+clouted shoes, then she's not for their company.  There's a many of that
+sort."
+
+"And you think Master Clere's one?" said Margaret, in a tone which
+sounded as if she did not think so.
+
+"I'm feared he is.  I'd not say it if there wasn't need.  But if you see
+Bess afore I do--and you are more like, for you go into town oftener--do
+drop a word to her to be prudent."
+
+"Tell Elizabeth Foulkes to be prudent!" exclaimed Margaret, laughing.
+"Nay, that were carrying coals to Newcastle!"
+
+"Well, and the day may come for that, if the pits there be used up.
+Meg, have you ne'er noted that folks oftener come to trouble for want of
+their chief virtue than from overdoing it?"
+
+"Nay, Alice, nor I don't think it, neither."
+
+"Well, let be!" said Alice, shifting the basket to her other arm.  "Them
+that lives 'll see it."
+
+"But what mean you touching Mistress Amy!  You said you were feared
+she'd make trouble for Bess."
+
+"Ay, I am: but that's another matter.  We've fault-found enough for one
+even.  Who be them two afore us?"
+
+"What, those bits of children?  Why, they're two of Jack Johnson's, of
+Thorpe."
+
+"They look as if they'd got too much to carry," said Alice, as they came
+up to the children.  They were now about half way to Bentley.
+
+The younger, a boy of about six, held one ear of a large jar full of
+meal, and the other was carried by his sister, whose apparent age was
+eight.  They were plodding slowly along, as if afraid of spilling their
+meal, for the jar was pretty full.
+
+"Well, Cis, thou hast there a load!" was Margaret's greeting.
+
+The little girl turned her head to see who spoke, but she only said
+gravely, "Ay."  A very grave, demure little maiden she seemed to be.
+
+"Whither go you?" asked Alice Mount.
+
+"We're going home," said the small boy.
+
+"What, a matter of five miles, with that jar?  Why, you'll drop in the
+road!  Couldn't nobody have fetched it but you?"
+
+"There wasn't nobody," said the little boy; and his sister looked up to
+say, in her grave way,--
+
+"You know Mother's gone to Heaven."
+
+"And who looks after you?"
+
+"Will looks after Baby," answered Cissy demurely, "and I look after
+Will."
+
+"And who looks after thee?" asked Alice much amused.
+
+"I'm older than I look," replied Cissy, drawing herself up; but she was
+not big enough to go far.
+
+"I'm nine--going in ten.  I can make porridge, and clean the room and
+wash Baby.  And Will's learning to wash himself, and then he'll be off
+my hands."
+
+It was irresistibly funny to hear this small mite talk like a woman, for
+she was very small of her age; and Alice and Margaret could not help
+laughing.
+
+"Well, but thou knowest thou canst not do a many things that must be
+done.  Who takes care of you all?  I dare be bound thou does thy best:
+but somebody there must be older than thee.  Who is it now?"
+
+"Have you e'er an aunt or a grandmother?" added Margaret.
+
+Cissy looked up quietly into Alice's face.
+
+"God takes care of us," she said.  "Father helps when his work's done;
+but when he's at work, God has to do it all.  There's nobody but God."
+
+Alice and Margaret looked at each other in astonishment.
+
+"Poor little souls!" cried Margaret.
+
+"Oh, but we aren't!" said Cissy, rather more eagerly.  "God looks after
+us, you know.  He's sure to do it right, Father says so."
+
+Alice Mount laid her hand softly on Cissy's head.
+
+"Ay, little maid, God will do it right," she said.  "But maybe He'd let
+me help too, by nows and thens.  Thou knowest the Black Bear at Much
+Bentley--corner of lane going down to Thorpe?"
+
+Yes, Cissy knew the Black Bear, as her face showed.
+
+"Well, when thou gets to the Black Bear, count three doors down the
+lane, and thou'lt see a sign with a bell.  That's where I live.  Thee
+rap at the door, and my daughter shall go along with you to Thorpe, and
+help to carry the meal too.  Maybe we can find you a sup of broth or
+milk while you rest you a bit."
+
+"Oh, thank you!" said Cissy in her grown-up way.  "That will be good.
+We'll come."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THREE.
+
+ROSE.
+
+"Poor little souls!" repeated Margaret Thurston, when the children were
+out of hearing.
+
+Alice Mount looked back, and saw the small pair still toiling slowly on,
+the big jar between them.  It would not have been a large jar for her to
+carry, but it was large and heavy too for such little things as these.
+
+"However will they get home!" said she.  "Nobody to look after them but
+`God and Father'!"
+
+The moment she had said it, her heart smote her.  Was that not enough?
+If the Lord cared for these little ones, did it matter who was against
+them?  How many unseen angels might there be on that road, watching over
+the safety of the children, and of that homely jar of meal for their
+sakes?  It was not the first time that angels had attended to springs of
+water and cakes baken on the coals.  No angel would dream of stopping to
+think whether such work degraded him.  It is only men who stoop low
+enough for that.  The highest work possible to men or angels is just
+doing the will of God: and God was the Father of these little ones.
+
+"What is their Father?" asked Alice Mount.
+
+"Johnson?  Oh, he is a labouring man--a youngish man, only
+four-and-thirty: his mistress died a matter of six months back, and
+truly I know not how those bits of children have done since."
+
+"They have had `God and Father,'" said Alice "Well, I've no doubt he's a
+good father," answered Margaret.  "John Johnson is as good a man as ever
+stepped, I'll say that for him: and so was Helen a rare good woman.  I
+knew her well when we were maids together.  Those children have been
+well fetched up, take my word for it."
+
+"It must have been a sad matter to lose such a wife," said Alice.
+
+"Well, what think you?" answered Margaret, dropping her voice.  "Agnes
+Love told me--Jack Love's wife, that dwells on the Heath--you'll maybe
+know her?"
+
+"Ay, I know her, though not well."
+
+"I've known her ever since she was a yard long.  Well, she told me, the
+even it happed came Jack Johnson to their house, and when she oped the
+door, she was fair feared of him, he looked so strange--his face all
+white, and such a glitter of his eyes--she marvelled what had taken him.
+And says he, `Agnes, my Helen's gone.'  `Gone? oh dear!' says she.
+`Ay, she's gone, thank God!' says he.  Well, Agnes thought this right
+strange talk, and says she, `Jack Johnson, what can you mean?  Never was
+a better woman than your Helen, and you thanking God you've lost her!'
+`Nay, Agnes, could you think that?' says he.  `I'm thanking God because
+now I shall never see her stand up on the waste by Lexden Road,' says
+he.  `She's safe from that anguish for evermore!'  And you know what
+that meant."
+
+Yes, Alice Mount knew what that meant--that allusion to the waste ground
+by Colchester town wall on the road to Lexden, where the citizens shot
+their rubbish, and buried their dead animals, or threw them unburied,
+and burned their martyrs.  It was another way of saying what the Voice
+from Heaven had cried to the Apostle--"Blessed are the dead that die in
+the Lord from henceforth!"
+
+"It's a marvel they haven't done somewhat to them Loves afore now," said
+Margaret, after a minute's silence.
+
+"I thought they had?" replied Alice.  "Wasn't John Love up afore the
+Sheriff once at any rate?"
+
+"Oh, ay, they've had him twice o'er; don't you mind they gat them away
+in the night the last time, and all his goods was taken to the Queen's
+use?  But now, see, he's come back, and they let him alone.  They've
+done all they mean to do, I reckon."
+
+"God grant it!" said Alice, with a sigh.  "Meg, I cannot forget last
+August.  Twenty-two of us had up afore the Bishop, and we only escaped
+by the very skin of our teeth, as saith Job.  Ay me!  I sometimes marvel
+if we did well or no, when we writ our names to that submission."
+
+"Truly, neighbour, so have I," replied Margaret rather bluntly.  "I
+would not have set mine thereto, I warrant you."
+
+Alice sighed heavily.  "God knoweth we meant not to deny His truth,"
+said she; "and He looketh on the heart."
+
+After that they were silent till they came to Much Bentley.  Turning
+down the lane which led to Thorpe, they came in sight of a girl of
+twenty years, sitting on a low stool at the door of the third cottage in
+the lane, weaving worsted lace on a pillow with bobbins.  Over the door
+hung a signboard bearing a bell painted blue.  The lace-maker was a
+small-built girl, not in any way remarkable to look at, with smooth dark
+hair, nicely kept, and a rosy face with no beauty about it, but with a
+bright, kind-hearted expression which was better than outside beauty.
+If a person accustomed to read faces had been there, he might perhaps
+have said that the small prominent chin, and the firm setting of the
+lips, suggested that Rose Allen occasionally had a will of her own.  The
+moment that Rose saw who was coming, she left her stool with a bright
+smile which lighted up all her face, and carrying the stool in one hand,
+and her lace pillow in the other, disappeared within the house.
+
+"She's quick at her work, yonder maid," said Margaret.
+
+"Ay, she's a good lass, my Rose!" was her mother's answer.  "You'll come
+in and sit a bit, neighbour?"
+
+"Well, thank you, I don't mind if I do--at any rate till them children
+comes up," responded Margaret, with a little laugh.  "Will you have me
+while then?"
+
+"Ay, and as long after as you've a mind," said Alice heartily, leading
+the way into her cottage.
+
+As Margaret had a mile yet to walk, for she lived midway between Much
+Bentley and Thorpe, she was glad of a rest.  In the kitchen they found
+Rose, very busy with a skillet over the fire.  There was no tea in those
+days, so there was no putting on of the kettle: and Rose was preparing
+for supper a dish of boiled cabbage, to which the only additions would
+be bread and cheese.  In reply to her mother's questions, she said that
+her step-father had been in, but finding his wife not yet come from
+market, he had said that he would step into the next neighbour's until
+she came, and Rose was to call him when supper was ready.
+
+William Mount, the second husband of Alice, was twenty years older than
+his wife, their ages being sixty-one and forty-one.  He was a tall,
+grey, grave-looking man,--a field labourer, like most of the dwellers in
+Much Bentley.  This was but a small place, nestling at one corner of the
+large park of the Earl of Oxford, the owner of all the property for some
+distance round.  Of course he was _the_ great man in the esteem of the
+Much Bentley people.  During the reign of Edward the Sixth, when
+Protestantism was in favour at Court, Lord Oxford had been a Protestant
+like other people; but, also like many other people, he was one of those
+of whom it has been well said that:
+
+  "He's a slave who dare not be
+  In the right with two or three."
+
+Lord Oxford was a slave in this sense--a slave to what other people said
+and thought about him--and very sad slavery it is.  I would rather sweep
+a crossing than feel that I did not dare to say what I believed or
+disbelieved, what I liked or did not like, because other people would
+think it strange.  It is as bad as being in Egyptian bondage.  Yet there
+are a great many people quite contented to be slaves of this kind, who
+have not half so much excuse as Lord Oxford.  If he went against the
+priests, who then were masters of everything, he was likely to lose his
+liberty and property, if not his life; while we may say any thing we
+like without need to be afraid.  It is not always an advantage to have a
+great deal to lose.  The poor labourers of Much Bentley, who had next to
+no property at all, and could only lose liberty and life, were far
+braver than the Earl whom they thought such a grand man, and who carried
+a golden wand before the Queen.
+
+Supper was over at the Blue Bell, and Margaret Thurston was thinking
+about going home, when a little faint rap came on the door of the
+cottage.  Rose opened it, and saw a big jar standing on the door-sill, a
+little boy sitting beside it, and an older girl leaning against the
+wall.
+
+"Please, we're come," said Cissy.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOUR.
+
+ON THE WAY TO THORPE.
+
+"Please, we're come," said Cissy.  "We've been a good while getting
+here, but we--Oh, it isn't you!"
+
+"What isn't me?" said Rose, laughing--for people said _me_ where it
+should have been I, then, as they do still.  "I rather think it is me;
+don't you?"
+
+"Yes, but you are not she that spake to us on the road," said Cissy.
+"Somebody told us to call here as we went down the lane, and her
+daughter should go home with us, and help us to carry the big jar.
+Perhaps you're the daughter?"
+
+"Well, I guess I am," answered Rose.  "Where's home?"
+
+"It's at the further end of Thorpe."
+
+"All right.  Come in and rest you, and I'll fetch a sup of something to
+do you good, poor little white faces."
+
+Rose took a hand of each and led them forward.
+
+"Mother, here be two bits of Maypoles," said she, "for they be scarce
+fatter; and two handfuls of snow, for they be scarce rosier--that say
+you promised them that I should go home with them and bear their jar of
+meal."
+
+"So I did, Rose.  Bring them in, and let them warm themselves," answered
+Mrs Mount.  "Give them a sup of broth or what we have, to put a bit of
+life in them; and at after thou shalt bear them company to Thorpe.  Poor
+little souls! they have no mother, and they say God looks after them
+only."
+
+"Then I shall be in His company too," said Rose softly.  Then, dropping
+her voice that the children might not hear, she added, "Mother, there's
+only that drop of broth you set aside for breakfast; and it's scarce
+enough for you and father both.  Must I give them that?"
+
+Alice Mount thought a moment.  She had spoken before almost without
+thinking.
+
+"Daughter," she said, "if their Father, which is also ours, had come
+with them visible to our eyes, we should bring forth our best for Him;
+and He will look for us to do it for the little ones whose angels see
+His Face.  Ay, fetch the broth, Rose."
+
+Perhaps Cissy had overheard a few words, for wheel the bowl of broth was
+put into her hands, she said, "Can you spare it?  Didn't you want it for
+something else than us?"
+
+"We can spare it, little maid," said Alice, with a smile.
+
+"Sup it up," added Rose, laying her hand on the child's shoulder; "and
+much good may it do thee!  Then, when you are both warmed and rested,
+I'll set forth with you."
+
+Cissy did not allow that to be long.  She drank her broth, admonished
+Will by a look to finish his--for he was disposed to loiter,--and after
+sitting still for a few minutes, rose and put down the bowl.
+
+"We return you many thanks," she said in her prim little way, "and I
+think, if you please, we ought to go home.  Father 'll be back by the
+time we get there; and I don't like to be away when he comes.  Mother
+bade me not.  She said he'd miss her worse if he didn't find me.  You
+see, I've got to do for Mother now, both for Father and the children."
+
+Alice Mount thought it very funny to hear this little mite talking about
+"the children," as if she were not a child at all.
+
+"Well, tarry a minute till I tie on my hood," said Rose.  "I'll be ready
+before you can say, `This is the house that Jack built.'"
+
+"What do you with the babe, little maid, when you go forth?" asked
+Alice.
+
+"Baby?" said Cissy, looking up.  "Oh, we leave her with Ursula Felstede,
+next door.  She's quite safe till we come back."
+
+Rose now came in from the inner room, where she had been putting on her
+hood and mantle.  There were no bonnets then.  What women called bonnets
+in those days were close thick hoods, made of silk, velvet, fur, or
+woollen stuff of some sort.  Nor had they either shawls or jackets--only
+loose mantles, for out-door wear.  Rose took up the jar of meal.
+
+"Please, I can carry it on one side," said Cissy rather eagerly.
+
+"Thou mayest carry thyself," said Rose.  "That's plenty.  I haven't
+walked five miles to-day.  I'm a bit stronger than thou, too."
+
+Little Will had not needed telling that he was no longer wanted to carry
+the jar; he was already off after wild flowers, as if the past five
+miles had been as many yards, though he had assured Cissy at least a
+dozen times as they came along that he did not know how he was ever to
+get home, and as they were entering Bentley had declared himself unable
+to take another step.  Cissy shook her small head with the air of a
+prophetess.
+
+"Will shouldn't say such things!" said she.  "He said he couldn't walk a
+bit further--that I should have to carry him as well as the jar--and I
+don't know how I could, unless I'd poured the meal out and put him in,
+and he'd never have gone, I'm sure; and now, do but look at him after
+those buttercups!"
+
+"He didn't mean to tell falsehoods," said Rose.  "He was tired, I dare
+say.  Lads will be lads, thou knowest."
+
+"Oh dear, I don't know how I'm to bring up these children to be good
+people!" said Cissy, as gravely as if she had been their grandmother.
+"Ursula says children are great troubles, and I'm sure it's true.  If
+there's any place where Will should be, that's just where he always
+isn't; and if there's one spot where he shouldn't be, that's the place
+where you commonly find him.  Baby can't walk yet, so she's safe; but
+whatever I shall do when she can, I'm sure I don't know!  I can't be in
+all the places at once where two of them shouldn't be."
+
+Rose could not help laughing.
+
+"Little maid," she said kindly, "thy small shoulders will never hold the
+world, nor even thy father's cottage.  Hast thou forgot what thou saidst
+not an half-hour gone, that God takes care of you all?"
+
+"Oh yes, He takes big care of us," was Cissy's answer.  "He'll see that
+we have meat and clothes and so forth, and that Father gets work.  But
+He'll hardly keep Will and Baby out of mischief, will He?  Isn't that
+too little for Him?"
+
+"The whole world is but a speck, little Cicely, compared with Him.  If
+He will humble Himself to see thee and me at all, I reckon He is as like
+to keep Will out of mischief as to keep him alive.  It is the very
+greatness of God that _He_ can attend to all the little things in the
+world at once.  They are all little things to Him.  Hast thou not heard
+that the Lord Jesus said the very hairs of our heads be numbered?"
+
+"Yea, Sir Thomas read that one eve at Ursula's."
+
+Sir Thomas Tye was the Vicar of Much Bentley.
+
+"Well," said Rose, "and isn't it of more importance to make Will a good
+lad than to know how many hairs he's got on his head?  Wouldn't thy
+father think so?"
+
+"For sure he would," said Cissy earnestly.
+
+"And isn't God thy Father?"
+
+Just as Rose asked that, a tall, dark figure turned out of a lane they
+were passing, and joined them.  It was growing dusk, but Rose recognised
+the Vicar of whom they had just been speaking.  Most priests were called
+"Sir" in those days.
+
+"Christ bless you, my children!" said the Vicar.
+
+Both Rose and Cissy made low courtesies, for great respect was then paid
+to a clergyman.  They called them priests, for very few could read the
+Bible, which tells us that the only priest is our Lord Jesus Christ.  A
+priest does not mean the same thing as a clergyman, though too many
+people thoughtlessly speak as if it did.  A priest is a man who offers a
+sacrifice of some living thing to God.  So, as Jesus Christ, who offered
+Himself, is our sacrifice, and there can never be any other, there
+cannot be any priests now.  There are a great many texts which tell us
+this, but I will only mention one, which you can look out in your Bibles
+and learn by heart: the tenth verse of the tenth chapter of the Epistle
+to the Hebrews.  It is easy to remember two tens.
+
+Cissy was a little frightened when she saw that Sir Thomas walked on
+with them; but Rose marched on as if she did not care whether he came or
+not.  For about a year after Queen Mary's accession Sir Thomas had come
+pretty regularly to the prayer-meetings which were held sometimes at the
+Blue Bell, and sometimes at Ursula Felstede's at Thorpe, and also
+sometimes at John Love's on the Heath.  He often read the Bible to them,
+and gave them little sermons, and seemed as kind and pleasant as
+possible.  But when Queen Mary had been about a year on the throne, and
+it could be plainly seen which way things were going--that is, that she
+would try to bring back the Popish religion which her brother had cast
+off--Sir Thomas began to come less often.  He found it too far to John
+Love's and to Thorpe; and whenever the meeting was at the Blue Bell,
+which was only a few hundred yards from the Vicarage,--well, it
+certainly was odd that Sir Thomas was always poorly on that night.
+Still, nobody liked to think that he was making believe; but Alice Mount
+said so openly, and Rose had heard her.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIVE.
+
+IN DIFFICULTIES.
+
+Cissy Johnson was not old enough to understand all the reasons why her
+father distrusted the priest; but she knew well that "Father didn't like
+him," and like the dutiful little girl she was, she was resolved not to
+make a friend of any one whom her father disliked, for she knew that he
+might have good reasons which she could not understand.  But Cissy had
+been taught to be civil to everybody, and respectful to her betters--
+lessons of which a little more would not hurt some folks in the present
+day.  People make a great mistake who think that you cannot both be
+respectful to others and independent for yourself.  The Bible teaches us
+to do both.  Being in this state of mind, Cissy was decidedly pleased to
+see her father coming up from the other end of the lane.
+
+"Oh, here's Father!" she said to Rose; and little Will ran on joyfully
+to meet him.
+
+"Well, my lad!" was Johnson's greeting to his boy.  "So thou and Cissy
+have got back?  It's a right long way for such as thou."
+
+Little Will suddenly remembered that he was exceedingly tired, and said
+so.
+
+"Thou'd better go to bed," said her father, as they came up with the
+girls.  "Well, Cis, who hast thou picked up?--I'm right thankful to
+you," he added, looking at Rose, "for giving my little maid a helping
+hand.  It's a long way for such little ones, all the way from the Heath,
+and a heavy load for little arms, and I'm main thankful.  Will you come
+in a bit and rest you?" he said to Rose.
+
+But Rose declined, for she knew her mother would expect her to come back
+at once.  She kissed Cissy, and told her, whenever she had a load to
+carry either way, to be sure she looked in at the Blue Bell, when Rose
+would help her if she possibly could: and giving the jar to Johnson, she
+bade him good-night, and turned back up the lane.  Sir Thomas had walked
+on, as Rose supposed: at any rate, he was not to be seen.  She went
+nearly a mile without seeing any one, until Margaret Thurston's cottage
+came in sight.  As Rose began to go a little more slowly, she heard
+footsteps behind her, and the next minute she was joined--to her
+surprise--by the priest.
+
+"My daughter," he said, in a soft, kind voice, "I think thou art Rose
+Allen?"
+
+Rose dropped a courtesy, and said she was.
+
+"I have been wishful to speak with some of thy father's household," said
+Sir Thomas, in the same gentle way: "so that I am fain to meet thee
+forth this even.  Tell me, my child, is there illness in the house or
+no?"
+
+Rose breathed quickly: she guessed pretty well what was coming.
+
+"No, Father," she answered; "we are all in good health, God be thanked
+for that same."
+
+"Truly.  I am glad to hear thee so speak, my daughter, and in especial
+that thou rememberest to thank God.  But wherefore, then, being in good
+health, have ye not come to give thanks to God in His own house, these
+eight Sundays past?  Ye have been regular aforetime, since ye were back
+from the Bishop's Court.  Surely it is not true--I do hope and trust it
+is not true, that ye be slipping yet again into your past evil ways of
+ill opinions and presumptuous sin?"
+
+The reason why the Mounts had not been to church was because the
+services were such as they could no longer join in.  Queen Mary had
+brought back the Popish mass, and all the images which King Edward had
+done away with; so that to go to church was not to worship God but to
+worship idols.  And so terrible was the persecution Mary had allowed to
+be set up, that the penalty for refusing to do this was to be burnt to
+death for what she called heresy.
+
+It was a terrible position for a young girl in which Rose Allen stood
+that night.  This man not only held her life in his hands, but also
+those of her mother and her step-father.  If he chose to inform against
+them, the end of it might be death by fire.  For one moment Rose was
+silent, during which she cried silently but most earnestly to God for
+wisdom and courage--wisdom to keep her from saying what might bring them
+into needless danger, and courage to stand true and firm to God and His
+truth.
+
+"Might I be so bold as to pray you, Father," she said at last, "to ask
+at my mother the cause of such absence from mass?  You wot I am but a
+young maid, and under direction of mine elders."
+
+Sir Thomas Tye smiled to himself.  He thought Rose a very cautious,
+prudent girl, who did not want to bring herself into trouble.
+
+"So be it, my daughter," said he in the same gentle way.  "Doubtless it
+was by direction of thine elders that then wert absent aforetime, ere ye
+were had up to the Bishop."
+
+He meant it as a question, by which he hoped to entangle poor Rose.  She
+was wise enough not to answer, but to let it pass as if he were merely
+giving his own opinion, about which she did not wish to say anything.
+
+"Crafty girl!" thought Sir Thomas.  Then he said aloud,--"The festival
+of our Lady cometh on apace: ye will surely have some little present for
+our blessed Lady?"
+
+The Virgin Mary was then called "Our Lady."
+
+"We be but poor folks," said Rose.  "Truly, I know ye be poor folks,"
+was the priest's reply.  "Yet even poor folks do oft contrive to
+pleasure their friends by some little present.  And if ye might bring no
+more than an handful of daisies from the field, yet is our Lady so
+gracious that she will deign to accept even so small an offering.  Ye
+need not be empty-handed."
+
+"I trust we shall do our duty," said poor Rose, in great perplexity.
+"Father, I cry you mercy if I stay me here, for I would fain speak with
+the woman of this cot."
+
+"So do, my daughter," was the soft reply, "and I will call here belike,
+for I do desire to speak with Thurston."  Poor Rose was at her wit's
+end.  Her little manoeuvre had not succeeded as she hoped.  She wanted
+to be rid of the unwelcome company of the priest; and now it seemed as
+if, by calling on Margaret Thurston instead of going straight home, she
+would only get more of it.  However, she must do it now.  She had
+nothing particular to say to Margaret, whom she had already seen that
+day, though her mother had said after Margaret was gone, that she wished
+she had told her something, and Rose meant to use this remark as
+furnishing an excuse.
+
+She tapped, lifted the latch, and went in, the priest following.
+
+John Thurston sat by the fire cutting clothes-pegs; Margaret was ironing
+clothes.  Thurston rose when he saw the priest, and both received him
+reverently.
+
+Feeling that her best chance of escaping the priest was to proceed
+immediately, Rose drew Margaret aside, and told her what her mother had
+said; but Margaret, who was rather fond of talking, had something to say
+too, and the precious minutes slid by.  Meanwhile the priest and
+Thurston went on with their conversation: and at last Rose, saying she
+really could not stay any longer, bade them good-bye, and went out.  But
+just as Margaret was opening the door to let her out, Sir Thomas said a
+few words in reply to Thurston, which Rose could not but overhear.
+
+"Oh, Master Clere is a worthy man enough.  If he hath gone somewhat
+astray in times past, that shall now be amended.  Mistress Cicely, too,
+is an honest woman that wist how to do her duty.  All shall be well
+there.  I trust, John Thurston, that thou shalt show thyself as wise and
+well ruled as he."
+
+Rose heard no more.  She passed out into the night, and ran nearly all
+the way home.
+
+"Why, Rose, how breathless art thou, maid!" said the other when she came
+in.
+
+"Well I may, Mother!" cried Rose.  "There is evil ahead for us, and that
+not a little.  Father Tye overtook me as I came back, and would know of
+me why we had not been to mass these eight Sundays; and I staved him
+off, and prayed him to ask of you.  And, Mother, he saith Master Clere
+the draper, though he have gone somewhat astray, is now returned to his
+duty, and you wot what that meaneth.  And I am feared for us, and Bessy
+too."
+
+"The good Lord have mercy on us!" said Alice Mount.
+
+"Amen!" responded William Mount gravely.  "But it had best be such mercy
+as He will, Alice, not such as we would.  On one matter I am resolved--I
+will sign no more submissions.  I fear we have done it once too often."
+
+"O Father, I'm so fain to hear you say it!" cried Rose.
+
+"Art thou so, daughter?" he answered a little sadly.  "Have a care thy
+quick tongue bring thee not into more trouble than need be.  Child, to
+refuse that submission may mean a fiery death.  And we may not--we must
+not--shrink from facing death for Him who passed through death for us.
+Lord, grant us Thy grace to stand true!"
+
+And William Mount stood up with uncovered head, and looked up, as we all
+do instinctively when we speak to Him who dwelleth in the heavens.
+
+"Who hath abolished death!" was the soft response of Alice.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIX.
+
+ROSE ASKS A FAVOUR.
+
+"You'll not find no better, search all Colchester through!" said Mrs
+Clere, to a fat woman who did not look particularly amiable, holding up
+some worsted florence, drab with a red stripe.
+
+"Well, I'm not so sure," replied the cross-looking customer.  "Tomkins,
+now, in Wye Street, they showed me some Kendal frieze thicker nor that,
+and a halfpenny less by the yard."
+
+"Tomkins!" said Mrs Clere, in a tone not at all flattering to the
+despised Tomkins.  "Why, if that man knows a Kendal frieze from a piece
+of black satin, it's all you can look for.  Never bred up to the
+business, _he_ wasn't.  And his wife's a poor good-for-nought that
+wouldn't know which end of the broom to sweep with, and his daughters
+idle, gossiping hussies that'll drive their husbands wild one o' these
+days.  Don't talk to me about Tomkins!"
+
+And Mrs Clere turned over the piece of florence as roughly as if it had
+been Tomkins instead of itself.
+
+"It was right good frieze," said the customer doubtfully.
+
+"Then you'd better go and buy it," snapped Mrs Clere, whom something
+seemed to have put out that morning, for she was generally
+better-tempered than that.
+
+"Well, but I'm not so sure," repeated the customer.  "It's a good step
+to Wye Street, and I've lost a bit o' time already.  If you'll take
+tenpence the ell, you may cut me off twelve."
+
+"Tenpence the fiddlesticks!" said Mrs Clere, pushing the piece of
+worsted to one side.  "I'll not take a farthing under the shilling, if
+you ask me while next week.  You can just go to Tomkins, and if you
+don't find you've got to darn his worthless frieze afore you've done
+making it up, why, my name isn't Bridget Clere, that's all.  Now, Rose
+Allen, what's wanting?"
+
+"An't please you, Mistress Clere, black serge for a girdle."
+
+"Suit yourself," answered Mistress Clere, giving three pieces of serge,
+which were lying on the counter, a push towards Rose.  "Well, Audrey
+Wastborowe, what are you standing there for?  Ben't you a-going to that
+Tomkins?"
+
+"Well, nay, I don't think I be, if you'll let me have that stuff at
+elevenpence the ell.  Come now, do 'ee, Mistress Clere!"
+
+"I'm not to be coaxed, I tell you.  Shilling an ell, and not a bit
+under."
+
+"Well! then I guess I shall be forced to pay it.  But you'll give me
+good measure?"
+
+"I'll give you as many ells as you give me shillings, and neither more
+nor less.  Twelve?  Very good."
+
+Mrs Clere measured off the florence, tied it up, received the twelve
+shillings, which Audrey drew from her pocket as slowly as possible,
+perhaps fancying that Mrs Clere might relent, and threw it into the
+till as if the coins were severely to blame for something.  Audrey took
+up her purchase, and went out.
+
+"Whatever's come to Mistress Clere?" asked a young woman who stood next
+to Rose, waiting to be served.  "She and Audrey Wastborowe's changed
+tempers this morrow."
+
+"Something's vexed her," said Rose.  "I'm sorry, for I want to ask her a
+favour, when I've done my business."
+
+"She's not in a mood for favour-granting," said the young woman.
+"That's plain.  You'd better let be while she's come round."
+
+"Nay, I can't let be," whispered Rose in answer.
+
+"Now or never, is it?  Well, I wish you well through it."
+
+Mistress Clere, who had been serving another customer with an ounce of
+thread--there were no reels of thread in those days; it was only sold in
+skeins or large hanks--now came to Rose and the other girl.
+
+"Good-morrow, Gillian Mildmay!  What's wanting?"
+
+"Good-morrow, Mistress Clere!  My mother bade me ask if you had a fine
+marble cloth, about five shillings the ell, for a bettermost gown for
+her."
+
+Mrs Clere spoke a little less crossly, but with a weary air.
+
+"Marbled cloth's not so much worn as it was," she said; "but I have a
+fair piece that may serve your turn.  It's more nor that, though.  I
+couldn't let it go under five and eightpence."
+
+"Mother'll want it better cheap than that," said Gillian.  "_I_ think
+that'll not serve her, Mistress Clere.  But I want a pair of tawny
+sleeves, an't like you, wrought with needlework."
+
+Sleeves, at this time, were not a part of the dress, but were buttoned
+in as the wearer chose to have them.  Gillian found these to suit her,
+paid for them, and went away.  Mrs Clere turned to Rose.
+
+"Now, then, do be hasteful, Rose Allen; I'm that weary!"
+
+"You seem so in truth, Mistress Clere.  I'm feared you've been
+overwrought," said Rose, in a sympathising tone.
+
+"Overwrought?  Ay, body and soul too," answered Mrs Clere, softening a
+little in response to Rose's tone.  "Well! folks know their own troubles
+best, I reckon, and it's no good harrying other folks with them.  What
+priced serge would you have?"
+
+"About eighteenpence, have you some?"
+
+"One and eightpence; and one and fourpence.  The one-and-fourpenny's
+right good, you'll find."
+
+"Thank you, I'll take the one-and-fourpenny: it'll be quite good enough
+for me.  Well, I was going to ask you a favour, Mistress Clere; but
+seeing you look so o'erwrought, I have no mind to it."
+
+"Oh, it's all in the day's work.  What would you?" asked Mrs Clere,
+rather more graciously.
+
+"Well, I scarce like to tell you; but I _was_ meaning to ask you the
+kindness, if you'd give leave for Bessy Foulkes to pass next saint's day
+afternoon with us.  If you could spare her, at least."
+
+"I can spare Bessy Foulkes uncommon well!" said Mrs Clere irascibly.
+
+"Why, Mistress Clere!  Has Bessy--" Rose began in an astonished tone.
+Mrs Clere's servant, Elizabeth Foulkes, was her dearest friend.
+
+"You'd best give Mistress Elizabeth Foulkes the go by, Rose Allen.
+She's a cantankerous, ill-beseen hussy, and no good company for you.
+She'll learn you to do as ill as herself, if you look not out."
+
+"But what has Bessy done?"
+
+"Gone into school-keeping," said Mrs Clere sarcastically.  "Expects her
+betters to go and learn their hornbook of her.  Set herself up to tell
+all the world their duty, and knows it a sight better than they do.
+That's what Mistress Elizabeth's done and doing.  Ungrateful hussy!"
+
+"I couldn't have thought it!" said Rose, in a tone of great surprise,
+mixed with disappointment.  "Bessy's always been so good a maid--"
+
+"Good! don't I tell you she's better than every body else?  Tell you
+what, Rose Allen, being good's all very well, but for a young maid to
+stick herself up to be better than her neighbours 'll never pay.  I
+don't hold with such doings.  If Bess'd be content to be the best cook,
+or the best cleaner, in Colchester, I'd never say nought to her; but
+she's not content; she'd fain be the best priest and the best
+school-master too.  And that isn't her work, preaching isn't; dressing
+meat and scouring pans and making beds is what she's called to, and not
+lecturing folks at Market Cross."
+
+"Has Bessy been preaching at the Market Cross?" asked Rose in genuine
+horror, for she took Mrs Clere's statements literally.
+
+"That's not while to-morrow," said Mrs Clere in the same sarcastic
+tone.  "She's giving the lecture at home first, to get perfect.  I
+promise you I'm just harried out of my life, what with one thing and
+another!"
+
+"Well, I'd like to speak with Bessy, if I might," said Rose in some
+perplexity.  "We've always been friends, Bessy and me; and maybe she'd
+listen to me--or, any ways, to Mother.  Could you kindly give leave for
+her to come, Mistress Clere?"
+
+"You may have her, and keep her, for all the good she is to me,"
+answered the clothier's wife, moving away.  "Mind she doesn't give you
+the malady, Rose Allen: that's all I say!  It's a fair infection going
+about, and the great doctors up to London 'll have to come down and look
+to it--see if they don't!  Oh, my lady can go if it like her--she's so
+grand now o' days I'm very nigh afeared of her.  Good-morrow!"
+
+And Rose went out with her parcel, lost in wonder as to what could be
+the matter--first with Mistress Clere, and then with her friend
+Elizabeth.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN.
+
+THE CLOUDS BEGIN TO GATHER.
+
+"Methinks that becomes me better.  What sayest thou, Bess?"
+
+Two girls were standing in an upper room of Nicholas Clere's house, and
+the younger asked this question of the elder.  The elder girl was tall,
+of stately carriage and graceful mien, with a very beautiful face: but
+her whole aspect showed that she thought nothing about herself, and
+never troubled her head to think whether she was pretty or ugly.  The
+younger, who was about seventeen, was not nearly so handsome; but she
+would have been pleasant enough to look at if it had not been for a
+silly simper and a look of intensely satisfied vanity, which quite
+spoiled any prettiness that she might have had.  She had just fastened a
+pair of ear-rings into her ears, and she was turning her head from one
+side to the other before the mirror, as she asked her companion's
+opinion of the ornaments.
+
+There are some savages--in Polynesia, I think--who decorate themselves
+by thrusting a wooden stick through their lips.  To our European taste
+they look hideous, honestly, I cannot see that they who make holes in
+their lips in order to ornament themselves are any worse at all than
+they who make holes in their ears for the same purpose.  The one is just
+as thorough barbarism as the other.
+
+When Amy Clere thus appealed to her to express an opinion, Elizabeth
+Foulkes looked up from her sewing and gave it.
+
+"No, Mistress Amy; I do scarce think it."
+
+"Why, wouldst thou better love these yellow ones?"
+
+"To speak truth, Mistress Amy, I think you look best without either."
+
+"Dear heart, to hear the maid!  Wouldst not thou fain have a pair,
+Bess?"
+
+"Nay, Mistress Amy, that would I not."
+
+"Wherefore?"
+
+"Because, as methinks, such tawdry gewgaws be unworthy a Christian
+profession.  If you desire my thought thereon, Mistress Amy, you have it
+now."
+
+"Forsooth, and thou mightest have kept it, for all I want of it.
+`Tawdry gewgaws,' indeed!  I tell thee, Bess; these be three shillings
+the pair."
+
+"They may be.  I would not pay three half-pence for them."
+
+"Bess, 'tis ten thousand pities thou art not a nun."
+
+"I would rather be what I am, Mistress."
+
+"I rather not be neither," said Amy flippantly.  In those days, they
+always put two nots together when they meant to speak strongly.  They
+did not see, as we do now, that the one contradicts the other.
+
+"Well, Mistress Amy, you have no need," said Elizabeth quietly.
+
+"And as to Christian profession--why, Bess, every lady in the land wears
+ear-rings, yea, up to the Queen's Grace herself.  Prithee who art thou,
+to set thee up for better than all the ladies in England, talking of
+Christian profession as though thou wert a priest?"
+
+"I am Mistress Clere's servant-maid; but I set not myself up to be
+better than any, so far as I know."
+
+"Thee hold thy peace!  Whether goeth this lace or the wide one best with
+my blue kirtle?"
+
+"The narrower, I would say.  Mistress Amy, shall you have need of me
+this next Wednesday afternoon?"
+
+"Why?  What's like to happen Wednesday afternoon?"
+
+"Saint Chrysostom's like to happen, an't please you; and Mistress
+granted me free leave to visit a friend, if so be you lacked me not."
+
+"What fashion of a friend, trow?  A jolly one?"  Elizabeth looked a
+little amused.
+
+"Scarce after your fashion, Mistress Amy."
+
+"What, as sad and sober as thyself?"
+
+"Well-nigh."
+
+"Then I'll not go with thee.  I mean to spend Saint Chrysostom with Mary
+Boswell and Lucy Cheyne, and their friends: and I promise thee we shall
+not have no sadness nor sedateness in the company."
+
+"That's very like," answered Elizabeth.
+
+"As merry as crickets, _we_ shall be.  Dost not long to come withal?"
+
+"I were liefer to visit Rose, if it liked you."
+
+"What a shame to call a sad maid by so fair a name!  Oh, thou canst go
+for all me.  Thy company's never so jolly I need shed tears to lose it."
+
+And with this rather uncomplimentary remark, Amy left the room, with the
+blue ear-rings in her ears and the yellow ones in her hand.  Elizabeth
+waited till her piece of work was finished.  Then folding it up and
+putting it away in a drawer, she ran down to prepare supper,--a task
+wherein Amy did not offer to help her, though it was usual then for the
+mistress of the house and her daughters to assist in the cooking.
+
+About two o'clock on the afternoon of the following Wednesday, a tap on
+the door of the Blue Bell called Rose to open it, and she greeted her
+friend Elizabeth with much pleasure.  Rose had finished her share of the
+household work (until supper), and she took her lace pillow and sat down
+in the window.  Elizabeth drew from her pocket a couple of nightcaps,
+and both girls set to work.  Mrs Mount was sewing also in the
+chimney-corner.
+
+"And how be matters in Colchester, Bess, at this present?"
+
+"The clouds be gathering for rain, or I mistake," said Elizabeth
+gravely.  "You know the thing I mean?"
+
+Alice Mount had put down her work, and she looked grave too.
+
+"Bess! you never mean we shall have last August's doings o'er again?"
+
+"That do I, Alice, and more.  I was last night at the King's Head, where
+you know they of our doctrine be wont to meet, and Master Pulleyne was
+there, that good man that was sometime chaplain to my Lady's Grace of
+Suffolk: he mostly puts up at the King's Head when he cometh to town.
+And quoth he, `There shall shortly be another search made for Gospel
+books,--ay, and Gospellers belike: and they be not like to 'scape so
+well as they did last year.'  And John Love saith--he was there, John
+Love of the Heath; you know him?--well, he saith he heard Master Simnel
+the bailiff to swear that the great Doctors of Colchester should find it
+warm work ere long.  There's an ill time coming, friends.  Take you
+heed."
+
+"The good Lord be our aid, if so be!" said Alice.
+
+"But what shall Master Clere do, Bessy?" asked Rose.  "He hath ever been
+a Gospeller."
+
+"He hath borne the name of one, Rose.  God knoweth if he be true.  I'm
+'feared--"
+
+Elizabeth stopped suddenly.
+
+"That he'll not be staunch?" said Alice.
+
+"He is my master, and I will say no more, Alice.  But this may I say--
+there's many in Colchester shall bear faggots ere they burn.  Ay, and
+all over England belike."
+
+Those who recanted had to carry a faggot, as if owning themselves worthy
+to be burned.
+
+"Thou'rt right there, Bess.  The Lord deliver us!"
+
+"Some thinketh we have been too bold of late.  You see, John Love coming
+home again, and nothing done to him, made folks think the worst was
+over."
+
+"Isn't it then?" said Rose.
+
+"Master Benold says he misdoubts if 'tis well begun."
+
+"Master Benold the chandler?"
+
+"Of East Hill--ay.  He was at the King's Head last night.  So was old
+Mistress Silverside, and Mistress Ewring the miller's wife, and
+Johnson--they call him Alegar--down at Thorpe."
+
+"Call him Alegar! what on earth for?" asked Rose indignantly.
+
+Elizabeth laughed.  "Well, they say he's so sour.  He'll not dance, nor
+sing idle songs, nor play quoits and bowls, but loveth better to sit at
+home and read; so they call him Alegar."
+
+Alegar is malt vinegar; the word vinegar was then used only of white
+wine vinegar.
+
+"He's not a bit sour!" cried Rose.  "I've seen him with his little lad
+and lass; and right good to them he was.  It's a shame to call folks
+names that don't fit them!"
+
+"Nay, I don't call him no names, but other folks do.  Did you know his
+wife, that died six months gone?"
+
+"No, but I've heard her well spoken of."
+
+"Then you've heard truth.  Those children lost a deal when they lost
+her, and so did poor Johnson.  Well, he'll never see her burn: that's
+one good thing!"
+
+"Ay," said Alice, "and that's what he said himself when she died.  Well,
+God help us to stand firm!  Have you been asked any questions, Bess?"
+
+"Not yet," said Elizabeth quietly, "but I look for it every day.  Have
+you?"
+
+"Not I; but our Rose here foregathered with the priest one even of late,
+and he was set to know why we came not to church these eight weeks past.
+She parried his darts right well; but I look to hear more thereabout."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT.
+
+NOT A BIT AFEARD.
+
+Alice Mount had only just spoken when the latch was lifted by Margaret
+Thurston.
+
+"Pray you, let me come in and get my breath!" said she; "I'm that
+frighted I can scarce stand."
+
+"Come in, neighbour, and welcome," replied Alice; and Rose set a chair
+for Margaret.  "What ails you? is there a mad bull about, or what?"
+
+"Mad bull, indeed!  A mad bull's no great shakes.  Not to him, any way."
+
+"Well, I'd as soon not meet one in our lane," said Alice; "but who's
+_him_?"
+
+"_Him's_ the priest, be sure!  Met me up at top o' the lane, he did, and
+he must needs turn him round and walk by me.  I well-nigh cracked my
+skull trying to think of some excuse to be rid of him; but no such luck
+for me!  On he came till we reached hither, and then I could bear no
+more, and I said I had to see you.  He said he went about to see you
+afore long, but he wouldn't come in to-day; so on he marched, and right
+thankful was I, be sure.  Eh, the things he asked me!  I've not been so
+hauled o'er the coals this year out."
+
+"But what about, marry?"
+
+"Gramercy! wherefore I came not to mass, and why Master didn't: and what
+I believed and didn't believe, and wherefore I did this and didn't do
+that, till I warrant you, afore he left off, I was that moithered I
+couldn't have told what I did believe.  I got so muggy I only knew one
+thing under the sun, and that was that I'd have given my best gown for
+to be rid of him."
+
+"Well, you got free without your best gown, Margaret," said Rose.
+
+"May be I have, but I feel as if I'd left all my wits behind me in the
+lane, or mayhap in the priest's pocket.  Whatever would the man be at?
+We pay our dues to the Church, and we're honest, peaceable folks: if it
+serve us better to read our Bible at home rather than go look at him
+hocus-pocussing in the church, can't he let us be?  Truly, if he'd give
+us something when we came, there'd be some reason for finding fault;
+nobody need beg me to go to church when there's sermon: but what earthly
+good can it do any mortal man to stare at a yellow cross on Father Tye's
+back?  And what good do you ever get beyond it?"
+
+Sermons have always been a Protestant institution, in this sense, that
+the more pure and Scriptural the Church has been, the more sermons there
+have generally been, while whenever the clergy have taken up with
+foolish ceremonies and have departed from the Bible, they have tried to
+do away with preaching.  And of course, when very few people could read
+their Bibles, there was more need of preaching than there is now, when
+nearly everybody can read.  Very, very few poor people could read a word
+in 1556.  It was put down as something remarkable, in the case of
+Cissy's father, that he could "read a little."  Saint Paul says that it
+pleased God by preaching to save them that believe (1 Corinthians one
+21), but he never says "by hearing music," or "by looking at flowers, or
+candles, or embroidered crosses."  Those things can only amuse our eyes
+and ears; they will never do our souls any good.  How can they?  The
+only thing that will do good to our souls is to get to know God better:
+and flowers, candles, music, and embroidery, cannot teach us anything
+about God.
+
+"What laugh you at, Rose?" asked Elizabeth.
+
+"Only Margaret's notion that it could do no man good to stare at the
+cross on Father Tye's back," said Rose, trying to recover her gravity.
+
+"Well, the only animal made with a cross on his back is an ass," said
+Margaret; "and one would think a man should be better than an ass; but
+if his chief business be to make himself look like one, I don't see that
+he is so much better."
+
+This amused Rose exceedingly.  Elizabeth Foulkes, though the same age as
+Rose, was naturally of a graver turn of mind, and she only smiled.
+
+"Well! if I haven't forgot all I was charged with, I'd better give my
+message," said Margaret; "but Father Tye's well-nigh shook all my wits
+out of my head.  Robin Purcas came by this morrow, and he lifted the
+latch, and gave me a word from Master Benold, that I was to carry on--
+for he's got a job of work at Saint Osyth, and won't be back while
+Friday--saith he, on Friday even, Master Pulleyne and the Scots priest,
+that were chaplains to my Lady of Suffolk, shall be at the King's Head,
+and all of our doctrine that will come to hear shall be welcome.  Will
+you go?"
+
+"Verily, that will I," replied Alice heartily.
+
+"You see, if Father Tye should stir up the embers and get all alight
+again, maybe we shalln't have so many more sermons afterward; so we'd
+best get our good things while we can."
+
+"Ay, there may be a famine of hearing the words of the Lord," said Alice
+gravely.  "God avert the same, if His will is!"
+
+"Johnson, he says he's right sure Master Simnel means to start of his
+inquirations.  Alice, think you you could stand firm?"
+
+Alice Mount sighed and half shook her head.  "I didn't stand over firm
+last August, Margaret," said she: "and only the Lord knows how I've
+since repented it.  If He'll keep me true--but I'm feared of myself."
+
+"Well, do you know I'm not a bit feared?  It's true, I wasn't tried in
+August, when you were: but if I had been, be sure I'd never have signed
+that submission that you did.  I wouldn't, so!"
+
+"Maybe not, neighbour," answered Alice meekly.  "I was weak."
+
+"Now, Mother," said Rose, who could bear no longer, "you know you stood
+forth best of anybody there!  It was Father that won her to sign,
+Margaret; she never would have done it if she'd been left to herself.  I
+know she wouldn't."
+
+"Then what didst thou sign for, Rose?" was the reply.
+
+Rose went the colour of her name.  Her mother came at once to her help,
+as Rose had just done to hers.
+
+"Why, she signed because we did, like a dutiful maid as she is alway:
+and it was our faults, Margaret.  May God forgive us!"
+
+"Well, but after all, it wasn't so very ill, was it?" asked Margaret,
+rather inconsistently with what she had said before: but people are not
+always consistent by any means.  "Did you promise anything monstrous
+wrong?  I thought it was only to live as became good Christians and
+faithful subjects."
+
+"Nay, Meg, it was more than that.  We promised right solemnly to submit
+us to the Church in all matters, and specially in this, that we did
+believe the Sacrament to be Christ's body, according to His words."
+
+"Why, so do we all believe," said Margaret, "_according to His words_.
+Have you forgot the tale Father Tye did once tell us at the King's Head,
+of my Lady Elizabeth the Queen's sister, that when she was asked what
+she did believe touching the Sacrament, she made this answer?
+
+  "`Christ was the Word that spake it,
+  He took the bread, and brake it;
+  And what that word did make it,
+  That I believe, and take it.'"
+
+"That was a bit crafty, methinks," said Rose.  "I love not such shifts.
+I would rather speak out my mind plainly."
+
+"Ay, but if you speak too plainly, you be like to find you in the wrong
+place," answered Margaret.
+
+"That would not be the wrong place wherein truth set me," was Rose's
+earnest answer.  "That were never the wrong place wherein God should be
+my company.  And if the fire were too warm for my weakness to bear, the
+holy angels should maybe fan me with their wings till I came to the
+covert of His Tabernacle."
+
+"Well, that's all proper pretty," said Margaret, "and like a book as
+ever the parson could talk: but I tell thee what, Rose Allen, thou'lt
+sing another tune if ever thou come to Smithfield.  See if thou
+doesn't."
+
+And Rose answered, "`The word that God putteth in my mouth, that will I
+speak.'"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINE.
+
+COME TO THE PREACHING.
+
+"Dorothy Denny, art thou never going to set that kettle on?"
+
+"Oh, deary me! a body never has a bit of peace!"
+
+"That's true enough of me, but it's right false of thee.  Thou's nought
+but peace all day long, for thou never puts thyself out.  I dare be
+bounden, if the Queen's Grace and all her noble company were to sup in
+this kitchen at five o' the clock, I should come in and find never a
+kettle nor a pan on at the three-quarter past.  If thy uncle wasn't a
+sloth, and thine aunt a snail, I'm not hostess of the King's Head at
+Colchester, thou'rt no more worth thy salt--nay, salt, forsooth! thou'rt
+not worth the water.  Salt's one and fourpence the raser, and that's a
+deal too much to give for thee.  Now set me the kettle on, and then teem
+out that rubbish in the yard, and run to the nests to see if the hens
+have laid: don't be all day and night about it!  Run, Doll!--Eh deary
+me!  I might as well have said, Crawl.  There she goes with the lead on
+her heels!  If these maids ben't enough to drive an honest woman crazy,
+my name's not Philippa Wade."
+
+And Mistress Wade began to put things tidy in the kitchen with a
+promptitude and celerity which Dorothy Denny certainly did not seem
+likely to imitate.  She swept up the hearth, set a chair before the
+table, fresh sanded the floor and arranged the forms in rows, before
+Dorothy reappeared, carefully carrying something in her apron.
+
+"Why, thou doesn't mean to say thou'st done already?" inquired her
+mistress sarcastically.  "Thou'st been all across the yard while I've
+done no more than sand the floor and side things for the gathering.
+What's that in thine apron? one of the Queen's Majesty's jewels?"
+
+"It's an _egg_, Mistress."
+
+"An egg! an _egg_?" demanded Mrs Wade, with a burst of hearty laughter;
+for she laughed, as she did everything else, with all her might.  "Is
+that all thou'st got by thy journey?  Marry, but I would have tarried
+another day, and fetched two!  Poor Father Pulleyne! so he's but to have
+one _egg_ to his supper?  If them hens have laid no more, I'm a
+Dutchwoman!  See thou, take this duster, and dust the table and forms,
+and I'll go and search for eggs.  If ever a mortal woman--"
+
+Mistress Wade was in the yard before she got further, and Dorothy was
+left to imagine the end of the sentence.  Before that leisurely young
+woman had finished dusting the first form, the landlady reappeared with
+an apronful of eggs.
+
+"I marvel whither thou wentest for thy _egg_, Doll.  Here be eighteen
+thou leftest for me to gather.  It's no good to bid thee be 'shamed, for
+thou dost not know how, I should in thy place, I'll warrant thee.
+Verily, I do marvel whatever the world's a-coming to!"
+
+Before Mrs Wade had done more than empty her apron carefully of the
+eggs, a soft rap came on the door; and she called out,--
+
+"Come within!"
+
+"Please, I can't reach," said a little voice.
+
+"Open the door, Doll," said Mrs Wade; and in came three children--a
+girl of nine, a boy of six, and a baby in the arms of the former.
+
+"Well, what are you after?  Come for skim milk!  I've none this even."
+
+"No, please.  Please, we're come to the preaching."
+
+"_You're_ come to the preaching?  Why, you're only as big as mice, the
+lot of you.  Whence come you?"
+
+"Please, we've come from Thorpe."
+
+"You've come from Thorpe! you poor little bits of things!  All that
+way!" cried Mrs Wade, whose heart was as large as her tongue was ready.
+"Why, I do believe you're Cicely Johnson.  You are so grown I didn't
+know you at first--and yet you're no bigger than a mouse, as I told you.
+Have you had any supper?"
+
+"No, Mistress.  Please, we don't have supper, only now and then.  We
+shall do very well, indeed, if we may stay for the preaching."
+
+"You'll sit down there, and eat some bread and milk, before you're an
+hour older.  Poor little white-faced mortals as ever I did see!  But
+you've never carried that child all the way from Thorpe?--Doll didst
+ever see such children?"
+
+"They're proper peaked, Mistress," said Dorothy.  [See note 1.]
+
+"Oh no!" answered the truth-loving Cissy.  "I only carried her from the
+Gate.  Neighbour Ursula, she bare her all the way."
+
+"Thou'rt an honest lass," said Mrs Wade, patting Cissy on the head.
+"There, eat that."
+
+And she put a large slice of bread into the hand of both Will and Cissy,
+setting a goodly bowl of milk on the table between them.
+
+"That's good!" commented Will, attacking the milk-bowl immediately.
+
+Cissy held him back, and looked up into Mrs Wade's kindly and capacious
+face.
+
+"But please we haven't got any money," she said anxiously.
+
+"Marry come up! to think I'd take money from such bits of things as you!
+I want no money, child.  The good Lord, He pays such bills as yours.
+And what set you coming to the preaching?  Did your father bid you?"
+[See Note 2.]
+
+"Father likes us to come," said Cissy, when her thanks had been properly
+expressed; "but he didn't bid us--not to-night.  Mother, she said we
+must always come if we could.  I'm feared Baby won't understand much:
+but Will and me, we'll try."
+
+"I should think not!" replied Mrs Wade, laughing.  "Why, if you and
+Will can understand aught that'll be as much as need be looked for.  How
+much know you about it?"
+
+"Please, we know about the Lord Jesus," said Cissy, putting her hands
+together, as if she were going to say her prayers.  "We know that He
+died on the cross for us, so that we should not be punished for our
+sins, and He sends the Holy Ghost to make us good, and the Bible, which
+is God's Word, and we mustn't let anybody take it away from us."
+
+"Well, if you know that much in your little hearts, you'll do," said the
+landlady.  "There's many a poor heathen doesn't know half as much as
+that.  Ay, child, you shall 'bide for the preaching if you want, but
+you're too soon yet.  You've come afore the parson.  Eat your bread and
+milk up, and 'bide where you are; that's a snug little corner for you,
+where you'll be warm and safe.  Is Father coming too, and Neighbour
+Ursula?"
+
+"Yes, they're both coming presently," said Cissy.
+
+The next arrival was that of two gentlemen, the preacher and a friend.
+After this people began to drop in, at first by twos and threes, and as
+the time drew near, with more rapidity.  The Mounts and Rose Allen came
+early; Elizabeth Foulkes was late, for she had hard work to get away at
+all.  Last of anybody was Margaret Thurston and with her a tall,
+strong-looking man, who was John Thurston, her husband.  John Johnson
+found out the corner where his children were, and made his way to them;
+but Rose Allen had been before him, and was seated next to Cissy,
+holding the little hand in hers.  On the other side of little Will sat
+an old lady with grey hair, and a very sweet, kind face.  She was Mrs
+Silverside, the widow of a priest.  By her was Mrs Ewring the miller's
+wife, who was a little deaf, and wanted to get near the preacher.
+
+When the room was full, Mr Pulleyne, who was to preach that evening,
+rose and came forward to the table, and gave out the Forty-Second Psalm.
+
+They had no hymn-books, as we have.  There were just a few hymns,
+generally bound up at the end of the Prayer-Book, which had been written
+during the reign of good King Edward the Sixth; but hardly any English
+hymns existed at all then.  They had one collection of metrical Psalms--
+that of Sternhold and Hopkins, of which we never sing any now except the
+Hundredth--that version known to every one, beginning--
+
+"All people that on earth do dwell."
+
+The Psalms they sang then sound strange to us now but we must remember
+they did not sound at all strange to those who sang them.  Here are two
+verses of the Forty-Second.
+
+  "Like as the hart doth pant and bray,
+  The well-springs to obtain,
+  So doth my soul desire alway
+  With Thee, Lord, to remain.
+  My soul doth thirst, and would draw near
+  The living God of might;
+  Oh, when shall I come and appear
+  In presence of His sight!
+
+  "The tears all times are my repast,
+  Which from mine eyes do slide;
+  Whilst wicked men cry out so fast,
+  `Where now is God thy Guide?'
+  Alas! what grief is it to think
+  The freedom once I had!
+  Therefore my soul, as at pit's brink,
+  Most heavy is and sad."
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Note 1.  Peaked: Very thin and pinched-looking.
+
+Note 2.  Come up.  An exclamation of surprise, then often used.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TEN.
+
+BROUGHT OUT, TO BE BROUGHT IN.
+
+Loud and full rang the volume of voices in the kitchen of the King's
+Head at Colchester, that winter evening.  They did not stand up in
+silence and let a choir do it for them, while they listened to it as
+they might to a German band, and with as little personal concern.  When
+men's hearts are warm with patriotism, or overflowing with loyalty, they
+don't want somebody else to sing _Rule, Britannia_, or _God Save the
+Queen_; the very enjoyment lies in doing it themselves.  Nobody would
+dream of paying another person to go to a party or to see a royal
+procession for him.  Well, then, when we prefer to keep silent, and hear
+somebody sing God's praises instead of doing it ourselves, what can it
+mean except that our Hearts are not warm with love and overflowing with
+thankfulness, as they ought to be?  And cold hearts are not the stuff
+that makes martyrs.
+
+There was plenty of martyr material in the King's Head kitchen that
+night--from old Agnes Silverside to little Cissy Johnson; from the
+learned priest, Mr Pulleyne, to many poor men and women who did not
+know their letters.  They were not afraid of what people would say, nor
+even of what people might do.  And yet they knew well that it was
+possible, and even likely, that very terrible things might be done to
+them.  Their feeling was,--Well, let them be done, if that be the best
+way I can glorify God.  Let them be done, if it be the way in which I
+can show that I love Jesus Christ.  Let them be done, if by suffering
+with Him I can win a place nearer to Him, and send a thrill of happiness
+to the Divine and human heart of the Saviour who paid His heart's blood
+to ransom me.
+
+So the hymn was not at all too long for them, though it had fifteen
+verses; and the sermon was not too long, though it lasted an hour and a
+half.  When people have to risk their lives to hear a sermon is not the
+time when they cry out to have sermons cut shorter.  They very well knew
+that before another meeting took place at the King's Head, some, and
+perhaps all of them, might be summoned to give up liberty and life for
+the love of the Lord Jesus.
+
+Mr Pulleyne took for his text a few words in the 23rd verse of the
+sixth chapter of Deuteronomy.  "He brought us out from thence, that He
+might bring us in."  He said to the people:--
+
+"`He brought us out'--who brought us?  God, our Maker; God, that loved
+the world.  `He brought us out'--who be we?  Poor, vile, wicked sinners,
+worms of the earth, things that He could have crushed easier than I can
+crush a moth.  From whence?  From Egypt, the house of bondage; from sin,
+self, Satan--the only three evil things there be: whereby I mean,
+necessarily inwardly, utterly evil.  Thence He brought us out.  Friends,
+we must come out of Egypt; out from bondage; out of these three ill
+things, sin, and self, and Satan: God will have us out.  He will not
+suffer us to tarry in that land.  And if we slack [Hesitate, feel
+reluctant] to come out, He will drive us sharp thence.  Let us come out
+quick, and willingly.  There is nothing we need sorrow to leave behind;
+only the task-master, Satan; and the great monster, sin; and the slime
+of the river wherein he lieth hid, self.  He will have at us with his
+ugly jaws, and bite our souls in twain, if we have not a care.  Let us
+run fast from this land where we leave behind such evil things.
+
+"But see, there is more than this.  God had an intent in thus driving us
+forth.  He did not bring us out, and leave us there.  Nay, `He brought
+us out that He might bring us in.'  In where?  Into the Holy Land, that
+floweth with milk and honey; the fair land where nothing shall enter
+that defileth; the safe land where in all the holy mountain nothing
+shall hurt nor destroy; His own land, where He hath His Throne and His
+Temple, and is King and Father of them that dwell therein.  Look you, is
+not this a good land?  Are you not ready to go and dwell therein?  Do
+not the clusters of its grapes--the hearing of its glories--make your
+mouths water?  See what you shall exchange: for a cruel task-master, a
+loving Father; for a dread monster, an holy City; for the base and ugly
+slime of the river, the fair paving of the golden streets, and the soft
+waving of the leaves of the tree of life, and the sweet melody of angel
+harps.  Truly, I think this good barter.  If a man were to exchange a
+dead rat for a new-struck royal, [see Note 1] men would say he had well
+traded, he had bettered himself, he was a successful merchant.  Lo, here
+is worse than a dead rat, and better than all the royals in the King's
+mint.  Will ye not come and trade?
+
+"Now, friends, ye must not misconceive me, as though I did mean that men
+could buy Heaven by their own works.  Nay, Heaven and salvation be free
+gifts--the glorious gifts of a glorious God, and worthy of the Giver.
+But when such gifts are set before you but for the asking, is it too
+much that ye should rise out of the mire and come?
+
+"`He brought them out, that He might bring them in.'  He left them not
+in the desert, to find their own way to the Holy Land.  Marry, should
+they ever have come there?  I trow not.  Nay, no more than a babe of a
+month old, if ye set him down at Bothal's Gate, could find his way to
+the Moot Hall.  But He dealt not with them thus.  He left them not to
+find their own way.  He brought them, He led them, He showed them where
+to plant their feet, first one step, then another, as mothers do to a
+child when he learneth first to walk.  `As a nurse cherisheth her
+children,' the Apostle saith he dealt with his converts: and the Lord
+useth yet tenderer image, for `as a mother comforteth her babe,' saith
+He, `will I comfort you.'  Yea, He bids the Prophet Esaias to learn
+them, `line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a
+little'--look you, how careful is God of His nurse-children.  `Feed My
+Lambs,' saith He: and lambs may not nibble so hard as sheep.  They take
+not so full a mouthful; they love the short grass, that is sweet and
+easily cropped.  We be all lambs afore we be sheep.  Sheep lack much
+shepherding, but lambs yet more.  Both be silly things, apt to stray
+away, and the wolf catcheth them with little trouble.  Now, if a dog be
+lost, he shall soon find his way back; but a lamb and a babe, if they be
+lost, they are utterly lost; they can never find the way.  Look you, the
+Lord likeneth His people to lambs and babes, these silly things that be
+continually lost, and have no wit to find the way.  So, brethren, _He_
+finds the way.  He goeth after that which is lost, until He find it.
+First He finds the poor silly lamb, and then He leadeth it in the way
+wherein it shall go.  He `brings us in' to the fair green pastures and
+by the still waters--brings us in to the safe haven where the little
+boats lie at rest--brings us in to the King's banquet-hall where the
+feast is spread, and the King Himself holdeth forth hands of welcome.--
+He stretched not forth the cold sceptre; He giveth His own hand--that
+hand that was pierced for our sins.  What say I?  Nay, `He shall gird
+Himself, and shall come forth and serve them'--so great honour shall
+they attain which serve God, as to have Him serve them.
+
+"Now, brethren, is this not a fair lot that God appointeth for His
+people?  A King to their guide, and a throne to their bed, and angels to
+their serving-men--verily these be folks of much distinction that be so
+served!  But, look you, there is one little point we may not miss--`If
+we suffer, we shall reign.'  There is the desert to be passed.  There is
+the Jordan to be forded.  There is the cross to bear for the Master that
+bare the cross for us.  Yea, we shall best bear our cross by looking
+well and oft on His cross.  Ah! brethren, He standeth close beside; He
+hath borne it all; He knoweth where the nails run, and in what manner
+they hurt.  Yet a little patience, poor suffering soul! yet a little
+courage; yet a little stumbling over the rough stones of the wilderness:
+and then the Golden City, and the royal banquet-hall, and the King that
+brought us out despite all the Egyptians, that brought us in despite all
+the dangers of the desert,--the King, our Shield, and Guide, and Father,
+shall come forth and serve us."
+
+Old Agnes Silverside, the priest's widow, sat with her hands clasped,
+and her eyes fixed on the preacher.  As he ended, she laid her hand upon
+Rose Allen's.
+
+"My maid," she said, "never mind the wilderness.  The stones be sharp,
+and the sun scorching, and the thirst sore: but one sight of the King in
+the Golden City shall make up for all!"
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Note 1.  Ten shillings; this was then the largest coin made.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ELEVEN.
+
+UNEXPECTED LODGINGS.
+
+"Now then, who goes home?" cried the cheerful voice of Mrs Wade, when
+the sermon was over.  "You, Mistress Benold?--you, Alice Mount?--you,
+Meg Thurston?  You'd best hap your mantle well about your head.
+Mistress Silverside, this sharp even: yon hood of yours is not so thick,
+and you are not so young as you were once.  Now, Adrian Purcas, thee be
+off with Johnson and Mount; thou'rt not for my money.  Agnes Love,
+woman, I wonder at you! coming out of a November night with no thicker a
+mantle than that old purple thing, that I'm fair tired of seeing on you.
+What's that?  `Can't afford a new one?'  Go to Southampton!  There's
+one in my coffer that I never use now.  Here, Doll! wherever is that
+lazy bones?  Gather up thy heels, wilt thou, and run to my great oak
+coffer, and bring yon brown hood I set aside.  Now don't go and fetch
+the red one! that's my best Sunday gear, and thou'rt as like to bring
+red when I tell thee brown as thou art to eat thy supper.--Well, Alice?"
+
+"I cry you mercy, Hostess, for troubling of you; but Master and me,
+we're bidden to lie at the mill.  Mistress Ewring's been that good; but
+there's no room for Rose, and--"
+
+"Then Rose can turn in with Dorothy, and I'm fain on't if she'll give
+her a bit of her earnestness for pay.  There's not as much lead to her
+heels in a twelvemonth as would last Doll a week.--So this is what thou
+calls a brown hood, is it?  I call it a blue apron.  Gramercy, the
+stupidness o' some folks!"
+
+"Please you, Mistress, there was nought but that in the coffer."
+
+"What coffer?"
+
+"The walnut, in the porch-chamber."
+
+"Well, if ever I did!  I never spake a word of the walnut coffer, nor
+the porch-chamber neither, I told thee the great oak coffer, and that's
+in my chamber, as thou knows, as well as thou knows thy name's Dorothy.
+Put that apron back where thou found it, and bring me the brown hood
+from the oak coffer.  Dear heart, but she'll go and cast her eyes about
+for an oak hood in a brown coffer, as like as not!  She's that heedless.
+It's not for lack of wit; she could if she would.--Why, what's to be
+done with yon little scraps!  You can never get home to Thorpe such a
+night as this.  Johnson! you leave these bits o' children with me, and
+I'll send them back to you to-morrow when the cart goes your way for a
+load of malt.  There's room enough for you; you'd all pack in a thimble,
+well-nigh.--Nay, now! hast thou really found it?  Now then, Agnes Love,
+cast that over you, and hap it close to keep you warm.  Pay! bless the
+woman, I want no pay! only some day I'd like to hear `Inasmuch' said to
+me.  Good even!"
+
+"You'll hear that, Mistress Wade!" said Agnes Love, a pale quiet-looking
+woman, with a warm grasp of Mistress Wade's hand.  "You'll hear that,
+and something else, belike--as we've heard to-night, the King will come
+forth and serve you.  Eh, but it warms one's heart to hear tell of it!"
+
+"Ay, it doth, dear heart, it doth!  Good-night, and God bless thee!
+Now, Master Pulleyne, I'll show you your chamber, an' it like you.  Rose
+Allen, you know the way to Dorothy's loft?  Well, go you up, and take
+the little ones with you.  It's time for babes like them to be abed.
+Doll will show you how to make up a bed for them.  Art waiting for some
+one, Bessy?"
+
+"No, Mistress Wade," said Elizabeth Foulkes, who had stood quietly in a
+corner as though she were; "but if you'd kindly allow it, I'd fain go up
+too and have a chat with Rose.  My mistress gave me leave for another
+hour yet."
+
+"Hie thee up, good maid, and so do," replied Mrs Wade cheerily, taking
+up a candlestick to light Mr Pulleyne to the room prepared for him,
+where, as she knew from past experience, he was very likely to sit at
+study till far into the night.
+
+Dorothy lighted another candle, and offered it to Rose.
+
+"See, you'll lack a light," said she.
+
+"Nay, not to find our tongues," answered Rose, smiling.
+
+"Ah, but to put yon children abed.  Look you in the closet, Rose, as you
+go into the loft, and you'll see a mattress and a roll of blankets, with
+a canvas coverlet that shall serve them.  You'll turn in with me."
+
+"All right, Doll; I thank you."
+
+"You look weary, Doll," said Elizabeth.
+
+"Weary?  Eh, but if you dwelt with our mistress, you'd look weary, be
+sure.  She's as good a woman as ever trod shoe-leather, only she's so
+monstrous sharp.  She thinks you can be there and back before you've
+fair got it inside your head that you're to go.  I marvel many a time
+whether the angels 'll fly fast enough to serve her when she gets to
+Heaven.  Marry come up but they'll have to step out if they do."
+
+Rose laughed, and led the way upstairs, where she had been several times
+before.
+
+Inns at that time were built like Continental country inns are now,
+round a square space, with a garden inside, and a high archway for the
+entrance, so high that a load of hay could pass underneath.  There were
+no inside stairs, but a flight led up to the second storey from the
+courtyard, and a balcony running all round the house gave access to the
+bedrooms.  Rose, however, went into none of the rooms, but made her way
+to one corner, where a second steep flight of stairs ran straight up
+between the walls.  These the girls mounted, and at the top entered a
+low door, which led into a large, low room, lighted by a skylight, and
+occupied by little furniture.  At the further end was a good-sized bed
+covered with a patchwork quilt, but without any hangings--the absence of
+these indicating either great poverty or extremely low rank.  There was
+neither drawers, dressing-table, nor washstand.  A large chest beside
+the bed held all Dorothy's possessions, and a leaf-table which would let
+down was fixed to the wall under a mirror.  A form in one corner, and
+two stools, made up the rest of the furniture.  In a corner close to the
+entrance stood another door, which Rose opened after she had set up the
+leaf-table and put the candle upon it.  Then, with Elizabeth's help, she
+dragged out a large, thick straw mattress, and the blankets and coverlet
+of which Dorothy had spoken, and made up the bed in one of the
+unoccupied corners.  A further search revealed a bolster, but no pillows
+were forthcoming.  That did not matter, for they expected none.
+
+"Now then, children, we'll get you into bed," said Rose.
+
+"Will must say his prayers first," said Cissy anxiously.
+
+"Of course.  Now, Will, come and say thy prayers, like a good lad."
+
+Will knelt down beside the bed, and did as he was told in a shrill,
+sing-song voice.  Odd prayers they were; but in those days nobody knew
+any better, and most children were taught to say still queerer things.
+First came the Lord's Prayer: so far all was right.  Then Will repeated
+the Ten Commandments and the Creed, which are not prayers at all, and
+finished with this formula:--
+
+  "Matthew, Mark, Luke and John,
+  Bless the bed that I lie on:
+  Four corners to my bed,
+  Four angels at their head;
+  One to read, and one to write,
+  And one to guard my bed at night.
+
+  "And now I lay me down to sleep,
+  I pray that Christ my soul may keep;
+  If I should die before I wake,
+  I pray that Christ my soul may take;
+  Wake I at morn, or wake I never,
+  I give my soul to Christ for ever."
+
+After this strange jumble of good things and nonsense, Will jumped into
+bed, where the baby was already laid.  It was Cissy's turn next.  Ever
+since it had been so summarily arranged by Mrs Wade that the children
+were to stay the night at the King's Head, Cissy had been looking
+preternaturally solemn.  Now, when she was desired to say her prayers,
+as a prelude to going to bed, Cissy's lip quivered, and her eyes filled
+with tears.
+
+"Why, little maid, what ails thee?" asked Rose.
+
+"It's Father," said Cissy, in an unsteady voice.  "I don't know however
+Father will manage without me.  He'll have to dress his own supper.  I
+only hope he'll leave the dish for me to wash when I get home.  No body
+never put Father and me asunder afore!"
+
+"Little maid," answered Elizabeth, "Mistress Wade meant to save thee the
+long walk home."
+
+"Oh, I know she meant it kind," replied Cissy, "and I'm right thankful:
+but, please, I'd rather be tired than Father be without me.  We've never
+been asunder afore--never!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWELVE.
+
+TRYING ON THE ARMOUR.
+
+"Oh, thy father 'll do right well!" said Rose encouragingly.  "I dare be
+bound he thought it should be a pleasant change for thee."
+
+"Ay, I dare say Father thought of us and what we should like," said
+Cissy.  "He nodded to Mistress Wade, and smiled on me, as he went forth;
+so of course I had to 'bide.  But then, you see, I'm always thinking of
+Father."
+
+"I see," said Rose, laughing; "it's not, How shall I do without Father?
+but, How can Father do without me?"
+
+"That's it," replied Cissy, nodding her capable little head.  "He'll do
+without Will and Baby--not but he'll miss them, you know; but they don't
+do nothing for him like _me_."
+
+This was said in Cissy's most demure manner, and Rose was exceedingly
+amused.
+
+"And, prithee, what dost thou for him?" said she.
+
+"I do everything," said Cissy, with an astonished look.  "I light the
+fire, and dress the meat, [Note 1] and sweep the floor.  Only I can't do
+all the washing yet; Neighbour Ursula has to help me with that.  But
+about Father--please, when I've said the Paternoster [the Lord's
+Prayer], and the Belief, and the Commandments, might I ask, think you,
+for somebody to go in and do things for Father?  I know he'll miss me
+very ill."
+
+"Thou dear little-soul!" cried Rose.
+
+But Cissy was looking up at Elizabeth, whom she dimly discerned to be
+the graver and wiser of the two girls.  Elizabeth smiled at her in that
+quiet, sweet way which she usually did.
+
+"Little Cissy," she said, "is not God thy Father, and his likewise?  And
+thinkest thou fathers love to see their children happy and at ease, or
+no?"
+
+"Father likes us to be happy," said Cissy simply.
+
+"And `your Father knoweth,'" softly replied Elizabeth, "`that ye have
+need of all these things.'"
+
+"Oh, then, He'll send in Ursula, or somebody," responded Cissy, in a
+contented tone.  "It'll be all right if I ask Him to see to it."
+
+And Cissy "asked Him to see to it," and then lay down peacefully, her
+tranquillity restored, by the side of little Will, and all the children
+were asleep in a few minutes.
+
+"Now, Bessy, we can have our talk."
+
+So saying, Rose drew the stools into a corner, out of the way of the
+wind, which came puffing in at the skylight in a style rather unpleasant
+for November, and the girls sat down together for a chat.
+
+"How go matters with you at Master Clere's, Bessy?"
+
+"Oh, middling.  I go not about to complain, only that I would Mistress
+Amy were a bit steadier than she is."
+
+"She's a gadabout, isn't she?"
+
+"Nay, I've said all I need, and maybe more than I should."
+
+"Doth Master Clere go now to mass, Bessy?"
+
+"Oh, ay, as regular as any man in the town, and the mistress belike.
+The net's drawing closer, Rose.  The time will soon come when even you
+and I, low down as we are, shall have to make choice, with death at the
+end of one way."
+
+"Ay, I'm afeard so," said Rose gravely.  "Bessy, think you that you can
+stand firm?"
+
+"Firm as a rock, if God hold me up; weak and shifting as water, if He
+hold me not."
+
+"Ay, thou hast there the right.  But we are only weak, ignorant maidens,
+Bessy."
+
+"Then is He the more likely to hold us up, since He shall see we need it
+rather.  If thou be high up on the rock, out of reach of the waves, what
+matter whether thou be a stone weight or a crystal vessel?  The waters
+beat upon the rock, not on thee."
+
+"But one sees them coming, Bess."
+
+"Well, what if thou dost?  They'll not touch thee."
+
+"Eh, Bess, the fire 'll touch us, be sure!"
+
+"It'll touch our flesh--the outward case of us--that which can drop off
+and turn to dust.  It can never meddle with Rose Allen and Elizabeth
+Foulkes."
+
+"Bessy, I wish I had thy good courage."
+
+"Why, Rose, art feared of death?"
+
+"Not of what comes after, thank God!  But I'm feared of pain, Bessy, and
+of dying.  It seems so shocking, when one looks forward to it."
+
+"Best not look forward.  Maybe 'tis more shocking to think of than to
+feel.  That's the way with many things."
+
+"O Bessy!  I can't look on it calm, like that.  It isn't nature."
+
+"Nay, dear heart, 'tis grace, not nature."
+
+"And thou seest, in one way, 'tis worser for me than for thee.  Thou art
+thyself alone; but there's Father and Mother with me.  How could I bear
+to see them suffer?"
+
+"The Lord will never call thee to anything, Rose, which He will not give
+thee grace to bear.  Be sure of that.  Well, I've no father--he's in
+Heaven, long years ago.  But I've a good mother at Stoke Nayland, and
+I'd sooner hurt my own head than her little finger, any day I live.
+Dear maid, neither thou nor I know to what the Lord will call us.  We do
+but know that on whatever journey He sendeth us, Himself shall pay the
+charges.  Thou goest not a warfare at thine own cost.  How many times in
+God's Word is it said, `Fear not?'  Would the Lord have so oft repeated
+it, without He had known that we were very apt to fear?"
+
+"Ah!" said Rose, sighing, "and the `fearful' be among such as are left
+without the gate.  O Bessy, if that fear should overcome me that I draw
+back!  I cannot but think every moment shall make it more terrible to
+bear.  And if one held not fast, but bought life, as soon as the fire
+were felt, by denying the truth!  I am feared, dear heart!  I'm feared."
+
+"It shall do thee no hurt to be feared of thyself, only lose not thine
+hold on God.  `Hold _Thou_ me up, and I shall be safe.'  But that should
+not be, buying life, Bessy, but selling it."
+
+"I know it should be bartering the life eternal, for the sake of a few
+years, at most, of this lower life.  Yet life is main sweet, Bessy, and
+we are young.  `All that a man hath will he give for his life.'"
+
+"Think not on the life, Rose, nor on what thou givest, but alone on Him
+for whom thou givest it.  Is He not worth the pain and the loss?
+Couldst thou bear to lose _Him_?--Him, who endured the bitter rood
+[Cross] rather than lose thee.  That must never be, dear heart."
+
+"I do trust not, verily; yet--"
+
+"What, not abed yet?" cried the cheery voice of Mrs Wade.  "I came up
+but to see if you had all you lacked.  Doll's on her way up.  I reckon
+she shall be here by morning.  A good maid, surely, but main slow.
+What! the little ones be asleep?  That's well.  But, deary me, what long
+faces have you two!  Are you taking thought for your funeral, or what
+discourse have you, that you both look like judges?"
+
+"Something like it, Hostess," said Elizabeth, with her grave smile.
+"Truly, we were considering that which may come, and marvelling if we
+should hold fast."
+
+The landlady set her arms akimbo, and looked from one of the girls to
+the other.
+
+"Why, what's a-coming?" said she.
+
+"Nay, we know not what, but--"
+
+"Dear heart, then I'd wait till I did!  I'll tell you what it is--I hate
+to have things wasted, even an old shoe-latchet; why, I pity to cast it
+aside, lest it should come in for something some day.  Now, my good
+maids, don't waste your courage and resolution.  Just you keep them till
+they're wanted, and then they'll be bright and ready for use.  You're
+not going to be burned to-night; you're going to bed.  And screwing up
+your courage to be burned is an ill preparation for going to bed, I can
+tell you.  You don't know, and I don't, that any one of us will be
+called to glorify the Lord in the fires.  If we are, depend upon it
+He'll show us how to do it.  Now, then, say your prayers, and go to
+sleep."
+
+"I thank you, Hostess, but I must be going home."
+
+"Good-night, then, Bessy, and don't sing funeral dirges over your own
+coffin afore it comes from the undertaker.  What, Doll, hast really got
+here?  I scarce looked to see thee afore morning.  Good-night, maids."
+
+And Mrs Wade bustled away.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Note 1.  At this time they used the word _meat_ in the sense of food of
+any kind--not butchers meat only.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
+
+A DARK NIGHT'S ERRAND.
+
+"Must you be gone, Bessy?" said Dorothy Denny, sitting down on the side
+of her bed with a weary air.  "Eh, I'm proper tired!  Thought this day
+'d never come to an end, I did.  Couldn't you tarry a bit longer?"
+
+"I don't think I ought, Dorothy.  Your mistress looked to see Rose abed
+by now, 'twas plain; and mine gave me leave but till eight o' the clock.
+I'd better be on my way."
+
+"Oh, you're one of that sort that's always thinking what they _ought_,
+are you?  That's all very well in the main; but, dear heart! one wants a
+bit of what one would like by nows and thens."
+
+"One gets that best by thinking what one ought," said Elizabeth.
+
+"Ay, but it's all to come sometime a long way off; and how do I know
+it'll come to me?  Great folks doesn't take so much note of poor ones,
+and them above 'll very like do so too."
+
+"There's only One above that has any right to bid aught," answered
+Elizabeth, "and He takes more note of poor than rich, Doll, as you'll
+find by the Bible.  Good-night, Rose; good-night, Dorothy."
+
+And Elizabeth ran lightly down the stairs, and out so into the street.
+She had a few minutes left before the hour at which Mrs Clere had
+enjoined her to be back, so she did not need to hurry, and she went
+quietly on towards Balcon Lane, carrying her lantern--for there were no
+street lamps, and nobody could have any light on a winter evening except
+what he carried with him.  Just before she turned the corner of the lane
+she met two women, both rather heavily laden.  Elizabeth was passing on,
+when her steps were arrested by hearing one of them say,--
+
+"I do believe that's Bess Foulkes; and if it be--"
+
+Elizabeth came to a standstill.
+
+"Yes, I'm Bess Foulkes," she said.  "What of that?"
+
+"Why, then, you'll give me a lift, be sure, as far as the North Hill.
+I've got more than I can carry, and I was casting about for a face I
+knew."
+
+"I've not much time to spare," said Elizabeth; "but I'll give you a lift
+as far as Saint Peter's--I can't go further.  Margaret Thurston, isn't
+it?  I must be in by eight; I'll go with you till then."
+
+"I've only to go four doors past Saint Peter's, so that'll do well.  You
+were at the preaching, weren't you, this even?"
+
+"Ay, and I thought I saw you."
+
+"Yes, I was there.  He talked full bravely.  I marvel if he'd stand if
+it came to it.  I don't think many would."
+
+"I misdoubt if any would, without God held them up."
+
+"Margaret says she's sure she would," said the other woman.
+
+"Oh, ay, I don't doubt myself," said Margaret.
+
+"Then I cry you mercy, but I doubt you," replied Elizabeth.
+
+"I'm sure you needn't!  I'd never flinch for pope nor priest."
+
+"Maybe not; but you might for rack or stake."
+
+"It'll ne'er come to that here.  Queen Mary's not like to forget how
+Colchester folk all stood with her against Lady Jane."
+
+"She mayn't; but think you the priests shall tarry at that? and she'll
+do as the priests bid her."
+
+"Ay, they say my Lord of Winchester, when he lived, had but to hold up
+his finger, and she'd have followed him, if it were over London Bridge
+into the Thames," said the other woman.  "And the like with my Lord
+Cardinal, that now is."
+
+By "my Lord of Winchester" she meant Bishop Gardiner, who had been dead
+rather more than a year.  The Cardinal was Reginald Pole, the Queen's
+third cousin, who had lately been appointed Archbishop of Canterbury, in
+the room of the martyred Cranmer, "Why, the Queen and my Lord Cardinal
+were ever friends, from the time they were little children," answered
+Margaret.
+
+"Ay, there was talk once of her wedding with him, if he'd not become a
+priest.  But I rather reckon you're right, my maid: a priest's a priest,
+without he's a Gospeller; and there's few of them will think more of
+goodness and charity than of their own order and of the Church."
+
+"Goodness and charity?  Marry, there's none in 'em!" cried Margaret.
+"Howbeit, here's the Green Sleeves, where I'm bound, and I'm beholden to
+you, Bessy, for coming with me.  Good even."
+
+Elizabeth returned the greeting, and set off to walk back at a quick
+pace to Balcon Lane.  She had not gone many steps when she was once more
+stopped, this time by a young man, named Robert Purcas, a fuller, who
+lived in the neighbouring village of Booking.
+
+"Bessy," said he.  "It is thou, I know well, for I heard thee bid
+Margaret Thurston good den, and I should know thy voice among a
+thousand."
+
+"I cannot 'bide, Robin.  I'm late, even now."
+
+"Tarry but one minute, Bessy.  Trust me, thou wouldst if--"
+
+"Well, then, make haste," said Elizabeth, pausing.
+
+"Thou art friends with Alice Mount, of Bentley, and she knows Mistress
+Ewring, the miller's wife."
+
+"Ay; well, what so?"
+
+"Bid Alice Mount tell Master Ewring there's like to be a writ out
+against him for heresy and contumaciousness toward the Church.  Never
+mind how I got to know; I know it, and that's enough.  He, and Mistress
+Silverside, and Johnson, of Thorpe, be like enough to come into court.
+Bessy, take heed to thy ways, I pray thee, that thou be not suspect."
+
+No thought of herself had caused Elizabeth Foulkes to lay her hand
+suddenly on the buttress of Saint Peter's, beside her.  The father who
+was so dear to little Cissy was in imminent danger; and Cissy had just
+been asking God to send somebody to see after him.  Elizabeth's voice
+was changed when she spoke again.
+
+"They must be warned," she said.  "Robin, thou and I must needs do this
+errand to-night.  I shall be chidden, but that does not matter.  Canst
+thou walk ten miles for the love of God?"
+
+"I'd do that for the love of thee, never name God."
+
+Elizabeth did not answer the words.  There was too much at stake to lose
+time.
+
+"Then go thou to Thorpe, and bid Johnson get away ere they take him.
+Mistress Wade has the children, and she'll see to them, or Alice Mount
+will.  I must--"
+
+"Thou'd best not put too much on Alice Mount, for Will Mount's as like
+as not to be in the next batch."
+
+"Lord, have mercy on us!  I'll go warn them--they are with Mistress
+Ewring at the mill; and then I'll go on to Mistress Silverside.  Make
+haste, Robin, for mercy's sake!"
+
+And, without waiting for anything more, Elizabeth turned and ran up the
+street as fast as she dared in the comparative darkness.  Streets were
+very rough in those days, and lanterns would not light far.
+
+Old Mistress Silverside lived in Tenant's Lane, which was further off
+than the mill.  Elizabeth ran across from the North Hill to Boucher's
+Street, and up that, towards the gate, beyond which the mill stood on
+the bank of the Colne.  Mr Ewring, the miller, was a man who kept early
+hours; and, as Elizabeth ran up to the gate, she saw that the lights
+were already out in the windows of the mill.  The gate was closed.
+Elizabeth rapped sharply on the window, and the shutter was opened, but,
+all being dark inside, she could not see by whom.
+
+"Prithee, let me through the gate.  I've a message of import for Master
+Ewring, at the mill."
+
+"Gate's shut," said the gruff voice of the gatekeeper.  "Can't let any
+through while morning."
+
+"Darnell, you'll let me through!" pleaded Elizabeth.  "I'm servant to
+Master Clere, clothier, of Balcon Lane, and I'm sent with a message of
+grave import to the mill."
+
+"Tell Master Clere, if he wants his corn ground, he must send by
+daylight."
+
+And the wooden shutter was flung to.  Elizabeth stood for an instant as
+if dazed.
+
+"I can't get to them," she said to herself.  "There's no chance that
+way.  I must go to Tenant's Lane."
+
+She turned away from the gate, and went round by the wall to the top of
+Tenant's Lane.
+
+"Pray God I be in time to warn somebody!  We are all in danger, we who
+were at the preaching to-night, and Mistress Wade most of all, for it
+was in her house.  I'll go to the King's Head ere I go home."
+
+Thus thinking, Elizabeth reached Mrs Silverside's, and rapped at the
+door.  Once--twice--thrice--four times.  Not a sound came from inside,
+and she was at last sorrowfully compelled to conclude that nobody was at
+home.  Down the lane she went, and came out into High Street at the
+bottom.
+
+"Then I can only warn Mistress Wade.  I dare be bound she'll let the
+others know, as soon as morning breaks.  I do trust that will be time
+enough."
+
+She picked her way across High Street, and had just reached the opposite
+side, when her arm was caught as if in an iron vice, and she felt
+herself held fast by greater strength than her own.
+
+"Hussy, what goest thou about?" said the stern voice of her master,
+Nicholas Clere.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
+
+STOPPED ON THE WAY.
+
+Nicholas Clere was a man of one idea at once; and people of that sort do
+a great deal of good when they get hold of the right idea, and a great
+deal of harm when a wrong idea gets hold of them.  Once let notion get
+into the head of Nicholas, and no reasoning nor persuasion would drive
+it out.  He made no allowances and permitted no excuses.  If a thing
+looked wrong, then wrong it must be, and it was of no use to talk to him
+about it.  That he should have found Elizabeth, who had been ordered to
+come home at eight o'clock, running in the opposite direction at
+half-past eight, was in his eyes an enormity which admitted of no
+explanations.  That she either had been in mischief, or was then on her
+way to it, were the only two alternatives possible to the mind of her
+master.
+
+And circumstances were especially awkward for Elizabeth, since she could
+not give any explanation of her proceedings which would clear her in the
+eyes of her employers.  Nicholas Clere, like many other people of
+prejudiced minds and fixed opinions, had a mind totally unfixed in the
+one matter of religion.  His religion was whatever he found it to his
+worldly advantage to be.  During King Edward's reign, it was polite and
+fashionable to be a Protestant; now, under Queen Mary, the only way to
+make a man's fortune was to be a Roman Catholic.  And though Nicholas
+did not say even to himself that it was better to have plenty of money
+than to go to Heaven when he died, yet he lived exactly as if he thought
+so.  During the last few years, therefore, Nicholas had gradually been
+growing more and more of a Papist, and especially during the last few
+weeks.  First, he left off attending the Protestant meetings at the
+King's Head; then he dropped family prayer.  Papists, whether they be
+the genuine article or only the imitation, always dislike family prayer.
+They say that a church is the proper place to pray in, though our
+Lord's bidding is, "When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when
+thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret."  The
+third step which Nicholas took was to go to mass, and command all his
+household to follow him.  This had Elizabeth hitherto, but quite
+respectfully, declined to do.  She was ready to obey all orders of her
+earthly master which did not interfere with her higher duty to God
+Almighty.  But His holy Word--not her fancy, nor the traditions of men--
+forbade her to bow down to graven images; or to give His glory to any
+person or thing but Himself.
+
+And Elizabeth knew that she could not attend mass without doing that.  A
+piece of consecrated bread would be held up, and she would be required
+to worship it as God.  And it was not God: it could neither see, nor
+hear, nor speak; it was not even as like God as a man is.  To worship a
+bit of bread because Christ likened His body to bread, would be as silly
+as to worship a stone because the Bible says, "That _Rock_ was Christ."
+It was evident that He was speaking figuratively, just as He spoke when
+He said, "I am the door of the sheep," and "I am the Morning Star."  Who
+in his senses would suppose that Christ meant to say that He was a
+wooden door?  It is important that we should have true ideas about this,
+because there are just now plenty of foolish people who will try to
+persuade us to believe that that poor, powerless piece of bread is God
+Himself.  It is insulting the Lord God Almighty to say such a thing.
+Look at the 115th Psalm, from the fifth verse to the eight, and you will
+see how God describes an idol, which He forbids to be worshipped: and
+then look at the 26th and 27th verses of the 24th chapter of Saint
+Matthew, and you will see that the Lord Jesus distinctly says that you
+are not to believe anybody who tells you that He is come before you see
+Him.  When He really does come, nobody will want any telling; we shall
+all see Him for ourselves.  So we find from His own words in every way
+that the bread and wine in the Sacrament are just bread and wine, and
+nothing more, which we eat and drink "in remembrance of Him," just as
+you might keep and value your mother's photograph in remembrance of her.
+But I am sure you never would be so silly as to think that the
+photograph was her own real self!
+
+This was the reason why Elizabeth Foulkes would not go to mass.  Every
+Sunday morning Mrs Clere ordered her to go, and Elizabeth quietly,
+respectfully, but firmly, told her that she could not do so.  Elizabeth
+had God's Word to uphold her; God forbade her to worship idols.  It was
+not simply that she did not like it, nor that somebody else had told her
+not to do it.  Nothing can excuse us if we break the laws of our
+country, unless the law of our country has broken God's law; and
+Elizabeth would have done very wrong to disobey her mistress, except
+when her mistress told her to disobey God.  What God said must be her
+rule; not what she thought.
+
+Generally speaking, Mrs Clere called Elizabeth some ugly names, and
+then let her do as she liked.  Up to this time her master had not
+interfered with her, but she was constantly expecting that he would.
+She was not afraid of answering for herself; but she was terribly afraid
+for her poor friends.  To tell him that she was on her way to warn them
+of danger, and beg them to escape, would be the very means of preventing
+their escape, for what he was likely to do was to go at once and tell
+the priests, in order to win their favour for himself.
+
+"Hussy, what goest thou about?" came sternly from Nicholas Clere, as he
+held her fast.
+
+"Master, I cry you mercy.  I was on my way home, and I was turned out of
+it by one that prayed me to take a word of grave import to a friend."
+
+Elizabeth thought she might safely say so much as that.
+
+"I believe thee not," answered Nicholas.  "All young maids be idle
+gadabouts, if they be not looked to sharply, and thou art no better than
+the rest.  Whither wert thou going?"
+
+"I have told all I may, Master, and I pray you ask no further.  The
+secret is not mine, but theirs that sent me and should have received my
+message."
+
+In those days, nothing was more usual than for secret messages to be
+sent from one person to another.  It was not safe then, as it is now,
+for people to speak openly.  Freedom always goes hand in hand with
+Protestantism.  If England should ever again become a Roman Catholic
+country--which many people are trying hard to make her--Englishmen will
+be no longer free.
+
+Nicholas Clere hesitated a moment.  Elizabeth's defence was not at all
+unlikely to be true.  But he had made up his mind that she was in fault,
+and probabilities must not be allowed to interfere with it.
+
+"Rubbish!" said he.  "What man, having his eyes in his head, should
+trust a silly maid with any matter of import?  Women can never keep a
+secret, much less a young jade like to thee.  Tell no more lies,
+prithee."
+
+And he began to walk towards Balcon Lane, still firmly holding Elizabeth
+by the arm.
+
+"Master, I beseech you, let me go on my way!" she pleaded earnestly.  "I
+will tarry up all night, if it be your pleasure, to make up for one
+half-hour now.  Truly as I am an honest maid, I have told you the truth,
+and I am about nothing ill."
+
+"Tush, jade!  Hold thy tongue.  Thou goest with me, and if not
+peaceably, then by force."
+
+"Will you, of your grace, Master, let me leave my message with some
+other to take instead of me?  May I have leave to speak, but one moment,
+with Mistress Wade, of the King's Head?  She would find a trusty
+messenger to go forward."
+
+"Tell me thy message, and if it be truly of any weight, then shall it be
+sent," answered Nicholas, still coldly, but less angrily than before.
+
+Could she tell him the message?  Would it not go straight to the priest,
+and all hope of escape be thus cut off?  Like Nehemiah, Elizabeth cried
+for wisdom.
+
+"Master, I cry you mercy yet again, but I may not tell the message."
+
+"Yet thou wouldst fain tell Mistress Wade!  Thou wicked hussy, thou
+canst be after no good.  What message is this, which thou canst tell
+Mistress Wade, but mayest not tell me?  I crede thee not a word.  Have
+forward, and thy mistress shall deal with thee."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
+
+SILENCE UNDER DIFFICULTIES.
+
+Elizabeth Foulkes was almost in despair.  Her master held her arm tight,
+and he was a strong man--to break away from him was simply impossible--
+and to persuade him to release her seemed about as unlikely.  Still she
+cried, "Master, let me go!" in tones that might have melted any softer
+heart than that of Nicholas Clere.
+
+"Step out!" was all he said, as he compelled Elizabeth to keep pace with
+him till they reached Balcon Lane.  Mrs Clere was busy in the kitchen.
+She stopped short as they entered, with a gridiron in her hand which she
+had cleaned and was about to hang up.
+
+"Well, this is a proper time of night to come home, mistress!  Marched
+in, too, with thy master holding of thee, as if the constable had thee
+in custody!  This is our pious maid, that can talk nought but Bible, and
+says her prayers once a day oftener nor other folks!  I always do think
+that sort no better than hypocrites.  What hath she been about,
+Nicholas? what saith she?"
+
+"A pack o' lies!" said Nicholas, harshly.  "Whined out a tale of some
+message of dread import that somebody, that must not be named, hath sent
+her on.  I found her hasting with all speed across the High Street, the
+contrary way from what it should have been.  You'd best give her the
+strap, wife.  She deserves it, or will ere long."
+
+Nicholas sat down in the chimney-corner, leaving Mistress Clere to deal
+with the offender.  Elizabeth well knew that the strap was no figure of
+speech, and that Mistress Clere when angry had no light hand.  Girls
+were beaten cruelly in those days, and grown women too, when their
+mothers or mistresses chose to punish them for real or supposed
+offences.  But Elizabeth Foulkes thought very little of the pain she
+might suffer, and very much of the needed warning which had not been
+given.  And then, suddenly, the words flashed across her, "Thy will be
+done on earth, as it is in Heaven."  Then the warning was better let
+alone, if it were God's will.  She rose with a calmer face, and followed
+Mistress Clere to the next room to receive her penalty.
+
+"There!" said that lady, when her arm began to ache with beating
+Elizabeth.  "That'll do for a bit, I hope.  Perhaps thou'lt not be so
+headstrong next time.  I vow, she looks as sweet as if I'd given her a
+box of sugar plums!  I'm feared thou'd have done with a bit more, but
+I'm proper tired.  Now, speak the truth: who sent thee on this
+wild-goose chase?"
+
+"Mistress, I was trusted with a secret.  Pray you, ask me not."
+
+"Secret me no secrets!  I'll have it forth."
+
+"Not of me," said Elizabeth, quietly, but firmly.
+
+"Highty-tighty! and who art thou, my lady?"
+
+"I am your servant, mistress, and will do your bidding in everything
+that toucheth not my duty to God Almighty.  But this I cannot."
+
+"I'll tell thee what, hussy! it was never good world since folks set up
+to think for themselves what was right and wrong, instead of hearkening
+to the priest, and doing as they were bid, Thou'rt too proud, Bess
+Foulkes, that's where it is, with thy pretty face and thy dainty ways.
+Go thou up and get thee abed--it's on the stroke of nine: and I'll come
+and lock thee in.  Dear heart, to see the masterfulness of these maids!"
+
+"Mistress," said Elizabeth, pausing, "I pray you reckon me not
+disobedient, for in very deed I have ever obeyed you, and yet will,
+touching all concerns of yours: but under your good leave, this matter
+concerns you not, and I have no freedom to speak thereof."
+
+"In very deed, my lady," said Mistress Clere, dropping a mock courtesy,
+"I desire not to meddle with your ladyship's high matters of state, and
+do intreat you of pardon that I took upon me so weighty a matter.  Go
+get thee abed, hussy, and hold thine idle tongue!"
+
+Elizabeth turned and went upstairs in silence.  Words were of no use.
+Mistress Clere followed her.  In the bedroom where they both slept,
+which was a loft with a skylight, was Amy, half undressed, and employed
+in her customary but very unnecessary luxury of admiring herself in the
+glass.
+
+"Amy, I'm going to turn the key.  Here's an ill maid that I've had to
+take the strap to: see thou fall not in her ways.  I'll let you out in
+the morning."
+
+So saying, Mistress Clere locked the door, and left the two girls
+together.
+
+Like most idle folks.  Amy Clere was gifted with her full share of
+curiosity.  The people who do the world's work, or who go about doing
+good, are not usually the people who want you to tell them how much Miss
+Smith gave for her new bonnet, or whom Mr Robinson had yesterday to
+dinner.  They are a great deal too busy, and generally too happy, to
+give themselves the least trouble about the bonnet, or to feel the
+slightest interest in the dinner-party.  But idle people--poor pitiable
+things!--who do not know what to do with themselves, are often very
+ready to discuss anything of that sort which considerately puts itself
+in their way.  To have something to talk about is both a surprise and a
+delight to them.
+
+No sooner had Mrs Clere shut the door than Amy dropped her edifying
+occupation and came up to Elizabeth, who had sat wearily down on the
+side of the bed.
+
+"Why, Bess, what ails Mother? and what hast thou been doing?  Thou
+mayest tell me; I'll not make no mischief, and I'd love dearly to hear
+all about it."
+
+If experience had assured Elizabeth Foulkes of anything, it was that she
+might as safely repeat a narrative to the town-crier as tell it to Amy
+Clere.
+
+"I have offenced Mistress," said she, "and I am sorry thereat: yet I did
+but what I thought was my duty.  I can say no more thereanent, Mistress
+Amy."
+
+"But what didst thou, Bessy?  Do tell me."
+
+Elizabeth shook her head.  "Best not, Mistress Amy.  Leave it rest, I
+pray you, and me likewise, for of a truth I am sore wearied."
+
+"Come, Bessy, don't be grumpy! let's know what it was.  Life's monstrous
+tiresome, and never a bit of play nor show.  I want to know all about
+it."
+
+"Maybe there'll be shows ere long for you, Mistress Amy," answered
+Elizabeth gravely, as a cold shiver ran through her to think of what
+might be the consequence of her untold message.  Well!  Cissy's father
+at any rate would be safe: thank God for that!
+
+"Why will there?  Hast been at one to-night?"
+
+"No."  Elizabeth checked herself from saying more.  What a difference
+there was between Amy's fancies and the stern realities she knew!
+
+"There's no lugging nought out of thee!" said Amy with a pout.  "Thou'rt
+as close shut as an oyster shell."
+
+And she went back to the mirror, and began to plait her hair, the more
+conveniently to tuck it under her night-cap.  Oh, how Elizabeth longed
+for a safe confidant that night!  Sometimes she felt as though she must
+pour out her knowledge and her fears--to Amy, if she could get no one
+else.  But she knew too well that, without any evil intention, Amy would
+be certain to make mischief from sheer love of gossip, the moment she
+met with any one who would listen to her.
+
+"Mistress Amy, I'm right weary.  Pray you, leave me be."
+
+"Hold thy tongue if thou wilt.  I want nought with thee, not I," replied
+Amy, with equal crossness and untruth, since, as she would herself have
+expressed it, she was dying to know what Elizabeth could have done to
+make her mother so angry.  But Amy was angry herself now.  "Get thee
+abed, Mistress Glum-face; I'll pay thee out some day: see if I don't!"
+
+Elizabeth's reply was to kneel down for prayer.  There was one safe
+Confidant, who could be relied upon for sympathy and secrecy: and He
+might be spoken to without words.  It was well; for the words refused to
+come.  Only one thing would present itself to Elizabeth's weary heart
+and brain: and that was the speech of little Cissy, that, "it would be
+all right if she asked God to see to it."  A sob broke from her, as she
+sent up to Heaven the one petition of which alone she felt capable just
+then--"Lord, help me!"  He would know how and when to help.  Elizabeth
+dropped her trouble into the Almighty hands, and left it there.  Then
+she rose, undressed, and lay down beside Amy, who was already in bed.
+
+Amy Clere was not an ill-natured girl, and her anger never lasted long.
+When she heard Elizabeth's sob, her heart smote her a little: but she
+said to herself, that she was "not going to humble herself to that
+crusty Bess," so she turned round and went to sleep.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIXTEEN.
+
+THE STORM BREAKS.
+
+When the morning came, Amy's good temper was restored by her night's
+rest, and she was inclined to look on her locking-in as a piece of
+amusement.
+
+"I vow, Bess, this is fun!" said she, "I've twenty minds to get out on
+the roof, and see if I can reach the next window.  It would be right
+jolly to wake up Ellen Mallory--she's always lies abed while seven; and
+I do think I could.  Wilt aid me?"
+
+Ellen Mallory was the next neighbour's daughter, a girl of about Amy's
+age; and seven o'clock was considered a shocking late hour for rising in
+1556.
+
+"Mistress Amy, I do pray you never think of such a thing," cried
+Elizabeth, in horror.  "You'll be killed!"
+
+"Well, I'm not wishful to be killed," answered Amy lightly: "I only want
+some fun while we are shut up here.  I marvel when Mother shall come to
+let us out.  She'll have to light the fire herself if she does not;
+that's one good thing!"
+
+Elizabeth thought it a very undutiful idea; but she was silent.  If she
+had but had wings like a dove, how gladly would she have flown to warn
+her friends!  She well knew that Mrs Clere was not likely to be in the
+mood to grant a favour and let her go, after what had happened the night
+before.  To go without leave was a thing which Elizabeth never
+contemplated.  That would be putting herself in the wrong.  But her poor
+friends, would they escape?  How if Robert Purcas had been stopped, as
+she had?  I was strange, but her imagination did not dwell nearly so
+much upon her own friend, Rose, as on little Cissy.  If Johnson were
+taken, if he were martyred, what would become of little Cissy?  The
+child had crept into Elizabeth's heart, before she was aware.  Suddenly
+Amy's voice broke in upon her thoughts.
+
+"Come, Bess, art in a better mood this morrow?  I'll forgive thee thy
+miss-words last night, if thou'lt tell me now."
+
+All the cross words there had been the night before had come from Amy
+herself; but Elizabeth let that pass.
+
+"Mistress Amy," said she, "this matter is not one whereof I may speak to
+you or any other.  I was charged with a secret, and bidden not to
+disclose the same.  Think you I can break my word?"
+
+"Dear heart!  I break mine many a time in the week," cried Amy, with a
+laugh.  "I'm not _nigh_ so peevish as thou."
+
+"But, Mistress Amy, it is not right," returned Elizabeth earnestly.
+
+Before Amy could answer, Mrs Clere's heavy step was heard approaching
+the door, and the key turned in the lock.  Amy, who sat on the side of
+the bed swinging her feet to and fro for amusement, jumped down.
+
+"Mother, you'll get nought from her.  I've essayed both last night and
+this morrow, and I might as well have held my tongue."
+
+"Go and light the fire," said Mrs Clere sternly to Elizabeth.  "I'll
+have some talk with thee at after."
+
+Elizabeth obeyed in silence.  She lighted the fire and buttered the
+eggs, and swept the house, and baked the bread, and washed the clothes,
+and churned the butter--all with a passionate longing to be free, hidden
+in her heart, and constant ejaculatory prayers--silent ones, of course--
+for the safely of her poor friends.  Mrs Clere seemed to expect
+Elizabeth to run away if she could, and she did not let her go out of
+her sight the whole day.  The promised scolding, however, did not come.
+
+Supper was over, and the short winter day was drawing to its close, when
+Nicholas Clere came into the kitchen.
+
+"Here's brave news, Wife!" said he, "What thinkest?  Here be an
+half-dozen in the town arrest of heresy--and some without, too."
+
+"Mercy on us!  Who?" demanded Mrs Clere.
+
+"Why, Master Benold, chandler, and Master Bongeor, glazier, and old
+Mistress Silverside, and Mistress Ewring at the mill--these did I hear.
+I know not who else."  And suddenly turning to Elizabeth, he said,
+"Hussy, was this thine errand, or had it ought to do therewith?"
+
+All the passionate pain and the earnest longing died out of the heart of
+Elizabeth Foulkes.  She stood looking as calm as a marble statue, and
+almost as white.
+
+"Master," she said, quietly enough, "mine errand was to warn these my
+friends.  God may yet save them, if it be His will.  And may He not lay
+to your charge the blood that will otherwise be shed!"
+
+"Mercy on us!" cried Mrs Clere again, dropping her duster.  "Why, the
+jade's never a bit better than these precious friends of hers!"
+
+"I'm sore afeared we have been nourishing a serpent in our bosoms," said
+Nicholas, in his sternest manner.  "I had best see to this."
+
+"Well, I wouldn't hurt the maid," said his wife, in an uneasy tone;
+"but, dear heart! we must see to ourselves a bit.  We shall get into
+trouble if such things be tracked to our house."
+
+"So we shall," answered her husband.  "I shall go, speak with the
+priest, and see what he saith.  Without"--and he turned to
+Elizabeth--"thou wilt be penitent, and go to mass, and do penance for
+thy fault."
+
+"I am willing enough to do penance for my faults, Master," said
+Elizabeth, "but not for the warning that I would have given; for no
+fault is in it."
+
+"Then must we need save ourselves," replied Nicholas: "for the innocent
+must not suffer for the guilty.  Wife, thou wert best lock up this hussy
+in some safe place; and, daughter, go thou not nigh her.  This manner of
+heresy is infectious, and I would not have thee defiled therewith."
+
+"Nay, I'll have nought to do with what might get me into trouble," said
+Amy, flippantly.  "Bessy may swallow the Bible if she likes; I shan't."
+
+Elizabeth was silent, quietly standing to hear her doom pronounced.  She
+knew it was equivalent to a sentence of death.  No priest, consulted on
+such a subject would dare to leave the heretic undenounced.  And she had
+no friends save that widowed mother at Stoke Nayland--a poor woman,
+without money or influence; and that other Friend who would be sure to
+stand by her,--who, that He might save others, had not saved Himself.
+
+Nicholas took up his hat and marched out, and Mrs Clere ordered
+Elizabeth off to a little room over the porch, generally used as a
+lumber room, where she locked her up.
+
+"Now then, think on thy ways!" said she.  "It'll mayhap do thee good.
+Bread and water's all thou'lt get, I promise thee, and better than thy
+demerits.  Dear heart! to turn a tidy house upside-down like this, and
+all for a silly maid's fancies, forsooth!  I hope thou feels ashamed of
+thyself; for I do for thee."
+
+"Mistress, I can never be ashamed of God's truth.  To that will I stand,
+if He grant me grace."
+
+"Have done with thy cant!  I've no patience with it."
+
+And Mistress Clere banged the door behind her, locked it, and left
+Elizabeth alone till dinner-time, when she carried up a slice of bread--
+only one, and that the coarsest rye-bread--and a mug of water.
+
+"There!" said she.  "Thou shouldst be thankful, when I've every bit of
+work on my hands in all this house, owing to thy perversity!"
+
+"I do thank you, Mistress," said Elizabeth, meekly.  "Would you suffer
+me to ask you one favour?  I have served you well hitherto, and I never
+disobeyed you till now."
+
+It was true, and Mrs Clere knew it.
+
+"Well, the brazen-facedness of some hussies!" cried she.  "Prithee,
+what's your pleasure, mistress?  Would you a new satin gown for your
+trial, and a pearl-necklace? or do you desire an hundred pounds given to
+the judges to set you free? or would you a petition to the Queen's
+Majesty, headed by Mr Mayor and my Lord of Oxenford?"
+
+Elizabeth let the taunts go by her like a summer breeze.  She felt them
+keenly enough.  Nobody enjoys being laughed at; but he is hardly worth
+calling a man who allows a laugh to turn him out of the path of duty.
+
+"Mistress," she said, quietly, "should you hear of any being arrested
+for heresy, would you do me so much grace as to let me know the name?
+and the like if you hear of any that have escaped?"
+
+Mrs Clere looked down into the eyes that were lifted to her, as
+Elizabeth stood before her.  Quiet, meek, tranquil eyes, without a look
+of reproach in them, with no anxiety save that aroused for the fate of
+her friends.  She was touched in spite of herself.
+
+"Thou foolish maid!" said she.  "Why couldst thou not have done as other
+folks, and run no risks?  I vow I'm well-nigh sorry for thee, for all
+thy perversity.  Well, we'll see.  Mayhap I will, if I think on't."
+
+"Thank you, Mistress!" said Elizabeth gratefully, as Mistress Clere took
+the mug from her, and left the little porch-chamber as before, locking
+her prisoner in the prison.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
+
+ROSE HEARS THE NEWS.
+
+While Elizabeth Foulkes was passing through these experiences, the
+Mounts, Rose Allen, and the children, had gone back to Much Bentley as
+soon as morning broke.  Rose took the little ones home to Thorpe, and
+they met Johnson just at the door of his own cottage.
+
+"Truly, friend, I am much beholden to you," said he to Rose, "for your
+kindly care of my little ones.  But, I pray you, is it true what I
+heard, that Mistress Silverside is arrest for heresy?"
+
+Rose looked up in horrified astonishment.
+
+"Why, we left them right well," she said, "but five hours gone.  I
+brought the children o'er to you so soon as they had had their dinner.
+Is it true, think you?"
+
+"Nay, that would I fain know of you, that were in town twelve hours
+later than I," answered Johnson.
+
+"Then, in very deed, we heard nought," said Rose.  "I do trust it shall
+prove but an ill rumour."
+
+"May it be so! yet I cannot but fear it be true.  Robin Purcas came to
+me last night, and I could not but think he should have told me somewhat
+an' he might: but he found Father Tye in mine house, and might not
+speak.  They both tarried so long," added Johnson, with a laugh, "that I
+was fain to marvel if each were essaying to outsit the other; but if so,
+Father Tye won, for Love of the Heath came for Robin and took him away
+ere the priest were wearied out.  If any straitness do arise against the
+Gospellers, Love had best look out."
+
+"Ay, they know him too well to leave him slip through their fingers
+again," replied Rose.
+
+"That do they, verily.  Well, dear hearts, and have ye been good
+children?"
+
+"We've tried," said Cissy.
+
+"They've been as good as could be," answered Rose.
+
+"Father, did anybody come and see to you?  I asked the Lord to see to
+it, because I knew you'd miss me sore," said Cissy anxiously, "and I
+want to know if He did."
+
+"Ay, my dear heart," replied Johnson, smiling as he looked down on her.
+"Ursula Felstede came in and dressed dinner for me, and Margaret
+Thurston looked in after, and she washed some matters and did a bit of
+mending; and at after I had company--Father Tye, and Robin Purcas, and
+Jack Love.  So thou seest I was not right lonesome."
+
+"He took good care of you.  Father," said Cissy, looking happy.  It was
+evident that Cissy lived for and in her father.  Whatever he was, for
+good or evil, that she was likewise.
+
+"Well, I've got to look in on Margaret Thurston," said Rose, "for I did
+a bit of marketing for her this morrow in the town, and I have a fardel
+to leave.  She was not at home when we passed, coming.  But now, I think
+I'd better be on my way, so I'll wish you good den, Johnson.  God bless
+you, little ones!"
+
+"Good den, Rose!" said Cissy.  "And you'll learn me to weave lace with
+those pretty bobbins?"
+
+"That will I, with a very good will, sweet heart," said Rose, stooping
+to kiss Cissy.
+
+"Weave lace!" commented her father.  "What, what is the child thinking,
+that she would fain learn to weave lace?"
+
+"Oh, Father, please, you won't say nay!" pleaded Cissy, embracing her
+father's arm with both her own.  "I want to bring you in some money."
+Cissy spoke with a most important air.  "You know, of an even, I alway
+have a bit of time, after Will and Baby be abed, and at times too in the
+day, when Will's out with George Felstede, and I'm minding Baby; I can
+rock her with my feet while I make lace with my hands.  And you know,
+Father, Will and Baby 'll be growing big by and bye, and you won't have
+enough for us all without we do something.  And Rose says she'll learn
+me how, and that if I have a lace pillow--and it won't cost very much,
+Father!--I can alway take it up for a few minutes by nows and thens,
+when I have a bit of time, and then, don't you see, Father?  I can make
+a little money for you.  Please, _please_ don't say I mustn't!" cried
+Cissy, growing quite talkative in her eagerness.
+
+Johnson and Rose looked at each other, and Rose laughed; but though
+Cissy's father smiled too, he soon grew grave, and laid his hand on his
+little girl's head, as she stood looking up earnestly.
+
+"Nay, my little maid, I'll never say nought of the sort.  If Rose here
+will be so good as to learn thee aught that is good, whether for body or
+soul, I will be truly thankful to her, and bid thee do the like and be
+diligent to learn.  Good little maid!  God bless thee!"
+
+Then, as Cissy trotted into the cottage, well pleased, Johnson added,
+"Bless the little maid's heart! she grows more like her mother in Heaven
+every day.  I'll never stay the little fingers from doing what they can.
+It'll not bring much in, I reckon, but it'll be a pleasure to the
+child, and good for her to be ever busy at something, that she mayn't
+fall into idle ways.  Think you not so, Rose?"
+
+"Indeed, and it so will, Johnson," answered Rose; "not that I think
+Cissy and idle ways 'll ever have much to do one with the other.  She's
+not one of that sort.  But I shouldn't wonder if lace-weaving brings in
+more than you think.  I've made a pretty penny of it, and I wasn't so
+young as Cissy when I learned the work, and it's like everything else--
+them that begin young have the best chance to make good workers.  She'll
+be a rare comfort to you, Cissy, if she goes on as she's begun."
+
+Johnson did not reply for a moment.  When he did, it was to say, "Well,
+God keep us all!  I'm right thankful to you, Rose, for all your goodness
+to my little maid.  Good den!"
+
+When she had returned the "good evening," Rose set off home, and walked
+rather fast till she came to Margaret Thurston's cottage.  After the
+little business was transacted between her and Margaret, Rose inquired
+if they had heard of Mistress Silverside's arrest.  Both Margaret and
+her husband seemed thunderstruck.
+
+"Nay, we know nought thereof," answered Thurston, "Pray God it be not
+true!  There'll be more an' it so be."
+
+"I fear so much," said Rose.
+
+She did not tell her mother, for Alice had not been well lately, and
+Rose wished to spare her an apprehension which might turn out to be
+quite unfounded, or at least exaggerated.  But she told her step-father,
+and old Mount looked very grave.
+
+"God grant it be not so!" said he.  "But if it be, Rose, thou wist they
+have our names in their black list of heretics."
+
+"Ay, Father, I know they have."
+
+"God keep us all!" said William Mount, looking earnestly into the fire.
+And Rose knew that while he might intend to include being kept safe, yet
+he meant, far more than that, being kept true.
+
+When John Love called at Johnson's cottage to fetch Robert Purcas, the
+two walked about a hundred yards on the way to Bentley without either
+speaking a word.  Then Robert suddenly stopped.  "Look you, Love! what
+would you with me?  I cannot go far from Thorpe to-night.  I was sent
+with a message to Johnson, and I have not found a chance to deliver it
+yet."
+
+"Must it be to-night? and what chance look you for?"
+
+"Ay, it must!" answered Robert earnestly.  "What I look for is yon black
+snake coming out of his hole, and then slip I in and deliver my
+message."
+
+Love nodded.  He knew well enough who the black snake was.  "Then maybe
+you came with the like word I did.  Was it to warn Johnson to 'scape ere
+the Bailiff should be on him?"
+
+"Ay, it was.  And you?"
+
+"I came to the same end, but not alone for Johnson.  Robin, thou hadst
+best see to thyself.  Dost know thou art on the black list."
+
+"I've looked for that, this many a day.  But so art thou, Love; and thou
+hast a wife to care for, and I've none."
+
+"I'm in danger anyway, Rob, but there's a chance for thee.  Think of thy
+old father, and haste thee, lad."
+
+Robert shook his head.  "I promised to warn Johnson," he said; "and I
+gave my word for it to one that I love right dearly.  I'll not break my
+word.  No, Love; I tarry here till I've seen him.  The Lord must have a
+care of my old father if they take me."
+
+Love found it impossible to move Robert from his resolution.  He bade
+him good-night and turned away.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.
+
+WHAT BEFELL SOME OF THEM.
+
+For half-an-hour, safely hidden behind a hedge, Robert Purcas watched
+the door of Johnson's cottage, until at last he saw the priest come out,
+and go up the lane for a short distance.  Then he stopped, looked round,
+and gave a low, peculiar whistle.  A man jumped down from the bank on
+the other side of the lane, with whom the priest held a long, low-toned
+conversation.  Robert knew he could not safely move before they were out
+of the way.  At length they parted, and he just caught the priest's
+final words.
+
+"Good: we shall have them all afore the even."
+
+"That you shall not, if God speed me!" said Robert to himself.
+
+The priest went up the lane towards Bentley, and the man who had been
+talking with him took the opposite way to Thorpe.  When his footsteps
+had died away, Robert crept out from the shelter of the hedge, and made
+his way in the dark to Johnson's cottage.  A rap on the door brought
+Cissy.
+
+"Who is it, please?" she said, "because I can't see."
+
+"It is Robin Purcas, Cis.  I want a word with thy father."
+
+"Come in, Robin!" called Johnson's voice from within.  "I could see thou
+wert bursting with some news not to be spoken in the presence but just
+gone.  What ails thee, man?"
+
+"Ay, I was, and I promised to tell you.  Jack, thou must win away ere
+daylight, or the Bailiff shall be on thee.  Set these little ones in
+safe guard, and hie thee away with all the speed thou mayest."
+
+"Is it come so near?" said Johnson, gravely.
+
+"Father, you're not going nowhere without me!" said Cissy, creeping up
+to him, and slipping her hand in his.  "You can leave Will and Baby with
+Neighbour Ursula: but I'll not be left unless you bid me--and you won't
+Father?  You can never do without me?  I must go where you go."
+
+"She's safe, I reckon," said Robert, answering Johnson's look: "they'd
+never do no mischief to much as she.  Only maybe she'd be more out of
+reach if I took her with me.  They'll seek to breed her up in a convent,
+most like."
+
+Cissy felt her father's hand tighten upon hers.
+
+"I'm not going with you, nor nobody!" said she.  "I'll go with Father.
+Nobody'll get me nowhere else, without they carry me."
+
+Johnson seemed to wake up, as if till then he had scarcely understood
+what it all meant.
+
+"God bless thee for the warning, lad!" he said.  "Now hie thee quick,
+and get out of reach thyself Cis, go up and fetch a warm wrap for Baby,
+and all her clothes; I'll take her next door.  I reckon Will must tarry
+there too.  It'd be better for thee, Cis: but I'll not compel thee, if
+thy little heart's set on going with me.  Thoul't have to rough it,
+little maid."
+
+"I'll not stop nowhere!" was Cissy's determination.
+
+Robert bade them good-bye with a smile, closed the door, and set off
+down the lane as fast as the darkness made it prudent.  He did not think
+it wise to go through the village, so he made a _detour_ by some fields,
+and came into the road again on the other side of Thorpe.  He had not
+gone many yards, when he became aware that a number of lights were
+approaching, accompanied by a noise of voices.  Robert turned straight
+round.  If he could get back to the stile which led into the fields, he
+would be safer: and if not, still it would be better to be overtaken
+than to meet a possible enemy face to face.  He would be less likely to
+be noticed in the former case than in the latter--at least so he
+thought.
+
+There must be a good number of people coming behind him, judging from
+the voices.  At length they came up with him.
+
+"Pray you, young man, how far be we from Thorpe?"
+
+"You are very nigh, straight on," was Robert's answer.
+
+"Do you belong there?"
+
+"No, I'm nigh a stranger to these parts: I'm from the eastern side of
+the county.  I can't tell you much about folks, if that be your
+meaning."
+
+"And what do you here, if you be a stranger?"
+
+"I've a job o' work at Saint Osyth, at this present."
+
+"What manner of work?"
+
+"I'm a fuller by trade."
+
+Robert had already recognised that he was talking to the Bailiff's
+searching party.  Every minute that he could keep them was a minute more
+for Johnson and the little ones.
+
+"Know you a man named Johnson?"
+
+"What, here?"
+
+"Ay, at Thorpe."
+
+Robert pretended to consider.  "Well, let's see--there's Will Johnson
+the miller, and Luke Johnson the weaver, and--eh, there's ever so many
+Johnsons!  I couldn't say to one or another, without I knew more."
+
+"John Johnson; he's a labouring man."
+
+"Well, there is Johnsons that lives up by the wood, but I'm none so sure
+of the man's name.  I think it's Andrew, but I'll not say, certain.  It
+may be John; I couldn't speak, not to be sure."
+
+"Let him be, Gregory; he knows nought," said the Bailiff.
+
+Robert touched his cap, and fell behind.  The Bailiff suddenly turned
+round.
+
+"What's your own name?"
+
+It was a terrible temptation!  If he gave a false name, the strong
+probability was that they would pass on, and he would very likely get
+safe away.  It was Johnson of whom they were thinking, not himself.  But
+that would enable them to reach Johnson's cottage a minute sooner, and
+it would be a cowardly lie.  No!  Robert Purcas had not so learned
+Christ.  He gave his name honestly.
+
+"Robert Purcas!  If that's not on my list--" said the Bailiff, feeling
+in his pocket.  "Ay, here it is--stay!  _William_, Purcas, of Booking,
+fuller, aged twenty, single; is that you?"
+
+"My name is Robert, not William," said the young man.
+
+"But thou art a fuller? and single? and aged twenty?"
+
+"Ay, all that is so."
+
+"Dost thou believe the bread of the sacred host to be transmuted after
+consecration into the body of Christ, so that no substance of bread is
+left there at all?"
+
+"I do not.  I cannot, for I see the bread."
+
+"He's a heretic!" cried Simnel.  "Robert or William, it is all one.
+Take the heretic!"
+
+And so Robert Purcas was seized, and carried to the Moot Hall in
+Colchester--a fate from which one word of falsehood would have freed
+him, but it would have cost him his Father's smile.
+
+The Moot Hall of Colchester was probably the oldest municipal building
+in England.  It was erected soon after the Conquest, and its low
+circular arches and piers ornamented the High Street until 1843, when
+the town Vandals were pleased to destroy it because it impeded the
+traffic.  Robert was taken into the dungeon, and the great door slammed
+to behind him.  He could not see for a few minutes, coming fresh from
+the light of day: and before he was able to make anything out clearly,
+an old lady's voice accosted him.
+
+"Robert Purcas, if I err not?" she said.  "I am sorry to behold thee
+here, friend."
+
+"Truly, Mistress, more than I am, that am come hither in Christ's
+cause."
+
+"Ay?  Then thou art well come."
+
+"Methinks it is Mistress Silverside?"
+
+"Thou sayest well.  I shall have company now," said the old lady with a
+smile.  "Methought some of my brethren and sisters should be like to
+have after."
+
+"I reckon," responded Purcas, "we be sure at the least of our Father's
+company."
+
+The great door just then rolled back, and they heard the gaoler's voice
+outside.
+
+"Gramercy, but this is tidy work!" cried he.  "Never had no such
+prisoners here afore.  I don't know what to do with 'em.  There, get you
+in! you aren't the first there."
+
+There was a moment's pause, and then Mrs Silverside and Robert, who
+were looking to see what uncommon sort of prisoners could be at hand,
+found that their eyes had to come down considerably nearer the floor, as
+the gaoler let in, hand in hand, Cissy and Will Johnson, followed by
+their father.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINETEEN.
+
+"FATHER'S COME TOO!"
+
+"Why, my dear hearts!" cried old Mrs Silverside, as the children came
+in.  "How won ye hither?"
+
+"Please, we haven't been naughty," said Will, rubbing his eyes with his
+knuckles.
+
+"Father's come too, so it's all right," added Cissy in a satisfied tone.
+
+Mrs Silverside turned to Robert Purcas.  "Is not here a lesson for thee
+and me, my brother?  Our Father is come too: God is with us, and thus it
+is all right."
+
+"Marry, these heretics beareth a good brag!" said Wastborowe the gaoler
+to his man.
+
+It is bad grammar now to use a singular verb with a plural noun; but in
+1556 it was correct English over the whole south of England, and the use
+of the singular with the singular, or the plural with the plural, was a
+peculiarity of the northern dialect.
+
+"They always doth," answered the under-gaoler.
+
+"Will ye be of as good courage, think you," asked Wastborowe, "the day
+ye stand up by Colne Water?"
+
+"God knoweth," was the reverent answer of Mrs Silverside.  "If He holds
+us up, then shall we stand."
+
+"They be safe kept whom He keepeth," said Johnson.
+
+"Please, Mr Wastborowe," said Cissy in a businesslike manner, "would
+you mind telling me when we shall be burned?"
+
+The gaoler turned round and stared at his questioner.
+
+"Thou aren't like to be burned, I reckon," said he with a laugh.
+
+"I must, if Father is," was Cissy's calm response.  "It'll hurt a bit, I
+suppose; but you see when we get to Heaven afterwards, every thing will
+be so good and pleasant, I don't think we need care much.  Do you,
+please, Mr Wastborowe?"
+
+"Marry come up, thou scrap of a chirping canary!" answered the gaoler,
+half roughly and half amused.  "If babes like this be in such minds,
+'tis no marvel their fathers and mothers stand to it."
+
+"But I'm not a baby, Mr Wastborowe!" said Cissy, rather affronted.
+"Will and Baby are both younger than me.  I'm going in ten, and I takes
+care of Father."
+
+Mr Wastborowe, who was drinking ale out of a huge tankard, removed it
+from his lips to laugh.
+
+"Mighty good care thou'lt take, I'll be bound!"
+
+"Yes, I do, Mr Wastborowe," replied Cissy, quite gravely; "I dress
+Father's meat and mend his clothes, and love him.  That's taking care of
+him, isn't it?"
+
+The gaoler's men, who were accustomed to see every body in the prison
+appear afraid of him, were evidently much amused by the perfect
+fearlessness of Cissy.  Wastborowe himself seemed to think it a very
+good joke.
+
+"And who takes care of thee?" asked he.
+
+Cissy gave her usual answer.  "God takes care of me."
+
+"And not of thy father?" said Wastborowe with a sneer.
+
+The sneer passed by Cissy quite harmlessly.
+
+"God takes care of all of us," she said.  "He helps Father to take care
+of me, and He helps me to take care of Father."
+
+"He'll be taken goodly care of when he's burned," said the gaoler
+coarsely, taking another draught out of the tankard.
+
+Cissy considered that point.
+
+"Please, Mr Wastborowe, we mustn't expect to be taken better care of
+than the Lord Jesus; and He had to suffer, you know.  But it won't
+signify when we get to Heaven, I suppose."
+
+"Heretics don't go to Heaven!" replied Wastborowe.
+
+"I don't know what heretics are," said Cissy; "but every body who loves
+the Lord Jesus is sure to get there.  Satan would not want them, you
+know; and Jesus will want them, for He died for them.  He'll look after
+us, I expect.  Don't you think so, Mr Wastborowe?"
+
+"Hold thy noise!" said the gaoler, rising, with the empty jug in his
+hand.  He wanted some more ale, and he was tired of amusing himself with
+Cissy.
+
+"Hush thee, my little maid!" said her father, laying his hand on her
+head.
+
+"Is he angry, Father?" asked Cissy, looking up.  "I said nothing wrong,
+did I?"
+
+"There's somewhat wrong," responded he, "but it's not thee, child."
+
+Meanwhile Wastborowe was crossing the court to his own house, jug in
+hand.  Opening the door, he set down the jug on the table, with the
+short command, "Fill that."
+
+"You may tarry till I've done," answered Audrey, calmly ironing on.  She
+was the only person in the place who was not afraid of her husband.  In
+fact, he was afraid of her when, as he expressed it, she "was wrong side
+up."
+
+"Come, wife!  I can't wait," replied Wastborowe in a tone which he never
+used to any living creature but Audrey or a priest.
+
+Audrey coolly set down the iron on its stand, folded up the shirt which
+she had just finished, and laid another on the board.
+
+"You can, wait uncommon well, John Wastborowe," said she; "you've had as
+much as is good for you already, and maybe a bit to spare.  I can't
+leave my ironing."
+
+"Am I to get it myself, then?" asked the gaoler, sulkily.
+
+"Just as you please," was the calm response.  "I'm not going."
+
+Wastborowe took up his jug, went to the cellar, and drew the ale for
+himself, in a meek, subdued style, very different indeed from the aspect
+which he wore to his prisoners.  He had scarcely left the door when a
+shrill voice summoned him to--
+
+"Come back and shut the door, thou blundering dizzard!  When will men
+ever have a bit of sense?"
+
+The gaoler came back to shut the door, and then, returning to the
+dungeon, showed himself so excessively surly and overbearing, that his
+men whispered to one another that "he'd been having it out with his
+mistress."  Before he recovered his equanimity, the Bailiff returned and
+called him into the courtyard.
+
+"Hearken, Wastborowe: how many of these have you now in ward?  Well-nigh
+all, methinks."  And he read over the list.  "Elizabeth Wood, Christian
+Hare, Rose Fletcher, Joan Kent, Agnes Stanley, Margaret Simson, Robert
+Purcas, Agnes Silverside, John Johnson, Elizabeth Foulkes."
+
+"Got 'em all save that last," said Wastborowe, "Who is she?  I know not
+the name.  By the same token, what didst with the babe?  There were
+three of Johnson's children, and one in arms."
+
+"Left it wi' Jane Hiltoft," said the gaoler, gruffly.  "I didn't want it
+screeching here."
+
+The Bailiff nodded.  "Maybe she can tell us who this woman is," said he;
+and stepping a little nearer the porter's lodge, he summoned the
+porter's wife.
+
+Mrs Hiltoft came to the door with little Helen Johnson in her arms.
+"Well, I don't know," said she.  "I'll tell you what: you'd best ask
+Audrey Wastborowe; she's a bit of a gossip, and I reckon she knows
+everybody in Colchester, by name and face, if no more.  She'll tell you
+if anybody can."
+
+The Bailiff stepped across the court, and rapped at the gaoler's door.
+He was desired by a rather shrill voice to come in.  He just opened the
+door about an inch, and spoke through it.
+
+"Audrey, do you know aught of one Elizabeth Foulkes?"
+
+"Liz'beth What-did-you-say?" inquired Mrs Wastborowe, hastily drying
+her arms on her apron, and coming forward.
+
+"Elizabeth Foulkes," repeated the Bailiff.
+
+"What, yon lass o' Clere's the clothier?  Oh, ay, you'll find her in
+Balcon Lane, at the Magpie.  A tall, well-favoured young maid she is--
+might be a princess, to look at her.  What's she been doing, now?"
+
+"Heresy," said the Bailiff, shortly.
+
+"Heresy! dear, dear, to think of it!  Well, now, who could have thought
+it?  But Master Clere's a bit unsteady in that way, his self, ain't he?"
+
+"Oh nay, he's reconciled."
+
+"Oh!"  The tone was significant.
+
+"Why, was you wanting yon maid o' Mistress Clere's?" said the porter's
+wife.  "You'll have her safe enough, for I met Amy Clere this even, and
+she said her mother was downright vexed with their Bess, and had turned
+the key on her.  I did not know it was her you meant.  I've never heard
+her called nought but Bess, you see."
+
+"Then that's all well," said Maynard.  "I'll tarry for her till the
+morrow, for I'm well wearied to-night."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY.
+
+LED TO THE SLAUGHTER.
+
+The long hours of that day wore on, and nobody came again to Elizabeth
+in the porch-chamber.  The dusk fell, and she heard the sounds of
+locking up the house and going to bed, and began to understand that
+neither supper nor bed awaited her that night.  Elizabeth quietly
+cleared a space on the floor in the moonlight, heaping boxes and baskets
+on one another, till she had room to lie down, and then, after kneeling
+to pray, she slept more peacefully than Queen Mary did in her Palace.
+She was awoke suddenly at last.  It was broad daylight, and somebody was
+rapping at the street door.
+
+"Amy!" she heard Mistress Clere call from her bedchamber, "look out and
+see who is there."
+
+Amy slept at the front of the house, in the room next to the
+porch-chamber.  Elizabeth rose to her feet, giving her garments a shake
+down as the only form of dressing just then in her power, and looked out
+of the window.
+
+The moment she did so she knew that one of the supreme moments of her
+life had come.  Before the door stood Mr Maynard, the Bailiff of
+Colchester--the man who had marched off the twenty-three prisoners to
+London in the previous August.  Everybody who knew him knew that he was
+a "stout Papist," to whom it was dear delight to bring a Protestant to
+punishment.  Elizabeth did not doubt for an instant that she was the one
+chosen for his next victim.
+
+Just as Amy Clere put her head out of the window.  Mr Maynard, who did
+not reckon patience among his chief virtues, and who was tired of
+waiting, signed to one of his men to give another sharp rap, accompanied
+by a shout of--"Open, in the Queen's name!"
+
+"Saints, love us and help us!" ejaculated Amy, taking her head in again.
+"Mother, it's the Queen's men!"
+
+"Go down and open to 'em," was Mrs Clere's next order.
+
+"Eh, I durstn't if it was ever so!" screamed Amy in reply.  "May I
+unlock the door and send Bessy?"
+
+"Thee do as thou art bid!" came in the gruff tones of her father.
+
+"Come, I'll go with thee," said her mother.  "Tell Master Bailiff we're
+at hand, or they'll mayhap break the door in."
+
+A third violent rap enforced Mrs Clere's command.
+
+"Have a bit of patience, Master Bailiff!" cried Amy from her window.
+"We're a-coming as quick as may be.  Let a body get some clothes on,
+do!"
+
+Somebody under the window was heard to laugh.
+
+Then Mrs Clere went downstairs, her heavy tread followed by the light
+run of her daughter's steps; and then Elizabeth heard the bolts drawn
+back, and the Bailiff and his men march into the kitchen of the Magpie.
+
+"Good-morrow, Mistress Clere.  I am verily sorry to come to the house of
+a good Catholic on so ill an errand.  But I am in search of a maid of
+yours, by name Elizabeth Foulkes, whose name hath been presented a afore
+the Queen's Grace's Commission for heresy.  Is this the maid?"
+
+Mr Maynard, as he spoke, laid his hand not very gently on Amy's
+shoulder.
+
+"Eh, bless me, no!" cried Amy, in terror.  "I'm as good a Catholic as
+you or any.  I'll say aught you want me, and I don't care what it is--
+that the moon's made o' green cheese, if you will, and I'd a shive last
+night for supper.  Don't take _me_, for mercy's sake!"
+
+"I'm not like," said Mr Maynard, laughing, and giving Amy a rough pat
+on the back.  "You aren't the sort I want."
+
+"You're after Bess Foulkes, aren't you?" said Mrs Clere.  "Amy, there's
+the key.  Go fetch her down.  I locked her up, you see, that she should
+be safe when wanted, I'm a true woman to Queen and Church, I am, Master
+Bailiff.  You'll find no heresy here, outside yon jade of a Bessy."
+
+Mrs Clere knew well that suspicion had attached to her husband's name
+in time past, which made her more desirous to free herself from all
+complicity with what the authorities were pleased to call heresy.
+
+Amy ran upstairs and unlocked the door of the porch-chamber.
+
+"Bessy, the Bailiff's come for thee!"
+
+A faint flush rose to Elizabeth's face as she stood up.
+
+"Now do be discreet, Bessy, and say as he says.  Bless you, it's only
+words!  I told him I'd say the moon was made o' green cheese if he
+wanted.  Why shouldn't you?"
+
+"Mistress Amy, it would be dishonour to my Lord, and I am ready for
+anything but that."
+
+"Good lack! couldst not do a bit o' penance at after?  Bess, it's thy
+life that's in danger.  Do be wise in time, lass."
+
+"It is only this life," said Elizabeth quietly, "and `he that saveth his
+life shall lose it.'  They that be faithful to the end shall have the
+crown of life.--Master Bailiff, I am ready."
+
+The Bailiff looked up at the fair, tall, queenly maiden who stood before
+him.
+
+"I trust thou art ready to submit to the Church," he said.  "It were
+sore pity thou shouldst lose life and all things."
+
+"Nay, I desire to win them," answered Elizabeth.  "I am right ready to
+submit to all which it were good for me to submit to."
+
+"Come, well said!" replied the Bailiff; and he tied the cord round her
+hands, and led her away to the Moot Hall.
+
+Just stop and think a moment, what it would be to be led in this way
+through the streets of a town where nearly everybody knew you, as if you
+had been a thief or a murderer!--led by a cord like an animal about to
+be sold--nay, as our Master, Christ, was led, like a sheep to the
+slaughter!  Fancy what it would be, to a girl who had always been
+respectable and well-behaved to be used in this way: to hear the rough,
+coarse jokes of the bystanders and of the men who were leading her, and
+not to have one friend with her--not one living creature that cared what
+became of her, except that Lord who had once died for her, and for whom
+she was now, for aught she knew, upon her way to die!  And even He
+_seemed_ as if He did not care.  Men did these things, and He kept
+silence.  Don't you think it was hard to bear?
+
+When Elizabeth reached the Moot Hall and was taken to the prison, for an
+instant she felt as if she had reached home and friends.  Mrs
+Silverside bade her welcome with a kindly smile, and Robert Purcas came
+up and kissed her--people kissed each other then instead of shaking
+hands as we do now,--and Elizabeth felt their sympathy a true comfort.
+But she was calm under her suffering until she caught sight of Cissy.
+Then an exclamation of pain broke from her.
+
+"O Cissy, Cissy; I am so sorry for thee!"
+
+"O Bessy, but I'm so glad!  Don't say you're sorry."
+
+"Why, Cissy, how canst thou be glad?  Dost know what it all signifieth?"
+
+"I know they've taken Father, and I'm sorry enough for that; but then
+Father always said they would some day.  But don't you see why I'm glad?
+They've got me too.  I was always proper 'feared they'd take Father and
+leave me all alone with the children; and he'd have missed us dreadful!
+Now, you see, I can tend on him, and do everything for him; and that's
+why I'm glad.  If it had to be, you know."
+
+Elizabeth looked up at Cissy's father, and he said in a husky voice,--
+
+"`Of such is the kingdom of Heaven.'"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.
+
+BEFORE THE COMMISSIONERS.
+
+"Bessy," said Cissy in a whisper, "do you think they'll burn us all
+to-day?"
+
+"I reckon, sweet heart, they be scarce like to burn thee."
+
+"But they'll have to do to me whatever they do to Father!" cried Cissy,
+earnestly.
+
+"Dear child, thou wist not what burning is."
+
+"Oh, but I've burnt my fingers before now," said Cissy, with an air of
+extensive experience which would have suited an old woman.  "It's not
+proper pleasant: but the worst's afterwards, and there wouldn't be any
+afterwards, would there?  It would be Heaven afterwards, wouldn't it?  I
+don't see that there's so much to be 'feared of in being burnt.  If they
+didn't burn me, and did Will and Baby, and--and Father"--and Cissy's
+voice faltered, and she began to sob--"that would be dreadful--dreadful!
+O Bessy, won't you ask God not to give them leave?  They couldn't,
+could they, unless He did?"
+
+"Nay, dear heart, not unless He did," answered Elizabeth, feeling her
+own courage strengthened by the child's faith.
+
+"Then if you and I both ask Him _very_ hard,--O Bessy! don't you think
+He will?"
+
+Before Elizabeth could answer, Johnson said--"I wouldn't, Cis."
+
+"You wouldn't, Father!  Please why?"
+
+"Because, dear heart, He knoweth better than we what is good for us.
+Sometimes, when folk ask God too earnestly for that they desire, He lets
+them have it, but in punishment, not in mercy.  It would have been a
+sight better for the Israelites if they hadn't had those quails.  Dost
+thou mind how David saith, `He gave them their desire, but sent leanness
+withall into their souls?'  I'd rather be burnt, Cis, than live with a
+lean soul, and my Father in Heaven turning away His face from me."
+
+Cissy considered.  "Father, I could never get along a bit, if you were
+so angry you wouldn't look at me!"
+
+"Truly, dear heart, and I would not have my Father so.  Ask the Lord
+what thou wilt, Cis, if it be His will; only remember that His will is
+best for us--the happiest as well as the most profitable."
+
+"Wilt shut up o' thy preachment?" shouted Wastborowe, with a severe blow
+to Johnson.  "Thou wilt make the child as ill an heretic as thyself, and
+we mean to bring her up a good Catholic Christian!"
+
+Johnson made no answer to the gaoler's insolent command.  A look of
+great pain came into his face, and he lifted his head up towards the
+sky, as if he were holding communion with his Father in Heaven.
+Elizabeth guessed his thoughts.  If he were to be martyred, and his
+little helpless children to be handed over to the keeping of priests who
+would teach them to commit idolatry, and forbid them to read the Bible--
+that seemed a far worse prospect in his eyes than even the agony of
+seeing them suffer.  That, at the worst, would be an hour's anguish, to
+be followed by an eternity of happy rest: but the other might mean the
+loss of all things--body and soul alike.  Little Will did not enter into
+the matter.  He might have understood something if he had been paying
+attention, but he was not attending, and therefore he did not.  But
+Cissy, to whom her father was the centre of the world, and who knew his
+voice by heart, understood his looks as readily as his words.
+
+"Father!" she said, looking at him, "don't be troubled about us.  I'll
+never believe nobody that says different from what you've learned us,
+and I'll tell Will and Baby they mustn't mind them neither."
+
+And Elizabeth added softly--"`I will be a God to thee, and to thy seed
+after thee.'  `Leave thy fatherless children; I will preserve them
+alive.'"
+
+"God bless you both!" said Johnson, and he could say no more.
+
+The next day the twelve prisoners accused of heresy were had up for
+examination before the Commissioners, Sir John Kingston, Mr Roper, and
+Mr Boswell, the Bishop's scribe.  Six of them--Elizabeth Wood,
+Christian Hare, Rose Fletcher, Joan Kent, Agnes Stanley, and Margaret
+Simson--were soon disposed of.  They had been in prison for a fortnight
+or more, they were terribly frightened, and they were not strong in the
+faith.  They easily consented to be reconciled to the Church--to say
+whatever the priests bade them, and to believe--or pretend to believe--
+all that they were desired.
+
+Robert Purcas was the next put on trial.  The Bishop's scribe called him
+(in the account he wrote to his master) "obstinate, and a glorious
+prating heretic."  What this really meant was that his arguments were
+too powerful to answer.  He must have had considerable ability, for
+though only twenty years of age, and a village tradesman, he was set
+down in the charge-sheet as "lettered," namely, a well-educated man,
+which in those days was most extraordinary for a man of that
+description.
+
+"When confessed you last?" asked the Commissioners of Purcas.
+
+"I have not confessed of long time," was the answer, "nor will I; for
+priests have no power to remit sin."
+
+"Come you to church, to hear the holy mass?"
+
+"I do not, nor will I; for all that is idolatry."
+
+"Have you never, then, received the blessed Sacrament of the altar?"
+
+"I did receive the Supper of the Lord in King Edward's time, but not
+since: nor will I, except it be ministered to me as it was then."
+
+"Do you not worship the sacred host?"
+
+That is, the consecrated bread in the Lord's Supper.
+
+"Those who worship it are idolaters!" said Robert Purcas, without the
+least hesitation: "that which there is used is bread and wine only."
+
+"Have him away!" cried Sir John Kingston.  "What need to question
+further so obstinate a man?"
+
+So they had him away--not being able to answer him--and Agnes Silverside
+was called in his stead.
+
+She was very calm, but as determined as Purcas.
+
+"Come hither, Mistress!" said Boswell, roughly.  "Why, what have we here
+in the charge-sheet?  `Agnes Silverside, _alias_ Smith, _alias_ Downes,
+_alias_ May!'  Hast thou had four husbands, old witch, or how comest by
+so many names?"
+
+"Sir," was the quiet answer, "my name is Smith from my father, and I
+have been thrice wed."
+
+The Commissioners, having first amused themselves by a little rough
+joking at the prisoner's expense, inquired which of her husbands was the
+last.
+
+"My present name is Silverside," she replied.
+
+"And what was he, this Silverside?--a tanner or a chimney-sweep?"
+
+"Sir, he was a priest."
+
+The Commissioners--who knew it all beforehand--professed themselves
+exceedingly shocked.  God never forbade priests to marry under the Old
+Testament, nor did He ever command Christian ministers to be unmarried
+men: but the Church of Rome has forbidden her priests to have any wives,
+as Saint Paul told Timothy would be done by those who departed from the
+faith: [see One Timothy four 3.] thus "teaching for doctrines the
+commandments of men."  [See Matthew fifteen verse 9.]
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.
+
+GENTLY HANDLED.
+
+When the Commissioners had tormented the priest's widow as long as they
+thought proper, they called on her to answer the charges brought against
+her.
+
+"Dost thou believe that in the blessed Sacrament of the altar the bread
+and wine becometh the very body and blood of Christ, so soon as the word
+of consecration be pronounced?"
+
+"Nay: it is but bread and wine before it is received; and when it is
+received in faith and ministered by a worthy minister, then it is Christ
+flesh and blood spiritually, and not otherwise."
+
+"Dost though worship the blessed Sacrament?"
+
+"Truly, nay: for ye make the Sacrament an idol.  It ought not to be
+worshipped with knocking, kneeling or holding up of hands."
+
+"Wilt thou come to church and hear mass?"
+
+"That will I not, so long as ye do worship to other than God Almighty.
+Nothing that is made can be the same thing as he that made it.  They
+must needs be idolators, and of the meanest sort, that worship the works
+of their own hands."
+
+"Aroint thee, old witch!  Wilt thou go to confession?"
+
+"Neither will I that, for no priest hath power to remit sin that is
+against God.  To Him surely will I confess: and having so done, I have
+no need to make confession to men."
+
+"Take the witch away!" cried the chief Commissioner.  "She's a froward,
+obstinate heretic, only fit to make firewood."
+
+The gaoler led her out of the court, and John Johnson was summoned next.
+
+"What is thy name, and how old art thou?"
+
+"My name is John Johnson; I am a labouring man, of the age of four and
+thirty years."
+
+"Canst read?"
+
+"But a little."
+
+"Then how darest thou set thee up against the holy doctors of the
+Church, that can read Latin?"
+
+"Cannot a man be saved without he read Latin?"
+
+"Hold thine impudent tongue!  It is our business to question, and thine
+to answer.  Where didst learn thy pestilent doctrine?"
+
+"I learned the Gospel of Christ Jesus, if that be what you mean by
+pestilent doctrine, from Master Trudgeon at the first.  He learned me
+that the Sacrament, as ye minister it, is an idol, and that no priest
+hath power to remit sin."
+
+"Dost thou account of this Trudgeon as a true prophet?"
+
+"Ay, I do."
+
+"What then sayest thou to our Saviour Christ's word to His Apostles,
+`Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them'?"
+
+"Marry, I say nought, without you desire it."
+
+"What meanest by that?"
+
+"Why, you are not apostles, nor yet the priests that be now alive.  He
+said not, `Whosesoever sins Sir Thomas Tye shall remit, they are
+remitted unto them.'"
+
+"Thou foolish man, Sir Thomas Tye is successor of the apostles."
+
+"Well, but it sayeth not neither, `Whosesoever sins ye and your
+successors do remit.'  I'll take the words as they stand, by your leave.
+To apostles were they said, and to apostles will I leave them."
+
+"The man hath no reason in him!" said Kingston.  "Have him away
+likewise."
+
+"Please your Worships," said the gaoler, "here be all that are indicted.
+There is but one left, and she was presented only for not attending at
+mass nor confession."
+
+"Bring her up!"
+
+And Elizabeth Foulkes stepped up to the table, and courtesied to the
+representatives of the Queen.
+
+"What is thy name?"
+
+"Elizabeth Foulkes."
+
+"How old art thou?"
+
+"Twenty years."
+
+"Art thou a wife?"
+
+Girls commonly married then younger than they do now.  The usual length
+of human life was shorter: people who reached sixty were looked upon as
+we now regard those of eighty, and a man of seventy was considered much
+as one of ninety or more would be at the present time.
+
+"Nay, I am a maid," said Elizabeth.
+
+The word maid was only just beginning to be used instead of servant; it
+generally meant an unmarried woman.
+
+"What is thy calling?"
+
+"I am servant to Master Nicholas Clere, clothier, of Balcon Lane."
+
+"Art Colchester-born?"
+
+"I was born at Stoke Nayland, in Suffolk."
+
+"And wherefore dost thou not come to mass?"
+
+"Because I hold the Sacrament of the altar to be but bread and wine,
+which may not be worshipped under peril of idolatry."
+
+"Well, and why comest not to confession?"
+
+"Because no priest hath power to remit sins."
+
+"Hang 'em! they are all in a story!" said the chief Commissioner,
+wrathfully.  "But she's a well-favoured maid, this: it were verily pity
+to burn her, if we could win her to recant."
+
+What a poor, weak, mean thing human nature is!  The men who had no pity
+for the white hair of Agnes Silverside, or the calm courage of John
+Johnson, or even the helpless innocence of little Cissy: such things as
+these did not touch them at all--these very men were anxious to save
+Elizabeth Foulkes, not because she was good, but because she was
+beautiful.
+
+It is a sad, sad blunder, which people often make, to set beauty above
+goodness.  Some very wicked things have been done in this world, simply
+by thinking too much of beauty.  Admiration is a good thing in its
+proper place; but a great deal of mischief comes when it gets into the
+wrong one.  Whenever you admire a bad man because he is clever, or a
+foolish woman because she is pretty, you are letting admiration get out
+of his place.  If we had lived when the Lord Jesus was upon earth, we
+should not have found people admiring Him.  He was not beautiful.  "His
+face was marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of
+men."  And would it not have been dreadful if we had admired Pontius
+Pilate and Judas Iscariot, and had seen no beauty in Him who is
+"altogether lovely" to the hearts of those whom the Holy Ghost has
+taught to love Him?  So take care what sort of beauty you admire, and
+make sure that goodness goes along with it.  We may be quite certain
+that however much men thought of Elizabeth's beautiful face, God thought
+very little of it.  The beauty which He saw in her was her love to the
+Lord Jesus, and her firm stand against what would dishonour Him.  This
+sort of beauty all of us can have.  Oh, do ask God to make you beautiful
+in _His_ eyes!
+
+No sooner had the chief Commissioner spoken than a voice in the Court
+called out,--
+
+"Pray you, Worshipful Sirs, save this young maid!  I am her mother's
+brother, Thomas Holt of Colchester, and I do you to wit she is of a
+right good inclination, and no wise perverse.  I do entreat you, grant
+her yet another chance."
+
+Then a gentleman stepped forward from the crowd of listeners.
+
+"Worshipful Sirs," said he, "may I have leave to take charge of this
+young maiden, to the end that she may be reconciled to the Church, and
+obtain remission of her errors?  Truly, as Master Commissioner saith, it
+were pity so fair a creature were made food for the fire."
+
+"Who are you?--and what surety give you?" asked Sir John.
+
+Sir Thomas Tye rose from his seat on the Bench.
+
+"Please it, your Worships, that is Master Ashby of this town, a good
+Catholic man, and well to be trusted.  If your Worships be pleased to
+show mercy to the maid, as indeed I would humbly entreat you to do,
+there were no better man than he to serve you in this matter."
+
+The priest having spoken in favour of Mr Ashby the Commissioners
+required no further surety.
+
+"Art thou willing to be reformed?" they asked Elizabeth.
+
+"Sirs," she answered cautiously, "I am willing to be shown God's true
+way, if so be I err from it."
+
+This was enough for the Commissioners.  They wanted to get her free, and
+they therefore accepted from her words which would probably have been
+used in vain by the rest.  Mr Ashby was charged to keep and "reconcile"
+her, which he promised to do, or to feed her on barley bread if she
+proved obstinate.
+
+As Elizabeth turned to follow him she passed close by Robert Purcas,
+whom the gaoler was just about to take back to prison.
+
+"`Thou hast set them in slippery places,'" whispered Purcas as she
+passed him.  "Keep thou true to Christ.  O Elizabeth, mine own love,
+keep true!"
+
+The tears rose to Elizabeth's eyes.  "Pray for me, Robin," she said.
+And then each was led away.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.
+
+RESPITE.
+
+The Commissioners who tried these prisoners were thoroughly worldly men,
+who really cared nothing about the doctrines which they burned people
+for not believing.  Had it been otherwise, when Queen Elizabeth came to
+the throne, less than two years afterwards, these men would have shown
+themselves willing to suffer in their turn.  But most of them did not do
+this--seldom even to the extent of losing promotion, scarcely ever to
+that of losing life.  They simply wheeled round again to what they had
+been in the reign of Edward the Sixth.
+
+It is possible to respect men who are willing to lose their lives for
+the sake of what they believe to be true, even though you may think them
+quite mistaken.  But how can you respect a man who will not run the risk
+of losing a situation or a few pounds in defence of the truth?  It is
+not possible.
+
+After the trial of the Colchester prisoners, the Commissioners passed on
+to other places, and the town was quiet for a time.  Mrs Silverside,
+Johnson and the children, and Purcas, remained in prison in the Moot
+Hall, and Elizabeth Foulkes was as truly a prisoner in the house of
+Henry Ashby.  At first she was very kindly treated, in the hope of
+inducing her to recant.  But as time went on, things were altered.  Mr
+Ashby found that what Elizabeth understood by "being shown God's true
+way," was not being argued with by a priest, nor being commanded to obey
+the Church, but being pointed to some passage in the Bible which agreed
+with what he said; and since what he said was not in accordance with the
+Bible, of course he could not show her any texts which agreed with it.
+
+The Church of Rome herself admits that people who read the Bible for
+themselves generally become Protestants.  Does not common sense show
+that in that case the Protestant doctrines must be the doctrines of the
+Bible?  Why should Rome be so anxious to shut up the Bible if her own
+doctrines are to be found there?
+
+Above four months passed on, and no change came to the prisoners, but
+there had not been any fresh arrests.  The other Gospellers began to
+breathe more freely, and to hope that the worst had come already.  Mrs
+Wade was left at liberty; Mr Ewring had not been taken; surely all
+would go well now!
+
+How often we think the worst must be over, just a minute before it comes
+upon us!
+
+A little rap on Margaret Thurston's door brought her to open it.
+
+"Why, Rose!  I'm fain to see thee, maid.  Come in."
+
+"My mother bade me tell you, Margaret," said Rose, when the door was
+shut, "that there shall be a Scripture reading in our house this even.
+Will you come?"
+
+"That will we, right gladly, dear heart.  At what hour?"
+
+"Midnight.  We dare not afore."
+
+"We'll be there.  How fares thy mother to-day?"
+
+"Why, not over well.  She seems but ill at ease.  Her hands burn, and
+she is ever athirst.  'Tis an ill rheum, methinks."
+
+"Ay, she has caught a bad cold," said Margaret.  "Rose, I'll tell you
+what--we'll come a bit afore midnight, and see if we cannot help you.
+My master knows a deal touching herbs; he's well-nigh as good as any
+apothecary, though I say it, and he'll compound an herb drink that shall
+do her good, with God's blessing, while I help you in the house.  What
+say you?  Have I well said?"
+
+"Indeed, Margaret, and I'd be right thankful if you would, for it'll be
+hard on Father if he's neither Mother nor me to do for him--she, sick
+abed, and me waiting on her."
+
+"Be sure it will!  But I hope it'll not be so bad as that.  Well, then,
+look you, we'll shut up the hut and come after you.  You haste on to
+her, and when I've got things a bit tidy, and my master's come from
+work--he looked to be overtime to-night--we'll run over to Bentley, and
+do what we can."
+
+Rose thanked her again, and went on with increased speed.  She found her
+mother no better, and urged her to go to bed, telling her that Margaret
+was close at hand.  It was now about five in the afternoon.
+
+Alice agreed to this, for she felt almost too poorly to sit up.  She
+went to bed, and Rose flew about the kitchen, getting all finished that
+she could before Margaret should arrive.
+
+It was Saturday night, and the earliest hours of the Sabbath were to be
+ushered in by the "reading."  Only a few neighbours were asked, for it
+was necessary now to be very careful.  Half-a-dozen might be invited, as
+if to supper; but the times when a hundred or more had assembled to hear
+the Word of God were gone by.  Would they ever come again?  They dared
+not begin to read until all prying eyes and ears were likely to be
+closed in sleep; and the reader's voice was low, that nobody might be
+roused next door.  Few people could read then, especially among the
+labouring class, so that, except on these occasions, the poorer
+Gospellers had no hope of hearing the words of the Lord.
+
+The reading was over, and one after another of the guests stole silently
+out into the night--black, noiseless shadows, going up the lane into the
+village, or down it on the way to Thorpe.  At length the last was gone
+except the Thurstons, who offered to stay for the night.  John Thurston
+lay down in the kitchen, and Margaret, finding Alice Mount apparently
+better, said she would share Rose's bed.
+
+Alice Mount's malady was what we call a bad feverish cold, and generally
+we do not expect it to do anything more than make the patient very
+uncomfortable for a week.  But in Queen Mary's days they knew very much
+less about colds than we do, and they were much more afraid of them.  It
+was only six years since the last attack of the terrible sweating
+sickness--the last ever to be, but they did not know that--and people
+were always frightened of anything like a cold turning to that dreadful
+epidemic wherein, as King Edward the Sixth writes in his diary, "if one
+took cold he died within three hours, and if he escaped, it held him but
+nine hours, or ten at the most."  It was, therefore, a relief to hear
+Alice say that she felt better, and urge Rose to go to bed.
+
+"Well, it scarce seems worth while going to bed," said Margaret.  "What
+time is it?  Can you see the church clock, Rose?"
+
+"We can when it's light," said Rose; "but I think you'll not see it
+now."
+
+Margaret drew back the little curtain, but all was dark, and she let it
+drop again.
+
+"It'll be past one, I reckon," said she.
+
+"Oh, ay; a good way on toward two," was Rose's answer.
+
+"Rose, have you heard aught of Bessy Foulkes of late?"
+
+"Nought.  I've tried to see her, but they keep hot so close at Master
+Ashby's there's no getting to her."
+
+"And those poor little children of Johnson's.  They're yet in prison,
+trow?"
+
+"Oh, ay.  I wish they'd have let us have the baby Jane Hiltoft has it.
+She'll care it well enough for the body: but for the soul--"
+
+"Oh, when Johnson's burned--as he will be, I reckon--the children 'll be
+bred up in convents, be sure," was Margaret's answer.
+
+"Nay!  I'll be sure of nought so bad as that, as long as God's in
+heaven."
+
+"There's no miracles now o' days, Rose."
+
+"There's God's care, just as much as in Elijah's days.  And, Margaret,
+they've burned little children afore now."
+
+"Eh, don't, Rose! you give me the cold chills!"
+
+"What's that?"  Rose was listening intently.
+
+"What's what?" said Margaret, who had heard nothing.
+
+"That!  Don't you hear the far-off tramp of men?"
+
+They looked at each other fearfully.  Margaret knew well enough of what
+Rose thought--the Bailiff and his searching party.  They stopped their
+undressing.  Nearer and nearer came that measured tread of a body of
+men.  It paused, went on, came close under the window, and paused again.
+Then a thundering rattle came at the door.
+
+"Open, in the Queen's name!"
+
+Then they knew it had come--not the worst, but that which led to it--the
+beginning of the end.
+
+Rose quietly, but quickly, put her gown on again.  Before she was ready,
+she heard her step-father's heavy tread as he went down the stairs;
+heard him draw the bolt, and say, as he opened the door, in calm tones--
+
+"Good-morrow, Master Bailiff.  Pray you enter with all honour, an' you
+come in the Queen's name."
+
+Just then the church clock struck two.  Two o'clock on the Sabbath
+morning!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.
+
+ROSE'S FIERY ORDEAL.
+
+"Art thou come, dear heart?" said Alice Mount, as her daughter ran
+hurriedly into her bedchamber.  "That is well.  Rose, the Master is
+come, and calleth for us, and He must find us ready."
+
+There was no time to say more, for steps were ascending the stairs, and
+in another minute Master Simnel entered--the Bailiff of Colchester
+Hundred, whose office it was to arrest criminals within his boundaries.
+He was a rough, rude sort of man, from whom women were wont to shrink.
+
+"Come, mistress, turn out!" said he.  "We'll find you other lodgings for
+a bit."
+
+"Master, I will do mine utmost," said Alice Mount, lifting her aching
+head from the pillow; "but I am now ill at ease, and I pray you, give
+leave for my daughter to fetch me drink ere I go hence, or I fear I may
+scarce walk."
+
+We must remember that they had then no tea, coffee, or cocoa; and they
+had a funny idea that cold water was excessively unwholesome.  The rich
+drank wine, and the poor thin, weak ale, most of which they brewed
+themselves from simple malt and hops--not at all like the strong,
+intoxicating stuff which people drink in public-houses now.
+
+Mr Simnel rather growlingly assented to the request.  Rose ran down,
+making her way to the dresser through the rough men of whom the kitchen
+was full, to get a jug and a candlestick.  As she came out of the
+kitchen, with the jug in her right hand and the candle in her left, she
+met a man--I believe he called himself a gentleman--named Edmund Tyrrel,
+a relation of that Tyrrel who had been one of the murderers of poor
+Edward the Fifth and his brother.  Rose dropped a courtesy, as she had
+been taught to do to her betters in social position.
+
+Mr Tyrrel stopped her.  "Look thou, maid! wilt thou advise thy father
+and mother to be good Catholic people?"
+
+Catholic means _general_; and for any one Church to call itself the
+Catholic Church, is as much as to say that it is the only Christian
+Church, and that other people who do not belong to it are not
+Christians.  It is, therefore, not only untrue, but most insulting to
+all the Christians who belong to other Churches.  Saint Paul
+particularly warned the Church of Rome not to think herself better than
+other Churches, as you will see in the eleventh chapter of the Epistle
+to the Romans, verses 17 to 22.  But she took no heed, and keeps calling
+herself _the_ Catholic Church, as if nobody could be a Christian who did
+not belong to her.  No Protestant Church has ever committed this sin,
+though some few persons in several denominations may have done so.
+
+However, Rose was accustomed to the word, and she knew what Mr Tyrrel
+meant.  So she answered, gently--
+
+"Master, they have a better instructor than I, for the Holy Ghost doth
+teach them, I hope, which I trust shall not suffer them to err."  [See
+Note 1.]
+
+Mr Tyrrel grew very angry.  He remembered that Rose had been before the
+magistrates before on account of Protestant opinions, "Why art thou
+still in that mind, thou naughty hussy?" cried he.  "Marry, it is time
+to look upon such heretics indeed."
+
+Naughty was a much stronger word then than it is now.  It meant, utterly
+worthless and most wicked.
+
+Brave Rose Allen! she lifted her eyes to the face of her insulter, and
+replied,--"Sir, with that which you call heresy, do I worship my Lord
+God, I tell you truth."
+
+"Then I perceive you will burn, gossip, with the rest for company's
+sake," said Mr Tyrrel, making a horrible joke.
+
+"No, sir, not for company's sake," said Rose, "but for my Christ's sake,
+if so be I be compelled; and I hope in His mercies, if He call me to it,
+He will enable me to bear it."
+
+Never did apostle or martyr answer better, nor bear himself more
+bravely, than this girl!  Mr Tyrrel was in the habit of looking with
+the greatest reverence on certain other young girls, whom he called
+Saint Agnes, Saint Margaret, and Saint Katherine--girls who had made
+such answers to Pagan persecutors, twelve hundred years or so before
+that time: but he could not see that the same scene was being enacted
+again, and that he was persecuting the Lord Jesus in the person of young
+Rose Allen.  He took the candle from her hand, and she did not resist
+him.  The next minute he was holding her firmly by the wrist, with her
+hand in the burning flame, watching her face to see what she would do.
+
+She did nothing.  Not a scream, not a word, not even a moan, came from
+the lips of Rose Allen.  All that could be seen was that the empty jug
+which she held in the other hand trembled a little as she stood there.
+
+"Wilt thou not cry?" sneered Tyrrel as he held her,--and he called her
+some ugly names which I shall not write.
+
+The answer was as calm as it could be.  "I have no cause, thank God,"
+said Rose tranquilly; "but rather to rejoice.  You have more cause to
+weep than I, if you consider the matter well."
+
+When people set to work to vex you, nothing makes them more angry than
+to take it quietly, and show no vexation.  That is, if they are people
+with mean minds.  If there be any generosity in them, then it is the way
+to make them see that they are wrong.  There was no generosity, nor love
+of justice, in Edmund Tyrrel.  When Rose Allen stood so calmly before
+him, with her hand on fire, he was neither softened nor ashamed.  He
+burned her till "the sinews began to crack," and then he let go her hand
+and pushed her roughly away, calling her all the bad names he could
+think of while he did so.
+
+"Sir," was the meek and Christlike response, "have you done what you
+will do?"
+
+Surely few, even among martyrs, have behaved with more exquisite
+gentleness than this!  The maiden's hand was cruelly burnt, and her
+tormentor was adding insult to injury by heaping false and abominable
+names upon her: and the worst thing she had to say to him was simply to
+ask whether he wished to torture her any more!
+
+"Yes," sneered Tyrrel.  "And if thou think it not well, then mend it!"
+
+"`Mend it'!" repeated Rose.  "Nay! the Lord mend you, and give you
+repentance, if it be His will.  And now, if you think it good, begin at
+the feet, and burn to the head also.  For he that set you a-work shall
+pay you your wages one day, I warrant you."
+
+And with this touch of sarcasm--only just enough to show how well she
+could have handled that weapon if she had chosen to fight with it--Rose
+calmly went her way, wetted a rag, and bound up her injured hand, and
+then drew the ale and carried it to her mother.
+
+"How long hast thou been, child!" said her mother, who of course had no
+notion what had been going on downstairs.
+
+"Ay, Mother; I am sorry for it," was the quiet reply.  "Master Tyrrel
+stayed me in talk for divers minutes."
+
+"What said he to thee?" anxiously demanded Alice.
+
+"He asked me if I did mean to entreat you and my father to be good
+Catholics; and when I denied the same, gave me some ill words."
+
+Rose said nothing about the burning, and as she dexterously kept her
+injured hand out of her mother's sight, all that Alice realised was that
+the girl was a trifle less quick and handy than usual.
+
+"She's a good, quick maid in the main," said she to herself: "I'll not
+fault her if she's upset a bit."
+
+While Rose was helping her mother to dress, the Bailiff was questioning
+her step-father whether any one else was in the house.
+
+"I'm here," said John Thurston, rising from the pallet-bed where he lay
+in a corner of the little scullery.  "You'd best take me, if you want
+me."
+
+"Take them all!" cried Tyrrel.  "They be all in one tale, be sure."
+
+"Were you at mass this last Sunday?" said the Bailiff to Thurston.  He
+was not quite so bad as Tyrrel.
+
+"No, that was I not," answered Thurston firmly.
+
+"Wherefore?"
+
+"Because I will not worship any save God Almighty."
+
+"Why, who else would we have you to worship?"
+
+"Nay, it's not who else, it's what else.  You would have me to worship
+stocks and stones, that cannot hear nor see; and cakes of bread that the
+baker made overnight in his oven.  I've as big a throat as other men,
+yet can I not swallow so great a notion as that the baker made Him that
+made the baker."
+
+"Of a truth, thou art a naughty heretic!" said the Bailiff; "and I must
+needs carry thee hence with the rest.  But where is thy wife?"
+
+Ay, where was Margaret?  Nobody had seen her since the Bailiff knocked
+at the door.  He ordered his men to search for her; but she had hidden
+herself so well that some time passed before she could be found.  At
+length, with much laughter, one of the Bailiff's men dragged her out of
+a wall-closet, where she crouched hidden behind an old box.  Then the
+Bailiff shouted for Alice Mount and Rose to be brought down, and
+proceeded to tie his prisoners together, two and two,--Rose contriving
+to slip back, so that she should be marched behind her parents.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Note 1.  This part of the story is all quite true, and I am not putting
+into Rose's lips, in her conversation with Mr Tyrrel, one word which
+she did not really utter.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.
+
+IN COLCHESTER CASTLE.
+
+The whole population of Much Bentley seemed to have turned out to
+witness the arrest at the Blue Bell.  Some were kindly and sympathising,
+some bitter and full of taunts; but the greater number were simply
+inquisitive, neither friendly nor hostile, but gossipping.  It was now
+four o'clock, a time at which half the people were up in the village,
+and many a woman rose an hour earlier than her wont, in order to see the
+strange sight.  There were the carpenters with baskets of tools slung
+over their shoulders; the gardeners with rake or hoe; the labourers with
+their spades; the fishermen with their nets.
+
+The Colne oyster-fishery is the oldest of all known fisheries in
+England, and its fame had reached imperial Rome itself, nearly two
+thousand years ago, when the Emperor Caligula came over to England
+partly for the purpose of tasting the Colchester oyster.  The oysters
+are taken in the Colne and placed in pits, where they are fattened till
+they reach the size of a silver oyster preserved among the town
+treasures.  In April or May, when the baby oyster first appears in the
+river, it looks like a drop from a tallow candle; but in twenty-four
+hours the shell begins to form.  The value of the oyster spawn (as the
+baby oysters are called) in the river, is reckoned at twenty thousand
+pounds; and from five to ten thousand pounds' worth of oysters is sold
+every year.
+
+"Well, Master Mount, how like you your new pair o' bracelets?" said one
+of the fishermen, as William Mount was led out, and his hands tied with
+a rough cord.
+
+"Friend, I count it honour to bear for my Lord that which He first bare
+for me," was the meek answer.
+
+"Father Tye 'll never preach a better word than that," said a voice in
+the crowd.
+
+Mr Simnel looked up as if to see who spoke.
+
+"Go on with thy work, old cage-maker!" cried another voice.  "We'll not
+find thee more gaol-birds to-day than what thou hast."
+
+"You'd best hold your saucy tongues," said the nettled Bailiff.
+
+"Nay, be not so tetchy, Master Simnel!" said another.  The same person
+never seemed to speak twice; a wise precaution, since the speaker was
+less likely to be arrested if he did not repeat the offence.  "Five
+slices of meat be enough for one man's supper."
+
+This allusion to the number of the prisoners, and the rapacity of the
+Bailiff, was received with laughter by the crowd.  The Bailiff's temper,
+never of the best, was quite beyond control by this time.  He relieved
+it by giving Mount a heavy blow, as he pushed him into line after tying
+his wife to him.
+
+"Hit him back, Father Mount!" cried one of the voices.  William Mount
+shook his head with a smile.
+
+"I'll hit some of you--see if I don't!" responded the incensed Bailiff,
+who well knew his own unpopularity.
+
+"Hush, fellows!" said an authoritative voice.  "Will ye resist the
+Queen's servants?"
+
+John Thurston and his wife were next tied together, and placed behind
+the Mounts, the crowd remaining quiet while this was being done.  Then
+they brought Rose Allen, and fastened her, by a cord round her wrists,
+to the same rope.
+
+"Eh, Lord have mercy on the young maid!" said a woman's voice in a
+compassionate tone.
+
+"Young witch, rather!" responded a man, roughly.
+
+"Hold thy graceless tongue, Jack Milman!" replied a woman's shrill
+tones.  "Didn't Rose Allen make broth for thee when we were both sick,
+and go out of a cold winter night a-gathering herbs to ease thy pain?
+Be shamed to thee, if thou knows what shame is, casting ill words at her
+in her trouble!"
+
+Just as the prisoners were marched off, another voice hitherto silent
+seemed to come from the very midst of the crowd.  It said,--
+
+"Be ye faithful unto death, and Christ shall give you a crown of life."
+
+"Take that man!" said the Bailiff, stopping.
+
+But the man was not to be found.  Nobody knew--at least nobody would
+own--who had uttered those fearless words.
+
+So the prisoners were marched away on the road to Colchester.  They went
+in at Bothal's Gate, up Bothal Street, and past the Black Friars'
+monastery to the Castle.
+
+Colchester Castle is one of the oldest castles in England, for it was
+built by King Edward the Elder, the son of Alfred the Great.  It is a
+low square mass, with the largest Norman keep, or centre tower, in the
+country.  The walls are twelve feet thick, and the whole ground floor,
+and two of the four towers, are built up perfectly solid from the
+bottom, that it might be made as strong as possible.  It was built with
+Roman bricks, and the Roman mortar still sticks to some of them.
+Builders always know Roman mortar, for it is so much harder than any
+mortar people know how to make now--quite as hard as stone itself.  The
+chimneys run up through the walls.
+
+The prisoners were marched up to the great entrance gate, on the south
+side of the Castle.  The Bailiff blew his horn, and the porter opened a
+little wicket and looked out.
+
+"Give you good-morrow, Master Bailiff.  Another batch, I reckon?"
+
+"Ay, another batch, belike.  You'll have your dungeons full ere long."
+
+"Oh, we've room enough and to spare!" said the porter with a grin.
+"None so many, yet.  Two men fetched in yestereven for breaking folks'
+heads in a drunken brawl; and two or three debtors; and a lad for
+thieving, and such; then Master Maynard brought an handful in this
+morrow--Moot Hall was getting too full, he said."
+
+"Ay so? who brought he?"
+
+"Oh, Alegar o' Thorpe, and them bits o' children o' his, that should be
+learning their hornbooks i' school sooner than be here, trow."
+
+"You'd best teach 'em, Tom," suggested Mr Simnel with a grim smile.
+"Now then, in with you!"
+
+And the prisoners were marched into the Castle dungeon.
+
+In the corner of the dungeon sat John Johnson, his Bible on his knee,
+and beside him, snuggled close to him, Cissy.  Little Will was seated on
+the floor at his father's feet, playing with some bits of wood.  Johnson
+looked up as his friends entered.
+
+"Why, good friends!  Shall I say I am glad or sorry to behold you here?"
+
+"Glad," answered William Mount, firmly, "if so we may glorify God."
+
+"I'm glad, I know," said Cissy, jumping from the term, and giving a warm
+hug to Rose.  "I thought God would send somebody.  You see, Father was
+down a bit when we came here this morning, and left everybody behind us;
+but you've come now, and he'll be ever so pleased.  It isn't bad, you
+know--not bad at all--and then there's Father.  But, Rose, what have you
+done to your hand?  It's tied up."
+
+"Hush, dear!  Only hurt it a bit, Cissy.  Don't speak of it," said Rose
+in an undertone; "I don't want mother to see it, or she'll trouble about
+it, maybe.  It doesn't hurt much now."
+
+Cissy nodded, with a face which said that she thoroughly entered into
+Rose's wish for silence.
+
+"Eh dear, dear! that we should have lived to see this day!" cried
+Margaret Thurston, melting into tears as she sat down in the corner.
+
+"Rose!" said her father suddenly, "thy left hand is bound up.  Hast hurt
+it, maid?"
+
+Rose's eyes, behind her mother's back, said, "Please don't ask me
+anything about it!"  But Alice turned round to look, and she had to own
+the truth.
+
+"Why, maid!  That must have been by the closet where I was hid, and I
+never heard thee scream," said Margaret.
+
+"Nay, Meg, I screamed not."
+
+"Lack-a-day! how could'st help the same?"
+
+"Didn't it hurt sore, Rose?" asked John Thurston.
+
+"Not nigh so much as you might think," answered Rose, brightly.  "At the
+first it caused me some grief; but truly, the more it burned the less it
+hurt, till at last it was scarce any hurt at all."
+
+"But thou had'st the pot in thine other hand, maid; wherefore not have
+hit him a good swing therewith?"
+
+"Truly, Meg, I thank God that He held mine hand from any such deed.
+`The servant of the Lord must not strive.'  I should thus have
+dishonoured my Master."
+
+"Marry, but that may be well enough for angels and such like.  _We_
+dwell in this nether world."
+
+"Rose hath the right," said William Mount.  "We may render unto no man
+railing for railing.  `If we suffer as Christians, happy are we; for the
+Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon us.'  Let us not suffer as
+malefactors."
+
+"You say well, neighbour," added John Thurston.  "We be called to the
+defence of God's truth, but in no wise to defend ourselves."
+
+"Nay, the Lord is the avenger of all that have none other," said Alice.
+"But let me see thine hand, child, maybe I can do thee some ease."
+
+"Under your good leave, Mother, I would rather not unlap it," replied
+Rose.  "Truly, it scarce doth me any hurt now; and I bound it well with
+a wet rag, that I trow it were better to let it be.  It shall do well
+enough, I cast no doubt."
+
+She did not want her mother to see how terribly it was burned.  And in
+her heart was a further thought which she would not put into words--If
+they shortly burn my whole body, what need is there to trouble about
+this little hurt to my hand?
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.
+
+SHUTTING THE DOOR.
+
+Once more the days wore on, and no fresh arrests were made; but no help
+came to the prisoners in the Castle and the Moot Hall, nor to Elizabeth
+Foulkes in the keeping of Mr Ashby.  Two priests had talked to
+Elizabeth, and the authorities were beginning to change their opinion
+about her.  They had fancied from her quiet, meek appearance, that she
+would be easily prevailed upon to say what they wanted.  Now they found
+that under that external softness there was a will of iron, and a power
+of endurance beyond anything they had imagined.
+
+The day of examination for all the prisoners--the last day, when they
+would be sentenced or acquitted--was appointed to be the 23rd of June.
+On the previous day the Commissioners called Elizabeth Foulkes before
+them.  She came, accompanied by Mr Ashby and her uncle; and they asked
+her only one question.
+
+"Dost thou believe in a Catholic Church of Christ, or no?"
+
+Of course Elizabeth replied "Yes," for the Bible has plenty to say of
+the Church of Christ, though it never identifies it with the Church of
+Rome.  They asked her no more, for Boswell, the scribe, interposed, and
+begged that she might be consigned to the keeping of her uncle.  The
+Commissioners assented, and Holt took her away.  It looks very much as
+if Boswell had wanted her to escape.  She was much more carelessly
+guarded in her uncle's house than in Mr Ashby's, and could have got
+away easily enough if she had chosen.  She was more than once sent to
+open the front door, whence she might have slipped out after dark with
+almost a certainty of escape.  It was quite dark when she answered the
+last rap.
+
+"Pray you," asked an old man's voice, "is here a certain young maid, by
+name Elizabeth Foulkes?"
+
+"I am she, master.  What would you with me?"
+
+"A word apart," he answered in a whisper.  "Be any ears about that
+should not be?"
+
+Elizabeth glanced back into the kitchen where her aunt was sewing, and
+her two cousins gauffering the large ruffs which both men and women then
+wore.
+
+"None that can harm.  Say on, my master."
+
+"Bessy, dost know my voice?"
+
+"I do somewhat, yet I can scarce put a name thereto."
+
+"I am Walter Purcas, of Booking."
+
+"Robin's father!  Ay, I know you well now, and I cry you mercy that I
+did no sooner."
+
+"Come away with me, Bessy!" he said, in a loud whisper.  "I have walked
+all the way from Booking to see if I might save thee, for Robin's sake,
+for he loves thee as he loveth nought else save me.  Mistress Wade shall
+lend me an horse, and we can be safe ere night be o'er, in the house of
+a good man that I know in a place unsuspect.  O Bessy, my dear lass,
+save thyself and come with me!"
+
+"Save thyself!"  The words had been addressed once before, fifteen
+hundred years back, to One who did not save Himself, because He came to
+save the world.  Before the eyes of Elizabeth rose two visions--one fair
+and sweet enough, a vision of safety and comfort, of life and happiness,
+which might be yet in state for her.  But it was blotted out by the
+other--a vision of three crosses reared on a bare rock, when the One who
+hung in the midst could have saved Himself at the cost of the glory of
+the Father and the everlasting bliss of His Church.  And from that cross
+a voice seemed to whisper to her--"If any man serve Me, let him follow
+Me."
+
+"Verily, I am loth you should have your pain for nought," said she, "but
+indeed I cannot come with you, though I do thank you with all my heart.
+I am set here in ward of mine uncle, and for me to 'scape away would
+cause penalty to fall on him.  I cannot save myself at his cost.  And
+should not the Papists take it to mean that I had not the courage to
+stand to that which they demanded of me?  Nay, Father Purcas, this will
+I not do, for so should I lose my crown, and dim the glory of my
+Christ."
+
+"Bessy!" cried her aunt from the kitchen, "do come within and shut the
+door, maid!  Here's the wind a-blowing in till I'm nigh feared o' losing
+my ears, and all the lace like to go up the chimney, while thou tarriest
+chatting yonder.  What gossip hast thou there?  Canst thou not bring her
+in?"
+
+"Bessy, _come_!" whispered Purcas earnestly.
+
+But Elizabeth shook her head.  "The Lord bless you!  I dare not."  And
+she shut the door, knowing that by so doing, she virtually shut it upon
+life and happiness--that is, happiness in this life.  Elizabeth went
+quietly back to the kitchen, and took up an iron.  She scarcely knew
+what she was ironing, nor how she answered her cousin Dorothy's rather
+sarcastic observations upon the interesting conversation which she
+seemed to have had.  A few minutes later her eldest cousin, a married
+woman, who lived in a neighbouring street, lifted the latch and came in.
+
+"Good even, Mother!" said she.  "Well, Doll, and Jenny!  So thou gave in
+at last, Bess?  I'm fain for thee.  It's no good fighting against a
+stone wall."
+
+"What dost thou mean, Chrissy?"
+
+"What mean I?  Why, didn't thou give in?  Lots o' folks is saying so.
+Set thy name, they say, to a paper that thou'd yield to the Pope, and be
+obedient in all things.  I hope it were true."
+
+"True! that I yielded to the Pope, and promised to obey him!" cried
+Elizabeth in fiery indignation.  "It's not true, Christian Meynell!
+Tell every soul so that asks thee!  I'll die before I do it.  Where be
+the Commissioners?"
+
+"Thank the saints, they've done their sitting," said Mrs Meynell,
+laughing: "or I do believe this foolish maid should run right into the
+lion's den.  Mother, lock her up to-morrow, won't you, without she's
+summoned?"
+
+"Where are they?" peremptorily demanded Elizabeth.
+
+"Sitting down to their supper at Mistress Cosin's," was the laughing
+answer.  "Don't thou spoil it by rushing in all of a--"
+
+"I shall go to them this minute," said Elizabeth tying on her hood,
+which she had taken down from its nail.  "No man nor woman shall say
+such words of me.  Good-night, Aunt; I thank you for all your goodness,
+and may the good Lord bless you and yours for ever Farewell!"  And amid
+a shower of exclamations and entreaties from her startled relatives, who
+never expected conduct approaching to this, Elizabeth left the house.
+
+She had not far to go on that last walk in this world.  The White Hart,
+where the Commissioners were staying, was full of light and animation
+that night when she stepped into it from the dark street, and asked
+leave to speak a few words to the Queen's Commissioners.
+
+"What would you with them?" asked a red-cheeked maid who came to her.
+
+"That shall they know speedily," was the answer.
+
+The Commissioners were rather amused to be told that a girl wanted to
+see them: but when they heard who it was, they looked at each other with
+raised eyebrows, and ordered her to be called in.  They had finished
+supper, and were sitting over their wine, as gentlemen were then wont to
+do rather longer than was good for them.
+
+Elizabeth came forward to the table and confronted them.  The
+Commissioners themselves were two in number, Sir John Kingston and Dr
+Chedsey; but the scribe, sheriff, and bailiffs were also present.
+
+"Worshipful Sirs," she said in a clear voice, "I have been told it is
+reported in this town that I have made this day by you submission and
+obedience to the Pope.  And since this is not true, nor by God's grace
+shall never be, I call on you to do your duty, and commit me to the
+Queen's Highness' prison, that I may yet again bear my testimony for my
+Lord Christ."
+
+There was dead silence for a moment.  Dr Chedsey looked at the girl
+with admiration which seemed almost reverence.  Sir John Kingston knit
+his brows, and appeared inclined to examine her there and then.  Boswell
+half rose as if he would once more have pleaded with or for her.  But
+Maynard, the Sheriff, whom nothing touched, and who was scarcely sober,
+sprang to his feet and dashed his hand upon the table, with a cry that
+"the jibbing jade should repent kicking over the traces this time!"  He
+seized Elizabeth, marched her to the Moot Hall, and thrust her into the
+dungeon: and with a bass clang as if it had been the very gate of doom,
+the great door closed behind her.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.
+
+AT THE BAR.
+
+The great hall of the Moot Hall in Colchester was filling rapidly.
+Every townsman, and every townswoman, wanted to hear the examination,
+and to know the fate of the prisoners--of whom there were so many that
+not many houses were left in Colchester where the owners had not some
+family connection or friend among them.  Into the hall, robed in
+judicial ermine, filed the Royal Commissioners, Sir John Kingston, and
+Dr Chedsey, followed by Boswell, the scribe, Robert Maynard and Robert
+Brown the Sheriffs, several priests, and many magistrates and gentlemen
+of the surrounding country.  Having opened the Court, they first
+summoned before them William Bongeor, the glazier, of Saint Michael's
+parish, aged sixty, then Thomas Benold, the tallow-chandler, and
+thirdly, Robert Purcas.  They asked Purcas "what he had to say touching
+the Sacrament."
+
+"When we receive the Sacrament," he answered, "we receive bread in an
+holy use, that preacheth remembrance that Christ died for us."
+
+The three men were condemned to death: and then Agnes Silverside was
+brought to the bar.  She was some time under examination, for she
+answered all the questions asked her so wisely and so firmly, that the
+Commissioners themselves were disconcerted.  They took refuge, as such
+men usually did, in abuse, calling her ugly names, and asking "if she
+wished to burn her rotten old bones?"
+
+Helen Ewring, the miller's wife, followed: and both were condemned.
+
+Then the last of the Moot Hall prisoners, Elizabeth Foulkes, was placed
+at the bar.
+
+"Dost thou believe," inquired Dr Chedsey, "that in the most holy
+Sacrament of the altar, the body and blood of Christ is really and
+substantially present?"
+
+Elizabeth's reply, in her quiet, clear voice, was audible in every part
+of the hall.
+
+"I believe it to be a substantial lie, and a real lie."
+
+"Shame! shame!" cried one of the priests on the bench.
+
+"Horrible blasphemy!" cried another.
+
+"What is it, then, that there is before consecration?" asked Dr
+Chedsey.
+
+"Bread."
+
+"Well said.  And what is there after consecration?"
+
+"Bread, still."
+
+"Nothing more?"
+
+"Nothing more," said Elizabeth firmly.  "The receiving of Christ lies
+not in the bread, but is heavenly and spiritual only."
+
+"What say you to confession?"
+
+"I will use none, seeing no priest hath power to remit sin."
+
+"Will you go to mass?"
+
+"I will not, for it is idolatry."
+
+"Will you submit to the authority of the Pope?"
+
+Elizabeth's answer was even stronger than before.
+
+"I do utterly detest all such trumpery from the bottom of my heart!"
+
+They asked her no more.  Dr Chedsey, for the sixth and last time,
+assumed the black cap, and read the sentence of death.
+
+"Thou shalt be taken from here to the place whence thou earnest, and
+thence to the place of execution, there to be burned in the fire till
+thou art dead."
+
+Never before had Chedsey's voice been known to falter in pronouncing
+that sentence.  He had spoken it to white-haired men, and delicate
+women, ay, even to little children; but this once, every spectator
+looked up in amazement at his tone, and saw the judge in tears.  And
+then, turning to the prisoner, they saw her face "as it were the face of
+an angel."
+
+Before any one could recover from the sudden hush of awe which had
+fallen upon the Court, Elizabeth Foulkes knelt down, and carried her
+appeal from that unjust sentence to the higher bar of God Almighty.
+
+"O Lord our Father!" she said, "I thank and praise and glorify Thee that
+I was ever born to see this day--this most blessed and happy day, when
+Thou hast accounted me worthy to suffer for the testimony of Christ.
+And, Lord, if it be Thy will, forgive them that thus have done against
+me, for they know not what they do."
+
+How many of us would be likely to thank God for allowing us to be
+martyrs?  These were true martyrs who did so, men and women so full of
+the Holy Ghost that they counted not their lives dear unto them,--so
+upheld by God's power that the shrinking of the flesh from that dreadful
+pain and horror was almost forgotten.  We must always remember that it
+was not by their own strength, or their own goodness, but by the blood
+of the Lamb, that Christ's martyrs have triumphed over Death and Satan.
+
+Then Elizabeth rose from her knees, and turned towards the Bench.  Like
+an inspired prophetess she spoke--this poor, simple, humble servant-girl
+of twenty years--astonishing all who heard her.
+
+"Repent, all ye that sit there!" she cried earnestly, "and especially ye
+that brought me to this prison: above all thou, Robert Maynard, that art
+so careless of human life that thou wilt oft sit sleeping on the bench
+when a man is tried for his life.  Repent, O ye halting Gospellers! and
+beware of blood-guiltiness, for that shall call for vengeance.  Yea, if
+ye will not herein repent your wicked doings,"--and as Elizabeth spoke,
+she laid her hand upon the bar--"this very bar shall be witness against
+you in the Day of Judgment, that ye have this day shed innocent blood!"
+
+Oh, how England needs such a prophetess now! and above all, those
+"halting Gospellers," the men who talk sweetly about charity and
+toleration, and sit still, and will not come to the help of the Lord
+against the mighty!  They sorely want reminding that Christ has said,
+"He that is not with us is against us."  It is a very poor excuse to
+say, "Oh, I am not doing any harm."  Are you doing any good?  That is
+the question.  If not, a wooden post is as good as you are.  And are you
+satisfied to be no better than a wooden post?
+
+What grand opportunities there are before boys and girls on the
+threshold of life!  What are you going to do with your life?  Remember,
+you have only one.  And there are only two things you can do with it.
+You must give it to somebody--and it must be either God or Satan.  All
+the lives that are not given to God fall into the hands of Satan.  There
+are very few people who say to themselves deliberately, Now, I will not
+give my life to God.  They only say, Oh, there's plenty of time; I won't
+do it just now; I want to enjoy myself.  They don't know that there is
+no happiness on earth like that of deciding for God.  And so they go on
+day after day, not deciding either way, but just frittering their lives
+away bit by bit, until the last day comes, and the last bit of life, and
+then it is too late to decide.  Would you like such a poor, mean,
+valueless thing as this to be the one life which is all you have?  Would
+you not rather have a bright, rich, full life, with God Himself for your
+best friend on earth, and then a triumphal entry into the Golden City,
+and the singer's harp, and the victor's palm, and the prince's crown,
+and the King's "Well done, good and faithful servant?"
+
+Do you say, Yes.  I would choose that, but I do not know how?  Well,
+then, tell the Lord that.  Say to Him, "Lord, I want to be Thy friend
+and servant, and I do not know how."  Keep on saying it till He shows
+you how.  He is sure to do it, for He cares about it much more than you
+do.  Never fancy for one minute that God does not want you to go to
+Heaven, and that it will be hard work to persuade Him to let you in.  He
+wants you to come more than you want it.  He gave His own Son that you
+might come.  "Greater love hath no man than this."
+
+Now, will you not come to Him--will you not say to Him, "Lord, here am
+I; take me"?  Are you going to let the Lord Jesus feel that all the
+cruel suffering which He bore for you was in vain?  He is ready to save
+you, if you will let Him; but He will not do it against your will.  How
+shall it be?
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT.
+
+THE SONG OF TRIUMPH.
+
+Elizabeth Foulkes was the last prisoner tried in the Moot Hall.  The
+Commissioners then adjourned to the Castle.  Here there were six
+prisoners, as before.  The first arraigned was William Mount.  He was
+asked, as they all were--it was the great test question for the Marian
+martyrs--what he had to say of the Sacrament of the altar, which was
+another name for the mass.
+
+"I say that it is an abominable idol," was his answer.
+
+"Wherefore comest thou not to confession?"
+
+"Sirs, I dare not take part in any Popish doings, for fear of God's
+vengeance," said the brave old man.
+
+Brave! ay, for the penalty was death.  But what are they, of whom there
+are so many, whose actions if not words say that they dare not refuse to
+take part in Popish doings, for fear of man's scorn and ridicule?  Poor,
+mean cowards!
+
+It was not worth while to go further.  William Mount was sentenced to
+death, and John Johnson was brought to the bar.  Neither were they long
+with him, for he had nothing to say but what he had said before.  He too
+was sentenced to die.
+
+Then Alice Mount was brought up.  She replied to their questions exactly
+as her husband had done.  She was satisfied with his answers: they
+should be hers.  Once more the sentence was read, and she was led away.
+
+Then Rose Allen was placed at the bar.  So little had the past daunted
+her, that she did more than defy the Commissioners: she made fun of
+them.  Standing there with her burnt hand still in its wrappings, she
+positively laughed Satan and all his servants to scorn.
+
+They asked her what she had to say touching the mass.
+
+"I say that it stinketh in the face of God!  [see Note 1] and I dare not
+have to do therewith for my life."
+
+"Are you not a member of the Catholic Church?"
+
+"I am no member of yours, for ye be members of Antichrist, and shall
+have the reward of Antichrist."
+
+"What say you of the see of the Bishop of Rome?"
+
+"I am none of his.  As for his see, it is for crows, kites, owls, and
+ravens to swim in, such as you be; for by the grace of God I will not
+swim in that sea while I live, neither will I have any thing to do
+therewith."
+
+Nothing could overcome the playful wit of this indomitable girl.  She
+punned on their words, she laughed at their threats, she held them up to
+ridicule.  This must be ended.
+
+For the fourth time Dr Chedsey assumed the black cap.  Rose kept
+silence while she was condemned to death.  But no sooner had his voice
+ceased than, to the amazement of all who heard her, she broke forth into
+song.  It was verily:
+
+  "The shout of them that triumph,
+  The song of them that feast."
+
+She was led out of the court and down the dungeon steps, singing, till
+her voice filled the whole court.
+
+  "Yea, though I walk through death's dark vale,
+  Yet will I fear none ill;
+  Thy rod, Thy staff doth comfort me,
+  And Thou art with me still."
+
+Which was the happier, do you think, that night?  Dr Chedsey, who had
+read the sentence of death upon ten martyrs? or young Rose Allen, who
+was to be burned to death in five weeks?
+
+When Rose's triumphant voice had died away, the gaoler was hastily
+bidden to bring the other two prisoners.  The Commissioners were very
+much annoyed.  It was a bad thing for the people who stood by, they
+thought, when martyrs insisted on singing in response to a sentence of
+execution.  They wanted to make the spectators forget such scenes.
+
+"Well, where be the prisoners?" said Sir John Kingston.
+
+"Please, your Worships, they be at the bar!" answered the gaolor, with a
+grin.
+
+"At the bar, man?  But I see nought.  Be they dwarfs?"
+
+"Something like," said the gaoler.
+
+He dragged up a form to the bar, and lifted on it, first, Will Johnson,
+and then Cissy.
+
+"Good lack! such babes as these!" said Sir John, in great perplexity.
+
+He felt it really very provoking.  Here was a girl of twenty who had
+made fun of him in the most merciless manner, and had the audacity to
+sing when condemned to die, thus setting a shocking example, and
+awakening the sympathy of the public: and here, to make matters worse,
+were two little children brought up as heretics!  This would never do.
+It was the more awkward from his point of view, that Cissy was so small
+that he took her to be much younger than she was.
+
+"I cannot examine these babes!" said he to Chedsey.
+
+Dr Chedsey, in answer, took the examination on himself.
+
+"How old art thou, my lad?" said he to Will.
+
+Will made no answer, and his sister spoke up for him.
+
+"Please, sir, he's six."
+
+"And what dost thou believe?" asked the Commissioner, half scornfully,
+half amused.
+
+"Please, we believe what Father told us."
+
+"Who is their father?" was asked of the gaoler.
+
+"Johnson, worshipful Sirs: Alegar, of Thorpe, that you have sentenced
+this morrow."
+
+"Gramercy!" said Sir John.  "Take them down, Wastborowe,--take them
+down, and carry them away.  Have them up another day.  Such babes!"
+
+Cissy heard him, and felt insulted, as a young woman of her age
+naturally would.
+
+"Please, Sir, I'm not a baby!  Baby's a baby, but Will's six, and I'm
+going in ten.  And we are going to be as good as we can, and mind all
+Father said to us."
+
+"Take them away--take them away!" cried Sir John.
+
+Wastborowe lifted Will down.
+
+"But please--" said Cissy piteously--"isn't nothing to be done to us?
+Mayn't we go 'long of Father?"
+
+"Ay, for the present," answered Wastborowe, as he took a hand of each to
+lead them back.
+
+"But isn't Father to be burned?"
+
+"Come along!  I can't stay," said the gaoler hastily.  Even his hard
+heart shrank from answering yes to that little pleading face.
+
+"But please, oh please, they mustn't burn Father and not us!  We _must_
+go with Father."
+
+"Wastborowe!"  Sir John's voice called back.
+
+"Take 'em down, Tom," said Wastborowe to his man,--not at all sorry to
+go away from Cissy.  He ran back to court.
+
+"We are of opinion, Wastborowe," said Dr Chedsey rather pompously,
+"that these children are too young and ignorant to be put to the bar.
+We make order, therefore, that they be discharged, and set in care of
+some good Catholic woman, if any be among their kindred; and if not, let
+them be committed to the care of some such not akin to them."
+
+"Please, your Worships, I know nought of their kindred," said the gaoler
+scratching his head.  "Jane Hiltoft hath the babe at this present."
+
+"What, is there a lesser babe yet?" asked Dr Chedsey, laughing.
+
+"Ay, there is so: a babe in arms."
+
+"Worshipful Sirs, might it please you to hear a poor woman?"
+
+"Speak on, good wife."
+
+"Sirs," said the woman who had spoken, coming forward out of the crowd,
+"my name is Ursula Felstede, and I dwell at Thorpe, the next door to
+Johnson.  The babes know me, and have been in my charge aforetime.  May
+I pray your good Worships to set them in my care?  I have none of mine
+own, and would bring them up to mine utmost as good subjects and honest
+folks."
+
+"Ay so? and how about good Catholics?"
+
+"Sirs, Father Tye will tell you I go to mass and confession both."
+
+"So she doth," said the priest: "but I misdoubt somewhat if she be not
+of the `halting Gospellers' whereof we heard this morrow in the Moot
+Hall."
+
+"Better put them in charge of the Black Sisters of Hedingham," suggested
+Dr Chedsey.  "Come you this even, good woman, to the White Hart, and
+you shall then hear our pleasure.  Father Tye, I pray you come with us
+to supper."
+
+Dr Chedsey had quite recovered from his emotions of the morning.
+
+"Meanwhile," said Sir John, rising, "let the morrow of Lammas be
+appointed for the execution of those sentenced."  [See note 2.]
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Note 1.  Rose's words are given as she spoke them: but it must be
+remembered that they would not sound nearly so strong to those who heard
+them as they do to us.
+
+Note 2.  Lammas is the second of August.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.
+
+MAN PROPOSES.
+
+Mrs Cosin, the landlady of the White Hart, prepared a very good supper
+for the Commissioners.  These gentlemen did not fare badly.  First, they
+had a dish of the oysters for which the town was famous, then some roast
+beef and a big venison pasty, then some boiled pigeons, then two or
+three puddings, a raspberry pie, curds and whey, cheese, with a good
+deal of Malmsey wine and old sack, finishing up with cherries and sweet
+biscuits.
+
+They had reached the cherry stage before they began to talk beyond mere
+passing remarks.  Then the priest said:--
+
+"I am somewhat feared, Master Commissioners, you shall reckon Colchester
+an infected place, seeing there be here so many touched with the poison
+of heresy."
+
+"It all comes of self-conceit," said Sir John.
+
+"Nay," answered Dr Chedsey.  "Self-conceit is scarce wont to bring a
+man to the stake.  It were more like to save him from it."
+
+"Well, but why can't they let things alone?" inquired Sir John, helping
+himself to a biscuit.  "They know well enough what they shall come to if
+they meddle with matters of religion.  Why don't they leave the priest
+to think for them?"
+
+Dr Chedsey was silent: not because he did not know the answer.  The
+time was when he, too, had been one of those now despised and condemned
+Gospellers.  In Edward the Sixth's day, he had preached the full, rich
+Gospel of the grace of God: and now he was a deserter to the enemy.
+Some of such men--perhaps most--grew very hard and stony, and seemed to
+take positive pleasure in persecuting those who were more faithful than
+themselves: but there were a few with whom the Spirit of God continued
+to strive, who now and then remembered from whence they had fallen, and
+to whom that remembrance brought poignant anguish when it came upon
+them.  Dr Chedsey appears to have been one of this type.  Let us hope
+that these wandering sheep came home at last in the arms of the Good
+Shepherd who sought them with such preserving tenderness.  But the sad
+truth is that we scarcely know with certainty of one who did so.  On the
+accession of Elizabeth, when we might have expected them to come forward
+and declare their repentance if it were sincere, they did no such thing:
+they simply dropped into oblivion, and we lose them there.
+
+It is a hard and bitter thing to depart from God: how hard, and how
+bitter, only those know in this world who try to turn round and come
+back.  It will be known fully in that other world whence there is no
+coming back.
+
+Dr Chedsey, then, was silent: not because he did not understand the
+matter, but because he knew it too well.  Sir John had said the
+Protestants "knew what they would come to": that was the stake and the
+fire.  But those who persecuted Christ in the person of His elect--what
+were they going to come to?  It was not pleasant to think about that.
+Dr Chedsey was very glad that it was just then announced that a woman
+begged leave to speak with their Worships.
+
+"It shall be yon woman that would fain take the children, I cast no
+doubt," said Sir John: "and we have had no talk thereupon.  Shall she
+have them or no?"
+
+"What say you, Father Tye?"
+
+"Truly, that I have not over much trust in Felstede's wife.  She was
+wont of old time to have Bible-readings and prayer-meetings at her
+house; and though she feigneth now to be reconciled and Catholic, yet I
+doubt her repentance is but skin deep.  The children were better a deal
+with the Black Nuns.  Yet--there may be some time ere we can despatch
+them thither, and if you thought good, Felstede's wife might have them
+till then."
+
+"Good!" said Sir John.  "Call the woman in."
+
+Ursula Felstede was called in, and stood courtesying at the door.  Sir
+John put on his stern and pompous manner in speaking to her.
+
+"It seemeth best to the Queen's Grace's Commission," said he, "that
+these children were sent in the keeping of the Sisters of Hedingham: yet
+as time may elapse ere the Prioress cometh to town, we leave them in thy
+charge until she send for them.  Thou shalt keep them well, learn them
+to be good Catholics, and deliver them to the Black Nuns when they
+demand it."
+
+Ursula courtesied again, and "hoped she should do her duty."
+
+"So do I hope," said the priest.  "But I give thee warning, Ursula
+Felstede, that thy duty hath not been over well done ere this: and 'tis
+high time thou shouldst amend if thou desire not to be brought to book."
+
+Ursula dropped half-a-dozen courtesies in a flurried way.
+
+"Please it, your Reverence, I am a right true Catholic, and shall learn
+the children so to be."
+
+"Mind thou dost!" said Sir John.
+
+Dr Chedsey meanwhile had occupied himself in writing out an order for
+the children to be delivered to Ursula, to which he affixed the seal of
+the Commission.  Armed with this paper, and having taken leave of the
+Commissioners, with many protests that she would "do her duty," Ursula
+made her way to the Castle gate.
+
+"Who walks so late?" asked the porter, looking out of his little wicket
+to see who it was.
+
+"Good den, Master Style.  I am James Felstede's wife of Thorpe, and I
+come with an order from their Worships the Commissioners to take
+Johnson's children to me; they be to dwell in my charge till the Black
+Sisters shall send for them."
+
+"Want 'em to-night?" asked the porter rather gruffly.
+
+"Well, what say you?--are they abed?  I'm but a poor woman, and cannot
+afford another walk from Thorpe.  I'd best take 'em with me now."
+
+"You're never going back to Thorpe to-night?"
+
+"Well, nay.  I'm going to tarry the night at my brother's outside East
+Gate."
+
+"Bless the woman! then call for the children in the morning, and harry
+not honest folk out o' their lives at bed-time."
+
+And Style dashed the wicket to.
+
+"Now, then, Kate! be those loaves ready?  The rogues shall be clamouring
+for their suppers," cried he to his wife.
+
+Katherine Style, who baked the prison bread, brought out in answer a
+large tray, on which three loaves of bread were cut in thick slices,
+with a piece of cheese and a bunch of radishes laid on each.  These were
+for the supper of the prisoners.  Style shouted for the gaoler, and he
+came up and carried the tray into the dungeon, followed by the porter,
+who was in rather a funny mood, and--as I am sorry to say is often the
+case--was not, in his fun, careful of other people's feelings.
+
+"Now, Johnson, hast thou done with those children?" said he.  "Thou'd
+best make thy last dying speech and confession to 'em, for they're going
+away to-morrow morning."
+
+Johnson looked up with a grave, white face.  Little Cissy, who was
+sitting by Rose Allen, at once ran to her father, and twined her arm in
+his, with an uneasy idea of being parted from him, though she did not
+clearly understand what was to happen.
+
+"Where?" was all Johnson seemed able to say.
+
+"Black Nuns of Hedingham," said the porter.  He did not say anything
+about the temporary sojourn with Ursula Felstede.
+
+Johnson groaned and drew Cissy closer to him.
+
+"Don't be feared, Father," said Cissy bravely, though her lips quivered
+till she could hardly speak.  "Don't be feared: we'll never do anything
+you've told us not."
+
+"God bless thee, my darling, and God help thee!" said the poor father.
+"Little Cissy, He must be thy Father now."  And looking upwards, he
+said, "Lord, take the charge that I give into Thine hands this night!
+Be Thou the Father to these fatherless little ones, and lead them forth
+by a smooth way or a rough, so it be the right way, whereby they shall
+come to Thy holy hill, and to Thy tabernacle.  Keep them as the apple of
+Thine eye; hide them under the covert of Thy wings!  I am no more in the
+world; but these are in the world: keep them through Thy Name.  Give
+them back safe to my Helen and to me in the land that is very far-off,
+whereinto there shall enter nothing that defileth.  Lord, I trust them
+to no man, but only unto Thee!  Here me, O Lord my God, for I rest on
+Thee.  Let no man prevail against Thee.  I have no might against this
+company that cometh against me, neither know I what to do; but mine eyes
+are upon Thee."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY.
+
+"THEY WON'T MAKE ME!"
+
+"What!  Agnes Bongeor taken to the Moot Hall?  Humph! they'll be
+a-coming for me next.  I must get on with my work.  Let's do as much as
+we can for the Lord, ere we're called to suffer for Him.  Thou tookest
+my message to Master Commissary, Doll?"
+
+Dorothy Denny murmured something which did not reach the ear of Mrs
+Wade.
+
+"Speak up, woman!  I say, thou tookest my message?"
+
+"Well, Mistress, I thought--"
+
+"A fig for thy thought!  Didst give my message touching Johnson's
+children?"
+
+"N-o, Mistress, I,--"
+
+"Beshrew thee for an unfaithful messenger.  Dost know what the wise King
+saith thereof?  He says it is like a foot out of joint.  Hadst ever thy
+foot out o' joint?  I have, and I tell thee, if thou hadst the one foot
+out of joint, thou wouldst not want t'other.  I knew well thou wert an
+ass, but I did not think thee unfaithful.  Why didst not give my
+message?"
+
+There were tears in Dorothy's eyes.
+
+"Mistress," said she, "forgive me, but I will not help you to run into
+trouble, though you're sore set to do it.  It shall serve no good
+purpose to keep your name for ever before the eyes of Master Commissary
+and his fellows.  Do, pray, let them forget you.  You'll ne'er be safe,
+an' you thrust yourself forward thus."
+
+"Safe!  Bless the woman!  I leave the Lord to see to my safety.  I've no
+care but to get His work done."
+
+"Well, then He's the more like to have a care of you; but, Mistress,
+won't you let Dorothy Denny try to see to you a bit too?"
+
+"Thou'rt a good maid, Doll, though I'm a bit sharp on thee at times; and
+thou knows thou art mortal slow.  Howbeit, tell me, what is come of
+those children?  If they be in good hands, I need not trouble."
+
+"Ursula Felstede has them, Mistress, till the Black Nuns of Hedingham
+shall fetch them away."
+
+"Ursula Felstede!  `Unstable as water.'  That for Ursula Felstede.
+Black Nuns shall not have 'em while Philippa Wade's above ground.  I
+tell thee, Dorothy, wherever those little ones go, the Lord's blessing
+'ll go with them.  Dost mind what David saith?  `I have been young, and
+now am old; and yet saw I never the righteous forsaken, nor his seed
+begging their bread.'  And I want them, maid,--part because I feel for
+the little ones, and part because I want the blessing.  Why, that poor
+little Cicely 'll be crying her bits of eyes out to part with `Father.'
+Doll, I'll go down this even, if I may find leisure, to Ursula Felstede,
+and see if I cannot win her to give me the children.  I shall tell her
+my mind first, as like as not: and much good may it do her!  But I'll
+have a try for 'em--I will."
+
+"Folks saith, Mistress, the prisoners be in as good case as may be:
+always reading and strengthening one another, and praising God."
+
+"I'm fain to hear it, Dorothy.  Ah, they be not the worst off in this
+town.  If the Lord were to come to judge the earth this even, I'd a deal
+liefer be one of them in the Moot Hall than be of them that have them in
+charge.  I marvel He comes not.  If he had been a man and not God, He'd
+have been down many a time afore now."
+
+About six o'clock on a hot July evening, Ursula Felstede heard a tap at
+her door.
+
+"Come in!  O Mistress Wade, how do you do?  Will you sit?  I'm sure
+you're very welcome," said Ursula, in some confusion.
+
+"I'm not quite so sure of it, Ursula Felstede: but let be.  You've
+Johnson's children here, haven't you?"
+
+"Ay, I have so: and I tell you that Will's a handful!  Seems to me he's
+worser to rule than he used.  He's getting bigger, trow."
+
+"And Cicely?"
+
+"Oh, she's quiet enough, only a bit obstinate.  Won't always do as she's
+told.  I have to look after her sharp, or she'd be off, I do believe."
+
+"I'd like to see her, an't please you."
+
+"Well, to be sure!  I sent 'em out to play them a bit.  I don't just
+know where they are."
+
+"Call that looking sharp after 'em?"
+
+Ursula laughed a little uneasily.
+
+"Well, one can't be just a slave to a pack of children, can one?  I'll
+look out and see if they are in sight."
+
+"Thank you, I'll do that, without troubling you.  Now, Ursula Felstede,
+I've one thing to say to you, so I'll say it and get it over.  Those
+children of Johnson's have the Lord's wings over them: they'll be taken
+care of, be sure: but if you treat them ill, or if you meddle with what
+their father learned them, you'll have to reckon with Him instead of the
+Queen's Commissioners.  And I'd a deal sooner have the Commissioners
+against me than have the Lord.  Be not afraid of them that kill the
+body, and after that have no more that they can do but fear Him which
+after He hath killed, hath power to cast into Hell.  Yea, I say unto
+thee, Fear Him!"
+
+And Mrs Wade walked out of the door without saying another word.  She
+was going to look for the children.  The baby she had already seen
+asleep on Ursula's bed.  Little Will she found in the midst of a group
+of boys down by the brook, one of whom, a lad twice his size, was just
+about to fight him when Mrs Wade came up.
+
+"Now, Jack Tyler, if thou dost not want to be carried to thy father by
+the scuff of thy neck, like a cat, and well thrashed to end with, let
+that lad alone.--Will, where's thy sister?"
+
+Little Will, who looked rather sheepish, said,--
+
+"Over there."
+
+"Where's _there_?"
+
+"On the stile.  She's always there when we're out, except she's looking
+after me."
+
+"Thou lackest looking after."
+
+"Philip Tye said he'd see to me: and then he went off with Jem Morris,
+bird-nesting."
+
+"Cruel lads! well, you're a proper lot!  It'd do you good, and me too,
+to give you a caning all round.  I shall have to let be to-night, for I
+want to find Cicely."
+
+"Well, you'll see her o' top o' the stile."
+
+Little Will turned back to his absorbing amusement of bulrush-plaiting,
+and Mrs Wade went up to the stile which led to the way over the fields
+towards Colchester.  As she came near, sheltered by the hedge, she heard
+a little voice.
+
+  "Yea, though I walk in vale of death,
+  Yet will I fear no ill:
+  Thy rod, Thy staff, doth comfort me,
+  And Thou art with me still."
+
+Mrs Wade crept softly along till she could see through the hedge.  The
+stile was a stone one, with steps on each side, such as may still be
+seen in the north of England: and on the top step sat Cissy, resting her
+head upon her hand, and looking earnestly in the direction of
+Colchester.
+
+"What dost there, my dear heart?"  Mrs Wade asked gently.
+
+"I'm looking at Father," said Cissy, rather languidly.  She spoke as if
+she were not well, and could not care much about anything.
+
+"`Looking at Father'!  What dost thou mean, my child?"
+
+"Well, you see that belt of trees over yonder?  When the sun shines, I
+can see All Hallows' tower stand up against it.  You can't see it
+to-day: it does not shine; but it's there for all that.  And Father's
+just behind in the Castle: so I haven't any better way to look at him.
+Only God looks at him, you know; they can't bar Him out.  So I come
+here, and look as far as I can, and talk to God about Father.  I can't
+see Father, but he's there: and I can't see God, but He's there too: and
+He's got to see to Father now I can't."
+
+The desolate tone of utter loneliness in the little voice touched Mrs
+Wade to the core of her great warm heart.
+
+"My poor little Cicely!" she said.  "Doth Ursula use thee well?"
+
+"Yes, I suppose so," said Cissy, in a quiet matter-of-fact way; "only
+when I won't pray to her big image, she slaps me.  But she can't make me
+do it.  Father said not.  It would never do for God to see us doing
+things Father forbade us, because he's shut up and can't come to us.
+I'm not going to pray to that ugly thing: never!  And if it was pretty,
+it wouldn't make any difference, when Father said not."
+
+"No, dear heart, that were idolatry," said Mrs Wade.
+
+"Yes, I know," replied Cissy: "Father said so.  But Ursula says the
+Black Sisters will make me, or they'll put me in the well.  I do hope
+God will keep away the Black Sisters.  I ask Him every day, when I've
+done talking about Father.  I shouldn't like them to put me in the
+well!" and she shuddered.  Evidently Ursula had frightened her very much
+with some story about this.  "But God would be there, in the well,
+wouldn't He?  They won't make me do it when Father said not!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY ONE.
+
+SUMPTUOUS APARTMENTS.
+
+"Well, be sure! who ever saw such a lad?  Sent out to play at four o'
+the clock, and all o'er mud at five!  Where hast thou been, Will?  Speak
+the truth, now!"
+
+"Been down by the brook rush-plaiting," said little Will, looking as if
+his mind were not quite made up whether to cry or to be sulky.
+
+"The mischievousness of lads!  Didn't I tell thee to mind and keep thy
+clothes clean?"
+
+"You're always after clothes!  How could I plait rushes and keep 'em
+clean?"
+
+"And who told you to plait rushes, Master Impudence?  Take that."
+_That_ was a sound box on the ear which Ursula delivered by way of
+illustration to her remarks.  "What's become o' Phil Tye?  I thought he
+was going to look after thee."
+
+"Well, he did, a bit: then he and Jem Morris went off bird-nesting."
+
+"I'll give it him when I see him!  Where's Cicely?"
+
+"She's somewhere," said Will, looking round the cottage, as if he
+expected to see her in some corner.
+
+"I reckon I could have told thee so much.  Did Mistress Wade find you?"
+
+"She was down at the brook: but she went after Cis."
+
+"Well, thou'lt have to go to bed first thing, for them clothes must be
+washed."
+
+Will broke into a howl.  "It isn't bed-time nor it isn't washing-day!"
+
+"It's bed-time when thou'rt bidden to go.  As to washing-day, it's
+always washing-day where thou art.  Never was such a boy, I do believe,
+for getting into the mud.  Thou'rt worser ten times o'er than thou wert.
+I do wish lads 'd stop babes till they're men, that one could tuck 'em
+in the cradle and leave 'em!  There's never a bit of peace!  I would the
+Black Ladies 'd come for you.  I shall be mighty thankful when they do,
+be sure."
+
+"Mistress Wade 'll have us," suggested Master William, briskly, looking
+up at Ursula.
+
+"Hold that pert tongue o' thine!  Mistress Wade's not like to have you.
+You're in my care, and I've no leave to deliver you to any save the
+Black Ladies."
+
+"Well!  I wouldn't mind camping out a bit, if you're so set to be rid of
+us," said Will, reflectively.  "There's a blanket you've got rolled up
+in the loft, that 'd make a tent, and we could cut down poles, if you'll
+lend us an axe; and--"
+
+"You cut down poles!  Marry come up!  You're not about to have any of my
+blankets, nor my axes neither."
+
+"It wouldn't be so bad," Will went on, still in a meditative key, "only
+for dinner.  I don't see where we should get that."
+
+"I see that you're off to bed this minute, and don't go maundering about
+tents and axes.  You cut down poles! you'd cut your fingers off, more
+like.  Now then, be off to the loft!  Not another word!  March!"
+
+Just as Ursula was sweeping Will upstairs before her, a rap came on the
+door.
+
+"There! didn't I say a body never had a bit of peace?--Go on, Will, and
+get to bed; and mind thou leaves them dirty clothes on the floor by
+theirselves: don't go to dirt everything in the room with 'em.--Walk in,
+Mistress Wade!  So you found Cis?"
+
+"Ay, I found her," said the landlady, as she and Cissy came in together.
+
+"Cis, do thou go up, maid, and see to Will a bit.  He's come in all o'er
+mud and mire, and I sent him up to bed, but there's no trusting him to
+go.  See he does, prithee, and cast his clothes into the tub yonder,
+there's a good maid."
+
+Cissy knew very well that Ursula spoke so amiably because Mrs Wade was
+there to hear her.  She went up to look after her little brother, and
+the landlady turned to Ursula.
+
+"Now, Ursula Felstede, I want these children."
+
+"Then you must ask leave from the Queen's Commissioners, Mistress Wade.
+Eh, I couldn't give 'em up if it were ever so!  I daren't, for the life
+o' me!"
+
+Mrs Wade begged, coaxed, lectured, and almost threatened her, but for
+once Ursula was firm.  She dared not give up the children, and she was
+quite honest in saying so.  Mrs Wade had to go home without them.
+
+As she came up, very weary and unusually dispirited, to the archway of
+the King's Head, she heard voices from within.
+
+"I tell you she's not!" said Dorothy Denny's voice in a rather
+frightened tone; "she went forth nigh four hours agone, and whither I
+know not."
+
+"That's an inquiry for me," said Mrs Wade to herself, as she sprang
+down from her old black mare, and gave her a pat before dismissing her
+to the care of the ostler, who ran up to take her.  "Good Jenny! good
+old lass!--Is there any company, Giles?" she asked of the ostler.
+
+"Mistress, 'tis Master Maynard the Sheriff and he's making inquiration
+for you.  I would you could ha' kept away a bit longer!"
+
+"Dost thou so, good Giles?  Well, I would as God would.  The Sheriff had
+best have somebody else to deal with him than Doll and Bab."  And she
+went forward into the kitchen.
+
+Barbara, her younger servant, who was only a girl, stood leaning against
+a dresser, looking very white and frightened, with the rolling-pin in
+her hand; she had evidently been stopped in the middle of making a pie.
+Dorothy stood on the hearth, fronting the terrible Sheriff, who was
+armed with a writ, and evidently did not mean to leave before he had
+seen the mistress.
+
+"I am here, Mr Maynard, if you want me," said Mrs Wade, quite calmly.
+
+"Well said," answered the Sheriff, turning to her.  "I have here a writ
+for your arrest, my mistress, and conveyance to the Bishop's Court at
+London, there to answer for your ill deeds."
+
+"I am ready to answer for all my deeds, good and ill, to any that have a
+right to question me.  I will go with you.--Bab, go and tell Giles to
+leave the saddle on Jenny.--Doll, here be my keys; take them, and do the
+best thou canst.  I believe thee honest and well-meaning, but I'm feared
+the house shall ne'er keep up its credit.  Howbeit, that cannot be
+helped.  Do thy best, and the Lord be with you!  As to directions, I
+were best to leave none; maybe they should but hamper thee, and set thee
+in perplexity.  Keep matters clean, and pay as thou goest--thou wist
+where to find the till; and fear God--that's all I need say.  And if it
+come in thy way to do a kind deed for any, and in especial those poor
+little children that thou wist of, do it, as I would were I here: ay,
+and let Cissy know when all's o'er with her father.  And pray for me,
+and I'll do as much for thee--that we may do our duty and please God,
+and for bodily safety let it be according to His will.--Now, Master
+Maynard, I am ready."
+
+Four days later, several strokes were rang on the great bell of the
+Bishop's Palace at Fulham.  The gaoler came to his gate when summoned by
+the porter.
+
+"Here's a prisoner up from Colchester--Philippa Wade, hostess of the
+King's Head there.  Have you room?"
+
+"Room and to spare.  Heresy, I reckon?"
+
+"Ay, heresy,--the old tale.  There must be a nest of it yonder down in
+Essex."
+
+"There's nought else all o'er the country, methinks," said the gaoler
+with a laugh.  "Come in, Mistress; I'll show you your lodging.  His
+Lordship hath an apartment in especial, furnished of polished black oak,
+that he keepeth for such as you.  Pray you follow me."
+
+Mrs Wade followed the jocose gaoler along a small paved passage between
+two walls, and through a low door, which the gaoler barred behind her,
+himself outside, and then opened a little wicket through which to speak.
+
+"Pray you, sit down, my mistress, on whichsoever of the chairs you count
+desirable.  The furniture is all of one sort, fair and goodly;
+far-fetched and dear-bought, which is good for gentlewomen, and liketh
+them: fast colours the broidery, I do ensure you."
+
+Mrs Wade looked round, so far as she could see by the little wicket,
+everything was black--even the floor, which was covered with black
+shining lumps of all shapes and sizes.  She touched one of the lumps.
+There, could be no doubt of its nature.  The "polished black oak"
+furniture was cobs of coal, and the sumptuous apartment wherein she was
+to--lodged was Bishop Bonner's coal-cellar.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY TWO.
+
+"READY!  AY, READY!"
+
+It was the evening of the first of August.  The prisoners in the Castle,
+now reduced to four--the Mounts, Rose, and Johnson--had held their
+Bible-reading and their little evening prayer-meeting, and sat waiting
+for supper.  John and Margaret Thurston, who had been with them until
+that day, were taken away in the morning to undergo examination, and had
+not returned.  The prisoners had not yet heard when they were to die.
+They only knew that it would be soon, and might be any day.  Yet we are
+told they remained in their dungeons "with much joy and great comfort,
+in continual reading and invocating the name of God, ever looking and
+expecting the happy day of their dissolution."
+
+We should probably feel more inclined to call it a horrible day.  But
+they called it a happy day.  They expected to change their prison for a
+palace, and their prison bonds for golden harps, and the prison fare for
+the fruit or the Tree of Life, and the company of scoffers and
+tormentors for that of Seraphim and Cherubim, and the blessed dead: and
+above all, to see His Face who had laid down His life for them.
+
+Supper was late that evening.  They could hear voices outside, with
+occasional exclamations of surprise, and now and then a peal of
+laughter.  At length the door was unlocked, and the gaoler's man came in
+with four trenchers, piled on each other, on each of which was laid a
+slice of rye-bread and a piece of cheese.  He served out one to each
+prisoner.
+
+"Want your appetites sharpened?" said he with a sarcastic laugh.
+"Because, if you do, there's news for you."
+
+"Prithee let us hear it, Bartle," answered Mount, quietly.
+
+"Well, first, writs is come down.  Moot Hall prisoners suffer at six
+to-morrow, on the waste by Lexden Road, and you'll get your deserving i'
+th' afternoon, in the Castle yard."
+
+"God be praised!" solemnly responded William Mount, and the others added
+an Amen.
+
+"Well, you're a queer set!" said Bartle, looking at them.  "I shouldn't
+want to thank nobody for it, if so be I was going to be hanged: and
+that's easier of the two."
+
+"We are only going Home," answered William Mount.  "The climb may be
+steep, but there is rest and ease at the end thereof."
+
+"Well, you seem mighty sure on't.  I know nought.  Priests say you'll
+find yourselves in a worser place nor you think."
+
+"Nay!  God is faithful," said Johnson.
+
+"Have it your own way.  I wish you might, for you seem to me a deal
+tidier folks than most that come our way.  Howbeit, my news isn't all
+told.  Alegar, your brats be gone to Hedingham."
+
+"God go with them!" replied Johnson; but he seemed much sadder to hear
+this than he had done for his own doom.
+
+"And Margaret Thurston's recanted.  She's reconciled and had to better
+lodging."
+
+It was evident, though to Bartle's astonishment, that the prisoners
+considered this the worst news of all.
+
+"And John Thurston?"
+
+"Ah, they aren't so sure of him.  They think he'll bear a faggot, but
+it's not certain yet."
+
+"God help and strengthen him!"
+
+"And Mistress Wade, of the King's Head, is had up to London to the
+Bishop."
+
+"God grant her His grace!"
+
+"I've told you all now.  Good-night."
+
+The greeting was returned, and Bartle went out.  He was commissioned to
+carry the writ down to the Moot Hall.
+
+Not many minutes later, Wastborowe entered the dungeon with the writ in
+his hand.  The prisoners were conversing over their supper, but the
+sight of that document brought silence without any need to call for it.
+
+"Hearken!" said Wastborowe.  "At six o'clock in the morning, on the
+waste piece by Lexden Road, shall suffer the penalty of the law these
+men and women underwritten:--William Bongeor, Thomas Benold, Robert
+_alias_ William Purcas, Agnes Silverside _alias_ Downes _alias_ Smith
+_alias_ May, Helen Ewring, Elizabeth Foulkes, Agnes Bowyer."
+
+With one accord, led by Mr Benold, the condemned prisoners stood up and
+thanked God.
+
+"`Agnes Bowyer'," repeated Wastborowe in some perplexity.  "Your name's
+not Bowyer; it's Bongeor."
+
+"Bongeor," said its bearer.  "Is my name wrong set down?  Pray you, Mr
+Wastborowe, have it put right without delay, that I be not left out."
+
+"I should think you'd be uncommon glad if you were!" said he.
+
+"Nay, but in very deed it should grieve me right sore," she replied
+earnestly.  "Let there not be no mistake, I do entreat you."
+
+"I'll see to it," said Wastborowe, as he left the prison.
+
+The prisoners had few preparations to make.  Each had a garment ready--a
+long robe of white linen, falling straight from the neck to the ankles,
+with sleeves which buttoned at the wrist.  There were many such robes
+made during the reign of Mary--types of those fairer white robes which
+would be "given to every one of them," when they should have crossed the
+dark valley, and come out into the light of the glory of God.  Only
+Agnes Bongeor and Helen Ewring had something else to part with.  With
+Agnes in her prison was a little baby only a few weeks old, and she must
+bid it good-bye, and commit it to the care of some friend.  Helen Ewring
+had to say farewell to her husband, who came to see her about four in
+the morning; and to the surprise of Elizabeth Foulkes, she found herself
+summoned also to an interview with her widowed mother and her uncle
+Holt.
+
+"Why, Mother!" exclaimed Elizabeth in astonishment, "I never knew you
+were any where nigh."
+
+"Didst thou think, my lass, that aught 'd keep thy mother away from thee
+when she knew?  I've been here these six weeks, a-waiting to hear.  Eh,
+my pretty mawther, [see note 1] but to see this day!  I've looked for
+thee to be some good man's wife, and a happy woman,--such a good maid as
+thou always wast!--and now!  Well, well! the will of the Lord be done!"
+
+"A happy woman, Mother!" said Elizabeth with her brightest smile.  "In
+all my life I never was so happy as this day!  This is my wedding day--
+nay, this is my crowning day!  For ere the sun be high this day, I shall
+have seen the Face of Christ, and have been by Him presented faultless
+before the light of the glory of God.  Mother, rejoice with me, and
+rejoice for me, for I can do nothing save rejoice.  Glory be to God on
+high, and on earth peace, good-will towards men!"
+
+There was glory to God, but little good-will towards men, when the six
+prisoners were marched out into High Street, on their way to martyrdom.
+Yet only one sorrowful heart was in the dungeon of the Moot Hall, and
+that was Agnes Bongeor's, who lamented bitterly that owing to the
+mis-spelling of her name in the writ, she was not allowed to make the
+seventh.  She actually put on her robe of martyrdom, in the _hope_ that
+she might be reckoned among the sufferers.  Now, when she learned that
+she was not to be burned that day, her distress was poignant.
+
+"Let me go with them!" she cried.  "Let me go and give my life for
+Christ!  Alack the day!  The Lord counts me not worthy."
+
+The other six prisoners were led, tied together, two and two, through
+High Street and up to the Head Gate.  First came William Bongeor and
+Thomas Benold; then Mrs Silverside and Mrs Ewring; last, Robert Purcas
+and Elizabeth Foulkes.  They were led out of the Head Gate, to "a plot
+of ground hard by the town wall, on the outward side," beside the Lexden
+Road.  There stood three great wooden stakes, with a chain affixed to
+each.  The clock of Saint Mary-at-Walls struck six as they reached the
+spot.
+
+Around the stakes a multitude were gathered to see the sight.  Mr
+Ewring, with set face, trying to force a smile for his wife's
+encouragement; Mrs Foulkes, gazing with clasped hands and tearful eyes
+on her daughter; Thomas Holt and all his family; Mr Ashby and all his;
+Ursula Felstede, looking very unhappy; Dorothy Denny, looking very sad;
+old Walter Purcas, leaning on his staff, from time to time shaking his
+white head as if in bitter lamentation; a little behind the others, Mrs
+Clere and Amy; and in front, busiest of the busy, Sir Thomas Tye and
+Nicholas Clere.  There they all were, ready and waiting, to see the Moot
+Hall prisoners die.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Note 1.  Girl.  This is a Suffolk provincialism.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY THREE.
+
+HOW THEY WENT HOME.
+
+Arrived at the spot where they were to suffer, the prisoners knelt down
+to pray: "but not in such sort as they would, for the cruel tyrants
+would not suffer them."  Foremost of their tormentors at this last
+moment was Nicholas Clere, who showed an especial spite towards
+Elizabeth Foulkes, and interrupted her dying prayers to the utmost of
+his power.  When Elizabeth rose from her knees and took off her outer
+garments--underneath which she wore the prepared robe--she asked the
+Bailiff's leave to give her petticoat to her mother; it was all the
+legacy in her power to leave.  Even this poor little comfort was denied
+her.  The clothes of the sufferers were the perquisite of the Sheriffs'
+men, and they would not give them up.  Elizabeth smiled--she did nothing
+but smile that morning--and cast the petticoat on the ground.
+
+"Farewell, all the world!" she said.  "Farewell, Faith! farewell, Hope!"
+Then she took the stake in her arms and kissed it.  "Welcome, Love!"
+
+Ay, faith and hope were done with now.  A few moments, and faith would
+be lost in sight; hope would be lost in joy; but love would abide for
+ever and ever.
+
+Her mother came up and kissed her.
+
+"My blessed dear," she said, "be strong in the Lord!"
+
+They chained the two elder men at one stake; the two women at another:
+Elizabeth and Robert together at the last.  The Sheriff's men put the
+chain round them both, and hammered the other end fast, so that they
+should not attempt to escape.
+
+Escape! none of them dreamed of such a thing.  They cared neither for
+pain nor shame.  To their eyes Heaven itself was open, and the Lord
+Christ, on the right hand of the Father, would rise to receive His
+servants.  Nor did they say much to each other.  There would be time for
+that when all was over!  Were they not going the journey together? would
+they not dwell in happy company, through the long years of eternity?
+The man who was nailing the chain close to where Elizabeth stood
+accidentally let his hammer slip.  He had not intended to hurt her; but
+the hammer came down heavily upon her shoulder and made a severe wound.
+She turned her head to him and smiled on him.  Then she lifted up her
+eyes to heaven and prayed.  Her last few moments were spent in alternate
+prayer and exhortation of the crowd.
+
+The torch was applied to the firewood and tar-barrels heaped around
+them.  As the flame sprang up, the six martyrs clapped their hands: and
+from the bystanders a great cry rose to heaven,--
+
+"The Lord strengthen them! the Lord comfort them! the Lord pour His
+mercies upon them!"
+
+Ah, it was not England, but Rome, who burned those Marian martyrs!  The
+heart of England was sound and true; she was a victim, not a persecutor.
+
+Just as the flame reached its fiercest heat, there was a slight cry in
+the crowd, which parted hither and thither as a girl was borne out of it
+insensible.  She had fainted after uttering that cry.  It was no wonder,
+said those who stood near: the combined heat of the August sun and the
+fire was scarcely bearable.  She would come round shortly if she were
+taken into the shade to recover.
+
+Half-an-hour afterwards nothing could be seen beside the Lexden Road but
+the heated and twisted chains, with fragments of charred wood and of
+grey ashes.  The crowd had gone home.
+
+And the martyrs had gone home too.  No more should the sun light upon
+them, nor any heat.  The Lamb in the midst of the Throne had led them to
+living fountains of water, and they were comforted for evermore.
+
+"Who was that young woman that swooned and had to be borne away?" asked
+a woman in the crowd of another, as they made their way back into the
+town.
+
+The woman appealed to was Audrey Wastborowe.
+
+"Oh, it was Amy Clere of the Magpie," said she.  "The heat was too much
+for her, I reckon."
+
+"Ay, it was downright hot," said the neighbour.
+
+Something beside the heat had been too much for Amy Clere.  The familiar
+face of Elizabeth Foulkes, with that unearthly smile upon it, had gone
+right to the girl's heart.  For Amy had a heart, though it had been
+overlaid by a good deal of rubbish.
+
+The crowd did not disperse far.  They were gathered again in the
+afternoon in the Castle yard, when the Mounts and Johnson and Rose Allen
+were brought out to die.  They came as joyfully as their friends had
+done, "calling upon the name of God, and exhorting the people earnestly
+to flee from idolatry."  Once more the cry rose up from the whole
+crowd,--
+
+"Lord, strengthen them, and comfort them, and pour Thy mercy upon them!"
+
+And the Lord heard and answered.  Joyfully, joyfully they went home and
+the happy company who had stood true, and had been faithful unto death,
+were all gathered together for ever in the starry halls above.
+
+To two other places the cry penetrated: to Agnes Bongeor weeping in the
+Moot Hall because she was shut out from that blessed company; and to
+Margaret Thurston in her "better lodging" in the Castle, who had shut
+herself out, and had bought life by the denial of her Lord.
+
+The time is not far-off when we too shall be asked to choose between
+these two alternatives.  Not, perhaps, between earthly life and death
+(though it may come to that): but between faith and unfaithfulness,
+between Christ and idols, between the love that will give up all and the
+self-love that will endure nothing.  Which shall it be with you?  Will
+you add your voice to the side which tamely yields the priceless
+treasures purchased for us by these noble men and women at this awful
+cost? or will you meet the Romanising enemy with a firm front, and a
+shout of "No fellowship with idols!--no surrender of the liberty which
+our fathers bought with their heart's blood!"  God grant you grace to
+choose the last!
+
+When Mrs Clere reached the Magpie, she went up to Amy's room, and found
+her lying on the bed with her face turned to the wall.
+
+"Amy! what ailed thee, my maid?--art better now?"
+
+"Mother, we're all wrong!"
+
+"Dear heart, what does the child mean?" inquired the puzzled mother.
+"Has the sun turned thy wits out o' door?"
+
+"The sun did nought to me, mother.  It was Bessie's face that I could
+not bear.  Bessie's face, that I knew so well--the face that had lain
+beside me on this pillow over and over again--and that smile upon her
+lips, as if she were half in Heaven already--Mother it was dreadful!  I
+felt as if the last day were come, and the angels were shutting me out."
+
+"Hush thee, child, hush thee!  'Tis not safe to speak such things.
+Heretics go to the ill place, as thou very well wist."
+
+"Names don't matter, do they, Mother?  It is truth that signifies.
+Whatever names they please to call Bessie Foulkes, she had Heaven and
+not Hell in her face.  That smile of hers never came from Satan.  I know
+what his smiles are like: I've seen them on other faces afore now.  He
+never had nought to do with her."
+
+"Amy, if thy father hears thee say such words as those, he'll be proper
+angry, be sure!"
+
+Amy sat up on the bed.
+
+"Mother, you know that Bessie Foulkes loved God, and feared Him, and
+cared to please Him, as you and I never did in all our lives.  Do folks
+that love God go to Satan?  Does He punish people because they want to
+please Him?  I know little enough about it, alack-the-day! but if an
+angel came from Heaven to tell me Bessie wasn't there this minute, I
+could not believe him."
+
+"Well, well! think what you will, child, only don't say it!  I've
+nothing against Bess being in Heaven, not I!  I hope she may be, poor
+lass.  But thou knowest thy father's right set against it all, and the
+priests too; and, Amy, I don't want to see _thee_ on the waste by Lexden
+Road.  Just hold thy tongue, wilt thou? or thou'lt find thyself in the
+wrong box afore long."
+
+"Mother, I don't think Bessie Foulkes is sorry for what happened this
+morning."
+
+"Maybe not, but do hold thy peace!"
+
+"I can hold my peace if you bid me, Mother.  I've not been a good girl,
+but I mean to try and be better.  I don't feel as if I should ever care
+again for the gewgaws and the merrymakings that I used to think all the
+world of.  It's like as if I'd had a glimpse into Heaven as she went in,
+and the world had lost its savour.  But don't be feared, Mother; I'll
+not vex you, nor Father neither, if you don't wish me to talk.  Only--
+nobody 'll keep me from trying to go after Bessie!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR.
+
+DOROTHY TAKES A MESSAGE.
+
+"Now then, attend, can't you?  How much sugar?"
+
+"Please, Sister Mary, my head does ache so!"
+
+"No excuses, Cicely!  Answer at once."
+
+A long sobbing sigh preceded the words--"Half a pound."
+
+"Now get to your sewing.  Cicely, I must be obeyed; and you are a right
+perverse child as one might look for with the training you have had.
+Let me hear no more about headache: it's nothing but nonsense."
+
+"But my head does ache dreadfully, Sister."
+
+"Well, it is your own fault, if it do.  Two mortal hours were you crying
+last night,--the stars know what for!"
+
+"It was because I didn't hear nothing about Father," said poor Cissy
+sorrowfully.  "Mistress Wade promised she--"
+
+"Mistress Wade--who is that?"
+
+"Please, she's the hostess of the King's Head: and she said she would
+let me know when--"
+
+"When what?"
+
+"When Father couldn't have any pain ever any more."
+
+"Do you mean that you wish to hear your Father is dead, you wicked
+child?"
+
+Cissy looked up wearily into the nun's face.  "He's in pain now," she
+said; "for he is waiting, and knows he will have more.  But when it has
+come, he will have no more, never, but will live with God and be happy
+for ever and ever.  I want to know that Father's happy."
+
+"How can these wicked heretics fall into such delusions?" said Sister
+Mary, looking across the room at Sister Joan, who shook her head in a
+way which seemed to say that there was no setting any bounds to the
+delusions of heretics.  "Foolish child, thy father is a bad man, and bad
+men do not go to Heaven."
+
+"Father's not a bad man," said Cissy, not angrily, but in a tone of calm
+persuasion that nothing would shake.  "I cry you mercy, Sister Mary, but
+you don't know him, and somebody has told you wrong.  Father's good, and
+loves God; and people are not bad when they love God and do what He says
+to them.  You're mistaken, please, Sister."
+
+"But thy father does not obey God, child, because he does not obey the
+Church."
+
+"Please, I don't know anything about the Church.  Father obeys the
+Bible, and that is God's own Word which He spoke Himself.  The Church
+can't be any better than that."
+
+"The Church, for thee, is the priest, who will tell thee how to please
+God and the Holy Mother, if thou wilt hearken."
+
+"But the priest's a man, Sister: and God's Book is a great deal better
+than that."
+
+"The priest is in God's stead, and conveys His commands."
+
+"But I've got the commands, Sister Mary, in the Book; and God hasn't
+written a new one, has He?"
+
+"Silly child! the Church is above any Book."
+
+"Oh no, it can't be, Sister, please.  What Father bade me do his own
+self must be better than what other people bid me; and so what God says
+in His own Book must be better than what other people say, and the
+Church is only people."
+
+"Cicely, be silent!  Thou art a very silly, perverse child."
+
+"I dare say I am, Sister, but I am sure that's true."
+
+Sister Joan was on the point of bidding Cissy hold her tongue in a still
+more authoritative manner, when one of the lay Sisters entered the room,
+to say that a woman asked permission to speak with one of the teaching
+Sisters.
+
+"What is her name?"
+
+"She says her name is Denny."
+
+"Denny!  I know nobody of that name."
+
+"Oh, please, is her name Dorothy?" asked Cissy, eagerly.  "If it's
+Dorothy Denny, Mrs Wade has sent her--she's Mrs Wade's servant.  Oh,
+do let me--"
+
+"Silence!" said Sister Mary.  "I will go and speak with the woman."
+
+She found in the guest-chamber a woman of about thirty, who stood
+dropping courtesies as if she were very uncomfortable.
+
+Very uncomfortable Dorothy Denny was.  She did not know what "nervous"
+meant, but she was exceedingly nervous for all that.  In the first
+place, she felt extremely doubtful whether if she trusted herself inside
+a convent, she would ever have a chance of getting out again; and in the
+second she was deeply concerned about several things, of which one was
+Cissy.
+
+"What do you want, good woman?"
+
+"Please you, Madam, I cry you mercy for troubling of you, but if I might
+speak a word with the dear child--"
+
+"What dear child?" asked the nun placidly.
+
+Dorothy's fright grew.  Were they going to deny Cissy to her, or even to
+say that she was not there?
+
+"Please you, good Sister, I mean little Cis--Cicely Johnson, an' it like
+you, that I was sent to with a message from my mistress, the hostess of
+the King's Head in Colchester."
+
+"Cicely Johnson is not now at liberty.  You can give the message to me."
+
+"May I wait till I can see her?"
+
+Plainly, Dorothy was no unfaithful messenger when her own comfort only
+was to be sacrificed.  Sister Mary considered a moment; and then said
+she would see if Cicely could be allowed to have an interview with her
+visitor.  Bidding Dorothy sit down, she left the room.
+
+For quite an hour Dorothy sat waiting, until she began to think the nuns
+must have forgotten her existence, and to look about for some means of
+reminding them of it.  There were no bells in sitting-rooms at that
+time, except in the form of a little hand-bell on a table, and for this
+last Dorothy searched in vain.  Then she tried to go out into the
+passage, in the hope of seeing somebody; but she was terrified to find
+herself locked in.  She did not know what to do.  The window was barred
+with an iron grating; there was no escape that way.  Poor Dorothy began
+to wonder whether, if she found herself a prisoner, she could contrive
+to climb the chimney, and what would become of her after doing so, when
+she heard at last the welcome sound of approaching steps, and the key
+was turned in the lock.  The next minute Cissy was in Dorothy's arms.
+
+"O Dorothy! dear Dorothy! tell me quick--Father--" Cissy could get no
+further.
+
+"He is at rest, my dear heart, and shall die no more."
+
+Cissy was not able to answer for the sobs that choked her voice, and
+Dorothy smoothed her hair and petted her.
+
+"Nay, grieve not thus, sweet heart," she said.
+
+"Oh no, it is so wicked of me!" sobbed poor Cissy.  "I thought I should
+have been so glad for Father: and I can only think of me and the
+children.  We've got no father now!"
+
+"Nay, my dear heart, thou hast as much as ever thou hadst.  He is only
+gone upstairs and left you down.  He isn't dead, little Cissy: he's
+alive in a way he never was before, and he shall live for ever and
+ever."
+
+Neither Dorothy nor Cissy had noticed that a nun had entered with her,
+and they were rather startled to hear a voice out of the dark corner by
+the door.
+
+"Take heed, good woman, how thou learn the child such errors.  That is
+only true of great saints; and the man of whom you speak was a wicked
+heretic."
+
+"I know not what sort of folks your saints are," said Dorothy bravely:
+"but my saints are folks that love God and desire to please Him, and
+that John Johnson was, if ever a man were in this evil world.  An _evil_
+tree cannot bring forth good fruit."
+
+The nun crossed herself, but she did not answer.
+
+"It would be as well if folks would be content to set the bad folks in
+prison, and let the good ones be," said Dorothy.  "Cissy, our mistress
+is up to London to the Bishop."
+
+"Will they do somewhat to her?"
+
+"God knoweth!" said Dorothy, shaking her head sorrowfully.  "I shall be
+fain if I may see her back; oh, I shall!"
+
+"Oh, I hope they won't!" said Cissy, her eyes filling again with tears.
+"I love Mistress Wade."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE.
+
+NOBODY LEFT FOR CISSY.
+
+"Please, Dorothy, what's become of Rose Allen? and Bessy Foulkes? and
+Mistress Mount, and all of them?"
+
+"All gone, my dear heart--all with thy father."
+
+"Are they all gone?" said Cissy with another sob, "Isn't there one
+left?"
+
+"Not one of them."
+
+"Then if we came out, we shouldn't find nobody?"
+
+"Prithee reckon not, Cicely," said the nun, "that thou art likely to
+come out.  There is no such likelihood at all whilst our good Queen
+reigneth; and if it please God, she shall have a son after her that
+shall be true to the Catholic faith, as she is, and not suffer evil
+courses and naughty heretics to be any more in the realm.  Ye will abide
+here till it be plainly seen whether God shall grant to thee and thy
+sister the grace of a vocation; and if not, it shall be well seen to
+that ye be in care of good Catholic folk, that shall look to it ye go in
+the right way.  So prithee, suffer not thy fancy to deceive thee with
+any thought of going forth of this house of religion.  When matters be
+somewhat better established, and the lands whereof the Church hath been
+robbed are given back to her, and all the religious put back in their
+houses, or new ones built, then will England be an Isle of Saints as in
+olden time, and men may rejoice thereat."
+
+Cissy listened to this long speech, which she only understood in part,
+but she gathered that the nuns meant to keep her a prisoner as long as
+they could.
+
+"But Sister Joan," said she, "you don't know, do you, what God is going
+to do?  Perhaps he will give us another good king or queen, like King
+Edward.  I ask Him to do, every day.  But, please, what is a vocation?"
+
+"Thou dost, thou wicked maid?  I never heard thee."
+
+"But I don't ask you, Sister Joan.  I ask God.  And I think He'll do it,
+too.  What is a vocation, please?"
+
+"What I'm afeared thou wilt never have, thou sinful heretic child--the
+call to become a holy Sister."
+
+"Who is to call me?  I am a sister now; I'm Will's and Baby's sister.
+Nobody can't call me to be a sister to nobody else," said Cissy, getting
+very negative in her earnestness.
+
+Sister Joan rose from her seat.  "The time is up," said she.  "Say
+farewell to thy friend."
+
+"Farewell, Dorothy dear," said Cissy, clinging to the one person she
+knew, who seemed to belong to her past, as she never would have thought
+of doing to Dorothy Denny in bygone days.  "Please give Mistress Wade my
+duty, when she comes home, and say I'm trying to do as Father bade me,
+and I'll never, never believe nothing he told me not.  You see they
+couldn't do nothing to me save burn me, as they did Father, and then I
+should go to Father, and all would be right directly.  It's much better
+for them all that they are safe there, and I'll try to be glad--thought
+here's nobody left for me.  Father'll have company: I must try and think
+of that.  I thought he'd find nobody he knew but Mother, but if they've
+all gone too, there'll be plenty.  And I suppose there'll be some holy
+angels to look after us, because God isn't gone away, you see: He's
+there and here too.  He'll help me still to look after Will and Baby,
+now I haven't"--a sob interrupted the words--"haven't got Father.
+Good-bye, Dolly!  Kiss me, please.  Nobody never kisses me now."
+
+"Thou poor little dear!" cried Dorothy, fairly melted, and sobbing over
+Cissy as she gave her half-a-dozen kisses at least.  "The Lord bless
+thee, and be good to thee!  I'm sure He'll take proper vengeance on
+every body as isn't.  I wouldn't like to be them as ill-used thee.
+They'll have a proper bill to pay in the next world, if they don't get
+it in this.  Poor little pretty dear!"
+
+"You will drink a cup of ale and eat a manchet?" asked Sister Joan of
+Dorothy.
+
+A manchet was a cake of the best bread.
+
+"No, I thank you, Sister, I am not a-hungered," was the answer.
+
+"But, Dolly, you did not come all the way from Colchester?" said Cissy.
+
+"Ay, I did so, my dear, in the miller's cart, and I'm journeying back in
+the same.  I covenanted to meet him down at the end of yonder lane at
+three o'clock, and methinks I had best be on my way."
+
+"Ay, you have no time to lose," responded Sister Joan.
+
+Dorothy found Mr Ewring waiting for her at the end of the lane.
+
+"Have you had to eat, Dorothy?" was his first question when she had
+climbed up beside him.
+
+"Never a bite or sup in _that_ house, Master, I thank you," was
+Dorothy's rejoinder.  "If I'd been starving o' hunger, I wouldn't have
+touched a thing."
+
+"Have you seen the children?"
+
+"I've seen Cissy.  That was enough and to spare."
+
+"What do they with her?"
+
+"They are working hard with both hands to make an angel of her at the
+soonest--that's what they are doing.  It's not what they mean to do.
+They want to make her a devil, or one of the devil's children, which
+comes to the same thing: but the Lord 'll not suffer that, or I'm a
+mistaken woman.  They are trying to bend her, and they never will.
+She'll break first.  So they'll break her, and then there'll be no more
+they can do.  That's about where it is, Master Ewring."
+
+"Why, Dorothy, I never saw you thus stirred aforetime."
+
+"Maybe not.  It takes a bit to stir me, but I've got it this even, I can
+tell you."
+
+"I could well-nigh mistake you for Mistress Wade," said Mr Ewring with
+a smile.
+
+"Eh, poor Mistress! but if she could see that poor little dear, it would
+grieve her to her heart.  Master Ewring, how long will the Lord bear
+with these sons of Satan!"
+
+"Ah, Dorothy, that's more than you or I can tell.  `Many shall be
+purified, and made white, and tried': that is all we know."
+
+"How much is many?" asked Dorothy almost bitterly.
+
+"Not one too many," said the miller gravely: "and not one too few.  We
+are called to wait until our brethren be accomplished that shall suffer.
+It may be shorter than we think.  But, Dorothy, who set you among the
+prophets?  I rather thought you had not over much care for such things."
+
+"Master Ewring, I've heard say that when a soldier's killed in battle,
+another steppeth up behind without delay to fill his place.  There's
+some places wants filling at Colchester, where the firing's been fierce
+of late: and when most of the old warriors be killed, they'll be like to
+fill the ranks up with new recruits.  And if they be a bit awkward, and
+don't step just up to pace, maybe they'll learn by and by, and meantime
+the others must have patience."
+
+"The Lord perfect that which concerneth thee!" said the miller, with
+much feeling.  "Dorothy, was your mistress not desirous to have brought
+up these little ones herself?"
+
+"She was so, Master Ewring, and I would with all my heart she could.
+Poor little dears!"
+
+"I would have taken the lad, if it might have been compassed, when he
+was a bit older, and have bred him up to my own trade.  The maids should
+have done better with good Mistress Wade."
+
+"Eh, Master, little Cicely's like to dwell in other keeping than either,
+and that's with her good father and mother above."
+
+"The Lord's will be done!" responded Mr Ewring.  "If so be, she at
+least will have little sorrow."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY SIX.
+
+INTO THE LION'S MOUTH.
+
+"Give you good den, Master Hiltoft!  May a man have speech of your
+prisoner, Mistress Bongeor?"
+
+"You're a bold man, Master Ewring."
+
+"Wherefore?"
+
+"Wherefore!  Sotting your head in the lion's mouth!  I should have
+thought you'd keep as far from Moot Hall as you could compass.  Yourself
+not unsuspected, and had one burned already from your house--I marvel at
+you that you hide not yourself behind your corn-measures and
+flour-sacks, and have a care not to show your face in the street.  And
+here up you march as bold as Hector, and desire to have speech of a
+prisoner!  Well--it's your business, not mine."
+
+"Friend, mine hearth is desolate, and I have only God to my friend.  Do
+you marvel that I haste to do His work whilst it is day, or that I
+desire to be approved of Him?"
+
+"You go a queer way about it.  I reckon you think with the old saw,
+[Proverb.] `The nearer the church the further from Heaven'!"
+
+"That is true but in some sense.  Verily, the nearer some churches, and
+some priests, so it is.  May I see Mistress Bongeor?"
+
+"Ay, you would fain not commit yourself, I see, more than may be.  Come,
+you have a bit of prudence left.  So much the better for you.  Come in,
+and I'll see if Wastborowe's in a reasonable temper, and that hangs
+somewhat on the one that Audrey's in."
+
+The porter shut the gate behind Mr Ewring, and went to seek Wastborowe.
+Just then Jane Hiltoft, coming to her door, saw him waiting, and
+invited him to take a seat.
+
+"Fine morning, Master."
+
+"Ay, it is, Jane.  Have you yet here poor Johnson's little maid?"
+
+"I haven't, Master, and I feel fair lost without the dear babe.  A rare
+good child she was--never see a better.  The Black Ladies of Hedingham
+has got her, and I'm all to pieces afeard they'll not tend her right
+way.  How should nuns (saving their holy presences) know aught about
+babes and such like?  Eh dear! they'd better have left her with me.  I'd
+have taken to her altogether, if Simon'd have let me--and I think he
+would after a bit.  And she'd have done well with me, too."
+
+"Ay, Jane, you'd have cared her well for the body, I cast no doubt."
+
+"Dear heart, but it's sore pity, Master Ewring, such a good man as you
+cannot be a good Catholic like every body else!  You'd save yourself
+ever so much trouble and sorrow.  I cannot think why you don't."
+
+"We should save ourselves a little sorrow, Jane; but we should have a
+deal more than we lost."
+
+"But how so, Master?  It's only giving up an opinion."
+
+"Maybe so, with some: but not with us.  They that have been taught this
+way by others, and never knew Christ for themselves--with them, as you
+say, it were but the yielding of opinion: but to us that know Him, and
+have heard His voice, it would be the betraying of the best Friend in
+earth or Heaven.  And we cannot do that, Jane Hiltoft--not even for
+life."
+
+"Nay, that stands to reason if it were so, Master Ewring; but, trust me,
+I know not what you mean, no more than if you spake Latin."
+
+"Read God's Book, and pray for His Spirit, and you shall find out,
+Jane.--Well, Hiltoft?"
+
+"Wastborowe says you may see Mistress Bongeor if you'll give him a royal
+farthing, but he won't let you for a penny less.  He's had words with
+their Audrey, and he's as savage as Denis of Siccarus."
+
+"Who was he, Hiltoft?" answered Mr Ewring with a smile, as he felt in
+his purse for the half-crown which was to be the price of his visit to
+Agnes Bongeor.
+
+"Eh, I don't know: I heard Master Doctor say the other day that his dog
+was as fierce as him."
+
+"Art sure he said not `Syracuse'?"
+
+"Dare say he might.  Syracuse or Siccarus, all's one to me."
+
+At the door of the dungeon stood the redoubtable Wastborowe, his keys
+hanging from his girdle, and looking, to put it mildly, not particularly
+amiable.
+
+"Want letting out again by and by?" he inquired with grim satire, as Mr
+Ewring put the coin in his hand.
+
+"If you please, Wastborowe.  You've no writ to keep me, have you?"
+
+"Haven't--worse luck!  Only wish I had.  I'll set a match to the lot of
+you with as much pleasure as I'd drink a pot of ale.  It'll never be
+good world till we're rid of heretics!"
+
+"There'll be Satan left then, methinks, and maybe a few rogues and
+murderers to boot."
+
+"Never a one as bad as you Lutherans and Gospellers!  Get you in.
+You'll have to wait my time to come out."
+
+"Very well," said Mr Ewring quietly, and went in.
+
+He found Agnes Bongeor seated in a corner of the window recess, with her
+Bible on her knee; but it was closed, and she looked very miserable.
+
+"Well, my sister, and how is it with you?"
+
+"As 'tis like to be, Master Ewring, with her whom the Lord hath cast
+forth, and reckons unworthy to do Him a service."
+
+"Did he so reckon Abraham, then, at the time of the offering up of
+Isaac?  Isaac was not sacrificed: he was turned back from the same.  Yet
+what saith the Lord unto him?  `Because thou hast done this thing, and
+hast not withheld thy son, thou shalt be blessed, because thou hast
+obeyed My voice.'  See you, his good will thereto is reckoned as though
+he had done the thing.  `The Lord looketh on the heart.'  Doubt thou
+not, my good sister, but firmly believe, that to thee also faith is
+counted for righteousness, and the will passeth for the deed, with Him
+who saith that `if thou be Christ's then art thou Abraham's seed.'"
+
+"That's comforting, in truth," said poor Agnes.  "But, Master Ewring,
+think you there is any hope that I may yet be allowed to witness for my
+Lord before men in very deed?  To have come so near, and be thrust back!
+Is there no hope?"
+
+Agnes Bongeor was not the only one of the sufferers in this persecution
+who actually coveted and longed for martyrdom.  If the imperial crown of
+all the world had been laid at their feet, they would have reckoned it
+beneath contempt in comparison with that crown of life promised to such
+as are faithful unto death.  Not faithful _till_ death, but _unto_ it.
+
+"I know not what the Lord holds in reserve for thee, my sister.  I only
+know that whatsoever it be, it is that whereby thou mayest best glorify
+Him.  Is that not enough?  If more glory should come to Him by thy dying
+in this dungeon after fifty years' imprisonment, than by thy burning,
+which wouldst thou choose?  Speak truly."
+
+Agnes dropped her face upon her hands for a moment.
+
+"You have the right, Master Ewring," said she, when she looked up again.
+"I fear I was over full of myself.  Let the Lord's will be done, and
+His glory ensured, by His doing with me whatsoever He will.  I will
+strive to be patient, and not grieve more than I should."
+
+"Therein wilt thou do well, my sister.  And now I go--when as it shall
+please Wastborowe," added Mr Ewring with a slight smile of amusement,
+and then growing grave,--"to visit one in far sorer trouble than
+thyself."
+
+"Eh, Master, who is that?"
+
+"It is Margaret Thurston, who hath not been, nor counted herself,
+rejected of the Lord, but hath of her own will rejected Him.  She bought
+life by recanting."
+
+"Eh, poor soul, how miserable must she be!  Tell her, if it like you,
+that I will pray for her.  Maybe the Lord will grant to both of us the
+grace yet to be His witnesses."
+
+Mr Ewring had to pass four weary hours in the dungeon before it pleased
+Wastborowe to let him out.  He spent it in conversing with the other
+prisoners,--all of whom, save Agnes Bongeor, were arrested for some
+crime,--and trying to do them good.  At last the heavy door rolled back,
+and Wastborowe's voice was heard inquiring, in accents which did not
+sound particularly sober,--
+
+"Where's yon companion that wants baking by Lexden Road?"
+
+"I am here, Wastborowe," said Mr Ewring, rising.  "Good den, friends.
+The Lord bless and comfort thee, my sister!"
+
+And out he went into the summer evening air, to meet the half-tipsy
+gaoler's farewell of,--
+
+"There!  Take to thy heels, old shortbread, afore thou'rt done a bit too
+brown.  Thou'lt get it some of these days!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN.
+
+"REMEMBER!"
+
+Mr Ewring only returned Wastborowe's uncivil farewell by a nod, as he
+walked up High Street towards East Gate.  At the corner of Tenant's Lane
+he turned to the left, and went up to the Castle.  A request to see the
+prisoner there brought about a little discussion between the porter and
+the gaoler, and an appeal was apparently made to some higher authority.
+At length the visitor was informed that permission was granted, on
+condition that he would not mention the subject of religion.
+
+The condition was rejected at once.  Mr Ewring had come to talk about
+that and nothing else.
+
+"Then you'd best go home," said Bartle.  "Can't do to have matters set
+a-crooked again when they are but now coming straight.  Margaret
+Thurston's reconciled, and we've hopes for John, though he's been harder
+of the two to bring round.  Never do to have folks coming and setting
+'em all wrong side up.  Do you want to see 'em burned, my master?"
+
+"I want to see them true," was Mr Ewring's answer, "The burning doesn't
+much matter."
+
+"Oh, doesn't it?" sneered Bartle.  "You'll sing another tune, Master
+Ewring, the day you're set alight."
+
+"Methinks, friend, those you have burned sang none other.  But how about
+a thousand years hence?  Bartholomew Crane, what manner of tune wilt
+thou be singing then?"
+
+"Time enough to say when I've got it pricked, Master," said Bartle: but
+Mr Ewring saw from his uneasiness that the shot had told.
+
+People were much more musical in England three hundred years ago than
+now.  Nearly everybody could sing, or read music at sight: and a lady
+was thought very poorly educated if she could not "set"--that is, write
+down a tune properly on hearing it played.  Writing music they called
+"pricking" it.
+
+Mr Ewring did not stay to talk with Bartle; he bade him good-bye, and
+walked up Tenant's Lane on his way home.  But before he had gone many
+yards, an idea struck him, and he turned round and went back to the
+Castle.
+
+Bartle was still in the court, and he peeped through the wicket to see
+who was there.
+
+"Good lack! you're come again!"
+
+"I'm come again," said Mr Ewring, smiling.  "Bartle, wilt take a
+message to the Thurstons for me?"
+
+"Depends," said Bartle with a knowing nod.  "What's it about?  If you
+want to tell 'em price of flour, I don't mind."
+
+"I only want you to say one word to either of them."
+
+"Come, that's jolly!  What's the word?"
+
+"Remember!"
+
+Bartle scratched his head.  "Remember what?  There's the rub!"
+
+"Leave that to them," said Mr Ewring.
+
+"Well,--I--don't--know," said Bartle very slowly.  "Mayhap _I_ sha'n't
+remember."
+
+"Mayhap that shall help you," replied the miller, holding up an angelet,
+namely, a gold coin, value 3 shillings 4 pence--the smallest gold coin
+then made.
+
+"Shouldn't wonder if that strengthened my wits," said Bartle with a
+grin, as the little piece of gold was slipped through the wicket.
+"That's over a penny a letter, bain't it?"
+
+"Fivepence.  It's good pay."
+
+"It's none so bad.  I'm in hopes you'll have a few more messages, Master
+Ewring.  They're easy to carry when they come in a basket o' that
+metal."
+
+"Ah, Bartle! wilt thou do that for a gold angelet which thou wouldst not
+for the love of God or thy neighbour?  Beware that all thy good things
+come not to thee in this life--which can only be if they be things that
+pertain to this life alone."
+
+"This life's enough for me, Master: it's all I've got."
+
+"Truth, friend.  Therefore cast it not away in folly."
+
+"In a good sooth, Master Ewring, I love your angelets better than your
+preachment, and you paid me not to listen to a sermon, but to carry a
+message.  Good den!"
+
+"Good den, Bartle.  May the Lord give thee good ending!"
+
+Bartle stood looking from the wicket until the miller had turned the
+corner.
+
+"Yon's a good man, I do believe," said he to himself.  "I marvel what
+they burn such men for!  They're never found lying or cheating or
+murdering.  Why couldn't folks let 'em alone?  We shouldn't want to hurt
+'em, if the priests would let us alone.  Marry, this would be a good
+land if there were no priests!"
+
+Bartle shut the wicket, and prepared to carry in supper to his
+prisoners.  John and Margaret Thurston were not together.  The priests
+were afraid to let them be so, lest John, who stood more firmly of the
+two, should talk over Margaret.  They occupied adjoining cells.  Bartle
+opened a little wicket in the first, and called John to receive his
+rations of brown bread, onions, and weak ale.
+
+"I promised to give you a message," said he, "but I don't know as it's
+like to do you much good.  It's only one word."
+
+"Should be a weighty one," said John.  "What is it?"
+
+"`Remember!'"
+
+"Ah!"  John Thurston's long-drawn exclamation, which ended with a heavy
+sigh, astonished Bartle.
+
+"There's more in it than I reckoned, seemingly," said he as he turned to
+Margaret's cell, and opened her wicket to pass in the supper.
+
+"Here's a message for you, Meg, from Master Ewring the miller.  Let's
+see what _you'll_ say to it--`Remember!'"
+
+"`Remember!'" cried Margaret in a pained tone.  "Don't I always
+remember? isn't it misery to me to remember?  And can't I guess what he
+means--`Remember from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the
+first works'?  Eh, then there's repentance yet for them that have
+fallen!  `I will fight against thee, _except_ thou repent.'  God bless
+you, Bartle: you've given me a buffet and yet a hope."
+
+"That's a proper powerful word, is that!" said Bartle.  "Never knew one
+word do so much afore."
+
+There was more power in that one word from Holy Writ than Bartle
+guessed.  The single word, sent home to their consciences by the Holy
+Ghost, brought quit different messages to the two to whom it was sent.
+To John Thurston it did not say, "Remember from whence thou hast
+fallen."  That was the message with which it was charged for Margaret.
+But to John it said, "Call to remembrance the former days, in which,
+after that ye were illuminated, ye endured a great flight of afflictions
+... knowing in yourselves that ye have in Heaven a better and an
+enduring substance.  Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath
+great recompense of reward."  That was John's message, and it found him
+just on the brink of casting his confidence away, and stopped him.
+
+Mr Ewring had never spent an angelet better than in securing the
+transmission of that one word, which was the instrument in God's hand to
+save two immortal souls.
+
+As he reached the top of Tenant's Lane, he met Ursula Felstede, carrying
+a large bundle, with which she tried to hide her face, and to slink
+past.  The miller stopped.
+
+"Good den, Ursula.  Wither away?"
+
+"Truly, Master, to the whitster's with this bundle."
+
+The whitster meant what we should now call a dyer and cleaner.
+
+"Do you mind, Ursula, what the Prophet Daniel saith, that `many shall be
+purified and made white'?  Methinks it is going on now.  White, as no
+fuller on earth can white them!  May you and I be so cleansed, friend!
+Good den."
+
+Ursula courtesied and escaped, and Mr Ewring passed through the gate,
+and went up to his desolated home.  He stood a moment in the mill-door,
+looking back over the town which he had just left.
+
+"`The night cometh, when no man can work,'" he said to himself.  "Grant
+me, Lord, to be about Thy business until the Master cometh!"
+
+And he knew, while he said it, that in all likelihood to him that coming
+would be in a chariot of fire, and that to be busied with that work
+would bring it nearer and sooner.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT.
+
+FILLING THE RANKS.
+
+As Mr Ewring stood looking out, he saw somebody coming up from the gate
+towards the mill--a girl, who walked slowly, as if she felt very hot or
+very tired.  The day was warm, but not oppressively so; and he watched
+her coming languidly up the road, till he saw that it was Amy Clere.
+What could she want at the mill?  Mr Ewring waited to see.
+
+"Good den, Mistress Amy," said he, as she came nearer.
+
+Amy looked up as if it startled her to be addressed.
+
+"Good den, Master Ewring.  Father's sending some corn to be ground, and
+he desired you to know the last was ground a bit too fine for his
+liking: would you take the pains to have it coarser ground, an' it
+please you?"
+
+"I will see to it, Mistress Amy.  A fine even, methinks?"
+
+"Ay, right fair," replied Amy in that manner which shows that the
+speaker's thoughts are away elsewhere.  But she did not offer to go; she
+lingered about the mill-door, in the style of one who has something to
+say which she is puzzled or unwilling to bring out.
+
+"You seem weary," said Mr Ewring, kindly; "pray you, sit and rest you a
+space in the porch."
+
+Amy took the seat suggested at once.
+
+"Master Clere is well, I trust?--and Mistress Clere likewise?"
+
+"They are well, I thank you."
+
+Mr Ewring noticed suddenly that Amy's eyes were full of tears.
+
+"Mistress Amy," said he, "I would not by my good-will be meddlesome in
+matters that concern me not, but it seemeth me all is scarce well with
+you.  If so be that I can serve you any way, I trust you will say so
+much."
+
+"Master Ewring, I am the unhappiest maid in all Colchester."
+
+"Truly, I am right sorry to hear it."
+
+"I lack one to help me, and I know not to whom to turn.  You could,
+if--"
+
+"Then in very deed I will.  Pray give me to wit how?"
+
+Amy looked up at him.  "Master Ewring, I set out for Heaven, and I have
+lost the way."
+
+"Why, Mistress Amy! surely you know well enough--"
+
+"No, I don't," she said, cutting him short.  "Lack-a-day!  I never took
+no heed when I might have learned it: and now have I no chance to learn,
+and everything to hinder.  I don't know a soul I could ask about it."
+
+"The priest," suggested Mr Ewring a little constrainedly.  This
+language astonished him from Nicholas Clere's daughter.
+
+"I don't want the priest's way.  He isn't going himself; or if he is,
+it's back foremost.  Master Ewring, help me!  I mean it.  I never wist a
+soul going that way save Bessy Foulkes: and she's got there, and I want
+to go _her_ way.  What am I to do?"
+
+Mr Ewring did not speak for a moment.  He was thinking, in the first
+place, how true it was that "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the
+Church"; and in the second, what very unlikely subjects God sometimes
+chooses as the recipients of His grace.  One of the last people in
+Colchester whom he would have expected to fill Elizabeth Foulkes' vacant
+place in the ranks was the girl who sat in the porch, looking up at him
+with those anxious, earnest eyes.
+
+"Mistress Amy," he said, "you surely know there is peril in this path?
+It were well you should count the cost afore you enter on it."
+
+"Where is there not peril?" was the answer.  "I may be slain of
+lightning to-morrow, or die of some sudden malady this next month.  Can
+you say surely that there is more peril of burning than of that?  If
+not, come to mine help.  I must find the way somehow.  Master Ewring, I
+want to be _safe_!  I want to feel that it will not matter how or when I
+go, because I know whither it shall be.  And I have lost the way.  I
+thought I had but to do well and be as good as I could, and I should
+sure come out safe.  And I have tried that way awhile, and it serves
+not.  First, I can't be good when I would: and again, the better I am--
+as folks commonly reckon goodness--the worser I feel.  There's somewhat
+inside me that won't do right; and there's somewhat else that isn't
+satisfied when I have done right; it wants something more, and I don't
+know what it is.  Master Ewring, you do.  Tell me!"
+
+"Mistress Amy, what think you religion to be?"
+
+"Nay, I always thought it were being good.  If it's not that, I know not
+what it is."
+
+"But being good must spring out of something.  That is the flower.  What
+is the seed--that which is to make you `be good,' and find it easy and
+pleasant?"
+
+"Tell me!" said Amy's eyes more than her words.
+
+"My dear maid, religion is fellowship; living fellowship with the living
+Lord.  It is neither being good nor doing good, though both will spring
+out of it.  It is an exchange made between you and the Lord Christ: His
+righteousness for your iniquity; His strength for your weakness; His
+rich grace for your bankrupt poverty of all goodness.  Mistress Amy, you
+want Christ our Lord, and the Holy Ghost, which He shall give you--the
+new heart and the right spirit which be His gift, and which He died to
+purchase for you."
+
+"That's it!" said Amy, with a light in her eyes.  "But how come you by
+them?"
+
+"You may have them for the asking--if you do truly wish it.  `Whosoever
+_will_, let him take the water of life.'  Know you what Saint Austin
+saith?  `Thou would'st not now be setting forth to find God, if He had
+not first set forth to find thee.'  `For by grace ye are saved, through
+faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God.'  Keep fast
+hold of that, Mistress Amy."
+
+"That 'll do!" said Amy, under her breath.  "I've got what I want now--
+if He'll hearken to me.  But, O Master Ewring, I'm not fit to keep
+fellowship with Him!"
+
+"Dear maid, you are that which the best and the worst man in the world
+are--a sinner that needeth pardon, a sinner that can be saved only
+through grace.  Have you the chance to get hold of a Bible, or no?"
+
+"No!  Father gave up his to the priest, months agone.  I never cared
+nought about it while I had it, and now I've lost the chance."
+
+"Trust the Lord to care for you.  He shall send you, be sure, either the
+quails or the manna.  He'll not let you starve.  He has bound Himself to
+bring all safe that trust in Him.  And--it looks not like it, verily,
+yet it may be that times of liberty shall come again."
+
+"Master Ewring, I've given you a deal of trouble," said Amy, rising
+suddenly, "and taken ever so much time.  But I'm not unthankful, trust
+me."
+
+"My dear maid, how can Christian men spend time better than in helping a
+fellow soul on his way towards Heaven?  It's not time wasted, be sure."
+
+"No, it's not time wasted!" said Amy, with more feeling than Mr Ewring
+had ever seen her show before.
+
+"Farewell, dear maid," said he.  "One thing I pray you to remember: what
+you lack is the Holy Ghost, for He only can show Christ unto you.  I or
+others can talk of Him, but the Spirit alone can reveal Him to your own
+soul.  And the Spirit is promised to them that ask Him."
+
+"I'll not forget, Master.  Good even, and God bless you!"
+
+Mr Ewring stood a moment longer to watch Amy as she ran down the road,
+with a step tenfold more light and elastic than the weary, languid one
+with which she had come up.
+
+"God bless the maid!" he said half aloud, "and may He `stablish,
+strengthen, settle' her!  `He hath mercy on whom He will have mercy.'
+But we on whom He has had it aforetime, how unbelieving and hopeless we
+are apt to be!  Verily, the last recruit that I looked to see join
+Christ's standard was Nicholas Clere's daughter."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THIRTY NINE.
+
+THE LAST MARTYRDOM.
+
+"Good-morrow, Mistress Clere!  Any placards of black velvet have you?"
+
+A placard with us means a large handbill for pasting on walls: in Queen
+Mary's time they meant by it a double stomacher,--namely an
+ornamentation for the front of a dress, put on separate from it, which
+might either be plain silk or velvet, or else worked with beautiful
+embroidery, gold twist, sometimes even pearls and precious stones.
+
+Mrs Clere came in all haste and much obsequiousness, for it was no less
+a person than the Mayoress of Colchester who thus inquired for a black
+velvet placard.
+
+"We have so, Madam, and right good ones belike.  Amy, fetch down yonder
+box with the bettermost placards."
+
+Amy ran up the little ladder needful to reach the higher shelves, and
+brought down the box.  It was not often that Mrs Clere was asked for
+her superior goods, for she dealt chiefly with those whose purses would
+not stretch so far.
+
+"Here, Madam, is a fine one of carnation velvet--and here a black
+wrought in gold twist; or what think you of this purple bordered in
+pearls?"
+
+"That liketh me the best," said the Mayoress taking up the purple
+velvet.  "What cost it, Mistress Clere?"
+
+"Twenty-six and eightpence, Madam, at your pleasure."
+
+"'Tis dear."
+
+"Nay, Madam!  Pray you look on the quality--velvet of the finest, and
+pearls of right good colour.  You shall not find a better in any shop in
+the town."  And Mrs Clere dexterously turned the purple placard to the
+light in such a manner that a little spot on one side of it should not
+show.  "Or if this carnation please you the better--"
+
+"No, I pass not upon that," said the Mayoress; which meant, that she did
+not fancy it.  "Will you take four-and-twenty shillings, Mistress
+Clere?"
+
+It was then considered almost a matter of course that a shopkeeper must
+be offered less than he asked; and going from shop to shop to "cheapen"
+the articles they wanted was a common amusement of ladies.
+
+Mrs Clere looked doubtful.  "Well, truly, Madam, I should gain not a
+penny thereby; yet rather than lose your good custom, seeing for whom it
+is--"
+
+"Very good," said the Mayoress, "put it up."
+
+Amy knew that the purple placard had cost her mother 16 shillings 8
+pence, and had been slightly damaged since it came into her hands.  She
+knew also that Mrs Clere would confess the fraud to the priest, would
+probably be told to repeat the Lord's Prayer three times over as a
+penance for it, would gabble through the words as fast as possible, and
+would then consider her sin quite done away with, and her profit of 7
+shillings 4 pence cheaply secured.  She knew also that the Mayoress, in
+all probability, was aware that Mrs Clere's protestation about not
+gaining a single penny was a mere flourish of words, not at all meant to
+be accepted as a fact.
+
+"Is there aught of news stirring, an' it like you, Madam?" asked Mrs
+Clere, as she rolled up the placard inside out, and secured it with
+tape.
+
+"I know of none, truly," answered the Mayoress, "save to-morrow's
+burning, the which I would were over for such spectacles like me not--
+not that I would save evil folks from the due penalty of their sins, but
+that I would some less displeasant manner of execution might be found.
+Truly, what with the heat, and the dust, and the close crowds that
+gather, 'tis no dainty matter to behold."
+
+"You say truth, Madam.  Indeed, the last burning we had, my daughter
+here was so close pressed in the crowd, and so near the fire, she fair
+swooned, and had to be borne thence.  But who shall suffer to-morrow,
+an' it like you? for I heard nought thereabout."
+
+Mrs Clere presented the little parcel as she spoke.
+
+"Only two women," said the Mayoress, taking her purchase: "not nigh so
+great a burning as the last--so very likely the crowd shall be less
+also."
+
+The crowd was not much less on the waste place by the Lexden Road, when
+on the 17th of September, 1557, those two martyrs were brought forth to
+die: Agnes Bongeor, full of joy and triumph, praising God that at length
+she was counted worthy to suffer for His Name's sake; Margaret Thurston,
+the disciple who had denied Him, and for whom therefore there could be
+no triumph; yet, even now, a meek and fervent appeal from the heart's
+core, of "Lord, Thou knowest that I love Thee!"
+
+As the chain was being fastened around them a voice came from the
+crowd--one of those mysterious voices never to be traced to a speaker,
+perpetually heard at martyrdoms.
+
+"`He remembered that they were but flesh.'  `He hath remembered His
+covenant forever.'  `According to Thy mercy, remember Thou me!'"
+
+Only Margaret Thurston knew who spoke three times that word never to be
+forgotten, once a terrible rebuke, now and evermore a benediction.
+
+So went home the last of the Colchester martyrs.
+
+As Mr Ewring turned back, he caught sight of Dorothy Denny, and made
+his way back to her.
+
+"You come to behold, do you, Dorothy?" said he, when they had turned
+into a quiet side street, safe from hostile ears.
+
+"Ay, Master, it strengthens me," she said.
+
+"Thou'rt of the right stuff, then," he answered.  "It weakens such as be
+not."
+
+"Eh, I'm as weak as any one," replied Dorothy.  "What comforts me is to
+see how the good Lord can put strength into the very feeblest lamb of
+all His flock.  It seems like as if the Shepherd lifted the lamb into
+His arms, so that it had no labour to carry itself."
+
+"Ay, 'tis easy to bear a burden, when you and it be borne together,"
+said Mr Ewring.  "Dorothy, have you strength for that burden?"
+
+"Master Ewring, I've given up thinking that I've any strength for any
+thing, and then I just go and ask for it for everything, and methinks I
+get along best that way."
+
+"Ay, so?  You are coming on fast, Dorothy.  Many Christian folks miss
+that lesson half their lives."
+
+"Well, I don't know but they do the best that are weak," said Dorothy.
+"Look you, they know it, and know they must fetch better strength than
+their own; so they don't get thinking they can manage the little things
+themselves, and only need ask the Lord to see to the greet ones."
+
+"It's true, Dorothy.  I can't keep from thinking of poor Jack Thurston;
+he must be either very hard or very miserable.  Let us pray for him,
+Dorothy.  I'm afeared it's a bad sign that he isn't with them this
+morrow."
+
+"You think he's given in, Master Ewring?"
+
+"I'm doubtful of it, Dorothy."
+
+They walked on for a few minutes without speaking.
+
+"I'll try to see Jack again, or pass in a word to him," said Mr Ewring
+reflectively.
+
+"Eh, Master Ewring don't you go into peril!  The Lord's cause can't
+afford to lose you.  Don't 'ee, now!"
+
+"Dorothy," said Mr Ewring with a smile, "if the Lord's cause can't
+afford to lose me, you may be very sure it won't lose me.  `The Lord
+reigneth, be the people never so impatient.'  He is on the throne, not
+the priests.  But in truth, Dorothy, the Lord can afford anything: He is
+able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham.  `He Himself
+knew what He would do,' touching the miracle of the loaves: Andrew
+didn't know, and Philip hadn't a notion.  Let us trust Him, Dorothy, and
+just go forward and do our duty.  We shall not die one moment before the
+Master calleth us."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FORTY.
+
+GOD SAVE THE QUEEN!
+
+"Come and sit a bit with me, Will.  I scarce ever see you now."
+
+Will Johnson, a year older and bigger, scrambled up on the garden seat,
+and Cissy put her arm round him.
+
+From having been very small of her age, Cissy was suddenly shooting up
+into a tall, slim, lily-like girl, nearly as white as a lily, and as
+delicate-looking.  "How are you getting on with the ladies, Will?"
+
+"Oh, middling."
+
+"You know you must learn as much as you can, Will, of aught they teach
+you that is good.  We're being better learned than Father could have
+learned us, in book-learning and such; and we must mind and pay heed,
+the rather because maybe we sha'n't have it long."
+
+"I wish you wouldn't talk so about--Father.  You're for ever talking
+about him," said Will uneasily, trying to wriggle himself out of his
+sister's clasp.
+
+"Not talk about Father!" exclaimed Cissy indignantly.  "Will, whatever
+do you mean?  I couldn't bear not to talk about Father!  It would seem
+like as we'd forgotten him.  And you must never forget him--never!"
+
+"I don't like talking about dead folks.  And--well it's no use biding
+it.  Look here.  Cissy--I'm going to give up."
+
+"Give up what?"  Cissy's voice was very low.  There might be pain and
+disappointment in it, but there was no weakness.
+
+"Oh, all this standing out against the nuns.  You can go on, if you like
+being starved and beaten and made to kneel on the chapel floor, and so
+forth; but I've stood it as long as I can.  And--wait a bit, Cis; let me
+have my say out--I can't see what it signifies, not one bit.  What can
+it matter whether I say my prayers looking at yon image or not?  If I
+said them looking at the moon, or at you, you wouldn't say I was praying
+to you or the moon.  I'm not praying to _it_; only, if they think I am,
+I sha'n't get thrashed and sent to bed hungred.  Don't you see?  That
+can't be idolatry."
+
+Cissy was silent till she had felt her way through the mist raised by
+Will's subterfuge into the clear daylight of truth.
+
+"Shall I tell you what it would be, Will?"
+
+"Well?  Some of your queer notions, I reckon."
+
+"Idolatry, with lying and cheating on the top of it.  Do you think they
+make it better?"
+
+"Cis, don't say such ugly words!"
+
+"Isn't it best to call ugly things by their right names?"
+
+"Well, any way, it won't be my fault: it'll be theirs who made me do
+it."
+
+"Theirs and yours too, Will, if you let them make you."
+
+"I tell you, Cissy, I can't stand it!"
+
+"Father stood more than that," said Cissy in that low, firm voice.
+
+"Oh, don't be always talking about Father!  He was a man and could bear
+things.  I've had enough of it.  God Almighty won't be hard on me, if I
+do give in."
+
+"Hard, Will!  Do you call it hard when people are grieved to the heart
+because you do something which they'd lay down their lives you shouldn't
+do?  The Lord did lay down His life for you: and yet you say that you
+can't bear a little hunger and a few stripes for Him!"
+
+"Cis, you don't know what it is.  You're a maid, and I dare say they
+don't lay on so hard on you.  It's more than a little, I can tell you."
+
+Cissy knew what it was far better than Will, for he was a strong boy, on
+whom hardships fell lightly, while she had to bear the blows and the
+hunger with a delicate and enfeebled frame.  But she only said,--
+
+"Will, don't you care for me?"
+
+"Of course I do, Cis."
+
+"I think the only thing in the world that could break my heart would be
+to see you or Nell `giving in', as you call it.  I couldn't stand that,
+Will.  I can stand anything else.  I hoped you cared for God and Father:
+but if you won't heed them, I must see if you will listen to me.  It
+would kill me, Will."
+
+"Oh, come, Cis, don't talk so."
+
+"Won't you go on trying a bit longer, Will?  Any day the tide may turn.
+I don't know how, but God knows.  He can bring us out of this prison all
+in a minute.  You know He keeps count of the hairs on our heads.  Now,
+Will, you know as well as I do what God said,--He did not say only,
+`Thou shalt not worship them,' but `Thou shalt not bow down to them.'
+Oh Will, Will! have you forgotten all the texts Father taught us?--are
+you forgetting Father himself?"
+
+"Cis, I wish you wouldn't!"
+
+"I wish _you_ wouldn't, Will."
+
+"You don't think Father can hear, do you?" asked Will uncomfortably
+glancing around.
+
+"I hope he can't, indeed, or he'll be sore grieved, even in Heaven, to
+think what his little Will's coming to."
+
+"Oh, well--come, I'll try a bit longer, Cis, if you--But I say, I do
+hope it won't be long, or I _can't_ stand it."
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+That night, or rather in the early hours of the following morning, a
+horseman came spurring up to the Head Gate of Colchester.  He alighted
+from his panting horse, and threw the reins on its neck.
+
+"Gate, ho!"
+
+Nothing but silence came in answer.
+
+"Gate, ho!" cried the horseman in a louder voice.
+
+"Somebody there?" asked the gatekeeper in a very sleepy voice.  "Tarry a
+minute, will you?  I'll be with you anon."
+
+"Tarry!" repeated the horseman with a contemptuous laugh.  "Thou'd not
+want me to tarry if thou knewest what news I bring."
+
+"Good tidings, eh? let's have 'em!" said the gatekeeper in a brisker
+voice.
+
+"Take them.  `God save the Queen!'"
+
+"Call that tidings?  We've sung that this five year."
+
+"Nay you've never sung it yet--not as you will.  How if it be `God save
+Queen Elizabeth'?"
+
+The gate was dashed open in the unsleepiest way that ever gate was
+moved.
+
+"You never mean--is the Queen departed?"
+
+"Queen Mary is gone to her reward," replied the horseman gravely.  "God
+save Queen Elizabeth!"
+
+"God be thanked, and praised!"
+
+"Ay, England is free now.  A man may speak his mind, and not die for it.
+No more burnings, friend! no more prison for reading of God's Word! no
+more hiding of men's heads in dens and caves of the earth!  God save the
+Queen! long live the Queen! may the Queen live for ever!"
+
+It is not often that the old British Lion is so moved by anything as to
+roar and dance in his inexpressible delight.  But now and then he does
+it; and never did he dance and roar as he did on that eighteenth of
+November, 1558.  All over England, men went wild with joy.  The terrible
+weight of the chains in which she had been held, was never truly felt
+until they were thus suddenly knocked from the shackled limbs.  Old,
+calm, sober-minded people--nay, grave and stern, precise and rigid--
+every manner of man and woman--all fairly lost their heads, and were
+like children in their frantic glee that day Men who were perfect
+strangers were seen in the streets shaking hands with each other as
+though they were the dearest friends.  Women who ordinarily would not of
+thought of speaking to one another were kissing each other and calling
+on each other to rejoice.  Nobody calmed down until he was so worn-out
+that wearied nature absolutely forced him to repose.  It was seen that
+day that however she had been oppressed, compelled to silence, or
+tortured into apparent submission, England was Protestant.  The prophets
+had prophesied falsely, and the priests borne rule, but the people had
+not loved to have it so, as they very plainly showed.  Colchester had
+declared for Mary five years before, because she was the true heir who
+had the right to reign, and rebellion was not right because her religion
+was wrong: but now that God delivered them from her awful tyranny,
+Colchester was not behind the rest of England in giving thanks to Him.
+
+We are worse off now.  The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests
+bear rule by their means.  It has not reached to the point it did then;
+but how soon will it do so?--for, last and worst of all, the people love
+to have it so.  May God awake the people of England!  For His mercies'
+sake, let us not have to say, England flung off the chains of bondage
+and the sin of idolatry under Queen Elizabeth; but she bound them tight
+again, of her own will, under Queen Victoria!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FORTY ONE.
+
+A BLESSED DAY.
+
+"Dorothy!  Dorothy Denny!  Wherever can the woman have got to?"
+
+Mr Ewring had already tapped several times with his stick on the brick
+floor of the King's Head kitchen, and had not heard a sound in answer.
+The clock ticked to and fro, and the tabby cat purred softly as she sat
+before the fire, and the wood now and then gave a little crackle as it
+burned gently away, and those were all the signs of life to be seen on
+the premises.
+
+Getting tired at last, Mr Ewring went out into the courtyard, and
+called in his loudest tones--"Do-ro-thy!"
+
+He thought he heard a faint answer of "Coming!" which sounded high up
+and a long way off: so he went back to the kitchen, and took a seat on
+the hearth opposite the cat.  In a few minutes the sound of running down
+stairs was audible, and at last Dorothy appeared--her gown pinned up
+behind, her sleeves rolled up to the elbows, and her entire aspect that
+of a woman who had just come off hard and dirty work.
+
+"Eh, Master Ewring! but I'm sorry to have kept you a-waiting.  Look you,
+I was mopping out the--Dear heart, but what is come to you?  Has the
+resurrection happened? for your face looks nigh too glad for aught
+else."
+
+The gladness died suddenly away, as those words brought to Mr Ewring
+the thought of something which could not happen--the memory of the
+beloved face which for thirty years had been the light of his home, and
+which he should behold in this world never any more.
+
+"Nay, Dorothy--nay, not that!  Yet it will be, one day, thank God!  And
+we have much this morrow to thank God for, whereof I came to tell thee."
+
+"Why, what has come, trow?"
+
+The glad light rose again to Mr Ewring's eyes.
+
+"Gideon has come, and hath subdued the Midianites!" he answered, with a
+ring of triumph in his voice.  "King David is come, and the Philistines
+will take flight, and Israel shall sit in peace under his vine and
+fig-tree.  May God save Elizabeth our Queen!"
+
+"Good lack, but you never mean _that_!" cried Dorothy in a voice as
+delighted as his own.  "Why then, Mistress 'll be back to her own, and
+them poor little dears 'll be delivered from them black snakes, and
+there 'll be Bible-reading and sermons again."
+
+"Ay, every one of them, I trust.  And a man may say what he will that is
+right, without looking first round to see if a spy be within hearing.
+We are free, Dorothy, once more."
+
+"Eh, but it do feel like a dream!  I shall have to pinch myself to make
+sure I'm awake.  But, Master, do you think it is sure?  She haven't
+changed, think you?"
+
+Mr Ewring shook his head.  "The Lady Elizabeth suffered with us," he
+said, "and she will not forsake us now.  No, Dorothy, she has not
+changed: she is not one to change.  Let us not distrust either her or
+the Lord.  Ah, He knew what He would do!  It was to be a sharp, short
+hour of tribulation, through which His Church was to pass, to purify,
+and try, and make her white: and now the land shall have rest forty
+years, that she may sing to Him a new song on the sea of glass.  Those
+five years have lit the candle of England's Church, and as our good old
+Bishop said in dying, by God's grace it shall never be put out."
+
+"Well, sure, it's a blessed day!"
+
+"Dorothy, can you compass to drive with me to Hedingham again?  I think
+long till those poor children be rescued.  And the nuns will be ready
+and glad to give them up; they'll not want to be found with Protestant
+children in their keeping--children, too, of a martyred man."
+
+"Master Ewring, give me but time to get me tidied and my hood, and I'll
+go with you this minute, if you will.  I was mopping out the loft.  When
+Mistress do come back, she shall find her house as clean as she'd have
+had it if she'd been here, and that's clean enough, I can tell you."
+
+"Right, friend, `Faithful in a little, faithful also in much.'  Dorothy,
+you'd have made a good martyr."
+
+"Me, Master?"
+
+Mr Ewring smiled.  "Well, whether shall it be to-morrow, or leave over
+Sunday?"
+
+"If it liked you, Master, I would say to-morrow.  Poor little dears!
+they'll be so pleased to come back to their friends.  I can be ready for
+them--I'll work early and late but I will.  Did you think of taking the
+little lad yourself, or are they all to bide with me?"
+
+"I'll take him the minute he's old enough, and no more needs a woman's
+hand about him.  You know, Dorothy, there be no woman in mine house--
+now."
+
+"Well, he'll scarce be that yet, I reckon.  Howbeit, the first thing is
+to fetch 'em.  Master, when think you Mistress shall be let go?"
+
+"It is hard to say, Dorothy, for we've heard so little.  But if she be
+in the Bishop of London's keeping, as she was, I cast no doubt she shall
+be delivered early.  Doubtless all the bishops that refuse to conform
+shall be deprived: and he will not conform, without he be a greater
+rogue than I think."
+
+There was something of the spirit of the earliest Christians when they
+had all things common, in the matter-of-course way in which it was
+understood on both sides that each was ready to take charge, at any
+sacrifice of time, money, or ease, of children who had been left
+fatherless by martyrdom.
+
+Early the next morning, the miller's cart drew up before the door of the
+King's Head, and Dorothy, hooded and cloaked, with a round basket on her
+arm, was quite ready to get in.  The drive to Hedingham was pleasant
+enough, cold as the weather was; and at last they reached the barred
+gate of the convent.  Dorothy alighted from the cart.
+
+"I'll see you let in, Dorothy, ere I leave you," said he, "if indeed I
+have to leave you at all.  I should never marvel if they brought the
+children forth, and were earnest to be rid of them at once."
+
+It did not seem like it, however, for several knocks were necessary
+before the wicket unclosed.  The portress looked relieved when she saw
+who was there.
+
+"What would you?" asked she.
+
+Mr Ewring had given Dorothy advice how to proceed.
+
+"An' it like you, might I see the children?  Cicely Johnson and the
+little ones."
+
+"Come within," said the portress, "and I will inquire."
+
+This appeared more promising.  Dorothy was led to the guest-chamber, and
+was not kept waiting.  Only a few minutes had elapsed when the Prioress
+herself appeared.
+
+"You wish to see the children?" she said.
+
+"I wish to take them with me, if you please," answered Dorothy
+audaciously.  "I look for my mistress back shortly, and she was
+aforetime desirous to bring them up.  I will take the full charge of
+them, with your leave."
+
+"Truly, and my leave you shall have.  We shall be right glad to be rid
+of the charge, for a heavy one it has been, and a wearisome.  A more
+obstinate, perverse, ungovernable maid than Cicely never came in my
+hands."
+
+"Thank the Lord!" said Dorothy.
+
+"Poor creatures!" said the Prioress.  "I suppose you will do your best
+to undo our teaching, and their souls will be lost.  Howbeit, we were
+little like to have saved them.  And it will be well, now for the
+community that they should go.  Wait, and I will send them to you."
+
+Dorothy waited half-an-hour.  At the end of that time a door opened in
+the wainscot, which she had not known was there, and a tall, pale,
+slender girl of eleven, looking older than she was, came forward.
+
+"Dorothy Denny!" said Cissy's unchanged voice, in tones of unmistakable
+delight.  "Oh, they didn't tell me who it was!  Are we to go with
+_you_?--back to Colchester?  Has something happened?  Do tell me what is
+going to become of us."
+
+"My dear heart, peace and happiness, if it please the Lord.  Master
+Ewring and I have come to fetch you all.  The Queen is departed to God,
+and the Lady Elizabeth is now Queen; and the nuns are ready enough to be
+rid of you.  If my dear mistress come home safe--as please God, she
+shall--you shall be all her children, and Master Ewring hath offered to
+take Will when he be old enough, and learn him his trade.  Your troubles
+be over, I trust the Lord, for some while."
+
+"It's just in time!" said Cissy with a gasp of relief.  "Oh, how wicked
+I have been, not to trust God better! and He was getting this ready for
+us all the while!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FORTY TWO.
+
+WHAT THEY FOUND AT THE KING'S HEAD.
+
+Mr Ewring had stayed at the gate, guessing that Dorothy would not be
+long in fulfilling her errand.  He cast the reins on the neck of his old
+bay horse, and allowed it to crop the grass while he waited.  Many a
+short prayer for the success of the journey went up as he sat there.  At
+last the gate was opened, and a boy of seven years old bounded out of it
+and ran up to the cart.
+
+"Master Ewring, is that you?  I'm glad to see you.  We're all coming.
+Is that old Tim?"
+
+"That's old Tim, be sure," said the miller.  "Pat him, Will, and then
+give me your hand and make a long jump."
+
+Will obeyed, just as the gate opened again, and Dorothy came out of it
+with the two little girls.  Little Nell--no longer Baby--could walk now,
+and chatter too, though few except Cissy understood what she said.  She
+talked away in a very lively manner, until Dorothy lifted her into the
+cart, when the sight of Mr Ewring seemed to exert a paralysing effect
+upon her, nor was she reassured at once by his smile.
+
+"Dear heart, but it 'll be a close fit!" said Dorothy.  "How be we to
+pack ourselves?"
+
+"Cissy must sit betwixt us," answered the miller; "she's not quite so
+fat as a sack of flour.  Take the little one on your knees, Dorothy; and
+Will shall come in front of me, and take his first lesson in driving
+Tim."
+
+They settled themselves accordingly, Will being highly delighted at his
+promotion.
+
+"Well, I reckon you are not sorry to be forth of that place?" suggested
+Mr Ewring.
+
+"Oh, so glad!" said Cissy, under her breath.
+
+"And how hath Will stood out?" was the next question, which produced
+profound silence for a few seconds.  Then Will broke forth.
+
+"I haven't, Master Ewring--at least, it's Cissy's doing, and she's had
+hard work to make me stick.  I should have given up ever so many times
+if she'd have let me.  I didn't think I could stand it much longer, and
+it was only last night I told her so, and she begged and prayed me to
+hold on."
+
+"That's an honest lad," said Mr Ewring.
+
+"And that's a dear maid," added Dorothy.
+
+"Then Cissy stood out, did she?"
+
+"Cissy! eh, they'd never have got _her_ to kneel down to their ugly
+images, not if they'd cut her head off for it.  She's just like a stone
+wall.  Nell did, till Cissy got hold of her and told her not; but she
+didn't know what it meant, so I hope it wasn't wicked.  You see, she's
+so little, and she forgets what is said to her."
+
+"Ay, ay; poor little dear!" said Dorothy.  "And what did they to you, my
+poor dears, when you wouldn't?"
+
+"Oh, lots of things," said Will.  "Beat us sometimes, and shut us in
+dark cupboards, and sent us to bed without supper.  One night they made
+Cissy--"
+
+"Never mind, Will," said Cissy blushing.
+
+"But they'd better know," said Will stoutly.  "They made Cissy kneel all
+night on the floor of the dormitory, tied to a bed-post.  They said if
+she wouldn't kneel to the saint, she should kneel without it.  And
+Sister Mary asked her how she liked saying her prayers to the moon."
+
+"Cruel, hard-hearted wretches!" exclaimed Dorothy.
+
+"Then they used to keep us several hours without anything to eat, and at
+the end of it they would hold out something uncommon good, and just when
+we were going to take it they'd snatch it away."
+
+"I'll tell you what, if I had known that a bit sooner, they'd have had a
+piece of my mind," said Dorothy.
+
+"With some thorns on it, I guess," commented the miller.
+
+"Eh, dear, but I marvel if I could have kept my fingers off 'em!  And
+they beat thee, Will?"
+
+"Hard," said Will.
+
+"And thee, Cissy?"
+
+"Yes--sometimes," said Cissy quietly.  "But I did not care for that, if
+they'd have left alone harassing Will.  You see, he's younger than me,
+and he doesn't remember Father as well.  If there hadn't been any right
+and wrong about it, I could not have done what would vex Father."
+
+Tim trotted on for a while, and Will was deeply interested in his
+driving lesson.  About a mile from Colchester, Mr Ewring rather
+suddenly pulled up.
+
+"Love! is that you?" he said.
+
+John Love, who was partly hidden by some bushes, came out and showed
+himself.
+
+"Ay, and I well-nigh marvel it is either you or me," said he
+significantly.
+
+"Truly, you may say so.  I believe we were aforetime the best noted
+`heretics' in all Colchester.  And yet here we be, on the further side
+of these five bitter years, left to rejoice together."
+
+"Love, I would your Agnes would look in on me a time or two," said
+Dorothy.  "I have proper little wit touching babes, and she might help
+me to a thing or twain."
+
+"You'll have as much as the nuns, shouldn't marvel," said Love, smiling.
+"But I'll bid Agnes look in.  You're about to care for the little ones,
+then?"
+
+"Ay, till they get better care," said Dorothy, simply.
+
+"You'll win the Lord's blessing with them.  Good den!  By the way, have
+you heard that Jack Thurston's still Staunch?"
+
+"Is he so?  I'm right glad."
+
+"Ay, they say--Bartle it was told a neighbour of mine--he's held firm
+till the priests were fair astonied at him; they thought they'd have
+brought him round, and that was why they never burned him.  He'll come
+forth now, I guess."
+
+"Not a doubt of it.  There shall be some right happy deliverances all
+over the realm, and many an happy meeting," said Mr Ewring, with a
+faint sigh at the thought that no such blessedness was in store for him,
+until he should reach the gate of the Celestial City.  "Good den, Jack."
+
+They drove in at the North Gate, down Balcon Lane, with a passing
+greeting to Amy Clere, who was taking down mantles at the shop door, and
+whose whole face lighted up at the sight, and turned through the great
+archway into the courtyard of the King's Head.  The cat came out to meet
+them, with arched back and erect tail, and began to mew and rub herself
+against Dorothy, having evidently some deeply interesting communication
+to make in cat language; but what it was they could not even guess until
+they reached the kitchen.
+
+"Sure," said Dorothy, "there's somebody here beside Barbara.  Run in, my
+dears," she added to the children.  "Methinks there must be company in
+the kitchen, and if Bab be all alone to cook and serve for a dozen,
+she'll be fain to see me returned.  Tell her I'm come, and will be there
+in a minute, only I'd fain not wake the babe, for she's weary with
+unwonted sights."
+
+Little Helen had fallen asleep in Dorothy's arms.  Cissy and Will went
+forward into the kitchen.  Barbara was there, but instead of company,
+only one person was seated in the big carved chair before the fire,
+furnished with red cushions.  That was the only sort of easy chair then
+known.
+
+"Ah, here they are!" said an unexpected voice.  "The Lord be praised!
+I've all my family safe at last."
+
+Dorothy, coming in with little Helen, nearly dropped her in astonished
+delight.
+
+"Mistress Wade!" cried Mr Ewring, following her.  "Truly, you are a
+pleasant sight, and I am full fain to welcome you back.  I trusted we
+should so do ere long, but I looked not to behold you thus soon."
+
+"Well, and you are a pleasant sight, Master Ewring, to her eyes that for
+fourteen months hath seen little beside the sea-coals [Note 1] in the
+Bishop of London's coalhouse.  That's where he sets his prisoners that
+be principally [note 2] lodged, and he was pleased to account of me as a
+great woman," said Mrs Wade, cheerily.  "But we have right good cause
+to praise God, every one; and next after that to give some thanks to
+each other.  I've heard much news from Bab, touching many folks and
+things, and thee not least, Doll.  Trust me, I never guessed into how
+faithful hands all my goods should fall, nor how thou shouldst keep
+matters going as well as if I had been here mine own self.  Thou shalt
+find in time to come that I know a true friend and an honest servant,
+and account of her as much worth.  So you are to be my children now and
+henceforth?--only I hear, Master Ewring, you mean to share the little
+lad with me.  That's right good.  What hast thou to say, little Cicely?"
+
+"Please, Mistress Wade, I think God has taken good care of us, and I
+only hope He's told Father."
+
+"Dear child, thy father shall lack no telling," said Mr Ewring.  "He is
+where no shade of mistrust can come betwixt him and God, and he knows
+with certainty, as the angels do, that all shall be well with you for
+ever."
+
+Cissy looked up.  "Please, may we sing the hymn Rose did, when she was
+taken down to the dungeon?"
+
+"Sing, my child, and we will join thee."
+
+  "Praise God, from whom all blessings flow,
+  Praise Him, all creatures here below;
+  Praise Him above, ye heavenly host,
+  Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost!"
+
+"Dear heart! but that's sweet!" said Dorothy, wiping her eyes.
+
+"Truth! but they sing it better _there_," responded Mr Ewring softly.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+Note 1.  Coals.--all coal then came to London by sea.
+
+Note 2.  Principally: handsomely.
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The King's Daughters, by Emily Sarah Holt
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