{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_23187/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_23187","id":"gutenberg_23187","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/23187","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Historical Novels","Category: History - Medieval/Middle Ages","Category: History - Religious","Christian life -- Juvenile fiction","Great Britain -- History -- Henry IV, 1399-1413 -- Juvenile fiction","Lollards -- Juvenile fiction","Religion -- Juvenile fiction"],"text":"Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England\n\n\n\n\nMistress Margery, A Tale of the Lollards, by Emily Sarah Holt.\n________________________________________________________________________\n\nThis is a short book, but it was quite hard to transcribe on account of\nso much of it being in mediaeval English, with its inconsistent and\nuncouth spelling.\n\nMargery is a young woman of high birth, who goes one day to hear a\nsermon preached by one of the new Lollards, who advise people to read\nthe Bible as recently translated by Wycliffe, and to believe only what\nthey find therein.  This was directly contrary to the view of the\nofficial church, which had made up all sorts of doctrines that could be\nseen to be not at all supported by the words of the Gospel.  Margery can\nonly get hold of a copy of the Gospel according to Saint John.\n\nMargery is very much struck with the words of the Gospel, despite the\nhostility of all around her.  Everyone was far too afraid of the extreme\npunishment meted out by \"Holy Church\" to those who questioned its\nteachings.  And Margery ends up by being burnt at the stake for her\nbelief in the Gospel, as opposed to what was taught by the Church.\n\nBut you will learn a lot about upper-class life in the early years of\nthe fifteenth century, and if you can put up with the forms of speech,\nyou will gain thereby.  Not recommended for audiobook, since a great\ndeal of editing, such as removal of footnotes, conversion of mediaeval\nspeech to modern, and so forth.\n\n________________________________________________________________________\nMISTRESS MARGERY, A TALE OF THE LOLLARDS, BY EMILY SARAH HOLT.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER ONE.\n\nA REGULAR OF OXENFORDE.\n\n  \"Give me the book, and let me read;\n  My soul is strangely stirred--\n  They are such words of love and truth\n  As ne'er before I heard!\"\n\n  Mary Howitt.\n\nThe sun was shining brightly on the battlements and casements of Lovell\nTower.  The season was spring, and the year 1395.  Within the house,\nthough it was barely seven o'clock in the morning, all was bustle and\nconfusion, for Dame Lovell was superintending her handmaidens in the\npreparation of dinner.  A buxom woman was Dame Lovell, neither tall nor\nshort, but decidedly stout, with a round, good-natured face, which just\nthen glowed and burned under the influence of the fire roaring on the\nlarge grateless hearth.  She wore a black dress, heavily trimmed at the\nbottom with fur, and she carried on her head one of those remarkable\nelevations generally known as the Syrian or conical head-dress, made of\nblack stiffened gauze, and spangled with golden stars.  Her assistants,\nmostly girls of from sixteen to twenty-five years of age, were occupied\nin various parts of the kitchen; while Mistress Katherine, a\nstaid-looking woman of middle age, who filled a post somewhat similar to\nthe modern one of housekeeper, was employed at a side table in mixing\nsome particularly elaborate compound.  Among this busy throng moved Dame\nLovell, now giving a stir to a pot, and now peeping into a pan, boxing\nthe ears of any maiden who appeared remiss in her duty, and generally\nkeeping up a strict and active supervision.\n\n\"Nan, thy leeks be not hewn small enough.  Cicely, look to the pottage,\nthat it boil not over.  Al'ce, thou idle jade!\"--with a sound box on the\near,--\"thou hast left out the onions in thy blanch-porre!  Margery!\nMadge!  Why, Madge, I say!  Where is Mistress Margery, maidens?  Joan,\nlass, hie thee up, and see whether Mistress Margery be not in the\nchamber.\"\n\nJoan, a diminutive girl of sixteen, quitted the parsley she was\nchopping, and ran lithely out of the room, to which she soon returned,\nand, dropping a courtesy, announced that \"Mistress Margery was in her\nchamber, and was coming presently,\"--which latter word, in the year\n1395, meant not \"by and by,\" as it now does, but \"at present.\"  Mistress\nMargery verified the assertion of Joan by following her into the kitchen\nalmost immediately.  And since Mistress Margery is to play the important\npart of heroine, it may be well to devote a few words to her person and\ncostume.  She is the only child of Sir Geoffrey Lovell, Knight, and Dame\nAgnes Lovell, and is now seventeen years of age; rather under the middle\nheight, slenderly formed, with an appearance of great fragility and\ndelicacy; her complexion is very fair, of that extreme fairness which\noften betokens disease, and her face almost colourless.  Her features\nare regular, and classical in their contour; her eyes are a clear grey--\nhonest, truthful eyes, that look straight at you; and her hair, which is\nalmost long enough, when let down, to touch her feet, is of that pale\ngolden colour so much celebrated in the Middle Ages, and so very rarely\nto be seen now.  Mistress Margery's attire comprises a black dress, so\nstiff, partly from its own richness of material, and partly with\nwhalebone, that it is quite capable of standing upright without any\nassistance from Mistress Margery's person.  Its trimming consists of a\nborder of gris, or marten's fur; and over this black petticoat the young\nlady wears a cote-hardie, or close-fitting jacket, also edged with gris.\nHer head is not encumbered by the steeplecap which disfigures her\nmother; instead of it she wears the beautiful \"dove-cote,\" a net of\ngolden tissue, ornamented with pearls, within which her hair is\nconfined.\n\nIt may also be as well to notice here, that Mistress Margery is highly\naccomplished.  Of course she can play the lute, and sing, and work\nelaborate and delicate embroidery, and compound savoury dishes; and\nequally of course does she know any nobleman or gentleman by a glance at\nhis shield, and can tell you in a moment to whom belong the three lions\nrampant sable, and who owns the bend engrailed argent on a field gules.\nThese are but the ordinary acquirements of a gentlewoman; but our\nheroine knows more than this.  Mistress Margery can read; and the\nhandmaidens furthermore whisper to each other, with profound admiration\nof their young mistress's extraordinary knowledge, that Mistress Margery\ncan _write_.  Dame Lovell cannot do either; but Sir Geoffrey, who is a\nliterary man, and possesses a library, has determined that his daughter\nshall receive a first-rate education.  Sir Geoffrey's library is a very\nlarge one, for it consists of no less than forty-two volumes, five of\nwhich are costly illuminated manuscripts, and consist of the Quest of\nthe Sangraal [see Note 1], the Travels of Sir John Maundeville, the\nChronicle of Matthew Paris, Saint Augustine's City of God, and a\nBreviary.  Dame Lovell has no Breviary, and as she could not read it if\nshe had, does not require one; but Margery, having obtained her father's\npermission to do so, has employed her powers of writing and illuminating\nin making an elaborate copy of his Breviary for her own use; and from an\nillumination in this book, not quite finished, representing Judas\nIscariot in parti-coloured stockings, and Saint Peter shooting at\nMalchus with a cross-bow, is Margery now summoned away to the kitchen.\n\nMargery entered the kitchen with a noiseless step, and making a low\ncourtesy to her mother, said, in a remarkably clear, silvery voice, \"It\npleased you to send for me, good mother.\"\n\n\"Yea, lass; give a hand to the blanch-porre, for Al'ce knows no more\nthan my shoe; and then see to the grewall, whilst I scrape these almonds\nfor the almond butter.\"\n\nMargery quietly performed her task, and spoke to the mortified Al'ce in\na much gentler tone than Dame Lovell had done.  She was occupied in the\npreparation of \"eels in grewall,\" a kind of eel-stew, when a slender\nyouth, a little older than herself, and attired in the usual costume of\na page, entered the kitchen.\n\n\"Why, Richard Pynson,\" cried Dame Lovell, \"thou art a speedy messenger,\nin good sooth.  I looked not for thee until evensong.\"\n\n\"I finished mine errand, good mistress,\" replied the youth, \"earlier by\nmuch than I looked for to do.\"\n\n\"Hast heard any news, Richard?\"\n\n\"None, mistress mine, unless it be news that a homily will be preached\nin Bostock Church on Sunday next ensuing, by a regular of Oxenforde, one\nMaster Sastre.\"\n\nThe grewall was standing still, and Margery was listening intently to\nthe words of Richard Pynson, as he carelessly leaned against the wall.\n\n\"Will you go, Mistress Margery?\"\n\nMargery looked timidly at her mother.  \"I would like well to go,\" said\nshe, \"an' it might stand with your good pleasure.\"\n\n\"Ay, lass, go,\" replied Dame Lovell, good-naturedly.  \"It is seldom we\nhave a homily in Bostock Church.  Parson Leggatt is not much given to\npreaching, meseemeth.\"\n\n\"I will go with you, Master Pynson,\" said Margery, resuming the\nconcoction of the dainty dish before her, \"with a very good will, for I\nshould like greatly to hear the Reverend Father.  I never yet heard\npreach a scholar of Oxenforde.\"\n\nDame Lovell moved away to take the pottage off the fire, and Pynson,\napproaching Margery, whispered to her, \"They say that this Master Sastre\npreacheth strange things, like as did Master John Wycliffe a while\nagone; howbeit, since Holy Church interfereth not, I trow we may well go\nto hear him.\"\n\nMargery's colour rose, and she said in a low voice, \"It will do us no\nharm, trow?\"\n\n\"I trust not so,\" answered Richard; and, taking up his hunting-bag, he\nquitted the room.\n\n\"Why, Cicely!\" exclaimed Dame Lovell, turning round from the pottage,\n\"had I wist thou hadst put no saffron herein, thou shouldst have had\nmine hand about thine ears, lass!  Bring the saffron presently!  No\nsaffron, quotha!\"\n\nBefore we accompany Margery and Richard to hear the homily of Master\nSastre, it might perhaps be as well to prevent any misunderstanding on\nthe part of the reader with respect to Richard Pynson.  He is the page\nof Sir Geoffrey Lovell, and the son of Sir John Pynson of Pynsonlee; for\nin the year 1395, wherein our story opens, it is the custom for young\ngentlemen, even the sons of peers, to be educated as page or squire to\nsome neighbouring knight of wealth and respectability.  Richard Pynson,\ntherefore, though he may seem to occupy a subordinate position, is in\nevery respect the equal of Margery.\n\nThe morning on which Master Sastre was to deliver his homily was one of\nthose delicious spring days which seem the immediate harbingers of\nsummer.  Margery, in her black dress, and with a warm hood over her\ncote-hardie, was assisted by her father to mount her pillion, Richard\nPynson being already seated before her on the grey palfrey; for in the\ndays of pillions, if the gentleman assisted the lady on her pillion\n_before_ he mounted himself, he ran imminent risk of knocking her off\nwhen he should attempt to mount.  They rode leisurely to church, the\ndistance being about two miles, and a little foot-page ran beside them\ncharged with the care of the palfrey, while they attended the service.\nMass was performed by the parish priest, but the scholar from Oxford,\nwho sat in the sedilia, where Margery could scarcely see him, took no\npart in the service beyond reading the Gospel.\n\nThe sermons of that day, as a rule, may be spoken of in two classes.\nEither the preacher would read a passage of Scripture in Latin, and\nthrow in here and there a few remarks by way of commentary, or else the\nsermon was a long and dry disquisition upon some of the (frequently very\nabsurd) dogmas of the schoolmen; such as, whether angels were synonymous\nwith spirits, which of the seven principal angels was the chief, how\nlong it took Gabriel to fly from heaven to earth at the Annunciation, at\nwhat time of day he appeared, how he was dressed, etcetera, Sastre's\ndiscourse could not be comprised in either of these classes.  He read\nhis text first, as usual, in Latin, but then he said:\n\n\"And now, brethren and sistren, to declare in the vulgar tongue unto you\nthat have not the tongues, this passage of God's Word as sueth.\"  [Sueth\nmeans follows].\n\n\"_The Lombe that was slayn is worthi to take vertue and Godhed and\nwisdom and strengthe and onour and glorie and blessyng_!\"\n\nNote: it will readily be seen that all the quotations from Scripture in\nthis story are necessarily taken from Wycliffe's translation.\n\nWhat followed was no scholastic disquisition, no common-place remarks on\nthe passage chosen.  \"The Lamb that was slain\" was the beginning and the\nend of Sastre's discourse.  He divided his sermon into the following\nsubjects.  \"Who is the Lamb?--how and why was He slain?--why is He\nworthy?--and, who are the speakers in the text who thus proclaim His\nworthiness?\"  He showed them, by a reference to the Mosaic sacrifices,\nwhy Christ was called a Lamb; he told them most fully that He died, the\nJust for the unjust, that He might bring us to God; he placed completely\nbefore his audience the full and free and finished nature of His perfect\nwork: he told them that God's love to sinners was such that He gave out\nof His bosom His own dear Son, the Son of His love, that their sins\nmight be counted His, and that His righteousness might be accounted\ntheirs.  And under his last head, he spoke of that holy, happy city\nwhereinto no sin, nor harm, nor death could ever enter; whose\nfoundations were gems, and whose gates pearls; the dwelling-place of the\nblessed ones, who having washed their robes, and made them white in the\nblood of the Lamb, would never rest day nor night in singing the praises\nof His worthiness.\n\nSastre also drew the attention of his hearers to the fact that the\nascription of praise in the text was made by the angels.  \"In all this\nBook,\" remarked he, \"I find nowhere such like laud as this given unto\nany but God only.  The blessed angels do worship unto the Lamb, but I\nsee not any offer for to do worship unto the angels, save only Saint\nJohn himself, who doth twice fall down to worship afore the feet of the\nangel which did show these things unto him.  But I find not the angel in\nany wise gladded with the same.  Nay, the blessed John doth receive a\nsharp rebuking of his folly: `See thou that thou do not,' saith the\nangel; `worschipe thou God.'  Wherefore, good friends, ye may see hence\nhow foolish are they who do worship unto the blessed angels: and how\ngrievous would be the same unto those good spirits of God if they did\nknowledge it.  Whether or no they be witting of such matters, I wis not,\nfor this Book saith nought thereupon; but ye see, friends, that if they\nwit it, it doth anger them; and if they wit it not, what are ye the\nbetter for praying unto them?  Moreover, meseemeth for the same reason,\nthat the blessed Virgin Saint Mary, who is now in heaven with her Son\nand Lord, Christ, would not be in any wise over well pleased if she wist\nhow men do worship unto her on the earth.  And the like, I trow, may be\nsaid of all God's saints.\"\n\nAt the conclusion of his sermon, Sastre leaned forward over the pulpit\nand spoke in a low, earnest, loving tone.  \"Who is here, good friends,\"\nasked he, \"that loveth this blessed Lord Jesu, the Lamb that was slain?\nWho is here who will give up this vile and wretched world for His sake?\nWho that will sue [follow] this blessed Lamb whithersoever He goeth,\neven though He lead along the sharp way called tribulation, or the weary\nway called prison, or the bitter way called poverty, or even verily\nthrough the low and dark door called death?  Who is here?  Is there none\nI beseech you, good friends, hath Christ no souls in this place?  When\nthe blessed angels count up the number of the purchased ones, will ye\nhave them leave Bostock out of their reckoning?  Shall it be worse than\nSodom and Gomorrah, wherein there was _one_ soul that was saved?  Is\nthere not _one_ here?  Nay, brethren, I trust it is not so.  I trust ye\nwill come, yea in numbers, yea in throngs, yea in multitudes, and crowd\non Christ to touch the hem of His blessed garment, that is the power of\nHis great mercy.  Christ loveth to have folk crowd on Him to cry Him\nmercy.  I read not that ever He complained of the crowding of the\nmultitude.  I read not that ever He turned away so much as one poor\ncaitiff [sinner] who came unto Him.  I read not that His lips plained\never of aught but that they came not--that they lacked faith.  I am an\nold man, friends, and in all likelihood shall I never come here again;\nbut I say unto you that I shall scan well the multitude in the white\napparel for the faces which be upturned unto me this day.  I pray you\nthat I miss them not.  I pray God that ye--yea, that every man and woman\nof you, may be clothed in yon glistering and shene [bright] raiment, and\nmay lift up your voices to cry, `The Lamb is worthy' in the city of\nGod!\"\n\nThat sermon was a strange thing to Margery Lovell.  Never, from the day\nof her birth to that day, had she heard as she now heard of the Lamb\nthat was slain.  For above a mile of their way home Richard and Margery\nkept perfect silence, which the latter was the first to break just\nbefore they came in sight of Lovell Tower.\n\n\"Master Pynson, we have heard strange things to-day.\"\n\n\"We have, of a truth, Mistress Margery.  I wonder whether Master Sastre\nbe right.\"\n\n\"I wish greatly,\" replied Margery, \"that I could get the book wherein I\nhave heard that Master Wycliffe rendered God's Word into the vulgar\ntongue.  I could see then whether Master Sastre were right.  I would I\nknew of any man who had that book!\"\n\n\"Master Carew of Marston told me some time agone,\" said Richard, rather\nhesitatingly, \"that he had the Gospel according to John the Apostle,\ncopied out by a feat [clever] scribe from Master Wycliffe's rendering\nthereof.\"\n\n\"O Master Pynson!\" said Margery, entreatingly, \"I pray you that you ask\ngood Master Carew to lend me that book!  Tell him that Mistress Margery\nLovell will lay her best jewels to pledge that she returneth the book\nsafe.  I must see that book Master Pynson!\"\n\n\"Softly, I pray you, good Mistress Margery,\" answered Richard, smiling;\n\"it were well to go warily to work; for wot you not that Master\nWycliffe--ay, and Master Sastre too--be accounted heretics by some?  You\nwould not, trow, fall under the ban of Holy Church?\"\n\n\"I would with a good will do aught, or bear aught,\" replied Margery,\nearnestly, \"so I might wit of a surety that I should be one of those who\nwear the white apparel, and cry, `The Lamb is worthy' in the city of\nGod!\"\n\n\"Well, Mistress Margery,\" said Richard, soothingly, \"I will do my best\nfor to get you the book, but it may be some time ere I see Master\nCarew.\"\n\nDame Lovell herself was standing on the steps of Lovell Tower,\napparently looking out for the riders, for as soon as they came within\nhearing distance she raised her voice to say, \"Richard Pynson!  Sir\nGeoffrey would speak with you.  Come in quickly, I pray you, and leave\nthe handmaidens to help Mistress Margery from her pillion.\"\n\n\"I need no help, good mother,\" said Margery, as she sprang lightly from\nher seat, while Richard hurried into the house to find Sir Geoffrey.\n\n\"Sir Geoffrey would send Richard Pynson to Marston,\" said Dame Lovell,\nas she preceded Margery into the hall.  \"And how liked you Master\nSastre, Madge?\"\n\n\"Very greatly, good mother; never heard I before a homily so brave.\"\n\n\"That is well,\" said Dame Lovell, and disappeared into the kitchen, as\nMargery ran up-stairs to her own room, and brought down in her hand a\nvaluable necklace.  Richard came into the banqueting-hall from one door,\nas Margery made her appearance from the opposite one.\n\n\"I have a letter from Sir Geoffrey to bear to Sir Ralph Marston,\" said\nhe.  \"Have you any commands for Marston, Mistress Margery?\" he\nmischievously added.\n\n\"Master Pynson,\" said Margery, earnestly, in a low tone, \"I pray you to\ntake this jewel to Master Carew, and to leave it in pledge with him, in\ncase he will lend me the book.  If he value it at more than this, I can\nsend other jewels; but, Master Pynson, bring me the book!\"\n\nRichard placed the necklace for safety in the bosom of his doublet, and\nanswered, \"Fear not, good mistress; if I bring you not the book, it\nshall not be for lack of entreaty.  Only hope not too much, for I may\nchance to fail.\"\n\n\"Pray God he lend you the book!\" was her only answer.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nNote.  The Sangraal was the vessel in which the wine was contained which\nChrist gave to His disciples, saying, \"Drink ye all of this;\" this\nvessel was supposed to have been brought into England by Joseph of\nArimathea; and the \"quest\" or search for this important relic formed one\nof the chief adventures of the Knights of the Round Table.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER TWO.\n\nA LATE DINNER.\n\n  \"And there is something in this book\n  That makes all care be gone,\n  And yet I weep--I know not why--\n  As I go reading on!\"\n\n  Mary Howitt.\n\nMargery went into the kitchen, and helped to prepare supper, under the\ndirections of Dame Lovell, and then she returned to her own room, and\ntried to finish her illumination of Peter and Malchus; but she could not\ncommand her thoughts sufficiently to paint well, so much was her heart\nset on \"the book.\"  Therefore she sat with her hands folded in her lap,\nand tried to recall Sastre's sermon.  Then came supper-time, and Margery\nwent down to the banqueting-hall; and after supper, having begged her\nparents' blessing before retiring to rest, she came back to her chamber.\nBut she did not attempt to undress.  When the sun set, a red glory\nabove the tree-tops, she was watching at her casement for Richard\nPynson; and when the silver moon and the little golden stars had taken\nthe sun's place in the heavens, she was watching still.  At last she\nheard the sound of a horse's feet, and stole softly down the private\nstaircase which led from her room to the hall.  As Richard entered the\nhall, Margery softly murmured his name.\n\n\"What, Mistress Margery!\" he cried, in astonishment.  \"You here!  You\nhave watched well for the book, and--there it is.\"\n\nAnd Richard drew from the bag slung over his shoulder a small quarto\nvolume.\n\n\"Oh, thanks, good Master Pynson, a thousand thanks!\" cried Margery, in\ndelight.  \"And how long season may I keep the book?\"\n\n\"Master Carew said,\" returned Pynson, \"that he asked not jewels for the\nsafe-keeping of the book, for the word of a Lovell was enough,\" and\nRichard drew the necklace from his bosom and handed it to Margery.  \"He\nwill lend the book for one month's time.  He said, furthermore, that he\nlent it, not because he loved it not, but because he prayed that you,\nMistress Margery, might know and love it too.\"\n\n\"Amen!\" was Margery's answer, as she folded the book to her bosom, and\ncrept softly back to her chamber--but not to bed.  The first thing she\ndid was to take off her petticoat and cote-hardie, and to put on a loose\ndressing-gown of grey serge.  Then she divested herself of her\nhead-dress, and allowed her fair hair to flow down over her shoulders\nwithout restraint.  Having thus rendered herself comfortable, she seated\nherself in a carved chair, furnished with an ample cushion, and\nproceeded to examine the book.\n\nThe book was bound in leather, dark brown in colour, and simple in\nworkmanship.  It was clasped with two small clasps of common metal,\nwashed over with silver; the leaves were of vellum, and on the first\npage was a badly-drawn and violently-coloured illumination of Christ and\nthe Samaritan woman.  Stops (as a rule) it had not, except a full stop\nhere and there; and capitals there were none, with the occasional\nexception of a letter in red ink.  Notwithstanding this, the manuscript,\nbeing written in a clear small hand, was very legible to eyes accustomed\nto read only black letter.  At first Margery felt as if she were doing\nwrong in reading the book, but her curiosity drew her on, as well as her\nearnest desire to know more of those \"strange things\" of which Sastre\nhad spoken in his sermon.  Margery had taken the precaution of fastening\nthe door before she commenced the study of the book.  After the first\nglance which had made her acquainted with the particulars above noticed,\nshe opened the book at random near the middle, and her eye fell on the\nfollowing words:--\n\n\"_Be not your herte afrayed, ne drede it; ye bileuen in God, and bileeue\nye in me.  In the hous of my Fadir ben manye dwellingis; if ony thinge\nlasse, I hadde seid to you; for I go to make readi to you a place.  And\nif I go to make redy to you a place, eftsoone I come, and I schal take\nyou to my silf, that where I am, ye be_.\"  John xiv. 1-3.\n\nNever before had Margery read words like these.  \"Be not your herte\nafrayed!\"  Why, the one feeling which she was taught was more acceptable\nto God than any other, was fear.  \"In the hous of my Fadir ben manye\ndwellingis.\"  Margery clasped her hands above her head, and laid head\nand hands upon the open volume; and in the agony of her earnestness she\ncried aloud, \"O Lamb that was slain, hast thou not made ready a dwelling\nfor Margery Lovell!\"\n\nMargery read on, and the more she read the more she wondered.  The\nChurch did not teach as this book did, and _both_ could not be right.\nWhich, then, was wrong?  How could the Church be wrong, which was the\ndepository of God's truth?  And yet, how could the holy apostle be wrong\nin reporting the words of Christ?\n\nMany times over during that night did Margery's thoughts arrange\nthemselves in this manner.  At one time she thought that nothing could\npossibly supersede the infallibility of the Church; at another she saw\nthe complete impossibility of anything being able to stand for a moment\nagainst the infallibility of God.  The only conclusion at which she\ncould arrive was a determination to read the volume, and judge for\nherself.  She read on.  \"_I am weye, treuthe, and lyf; no man cometh to\nthe Fadir but by me_.\"  [John xiv. 6.] Were these words the words of\nChrist?  And what way had Margery been taught?  Obedience to the Church,\nhumility, penances, alms-giving--works always, Christ never.  Could\nthese be the right way?  She went on, till the tears ran down her cheeks\nlike rain--till her heart throbbed and her soul glowed with feelings she\nhad never felt before--till the world, and life, and death, and things\npresent, all seemed to be nothing, and Christ alone seemed to be\neverything.  She read on, utterly oblivious of the flight of time, and\nregardless that darkness had given place to light, until the fall of\nsomething in the room below, and the voice of Dame Lovell calling for\nCicely, suddenly warned her that the house was astir.  Margery sprang\nup, her heart beating now for a different reason.  She hurriedly closed\nthe book, and secreted it in a private cupboard, of which she alone had\nthe key, and where she generally kept her jewels, and any little\ntrinkets on which she set a special value.  Margery's next act, I fear,\nwas indefensible; for it was to throw the cover and pillows of her bed\ninto confusion, that the maids might suppose it had been occupied as\nusual.  She then noiselessly unfastened the door, and proceeded with her\ndressing, so that when, a few minutes after, Dame Lovell came panting up\nthe stairs, and lifted the latch, the only thing she noticed was Margery\nstanding before the mirror, and fastening up her hair with what she\ncalled a pin, and what we should, I suspect, designate a metallic\nskewer.\n\n\"What, Madge, not donned yet?\" was Dame Lovell's greeting.  \"How thou\nhast overslept thyself, girl!  Dost know it is already five of the\nclock, and thy father and I have been stirring above an hour?\"\n\n\"Is it so late, of a truth?\" asked Margery, in dismay.  \"I cry you\nmercy, good mother!\"\n\nAnd Margery was thinking what excuse she could use by way of apology,\nwhen Dame Lovell's next words set her at rest, as they showed that the\nmind of that good lady was full of other thoughts than her daughter's\nlate rising.\n\n\"Grand doings, lass!\" said she, as she sat down in the carved arm-chair.\n\"Grand doings, of a truth, Madge!\"\n\n\"Where, good mistress mine?\"\n\n\"Where?\" said Dame Lovell, lifting her eyebrows.  \"Why, here, in Lovell\nTower.  Where should they be else?  Richard Pynson was so late of\nreturning from Marston that he saw not thy father until this morrow.\"\n\n\"I heard him come.\"\n\n\"Wert awake?\"\n\n\"Yea.  I was awake a long season!\"\n\n\"Poor lass!\" said her mother.  \"No marvel thou art late.  But harken to\nwhat I was about to tell thee.  Sir Ralph Marston and his kinsman the\nLord Marnell, dine with us to-day.\"\n\n\"To-day?\"\n\n\"Yea, to-day.  Dear, dear, dear, dear!  What folk must they be that live\nin London town!  Marry, Sir Ralph sent word by Richard Pynson, praying\nus not to dine until one of the clock, for that the Lord Marnell is not\nused to it at an earlier hour.  I marvel when they sup!  I trow it is\nnot until all Christian folk be a-bed!\"\n\n\"Dwells the Lord Marnell in London?\" inquired Margery, with surprise;\nfor Margery was more astonished and interested to hear of a nobleman\nfrom London dining with her parents than a modern young lady would be if\ntold that a Chinese mandarin was expected.\n\n\"Yea, truly, in London dwells he, and is of the bedchamber to our Lord\nthe King, and a great man, Madge!  Hie thee down when thou art dressed,\nchild, and make up thy choicest dishes.  But, good Saint Christopher!\nhow shall I do from seven to one of the clock without eating?  I will\nbid Cicely serve a void at ten.\"\n\nAnd so saying, Dame Lovell bustled downstairs as quickly as her\ncorpulence would allow her, and Margery followed, a few minutes later.\nWhile the former was busy in the hall, ordering fresh rushes to be\nspread, and the tables set, Margery repaired to the ample kitchen,\nwhere, summoning the maids to assist her, and tying a large coarse apron\nround her, she proceeded to concoct various dishes, reckoned at that\ntime particularly choice.  There are few books more curious than a\ncookery-book five hundred years old.\n\nOur forefathers appear to have used joints of meat much less frequently\nthan the smaller creatures, whether flesh or fowl, hares, rabbits,\nchickens, capons, etcetera.  Of fish, eels excepted, they ate little or\nnone out of Lent.  Potatoes, of course, they had none; and rice was so\nrare that it figured as a \"spice;\" but to make up for this, they ate,\napparently, almost every green thing that grew in their gardens,\nrose-leaves not excepted.  Of salt they had an unutterable abhorrence.\nSugar existed, but it was very expensive, and honey was often used\ninstead.  Pepper and cloves were employed in immense quantities.  The\narticle which appears to have held with them the corresponding place to\nthat of salt with us, and which was never omitted in any dish, no matter\nwhat its other component parts, was saffron.  In corroboration of these\nremarks, I append one very curious receipt,--a dish which formed one of\nthe principal covers on Sir Geoffrey Lovell's table:--\n\n\"Farsure of Hare.\n\n\"Take hares and flee [flay] hom, and washe hom in broth of fleshe with\nthe blode; then boyle the brothe and scome [skim] hit wel and do hit in\na pot, and more brothe thereto.  And take onyons and mynce horn and put\nhom in the pot, and set hit on the fyre and let hit sethe [boil], and\ntake bred and stepe hit in wyn and vynegur, and drawe hit up and do hit\nin the potte, and pouder of pepur and clowes, and maces hole [whole],\nand pynes, and raysynges of corance [currants], then take and parboyle\nwel the hare, and choppe hym on gobettes [small pieces] and put him into\na faire [clean] urthen pot; and do thereto clene grese, and set hit on\nthe fyre, and stere hit wele tyl hit be wel fryed; then caste hit in the\npot to the broth, an do therto pouder of canell [cinnamon] and sugur;\nand let hit boyle togedur, and colour hit wyth saffron, and serve hit\nforthe.\"\n\nIt will be noticed from this that our ancestors had none of our vulgar\nprejudices with respect to onions, neither had they any regard to the\nScriptural prohibition of blood.  The utter absence of all prescription\nof quantities in these receipts is delightfully indefinite.\n\nThere were many other dishes to this important dinner beside the\n\"farsure of hare;\" and on this occasion most of the rabbits and chickens\nwere entire, and not \"chopped on gobbettes;\" for the feast was \"for a\nlord,\" and lords were permitted to eat whole birds and beasts, while the\nless privileged commonalty had to content themselves with \"gobbettes.\"\n\nWhen Margery had concluded her preparations for dinner, she went into\nthe garden to gather rosemary and flowers, which she disposed in various\nparts of the hall, laying large bunches of rosemary in all available\nplaces.  All was now ready, and Margery washed her hands, took off her\napron, and ran up into her own room, to pin on her shoulder a\n\"quintise,\" in other words, a long streamer of cherry-coloured ribbon.\n\nThe guests arrived on horseback about half-past twelve, and Richard\nPynson ushered them into the hall, and ran into the kitchen to inform\nDame Lovell and Margery, adding that \"he pitied Lord Marnell's horse,\" a\nremark the signification of which became apparent when the ladies\npresented themselves in the banqueting-hall.  Sir Geoffrey was already\nthere, conversing with his guests.  Margery expected to find Lord\nMarnell similar to his cousin, Sir Ralph Marston, whom she already knew,\nand who was a pleasant, gentlemanly man of about forty years of age,\nalways joking with everybody, and full of fun.  But she did not expect\nwhat she now saw.\n\nThe great man from London, who sat in a large oak-chair in the hall, was\na great man in all corporeal senses.  He was very tall, and stout in\nproportion; an older man than his cousin Sir Ralph, perhaps ten or\nfifteen years older; and there was something in his face which made\nMargery drop her eyes in an instant.  It was a very curious face.  The\nupper part--the eyes and forehead--was finely-formed, and showed at\nleast an average amount of intellect; but from the nose downward the\nform and expression of the features were suggestive only of the\nanimal,--a brutal, sensual, repelling look.  Margery, who had looked for\nthe great man from London with girlish curiosity, suddenly felt an\nunconquerable and causeless dislike to him swell up in her heart, a\nsomething which she could neither define nor account for, that made her\nwish to avoid sitting near him, and turn her eyes away whenever his were\ndirected towards her.\n\nSir Geoffrey presented his wife and daughter to Lord Marnell, and Sir\nRalph came forward with a cordial greeting; after which they took their\nseats at table, for Richard Pynson was already bringing in the \"farsure\nof hare,\" and Mistress Katherine following with the pottage.  The\noccupants of the high table, on the dais, consisted of Sir Geoffrey and\nDame Lovell, Lord Marnell, Sir Ralph Marston, Margery, Richard Pynson,\nMistress Katherine, and Friar Andrew Rous, Sir Geoffrey's chaplain.  The\nmaids sat at the second table, and the farm-servants at a third, lower\ndown the hall.  Sir Ralph, as usual, was full of fun, and spared nobody,\nkeeping the whole table in a roar of laughter, excepting Lord Marnell,\nwho neither laughed at his cousin's jokes, nor offered any observations\nof his own, being wholly occupied with the discussion of the various\ndishes as they were presented to him, and consuming, according to the\njoint testimony of Dame Lovell and Friar Andrew after the feast, \"enough\nto last seven men for a week.\"  When dinner was over, and \"the tables\nlifted,\" the company gathered round the fire, and proceeded to make\nthemselves comfortable.  Sir Ralph sang songs, and told funny anecdotes,\nand cracked jokes with the young people; while Lord Marnell, in\nconversation with Sir Geoffrey, showed that the promise of neither half\nof his face was entirely unfulfilled, by proving himself a shrewd\nobserver, and not a bad talker.  In the midst of this conversation, Sir\nRalph, turning round to Sir Geoffrey, inquired if he had heard anything\nof a certain sermon that had been preached the day before at Bostock\nChurch.\n\n\"I heard of it,\" answered he, \"but I heard it not.  Some of mine,\nmethinks, heard the same.  Madge, wentest not thou thereto?\"\n\n\"Ay, good father, I went with Master Pynson.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Sir Ralph.  \"I went not, for the which I now grieve, the more\nas my good cousin telleth me that Master Sastre is accounted a great one\nby some--but these seem not of the best.\"\n\n\"Misconceive me not, fair cousin,\" said Lord Marnell.  \"It is only the\nLollards that think well of the man, and thou wottest that Holy Church\nlooketh not kindly on their evil doings.  That ill priest, John\nWycliffe, who is accounted their leader, hath done more hurt to the\nfaith than any heretic these many years.\"\n\n\"Thou art but ill affected unto them, I trow,\" said Sir Ralph, jokingly.\n\n\"Ill affected!\" exclaimed Lord Marnell, bringing down his hand violently\nupon the arm of his chair, with a blow which made Margery start.  \"I cry\nyou mercy, fair mistress--but if I knew of any among my kin or meynie\n[Household retinue] that leaned that way--ay, were it mine own sister,\nthe Prioress of Kennington--I tell thee, Ralph, I would have her up\nbefore the King's Grace's council, and well whipped!\"\n\nMargery shuddered slightly.  Sir Ralph leaned back in his chair, and\nlaughed heartily.\n\n\"Well said, fair cousin mine!  But I pray thee, tell me what doctrines\nhold these men, that thou wouldst have them all up afore the King's\nGrace's council, and well whipped?\"\n\n\"All manner of evil!\" answered Lord Marnell, wrathfully.  \"They hold, as\nI hear, that the blessed Sacrament of the Altar is in no wise the true\nbody of Christ, but only a piece of bread blessed by the priest, and to\nbe eaten in memory of His death; for the which reason also they would\nallow the lay folk to drink Christ's blood.  Moreover, they say that the\nblessed angels and God's saints be not to be worshipped, but only to be\nheld in reverence and kindly memory.  Also, they give to the common\npeople the Scriptures of God's Word for to read, which we wot well is\nonly fit for priests.  And in all things which they do, I find not that\nthese evil wretches do hold any true thing as taught by Holy Church, but\none, which is masses for souls departed.  I wis not much concerning\nthem, for they move mine anger.\"\n\n\"I pray your good Lordship,\" asked Sir Geoffrey, \"can you tell me\nwhether these men be in great force in London or thereabouts at this\ntime?  Find they any favour in the Court?\"\n\n\"They be ever increasing,\" said Lord Marnell \"so much so that the King's\ncouncil have seen good to prepare some orders against them--forbidding\nof their assemblages, and such like--for to present unto the Parliament.\nThese orders provide, as my good friend holy Abbot Bilson did tell me,\nthat all convicted to be Lollards shall suffer close prison, for longer\nor shorter time, as pleaseth the King's Grace.  I trow they find not\nfavour at Court with many, but the few that look well on them be unhaply\nof the highest.  I have heard say that some in the Duke of Lancaster's\npalace show them favour, and it is no news that the Queen--whose soul\nGod pardon!--did lean that way.  In all open hours she was reading of\nScripture in the vulgar tongue.  Master Sastre, the priest, who my fair\ncousin telleth me was a-preaching in Bostock Church yestermorn, is, I\ntake it, one of their chief men, and did learn of Master Wycliffe\nhimself.  I trow he will find it go hard with him if ever he cometh near\nLondon again.  He goeth a-preaching of his doctrines up and down the\nrealm, and perverting from the faith evilly-disposed men and sely\n[simple, unlearned] damsels who lack something to set their tongues\nrunning.\"\n\nSir Ralph here made a remark which turned the conversation; for this\nMargery was sorry, as it had interested her extremely.  Lord Marnell's\nremarks taught her more about the Lollards than she had ever known\nbefore.  So the Queen read the Bible in English! thought she.  Why\nshould not I do the same?  She sat wrapped in her own thoughts for a\nlong time, and when she roused herself from them, she noticed that Dame\nLovell had quitted the room, and that Sir Ralph and Sir Geoffrey were\ntalking politics, wherein they were occupied in proving, to the\nunqualified satisfaction of each, that there was \"something rotten in\nthe State,\" and that England could not last very long, her only business\nbeing to demolish France.  And Margery, finding the conversation now\nextremely dull--though had she for an instant suspected the turn it\nwould take in her absence, she certainly would never have gone--slipped\nout, and joined the more noisy party in the kitchen, where she found\nDame Lovell seated in the chimney-corner and inveighing fervently\nagainst late hours.\n\n\"An it be not three of the clock already,\" said that angry lady, \"I am a\nheathen Jew, and no Christian!  Time to prepare supper for Christian\nfolk--but when that great hulk of a man, that can do nothing in this\nworld but eat, thinks to sup, I wis not!  Marry, I trow that nought more\nwill go down his throat until evensong!  I marvel if our grandsons will\nbe as great fools as we be!\"\n\n\"More, Dame,\" answered Mistress Katherine, sententiously.  She was a\nwoman who very seldom spoke, and when she did, compressed all her ideas\ninto as few words as would serve the purpose.\n\n\"Nay, Saint Christopher!  I hope not,\" said Dame Lovell.  \"And what am I\nfor to do now?  Madge, lass, open the door and bid hither Richard\nPynson.\"\n\nMargery softly opened the door into the hall; and as softly called the\nperson who answered to that name.  He rose, and came to her, and Sir\nGeoffrey and Lord Marnell, who were in low-toned, earnest conversation,\nsuddenly stopped as she appeared.\n\n\"Richard,\" said Dame Lovell, in what she doubtlessly intended for a\nwhisper, \"I pray thee, good youth, to go in softly, and privily demand\nof Sir Ralph what time he list to sup.\"\n\nRichard executed the order, and, returning, closed the door behind him.\n\n\"Sir Ralph saith, good mistress mine, that the Lord Marnell when at home\nsuppeth not afore six of the clock; but he prayeth you for to sup when\nyou will, to the which he will without doubt accommodate himself.\"\n\n\"Six of the clock!\" cried Dame Lovell, in amazement.  \"Richard, art sure\nthou heardest aright?\"\n\n\"Certes, good mistress.\"\n\nDame Lovell sat in silent horror.\n\n\"Well!\" said she at length, \"if ever in all my days did I hear of a like\nthing!  Cicely, serve a void in my privy chamber at four of the clock.\nThis poor country of ours may well go to wrack, if its rulers sup not\nafore six of the clock!  Dear, dear, dear!  I marvel if the blessed\nVirgin Saint Mary supped not until six of the clock!  May all the saints\nforgive us that we be such fools!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER THREE.\n\nCOMING EVENTS CAST THEIR SHADOWS BEFORE.\n\n  \"Ay, sooth we feel too strong in weal to need Thee on that road.\n  But woe being come, the soul is dumb that crieth not on God.\"\n\n  Elizabeth Barrett Browning.\n\nThe guests departed about seven o'clock, and Dame Lovell got to bed a\nlittle before nine--an hour which was in her eyes most untimely.\nMargery, though she had not slept on the previous night, was unable to\nclose her eyes for some time.  The unwonted excitement kept her awake,\nand another idea, too, mingled with her thoughts.  The book!  How should\nshe copy it?  It must be at stolen hours--probably in the night.  And\nwhat material should she use?  Not vellum, for Sir Geoffrey might ask\nwhat she was doing if she requested more of that precious article than\nwas necessary for her Breviary.  He had allowed her some paper for the\nrough draft of her illuminations, and she had a little of this left.\nShe determined to make use of this paper so far as it would go, and to\ntrust to circumstances for the remainder.\n\nThinking and contriving, Margery sank to sleep, and dreamed that Sir\nGeoffrey was reading the book to Lord Marnell, who, by that curious\nmixture which often takes place in dreams, was also Richard Pynson.\nFrom this dream, about ten minutes after she fell asleep, as it appeared\nto her, Margery suddenly sprang up to the conviction that broad daylight\nwas streaming in at the window.  She rose and dressed herself hurriedly,\nand, running down into the kitchen, was surprised to find nobody there\nbut Joan, the drudge of the household, who moreover was rubbing her\neyes, and apparently only half awake.\n\n\"Why, Mistress Margery!\" said the girl, in astonishment, \"your good\nmistress-ship is early, considering our late hours.  The Dame is not yet\nrisen.\"\n\n\"In good sooth?\" inquired Margery, looking at the clock, when she found\nto her surprise that it was barely five o'clock; and receiving from Joan\nthe information that Dame Lovell had told Cicely overnight that she did\nnot intend to appear until six, she returned to her own room, and,\ndrawing the book from its hiding-place, commenced her task of copying.\nMargery worked quickly, and had copied nearly a page in the hour.  So\nabsorbed was she in her task, that she never heard the door open, and\nstarted like a guilty thing when the well-known voice of her mother\nsounded close by her.\n\n\"Eh, Madge!  Up and at work?  Thou wilt work thy fingers to the bone,\nchild!  Is that thy mass-book?  Nay, it is paper, I see, and that, I\nwis, is on vellum.  What art doing, damsel?\"\n\nPale and red, red and pale, went Margery by turns at this string of\nquestions.\n\n\"Why, lass, what hast?\" asked Dame Lovell, in surprise.\n\n\"I cry you mercy, good mother!\" said Margery, descending to\nequivocation, and blushing more than ever; \"I heard you not open my\ndoor, and your voice started me.\"\n\n\"Poor Madge! did I fright thee?\" said Dame Lovell, kindly.  \"But what is\nthis, child?  Another Breviary?  Dost want two?\"\n\n\"Poor Madge\" she was indeed at this moment.  Terrified beyond measure\nlest Dame Lovell should inform Sir Geoffrey, whose learned eyes would\nperceive in a moment what the book was--and seeing more danger in his\ndiscovering its real character than in letting him suppose it to be\nanother Breviary, Margery, generally so truth-telling, was frightened\ninto a lie.\n\n\"Ay, good mother,\" she stammered out, \"'tis a Breviary.\"\n\nAll that day Margery sat upon thorns; but Dame Lovell made no mention of\nthe incident, and she accordingly hoped it was forgotten.\n\nDay after day passed on, and Margery worked harder than ever at copying\nthe book.  She finished her task just one day before the month was up,\nand gave back the original to Richard Pynson, entreating him to make an\nerrand to Marston as soon as possible, and restore the book, with her\nhearty thanks, into the hands of Master Carew.\n\nOn the evening of that day, Dame Lovell sat at work in the wide\nchimney-corner of the hall.  Near her was Mistress Katherine, scraping\nalmonds into a bowl; while Margery, occupied with her distaff, sat at a\nlittle distance.  On a wide oaken settle on the opposite side of the\nfire lay Friar Andrew, taking a nap, as was his afternoon custom; while\non another settle drawn up before the fire, Sir Geoffrey and Richard\nPynson sat conversing with the ladies.\n\n\"Madge, lass, hast finished thy Breviary?\" asked Sir Geoffrey.  \"An thou\nhast, I would see it.\"\n\nMargery's heart leaped into her mouth, for now was the time for the\ndiscovery of her falsehood to be made.  Simply replying, however, \"I\nwill seek it, father,\" she rose and laid her distaff down.\n\n\"Ay, Madge is a feat scribe, truly!\" remarked Dame Lovell, to Margery's\nunspeakable distress.  \"She hath written two Breviaries, I wis.\"\n\n\"Two!\" said Sir Geoffrey, laughing.  \"One for Sundays and feasts, and\nthe other for week-days?  Madge, bring us both of them.\"\n\nMargery left the room, and returned in a few minutes, with both the\nbooks in her hand.  Sir Geoffrey took them, and opened the illuminated\none--the genuine Breviary--first.  Margery reseated herself, and took up\nher distaff, but the thread was very uneven, and she broke it twice,\nwhile her father turned over the leaves of the book, and praised her\nwriting and illuminations.  His praise was sweet enough, but some time\nhe must come to the end, and _then_--!\n\nHow fervently Margery wished that Dame Lovell would ask an irrelevant\nquestion, which might lead to conversation--that Friar Andrew would\nawake--that Cicely would rush in with news of the cows having broken\ninto the garden--or that _anything_ would occur which would put a stop\nto the examination of those volumes before Sir Geoffrey arrived at the\nlast leaf!  But everything, as it always is under such circumstances,\nwas unusually quiet; and Sir Geoffrey fastened the silver clasps of the\nBreviary, and opened the book without anything to hinder his doing so.\nMargery stole furtive looks at her father over her distaff, and soon\nobserved an ominous look of displeasure creeping over his face.  He\npassed over several leaves--turned to the beginning, and then to the\nend,--then, closing the volume, he looked up and said, in a stern\nvoice--\n\n\"Andrew!\"\n\nFriar Andrew snored placidly on.\n\n\"Andrew!\" said Sir Geoffrey, in a louder tone.\n\nFriar Andrew gave an indistinct sound between a snore and a grunt.  Sir\nGeoffrey rose from his seat, and striding over to where his confessor\nslept, laid hold of his shoulders, and gave him such a shake as nearly\nbrought him to the stone floor.\n\n\"Awake, thou sluggard!\" said he, angrily.  \"Is it a time for the\nshepherd to sleep when the wolf is already in the fold, and the lambs be\nin danger?\"\n\n\"Eh?  Oh! ay!\" said Friar Andrew, half awake.  \"Time to sup, eh?\"\n\n\"Look here, Andrew!\" roared his offended patron, \"and see thee what this\nsinful maid hath been doing.  What penance deemest thou fit for such\nfault as this?\"  He handed the book to the friar.  The friar sat up,\nrubbed his eyes, opened the book, and turned over two or three leaves.\n\n\"I cry your good worship mercy,\" said he.  \"I knew not you were assaying\nto arouse me.  I was dreaming of a kettle of furmety of Madge's making.\"\n\n\"I trow here is a pretty kettle of furmety of Madge's making!\" was the\nirate response.\n\n\"I conceive you not, good master,\" said the friar.  \"The book is a good\nbook enough, trow.\"\n\n\"Thou art an ass!\" was the civil answer.  \"Seest thou not that it is the\ntranslation of Scripture whereof the Lord Marnell spake, by Master John\nWycliffe, the Lollard priest?  Mindest thou not that which he said about\nLollards?\"\n\n\"An what if it be?\" said the confessor, yawning.  \"I pin not my faith on\nmy Lord Marnell's sleeve, though it _were_ made of slashed velvet.  And\nI trow Madge hath been too well bred up to draw evil from the book.  So\nlet the damsel alone, good master, and give her book back.  I trow it\nwill never harm her.\"  Margery was exceedingly surprised at the turn\nwhich affairs were taking.  The truth was, that Friar Andrew was very\nfond of her; he had been Sir Geoffrey's chaplain before she was born,\nshe had grown up under his eye, and she made, moreover, such a kettle of\nfurmety as he declared no one else could make.  Beside this, Andrew was\na marvellous poor scholar; he could never read a book at sight, and\nrequired to spell it over two or three times before he could make out\nthe meaning.  He could read his mass-book, because he had done so for\nthe last forty years, and could have gone through the service as easily\nwithout book as with it; though, had a different copy been given him, in\nwhich the pages did not commence with the same line, it would probably\nhave perplexed him extremely.  Thus, under these circumstances, his love\nfor Margery, his love for furmety, and his utter ignorance, combined to\ndispose him to let her off easily.\n\nSir Geoffrey took the book from his chaplain with a sort of growl, and\nthrew it into Margery's lap.\n\n\"There! take it, damsel!\" said he.  \"I account it Andrew's business to\ntake care of thy soul, and he saith it will not hurt thee.  I mind it\nthe less, as thou wilt shortly go to dwell with one who will see to thee\nin these matters, and will not let thee read Lollard books.\"\n\nThe thread fell from Margery's hand, and so did the distaff, which\nrolled over the floor with a clatter.  She never heeded it.  A terrible,\nindefinite dread had taken hold of her.\n\n\"Father! what mean you?\" she stammered forth at last.\n\n\"What mean I?\" said Sir Geoffrey, in the same half-affectionate,\nhalf-sarcastic tone.  \"Why, that I have promised thee to the Lord\nMarnell, Lord of the Bedchamber to the King's Grace, and Knight of the\nGarter--and thou wilt be a lady and dwell in London town, and hold up\nthine head with the highest!  What sayest to _that_, child?\" he added,\nproudly.\n\nShe sat a moment with her white lips parted,--cold, silent, stunned.\nThen the bitter cry of \"Father, father!\" awoke the echoes of the old\nhall.\n\nSir Geoffrey was evidently troubled.  He had sought only his daughter's\ngrandeur, and had never so much as dreamed that he might be making her\nmiserable.\n\n\"Why, child! dost not like it?\" said he, in surprise.\n\nShe rose from her seat, and went to him, and kneeling down by him, laid\nher head, bowed on her clasped hands, upon his knee.  \"O father,\nfather!\" was all she said again.\n\n\"Truly, lass, I grieve much to see thee thus,\" said her father, in a\nperplexed tone.  \"But thou wilt soon get over this, and be right glad,\ntoo, to be so grand a lady.  What shall I say to comfort thee?\"\n\nLong, terrible, hysterical sobs were coming from the bowed frame--but no\ntears.  At length, still without lifting up her head, she whispered--\n\n\"Is there no way to shun it, father?  I love him not.  O father, I love\nhim not--I cannot love him!\"\n\n\"Truly, my poor lass, I trow we cannot shun it,\" said he.  \"I never\nthought to see thee grieve so sore.  The Lord Marnell is a noble\ngentleman, and will find thee in silken tissues and golden cauls.\"\n\nSir Geoffrey did not rightly understand his daughter's sorrow.  His\n\"silken tissues and golden cauls\" did not raise the bowed head one inch.\n\n\"Father!\" she whispered, \"have you promised him?\"\n\n\"I have, my child,\" he answered, softly.\n\nShe rose suddenly, and quickly turned to go up the stairs leading to her\nown room.  At this moment Richard Pynson rose also, and quietly taking\nup the book, which had fallen from Margery's lap on the floor, he handed\nit to her.  She took it with one hand, and gave him the other, but did\nnot let him see her face.  Then she passed into her chamber, and they\nheard her fasten the door.\n\nWhen she had done so, she flung herself down on the rushes [note 1], and\nbent her head forward on her knees.  The longer she thought over her\nprospects, the more dreary and doleful they appeared.  Her state of mind\nwas one that has been touchingly described by a writer who lived three\nhundred years later--\"Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother\"--who, of all\nwho have attempted and failed in the impossible task of rendering the\nPsalms into verse, perhaps approached as near success as any one.\n\n  \"Troublous seas doe mee surrownde;\n  Saue, O Lord, my sinking soule,\n  Sinking wheare it feeles no grownde,\n  In this gulf, this whirling hole;\n  Wayghting ayde with earnest eying,\n  Calling God with bootles crying;\n  Dymme and drye in mee are fownde\n  Eyes to see, and throat to sounde.\"\n\nSuddenly, as she sat thus bowed down, too sorrowful for tears, like the\ndew to a parched flower came the words of the book--nay, the words of\nthe Lord--into her soul.\n\n\"_Be not your herte afrayed, ne drede it_.\"\n\n\"_And therfore ghe han now sorowe, but eftsoone I schal se ghou, and\nghoure herte schal haue ioie, and no man schal take fro ghou ghoure\nioie.  Treuly, treuly, I seie to ghou, if ghe axen the Fadir ony thing\nin my name he schal ghyue to ghou_.\"  John xvi. 22, 23.\n\nNow, Margery had neither teacher nor commentary to interpret to her the\nwords of Scripture; and the result was, that she never dreamed of\nmodifying any of them, but took the words simply and literally.  It\nnever entered her head to interpret them with any qualification--to\nargue that \"anything\" must mean only some things.  Ah! how much better\nwould it be for us, if we would accept those blessed words as plainly,\nas unconditionally, as conclusively, as this poor untaught girl!\n\nBut when Margery considered the question more minutely, poor child! she\nknew not what to ask.  The constant reference of everything by the Lord\nJesus to \"the will of the Father\" had struck her forcibly; and now she\ndared not ask for entire freedom from the crashing blow which had fallen\non her, lest it should not be the will of the Father.  So she contented\nherself with a supplication which, under the circumstances, was the best\nshe could have offered.  She did not even try to form her petitions into\nwords--the depths in which her soul lay were too deep for that; it was a\nwordless cry which went up to God.  But its substance was an entreaty\nthat the Father would do His will, and would bend her will to it; that\nwhatever He saw fit to give her, He would always give His presence and\nHis love; that whatever He was pleased to take away, He would not take\nfrom her the word unto His handmaid wherein He had caused her to hope.\nAnd when she rose from her knees, the prominent idea in her mind might\nhave been expressed in the words of the old proverb, \"He loseth nothing\nthat keepeth God for his friend.\"\n\nAn hour afterwards, Dame Lovell, who could not rest for the remembrance\nof her child's grief, came softly into Margery's chamber to see if she\ncould comfort her.  She was surprised to find her sleeping as quietly as\na little child, with the book, even in sleep, held fast to her bosom, as\nif she would permit nothing to separate her from that Word of God which\nhad given rest to her soul.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nNote 1.  Carpets were very rare at this time, and only used on state\noccasions and for invalids.  Their place was supplied by fresh green\nrushes, strewn on the floor.  It appears rather doubtful, however,\nwhether carpets were not sometimes used in the winter.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER FOUR.\n\nLIFE IN LONDON.\n\n  \"Whan we cam' in by Glasgow toun,\n  We were a comely sicht to see,--\n  My luve was clad in velvet black\n  And I mysel' in cramoisie.\"\n\n  Old Ballad.\n\nA fortnight after the events recorded in the last chapter, Lovell Tower\nwas in the confusion of great preparations for the approaching wedding.\nFriar Andrew was despatched to York fair to purchase twenty yards of\nscarlet cloth, fourteen yards of tawny satin, eight of purple satin, and\nthe same number of blue cloth of silver, with jewels and rich furs.  All\nwas cutting-out and fitting-on, with discussions about trimmings,\nquintises, and head-dresses.  Richard Pynson was sent hither and thither\non errands.  Sir Geoffrey himself superintended the purchase of a new\npillion, and ordered it to be covered with green velvet.  Lord Marnell,\nwho did not often come to Lovell Tower himself, sent over a trusty\nmessenger every day to inquire if Mistress Margery had rested well and\nwas merry.  From the latter condition she was very far.  At length the\npreparations were completed; and on a splendid summer day, when the\nbirds were singing their most joyous melodies, Margery Lovell was\nmarried, in Bostock Church, to Sir Ralph Marnell, Baron Marnell of\nLymington, Knight of the Garter.  The bride was attired in blue cloth of\nsilver, trimmed with miniver; and her hair, as was then the custom at\nweddings, was not confined by any head-dress, but flowed down her back,\nlong and straight.  The bridegroom was dressed in cramoisie--crimson\nvelvet--richly trimmed with bullion, and wore three long waving plumes\nin his cap, as well as a streamer of gold lace.  If any one who may read\nthese pages should inquire why Margery chose blue for her wedding-dress,\nI may answer that Margery would have been greatly astonished if any one\nhad recommended white.  White at this period was not only a mourning\ncolour, but mourning of the very deepest character.\n\nNo pains were spared to make this a merry wedding, and yet it certainly\ncould not be called a joyous one.  All the inhabitants of Lovell Tower\nknew well that the bride was very far from happy; Sir Geoffrey and Dame\nLovell were naturally sorry to lose their only child; Friar Andrew\nmourned over his favourite and his kettle of furmety; while Richard\nPynson had his own private sorrow, to which I need not allude further in\nthis place.\n\nThe bridal feast was held at Lovell Tower, and all the neighbours were\ninvited to it.  The festivities were prolonged to a late hour; and at\nfive o'clock next morning everybody was busy helping the bride to pack\nup.  Everybody thought of everything so well, that there was very little\nleft for her to think of; but she did think of one thing.  When Margery\nset out for her new home in London, the book went too.\n\nThe journey to London from the North was in those days a long and\nwearisome one.  There were no vehicles but litters and waggons.  Margery\ntravelled part of the way in a litter, and part on a pillion behind her\nbridegroom, who rode on horseback the whole way.  He had with him a\nregular army of retainers, besides sundry maidens for the Lady Marnell,\nat the head of whom was Alice Jordan, the unlucky girl who, at our first\nvisit to Lovell Tower, was reprimanded for leaving out the onions in the\nblanch-porre.  Margery had persuaded her mother to resign to her for a\npersonal attendant this often clumsy and forgetful but really\nwell-meaning girl.  It was a Friday evening when they arrived in London;\nand Margery was much too tired to think of doing anything but rest her\nwearied head in sleep.\n\nAs early as four o'clock the next morning, she was roused by London\ncries from a happy dream of Lovell Tower.  \"Quinces! sweet quinces! ripe\nquinces!\"\n\n\"Any kitchen-stuff, have you, maids?\"\n\n\"Cakes and ale! cakes and ale!\"\n\n\"Cherry ripe! cherry ripe!\"\n\n\"Come buy, pretty maids, come buy! come buy!\" with an undercurrent of\nthe long rhymed cry of the hawker of haberdashery, of which Shakespeare\nhas given us a specimen as regards the English version--\n\n  \"Lawn, as white as driven snow;\n  Cyprus, black as e'er was crow,\"\n  etcetera.\n\nMargery lay still, and listened in silence to all these new sounds.  At\nlength she rose and dressed herself, with the assistance of Alice, who\nwas seriously dissatisfied with the narrow streets and queer smells of\nthe town, and spared no comment on these points while assisting her\nyoung mistress at her toilette.  Having dressed, Margery passed into an\nantechamber, close to her bedroom, where breakfast was served.  This\nrepast consisted of a pitcher of new milk, another pitcher of wine, a\ndish of poached eggs, a tremendous bunch of water-cress, a large loaf of\nbread, and marchpanes--a sweet cake, not unlike the modern macaroon.\nBreakfast over, Margery put on her hood, and taking Alice with her, she\nsallied forth on an expedition to examine the neighbourhood of her new\nhome.  One of Lord Marnell's men-servants followed at a short distance,\nwearing a rapier, to defend his mistress in case of any assault being\nmade upon her.\n\nLord Marnell's house was very near the country, and in a quiet and\nsecluded position, being pleasantly situated in Fleet Street.  Green\nfields lay between the two cities of London and Westminster.  There was\nonly one bridge across the river, that silver Thames, which ran, so\nclear and limpid, through the undulating meadows; and the bridge was\nentirely built over, a covered way passing under the houses for wheeled\nvehicles.  Far to the right rose the magnificent Palace of Westminster,\na relic of the Saxon kings; and behind it the grand old Abbey, and the\nstrong, frowning Sanctuary; while to the left glittered the walls and\nturrets of the White Tower, the town residence of royalty.  Margery,\nhowever, could not see the whole of this as she stepped out of her\nhouse.  What first met her eyes were the more detailed and less pleasant\nfeatures of the scene.  There were no causeways; the streets, as a rule,\nwould just allow of the progress of one vehicle, though a few of the\nprincipal ones would permit the passage of two; and the pavements\nconsisted of huge stones, not remarkable either for evenness or\nsmoothness.  A channel ran down the middle of the street, into which\nevery housewife emptied her slops from the window, and along which dirty\nwater, sewerage, straw, drowned rats, and mud, floated in profuse and\nodoriferous mezee.  Margery found it desirable to make considerable use\nof her pomander, a ball of various mixed drugs inclosed in a gold\nnetwork, and emitting a pleasant fragrance when carried in the warm\nhand.  As she proceeded along the streets which were lined with shops,\nthe incessant cry of the shopkeepers standing at their doors, \"What do\nyou lack? what do you lack?\" greeted her on every side.  The vehicles\nwere of two classes, as I have before observed--waggons and litters, the\nlitters being the carriages of the fourteenth century; but the waggons\nwere by far the most numerous.  Occasionally a lady of rank would ride\npast in her litter, drawn by horses whose trappings swept the ground; or\na knight, followed by a crowd of retainers, would prance by on his\nhigh-mettled charger.  Margery spent the happiest day which she had\npassed since her marriage, in wandering about London, and satisfying her\ngirlish curiosity concerning every place of which she had ever heard.\nLord Marnell frowned when Margery confessed, on her return, that she had\nbeen out to see London.  It was not fit, he said, that she should go out\non foot: ladies of rank were not expected to walk: she ought to have\nordered out her litter, with a due attendance of retainers.\n\n\"But, my lord,\" said Margery, very naturally, \"an't please you, I could\nnot see so well in a litter.\"\n\nLord Marnell's displeased lips relaxed into a laugh, for he was amused\nat her simplicity; but he repeated that he begged she would remember,\nnow that she _had_ seen, that she was no longer plain Mistress Margery\nLovell, but Baroness Marnell of Lymington, and would behave herself\naccordingly.  Margery sighed at this curtailment of her liberty, and\nwithdrew to see where Alice was putting her dresses.\n\nAs it was approaching evening, Lord Marnell's voice called her\ndownstairs.\n\n\"If thou wilt see a sight, Madge,\" he said, good-naturedly, as she\nentered, \"come quickly, and one will gladden thine eyes which never\nsawest thou before.  The King rideth presently from the Savoy to the\nTower.\"\n\nMargery ran to the window, and saw a number of horses, decked, as well\nas their riders, in all the colours of the rainbow, coming up the street\nfrom the stately Savoy Palace, which stood, surrounded by green fields,\nin what is now the Strand.\n\n\"Which is the King's Grace, I pray you?\" asked she, eagerly.\n\n\"He weareth a plain black hood and a red gown,\" answered her husband.\n\"He rideth a white horse, and hath a scarlet footcloth, all powdered\nover with ostrich feathers in gold.\"\n\n\"What!\" said Margery, in surprise, \"that little, fair, goodly man, with\nthe golden frontlet to his horse?\"\n\n\"The very same,\" said Lord Marnell.  \"The tall, comely man who rideth\nbehind him, on yon brown horse, and who hath eyes like to an eagle, is\nthe Duke of Lancaster.  `John of Gaunt,' the folk call him, by reason\nthat he was born at Ghent, in Flanders.\"\n\n\"And who be the rest, if I weary you not with asking?\" said Margery,\nrather timidly.\n\n\"In no wise,\" answered he.  \"Mostly lords and noble gentlemen, of whom\nthou mayest perchance have heard.  The Earl of Surrey is he in the green\ncoat, with a red plume.  The Earl of Northumberland hath a blue coat,\nbroidered with gold, and a footcloth of the same.  Yon dark,\nproud-looking man in scarlet, on the roan horse, is the Duke of Exeter\n[Sir John Holland], brother to the King's Grace by my Lady Princess his\nmother, who was wed afore she wedded the Prince, whose soul God rest!\nAh! and here cometh my Lord of Hereford, Harry of Bolingbroke\n[afterwards Henry IV], the Duke of Lancaster's only son and heir--and a\nson and heir who were worse than none, if report tell truth,\" added Lord\nMarnell, in a lower tone.  \"Seest thou, Madge, yon passing tall man,\nwith black hair, arrayed in pink cloth of silver?\"  [See note 1].\n\n\"I see him well, I thank your good Lordship,\" was Margery's answer; but\nshe suddenly shivered as she spoke.\n\n\"Art thou cold, Madge, by the casement?  Shall I close the lattice?\"\n\n\"I am not cold, good my Lord, I thank you,\" said Margery, in a different\ntone; \"but I like not to look upon that man.\"\n\n\"Why so?\" asked Lord Marnell, looking down from his altitude upon the\nslight frail figure at his side.  \"Is he not a noble man and a goodly?\"\n\n\"I know not,\" answered Margery, still in a troubled voice.  \"There is a\nthing in his face for which I find not words, but it troubleth me.\"\n\n\"Look not on him, then,\" said he, drawing her away.  She thanked him for\nhis kindness in showing and explaining the glittering scene to her, and\nreturned to her supervision of Alice.\n\nA few days after this, the Prioress of Kennington, Lord Marnell's\nsister, came in her litter to see her young sister-in-law.  Margery was\nsurprised to find in her a lady so little resembling her country-formed\nidea of a nun.  She wore, indeed, the costume of her order; but her\ndress, instead of being common serge or camlet, was black velvet; her\nfrontlet and barb [see Note 2] were elaborately embroidered; her long\ngloves [see Note 3] were of white Spanish leather, delicately perfumed,\nand adorned with needlework in coloured silks; she wore nearly as many\nrings as would have stocked a small jeweller's shop, and from her\ngirdle, set with the finest gems, were suspended a pomander richly\nworked in gold and enamel, a large silver seal, and a rosary, made of\namethyst beads, holding a crucifix, the materials of which were\nalabaster and gold.\n\nIn those palmy days of Romanism in England, nuns were by no means so\nstrictly secluded as now.  They were present at all manner of\nfestivities; the higher class travelled about the country very much as\nthey chose, and all of them, while retaining the peculiar shape and\ncolour of the prescribed monastic costume, contrived to spend a fortune\non the accessories and details of their dress.  The Prioress of\nKennington, as I have just described her, is a specimen of nearly all\nthe prioresses and other conventual authorities of her day.\n\nThis handsomely-dressed lady was stiff and stately in her manner, and\nuttered, with the proudest mien, words expressive only of the most\nabject humility.  \"If her fair sister would come and see her at her poor\nhouse at Kennington, she would be right glad of so great honour.\"\nMargery replied courteously, but she had no desire to see much of the\nPrioress.\n\nLord Marnell took his wife to Court, and presented her to the King--the\nQueen was dead--and the Duchess of Gloucester [Eleanor Bohu], his aunt.\nThe King spoke to Margery very kindly, and won her good opinion by so\ndoing.  The Duchess honoured her with a haughty stare, and then\n\"supposed she came from the North?\" in a tone which indicated that she\nconsidered her a variety of savage.  The ladies in waiting examined and\nquestioned her with more curiosity than civility; and Margery's visit to\nCourt left upon her mind, with the single exception of King Richard's\nkindness, a most unpleasant impression.\n\nIn the winter of 1396, King Richard brought home a new queen, the\nPrincess Isabelle of France, who had attained the mature age of eight\nyears.  Margery watched the little Queen make her entrance into London.\nShe was decked out with jewels, of which she brought a great quantity\nover with her, and fresh ones were presented to her at every place where\nshe halted.  Alice, with round eyes, declared that \"the Queen's Grace's\njewels must be worth a King's ransom--and would not your good Ladyship\nwish to have the like?\"\n\nMargery shook her head.\n\n\"The only jewels that be worth having, good Alice,\" said she, \"be gems\nof the heart, such like as meekness, obedience, and charity.  And in\ntruth, if I were the chooser, there be many things that I would have\nafore jewels.  But much good do they the Queen's Grace, poor child! and\nI pray God she rest not content with gauds of this earth.\"\n\nBefore that winter was over, one thing, worth more than the Queen's\njewels in her eyes, was bestowed upon Margery.  Something to take care\nof--something to love and live for.  A little golden-haired baby, which\nbecame, so far as anything in this world could become so, the light and\njoy of her heart and soul.\n\nMargery soon learned to value at its true worth the show and tinsel of\nLondon life.  She never appeared again at Court but once, to pay her\nrespects to the new Queen, who received her very cordially, seated on a\nthrone by her husband.  The small Queen of eight \"hoped she was quite\nwell, and thought that England was a very fine country.\"  The king spoke\nto her as kindly as before, offered her ipocras [see Note 4] and spices,\nand on the close of the interview, took up his little Queen in his arms,\nand carried her out of the room.  Margery had, indeed, no opportunity to\nvisit the Court again; for the young Queen was educated at Windsor, and\nvery rarely visited London.  And Lady Marnell, tired of the hollow\nglitter of high life, and finding few or none in her own sphere with\nwhom she could complacently associate, went back with fresh zest to her\nbaby and the book.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nNote 1.  These descriptions are taken from the invaluable illuminations\nin Creton's _Histoire du Roy Richart Deux_, Harl.  Ms. 1319.  Creton was\na contemporary and personal friend of King Richard.\n\nNote 2.  The frontlet and barb were pieces of white linen, the former\nworn over the forehead, the latter over the chin.\n\nNote 3.  Gloves were just becoming fashionable in the fourteenth century\nfor common wear.  Before that, they were rarely used except when the\nwearer carried a falcon on the wrist.\n\nNote 4.  A sweet wine or liqueur, generally served at the \"void.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER FIVE.\n\nTHE BEGINNING OF THE END.\n\n  \"All quick and troubled was his speech,\n  And his face was pale with dread,\n  And he said, `The king had made a law,\n  That the book must not be read,--\n  For it was such fearful heresy,\n  The holy abbot said.'\"\n\n  Mary Howitt.\n\nThree years had passed since the events narrated in the last chapter,\nand Margery was now twenty-one years of age.  She appeared older than\nshe was, and her face wore an unnaturally pensive expression, which had\nbeen gradually settling itself there since the day of her marriage.  She\nnever laughed, and very rarely smiled, except when her eyes rested upon\nher little golden-haired Geoffrey, whom she had sought and obtained\npermission to name after her father.  He was a bright, merry little\nfellow, perpetually in motion, and extremely fond of his mother, though\nhe always shrank from and seemed to fear his father.\n\nOn a summer day in the year 1399, Margery sat in her bower, or boudoir,\nperusing the book.  Lord Marnell was, as usual, at Court; and little\nGeoffrey was running about his mother's apartments on what he doubtless\nconsidered important business.  Suddenly, in the midst of her reading, a\ncry of pain from the child startled Margery.  She sprang up, and ran to\nhim; and she found that in running about, he had contrived to fall down\na step which intervened between the landing and the antechamber, whereby\nhe had very slightly bruised his infantine arm, and very greatly\nperturbed his infantine spirit.  Geoffrey was weeping and whining\npiteously, and his mother lifted him up, and carried him into her\nbedroom, where she examined the injured arm, and discovered that the\ninjury consisted only of an almost imperceptible bruise.  The child,\nhowever, still bewailed his misfortune; and Lady Marnell, having applied\nsome ointment to the sore place, sat down, and taking Geoffrey in her\nlap, she soothed and rocked him until he fell asleep, and forgot all\nabout his bruised arm.  The boy had been asleep about a quarter of an\nhour, when the recollection suddenly flashed upon Margery's mind that\nshe had left the book open to all comers and goers, instead of putting\nit carefully away, as was her wont.  She set down the child softly on\nthe trussing-bed, (the curious name given by our forefathers to a piece\nof furniture which formed a sofa or travelling-bed at pleasure), and\nquietly opening the door into her bower, she saw--her husband standing\non the hearth, with the book in his hand, and a very decided frown\ngathering on his countenance.  The rustle of Margery's dress made Lord\nMarnell look up.\n\n\"What meaneth this, I pray you, mistress?\" asked he, angrily.\n\nThere was no need, had Margery felt any disposition, to attempt further\nconcealment.  The worst that could come, had come.\n\n\"It is a book of mine,\" she quietly answered, \"which I left here a short\nseason agone, when the boy's cry started me.\"\n\n\"Hast read it?\" asked Lord Marnell, no less harshly.\n\n\"I have read it many times, good my Lord.\"\n\n\"And I pray you for to tell me whence you had it, good my Lady?\" said\nhe, rather ironically.\n\nMargery was silent.  She was determined to bear the blame alone, and not\nto compromise either Pynson or Carew.\n\n\"Had you this book since you came hither?\" said Lord Marnell, varying\nthe form of his question, when he saw she did not answer.\n\n\"No, my Lord.  I brought it with me from home.\"\n\nAnd the word \"home\" almost brought the tears into her eyes.\n\n\"Your father--Sir Geoffrey--knew he thereof?\"\n\n\"He did,\" said Margery, \"and rebuked me sharply therefor.\"\n\n\"He did well.  Why took he not the book from you?\"\n\n\"Because he showed it to Friar Andrew Rous, his and my confessor, who\nthought there was no harm in the book, and that I might safely retain\nthe same.\"\n\n\"Then Friar Andrew Rous is the longest-eared ass I have lightly seen.\nWhence got you this book?\"\n\n\"It is mine own writing.  I copied it.\"\n\n\"Whence had you it?\"\n\nNo answer.\n\n\"I say, whence had you this book?\" roared Lord Marnell.\n\n\"My Lord,\" said Margery, gently, but decidedly, \"I think not that it\nneedeth to say whence I had the same.  The book was lent unto me, whence\nI copied that one; but I say not of whom it was lent unto me.\"\n\n\"You shall say it, and soon too!\" was the reply.  \"This matter must not\nbe let drop--it passeth into the hands of holy Abbot Bilson.  I will\nseek him presently.\"\n\nAnd so saying, Lord Marnell strode out of the room, leaving Margery in a\ncondition of intense terror.\n\nThat afternoon, as Margery sat in her bower, she was informed that the\nPrioress of Kennington was in the oaken chamber.  Margery went down to\nher, holding Geoffrey by the hand, and found her seated on a settle,\napparently preferring this more ancient form of seat to a chair; and\nwearing her veil low over her face.  The Prioress rose when Lady Marnell\nentered, and threw back her heavy black veil, as she advanced to greet\nher.  Margery returned her salutation courteously, and then tried to\ninduce Geoffrey to go to his aunt--but Geoffrey hung back and would not\ngo.  Margery did not attempt to force the child, but sat down, and he\nattached himself to that particular plait of her dress which was\nfurthest from the Prioress.  The Prioress tried to propitiate him, by\ndrawing from her pocket a piece of linen, which, being unfolded,\nrevealed a placenta--a delicacy which the nuns of several convents were\nspecially famed for making, and the nature of which will be better known\nto an ordinary reader by the explanatory term cheese-cake.  Geoffrey\ngraciously accepted the placenta, but utterly declined all further\nintimacy.  The expression of the Prioress's countenance suggested to\nMargery the idea that she had seen her brother, and had heard of the\ndiscovery of the book; so that Margery was quite prepared for her\nremarking gravely, after her unsuccessful attempt to attract her little\nnephew--\n\n\"I heard this morn, fair sister, of a thing which did much trouble me.\"\n\n\"You mean,\" said Margery, simply, \"of the discovering of a book in my\nchamber by my Lord my husband, the which did anger him?\"\n\n\"I rejoice that you take my meaning,\" answered the Prioress, in an even\nvoice.  \"I meant that verily.  I grieve much, fair sister, to hear from\nmy fair brother that you have allied yourself unto those evil men which\nbe known by the name of Lollards.\"\n\n\"I cry you mercy, holy mother,\" answered Margery, quietly, \"I have\nallied myself unto no man.  I know not a Lollard in the realm.  Only I\nread that book--and that book, as you must needs wit, holy mother,\ncontaineth the words of the Lord Jesu.  Is there hurt therein?\"\n\nThe Prioress did not directly answer this question.  She said, \"If your\nelders [parents], fair sister, had shown the wisdom for to have put you\nin the cloister, you would have been free from such like temptations.\"\n\n\"Is it a temptation?\" replied Margery.  \"Meseemeth, holy mother, that\nthere be temptations as many in the cloister as in the world, only they\nbe to divers sins: and I misdoubt that I should have temptation in the\ncloister, to the full as much as here.\"\n\n\"I cry you mercy, fair sister!\" said the Prioress, with an air of\nsuperiority.  \"We have no temptations in our blessed retreat.  Our rule\nsaveth us, and our seclusion from the vanity of the world--and I pray\nyou, what other evil can assail a veiled nun?\"\n\nMargery glanced at the heavy gold chain round the Prioress's neck, the\nmultifarious rings on her fingers, and the costly jewels in her girdle,\nand rather doubted her testimony as to the utter absence of vanity in a\nveiled nun; but she contented herself with saying, \"I trow, holy mother,\nthat ye carry with you evil hearts into your cloister, as have all men\nwithout; and an evil heart within, and the devil without, need not\noutward matters whereon to form temptation.  At least, I speak by mine\nown.\"\n\nThe Prioress looked rather shocked.  \"The evil heart,\" answered she, \"is\ngoverned and kept down in us by our mortifications, our almsgivings, our\npenances, our prayers, and divers other holy exercises.\"\n\n\"Ah, holy mother,\" said Margery, looking up, \"can ye keep down by such\nmeans your evil hearts!  I trow mine needeth more than that!\"\n\n\"What mean you, fair sister?\" inquired the Prioress.\n\n\"Nought less,\" replied Margery, \"than the blood of the Lamb slain, and\nthe grace of Christ risen, have I yet found, that would avail to keep\ndown an evil heart!\"\n\n\"Of force, fair sister, of force!\" said the Prioress, coldly, \"that is\nas well as said.\"\n\n\"Then I pray you, why said you it not?\"\n\nThe Prioress rose.  \"I trust, fair sister,\" said she, without giving any\nreply to Margery's home question, \"that you may see your error ere it be\nfull late so to do.\"\n\n\"I trust,\" said Margery, as she followed her sister-in-law to the door,\n\"that God will keep me in the true faith, whatsoever that be.\"\n\n\"Amen!\" said the Prioress, her long black robe sweeping the steps as she\nmounted her litter.\n\n\"Is she gone?\" lisped little Geoffrey, when his mother returned.\n\"Deff'y so glad!  Deff'y don't like her!\"\n\nThat evening Margery received a message from her husband, bidding her\nmeet him and Abbot Bilson in the oaken chamber, and bring the book with\nher.  She took the book from the table on which Lord Marnell had thrown\nit--no need to hide it any longer now--kissed little Geoffrey's sleeping\nforehead, as he lay in his cradle, and went down to the oaken chamber.\n\nLord Marnell, who, when angry, looked taller than ever, stood on the\nhearth with his arms folded.  Abbot Bilson was seated in an arm-chair,\nwith his cowl thrown back.  He was a man of about sixty, with a\nfinely-formed head, more bald than the tonsure would account for, and a\nremarkably soft, persuasive voice and manner.  Had the Order of Jesuits\nexisted at that time, Abbot Bilson might fitly have been the head of it.\n\"His words were softer than oil, yet were they drawn swords.\"\n\n\"The Lady Marnell,\" said her husband to the Abbot as she entered, and\nthe latter, without rising, saluted her with the benediction, \"Peace be\nwith thee, daughter.\"\n\n\"Where is the book?\" asked Lord Marnell, sternly, but not quite so\nangrily as he had spoken in the morning.\n\nMargery passed it to him.\n\n\"See there, reverend father,\" said he, as he handed it to the Abbot.\n\"What callest thou that?\"\n\nThe Abbot turned over the leaves, but the suavity of his manner suffered\nno change.\n\n\"A fine, clear scribe hath written this,\" remarked he, politely.  \"The\nGospel according unto the blessed John, I ween, from the traduction of\nMaster John Wycliffe, the parson of Lutterworth, who deceased a few\nyears back.  And our good brother Andrew Rous thought no harm of your\nkeeping the book, my daughter?\"\n\n\"So he said,\" answered Margery, shortly.\n\n\"Ah!  But your father--?\"\n\n\"Did not like thereof at the first; but after that Father Rous had so\nsaid, he made no further matter.\"\n\n\"Ah! of force.  I conceive it fully.  Your mother, good daughter?\"\n\n\"My mother spake not of the matter.  She witteth not to read, and\ntherefore knew not the book.\"\n\n\"Certes,\" said the abbot, with the most exquisite gentleness.  Lord\nMarnell, who kept fidgeting up and down the room, seemed almost annoyed\nat the Abbot's extreme suavity.\n\n\"You had this book from a friend, methinks?\" resumed the Abbot.\n\n\"I cannot tell you, father, whence I had it,\" was Margery's firm reply.\n\nThe Abbot looked surprised.\n\n\"Did our brother Rous lend it you?\" he asked, his manner losing a small\nportion of its extraordinary softness.\n\n\"Nay.\"\n\n\"Some friend, then, belike?  Sir Ralph Marston, your good cousin? or\nMaster Pynson, the squire of my worthy knight your father?\"\n\nMargery felt instantaneously that she was in the power of a very\ndangerous man.  How he was endeavouring to ferret out admissions and\ndenials which would afterwards stand him in good stead!  How came he,\ntoo, to know so much about her friends?  Had he been questioning Lord\nMarnell?  Margery's breath came short and fast, and she trembled\nexceedingly.  She was annoyed with herself beyond measure, because, when\nthe Abbot named Richard Pynson, she could not help a conscious blush in\nhearing him mention, not indeed the person who had actually lent her the\nbook, but one who was concerned in the transaction.  The Abbot saw the\nblush, though just then it did not suit his purpose to take notice of\nit.\n\n\"Well, well,\" said he, courteously, \"we will not go further into that\nquestion at present.  But you must wit, dear daughter, that this book\ncontaineth fearful heresy!  Hath not our brother Rous taught you the\nsame?  Error of all kinds is therein, and weak women like unto you be\nnot able, my child, for to separate in all cases this error from the\ntruth wherewith, in these pernicious volumes, it is mingled.  You are\nvery young, daughter, and wit not yet all that the fathers of the Church\ncan tell you, an' you be meek and humble in receiving of their\nteaching.\"\n\nHe ceased, evidently thinking that he had made an impression.  He was\nquite prepared for a little pouting, and for earnest entreaties, and\neven passionate words; but the one thing for which he was not prepared\nhe got in Margery's answer.\n\n\"I wis well, reverend father,\" she said, very quietly, \"to the full as\nwell as it list you to tell me, how young, and weak, and all unwitting I\nbe.  But I trow that Christ deceiveth not His children because they be\nweak; and that if I can any words at all conceive, I can His.  Saith He\nnot, `_If ony man wole do His wille_, _he schall knowe of the\ntechinge_'?  [John vii. 17.] Saith He not again, `_Seke ye Scripturis_'?\n[John v. 39.] I pray you now, father, to whom said He that?  Unto\nfathers of the Church?  Nay, soothly, but unto Jews unbelieving--very\nheathens, and no Christians.  Moreover, saith He not again, `_He that\ndispisith me, and takith not my wordis, hath him that schal juge him;\nthilk word that I have spoken schal deme him in the laste day_'?  [John\nxii. 48.] I pray you, good father, how shall I know the word that shall\njudge me if I read it not?  Truly meseemeth that the despising of His\nWord lieth more in the neglect thereof.  Also say you that this book\ncontaineth heresy and evil teaching.  Good father, shall Christ the Son\nof God teach evil?  Doth God evil?  Will God deceive them that ask Him\ntruth?  Knoweth He not as much as fathers of the Church?  Nay truly,\ngood father, I trust that you wot not fully what you have said.  He is\n`_weye, treuthe, and lyf; no man cometh to the Fadir but by Him_.'\"\n[John xiv. 6.]\n\nAbbot Bilson, for once in his life, was completely dumb-foundered.  He\nlooked silently at Lord Marnell.\n\n\"I pray you see now, reverend father,\" said Lord Marnell, angrily, \"how\nthe teaching of this book hath leavened yon girl's talk!  Is it a small\nevil, Madge, to turn upon thy teacher when he teacheth thee of wisdom,\nwith sayings picked up from a book?  Art not ashamed?\"\n\n\"No, my Lord, I am no wise shamed,\" answered she; \"for the reverend\nfather teacheth me the words of men, and the words of my book be the\nwords of Christ; and when Christ and men come to warring, I trow there\nis small doubt as to who shall be the winner.\"\n\nThe Abbot sat mutely gazing at Margery.  Her face, usually so calm and\npale, was lighted up, as she spoke, with a light not of this world; and\nhe could not comprehend it.  Had she asked pardon, he could have soothed\nher; had she lamented and bewailed, he might have promised her many\nthings to comfort her; had she spoken bitterly or passionately, he might\nhave commanded her silence.  But this conduct of hers, so quiet, yet so\ndecided--so gentle, but so uncompromising--puzzled him extremely.  He\nonly saw the exterior, and he could not discover that wherein her great\nstrength lay.\n\n\"My Lord Marnell,\" he said, in a perplexed tone, \"I would speak with\nyou.  Good lady, will you give us leave?\"\n\nMargery rose, and, courtesying, quitted the room at once; but she took\nthe book with her, and nobody prevented her from doing so.\n\n\"My Lord,\" said the Abbot, when she was gone, \"I am bewildered utterly.\nI know not what to do with this girl.  Never the like of her saw I\nbefore, and my experience is baffled.  But meseemeth that the best thing\nis to treat her gently at the first; and if she relent not, _then_--\"\n\nThe sentence was left unfinished, but Lord Marnell understood it.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER SIX.\n\nNEWS FROM HOME.\n\n  \"There are briars besetting every path,\n  That call for patient care;\n  There is a cross in every lot,\n  And an earnest need for prayer;\n  But a lowly heart that leans on Thee\n  Is happy anywhere.\"\n\n  Miss Waring.\n\nIt was a lovely, clear, moonlight night, and the streets of London were\nhushed and still.  By the light of the moon might be discerned a man in\ntraveller's dress, walking slowly along Fleet Street, and looking up at\nthe houses, as if uncertain which of them would prove the one he sought.\nThe traveller, though he looks much older, and his face wears a weary,\nworn expression, we recognise as our old friend Richard Pynson.\nSuddenly, in the midst of his search, Richard stopped and looked up.\nFrom an oriel window, directly above his head, a faint sound of singing\nreached him--an air which he instantly recognised as \"The Palmer's\nhymn,\" sung by the pilgrims to Jerusalem on their journey to the Holy\nLand.  The voice of the singer, though low, was so clear, that the words\nof the hymn were floated distinctly to his ear.\n\n  \"Holy City, happy City,\n  Built on Christ, and sure as He,\n  From my weary journeying,\n  From the wastes, I cry to thee;\n  Longing, sighing, hasting, crying,\n  Till within thy walls I be.\n  Ah! what happy, happy greeting\n  For the guests thy gates who see!\n  Ah! what blessed, blessed meeting\n  Have thy citizens in thee!\n  Ah! those glittering walls how fair,\n  Jasper shene and ruby blee.\n  Never harm, nor sin, nor danger,\n  Thee can tarnish, crystal sea;\n  Never woe, nor pain, nor sorrow,\n  Thee can enter, City free!\"\n\nThe voice ceased, and Richard Pynson, without any further doubt or\ntrouble, applied at once for admittance at the gate of the house whence\nthe music had issued.  He could never mistake the voice of Margery\nLovell.  The old porter, half asleep, came to the gate, and,\nsentinel-like, inquired, \"Who goes there?\"\n\n\"A friend, a messenger from Dame Lovell, who would fain have speech, if\nhe may, of the Lady Marnell.\"\n\nAs soon as the porter heard the name of Dame Lovell, he threw open the\ngate.  \"Enter, friend.\"  The ponderous gate swung to again, and the old\nman slowly preceded Richard through the archway to the door of the\nhouse, and up the wide staircase.  He ushered him into a room panelled\nwith oak, where he stirred up the decaying embers of the fire, requested\nhim to be seated, and left the room.  At the door of the adjoining\nchamber, Richard heard him softly whisper, \"Mistress Alice!  Mistress\nAlice!\"\n\nA gentle movement in the room followed, and then Richard heard the\nfamiliar voice of Alice Jordan.\n\n\"Hush! good Christopher,\" said she, in a low tone; \"the boy sleepeth at\nlast--wake him not.  What wouldst?\"\n\n\"There is here a messenger from Lovell Tower, who would have speech of\nmy Lady.\"\n\nOn hearing this, Alice came forward at once into the oaken chamber where\nRichard sat.\n\n\"Ah!  Master Pynson!\" she said, \"is it you!  My Lady will be right fain\nto see you--but you come at an evil hour.\"\n\n\"How so?\" asked Richard, quickly.\n\n\"My Lady is watching this livelong night by the cradle of the young\nmaster, who is sore sick--we fear nigh unto death.  The child is in\ngrievous disease [restlessness, uneasiness], and cannot sleep; and her\ngood Ladyship hath been singing unto him, I ween, for to soothe him to\nrest.  Her voice hushed as you came, wherefore I count that the boy\nsleepeth.\"\n\n\"What aileth the poor child?\" inquired Richard.\n\n\"My Lady counteth that he got him an ill rheum when we departed hence\nfor my Lord his house of plesance [country house], for to sweeten [See\nNote 2].  Howsoever that be, he is now grievous sick.\"\n\n\"The Lady Marnell herself is well?\"\n\n\"Alas!\" replied Alice, \"I ween she is little better than the child.  She\nhath been in sore trouble of late, wherefore it is no marvel.  There be\nrumours of accusations for heresy out against her, and my Lord is ill\nangered towards her.  Well, God witteth, and God keep her!  You will see\nhow evil [ill] she looketh an' she come to speak with you, and I trow\nthat she will when I give her to wit who is here.\"\n\nSo saying, Alice returned to the room she had quitted, and for some\nminutes Richard heard nothing more.  Then the door re-opened, and a lady\nentered the chamber.\n\nWas _that_ Margery Lovell?  Never, surely, were hers that feeble step,\nthat worn, wan, white face, that dark ring round the eyes, telling of\nweary vigils, and of bitter weeping!  But the smile of welcome was\nMargery Lovell's own, and the gesture, as she came forward quickly,\nholding out both hands, was hers also; though the smile died away in an\ninstant, and the worn, wearied look came back instead.\n\n\"Dear, good friend!\" she said, \"how it gladdeth me to see you!  You come\nstraightway from Lovell Tower?  My father and mother be well?  And\nMistress Katherine, and Cicely, and all the maidens?  And Lyard, and old\nBeaudesert?  (naming her palfrey and the watchdog).  And all mine old\nfriends--Sir Ralph Marston, and Master Carew?\"\n\nRichard smiled a grave, almost mournful smile.\n\n\"You ask too many questions, good my Lady, to be answered in a breath.\nBut Dame Lovell is in health, and greets you well by me, bidding you be\nassured ever of her love and blessing.\"\n\n\"And my father?  O Master Pynson, my father! my father!\"\n\nShe sat down, and buried her face in her hands, and wept; for though\nRichard had made no answer in words, his face told his tidings too\nunmistakably.  Sir Geoffrey Lovell was dead.  After a time Margery\nlooked up whiter and more wan than ever, and begged to know the\nparticulars of her father's death.  Richard informed her that Sir\nGeoffrey had been taken ill three days only before he died; they had\nimmediately summoned Master Carew, who was a physician, and who had\npronounced that since he could not live many days, it would be useless\nto send for his daughter, who could not possibly reach Lovell Tower in\ntime to see him alive.  Dame Lovell was well in health, but had quite\nlost her old cheerfulness, and appeared to feel her husband's death very\nacutely.  It had been arranged that Friar Andrew should remain with Dame\nLovell as her confessor.  As to himself, Richard said that he should of\ncourse return to his father for a time, until he could by some act of\nbravery or special favour receive the honour of knighthood; but he did\nnot like to say anything to Dame Lovell about leaving her, so long as he\nsaw that he was of any use to her, as he knew that she regarded him in\nthe light of an adopted son, and had especially seemed to cling to him\nsince Margery's departure.\n\nMargery replied that she would have requested for him the favour of\nknighthood in a moment at the hands of Lord Marnell, but she did not\nlike to ask him for anything so long as he was displeased with her.\n\nRichard inquired after Lord Marnell.  Margery said he was well, and was\nwith the King at Havering-atte-Bower: but talking about him seemed to\nincrease her look of weariness and woe.  She turned the subject by\ninquiring again about her old friends.  Cicely and the maids, Richard\ntold her, were well; but old Beaudesert always howled whenever he was\nasked for Madge; and Lyard would stand switching his tail in the meadow,\nand looking wistfully at the house for the young mistress whom he must\nnever see again.\n\n\"You miss me, then, all?\" said Margery, mournfully.\n\n\"You will never know how sore,\" was Richard's answer.\n\nAnother pause ensued--there seemed some strange constraint between\nthem--and then Richard asked--\n\n\"And what tidings take I home, good my Lady?  Dame Lovell bade me have a\ncare to ask how you fared, and the child.  I grieve to hear from Alice\nJordan that _he_ fareth but evil, and for _you_--\"\n\nHe smiled the same grave smile.\n\n\"Well--_well_, Master Pynson,\" said Margery, quickly.  \"I fare well.  I\ncannot go where is not Christ, and where He is, howsoever I fare, I must\nneeds fare well.  And for the child--come and see him.\"\n\nShe led the way noiselessly to the adjoining room.  Little Geoffrey lay\nin Alice's arms in a heavy sleep.  His breathing was very quick and\nshort, and his face flushed and fevered.  Richard stood looking silently\nat him for a few minutes, and then returned with Margery to the oaken\nchamber.  She offered him refreshments, but he declined them.  He had\nsupped, he said, already; and ere breakfast-time, he looked to be on his\nway back to the North.  Margery wrote a short letter to Dame Lovell, and\nintrusted it to him; and then she sat by the table, wearily resting her\nhead upon her hand.\n\n\"I pray you, good my Lady,\" said Richard, suddenly, breaking the spell\nthat seemed to bind them, \"what meaneth this bruit [noise, rumour] of\nheresy that I hear of you?\"\n\nMargery looked up with a strange light in her eyes.\n\n\"You remember, I trow, asking Master Carew for to lend me yon book?--and\nwending with me to hear Master Sastre's homily?\"\n\n\"I mind it well.\"\n\n\"_That_ meaneth it.  That because I read Christ's words, and love them,\nand do them, so far as in my poor power lieth, the charge of heresy is\nlaid at my door.  And I ween they will carry it on to the end.\"\n\n\"_The end_?\" said Richard, tremblingly,--for he guessed what that meant,\nand the idea of Margery being subjected to a long and comfortless\nimprisonment, was almost more than he could bear.  His own utter\npowerlessness to save her was a bitter draught to drink.\n\n\"Ay, the end!\" she said, with the light spreading all over her face.\n\"Mind you not how Master Sastre asked us if we could sue the Lamb along\nthe weary and bitter road?  Is it an evil thing to sue the Lamb, though\nHe lead over a few rugged stones which be lying in the path?  Nay,\nfriend, I am ready for the suing, how rough soever the way be.\"\n\nRichard sat looking at her in silence.  He had always thought her half\nan angel, and now he thought her so more than ever.\n\n\"I trow you know these things, good friend?\" said Margery, with her sad,\nfaint smile.  \"You know, is it not, how good is Christ?\"\n\n\"I am assaying for to know,\" answered Richard, huskily.  \"I have been\na-reading of Master Carew's book, since I found you counted it so great\na thing.  Oft-times have Master Carew and I sat reading of that book\nwhenever I could make an errand unto his neighbourhood; and he hath\ntaught me many things.  But I cannot say yet that I be where you be,\nMistress Margery,\" he added, calling her by the old familiar title, \"or\nthat I know Christ as friendly as you seem to know Him.\"\n\n\"Then,\" said Margery, earnestly, \"let not go your grasp till you have\nfast hold of Him.  Ah! what matter how soon or how sore cometh the end,\nif `_whanne He hath loued Hise that ben in the world, into the ende He\nloueth them_.'  [John xiii. 1.] O dear friend, count not anything lost\nif thou keepest Christ His love!  If He shall come unto thee and say of\naught by which thou settest store, as He did say unto Peter, `_Louest_\n_thou me more than these_?' let thine answer be his, `_Che, Lord, Thou\nwoost that I loue Thee_!'  [John xxi. 15.] Oh count not aught too rare\nor too brave for to give Christ!  `_He that loueth his lyf schal leese\nit; and he that hatith his lyf in this world, kepith it unto\neverlastinge lyf_.'  [John xii. 25.] No man loseth by that chepe\n[exchange, bargain] of life worldly for life everlasting.  Never shall\nthe devils have leave to say, `Behold here a man who hath lost by\nChrist!'\"\n\n\"Must we needs give Christ _all_?\" said Richard, in an unsteady tone.\n\n\"Is there a thing that thou wouldst keep from Him?--a thing that thou\nlovest more than thou lovest Him?  Then it will be no marvel that thou\nshouldst lose the same.  Trust me, if His heart be set on thee, He will\neither have thy heart away from it by thy good will, or will have it\naway from thy heart by bitter rending and sorrow.  And alas for that man\nwho hath no portion in Christ His heart!\"\n\nRichard answered almost in a whisper, and bent forward to take Margery's\nhand as he did so.  The spell was fully broken now.\n\n\"There was only one thing, and He hath taken it.  Margery, I loved\n_you_.  I had given readily all else but you.  And I trow you will count\nit but a sorry [poor, unworthy] giving, wherein the heart goeth not with\nthe hands.\"\n\nShe turned her head hastily away, and made no answer; but he felt her\nhand grow deathly cold in his own.  He dropped it, and rose--and so did\nshe.  She went with him to the door; and there, as she offered her hand\nfor a farewell greeting, she spoke--\n\n\"Richard, God hath parted thee and me, and whatsoever God doth He doth\nwed.  If it were as thou sayest, there was need thereof.  When children\ncome home to their father's house from afar, I trow they fall not\na-bewailing that they had not leave to come in company.  And if only we\nmay clasp hands at the gate of the _Urbs Beata_, I trow well that we\nshall count it no great matter, good friend, that we saw but little the\none of the other on the journey!\"\n\nRichard kissed her hand, and then she drew it from him, and softly\npassed into her darkened nursery.  For a moment he stood looking after\nher.  \"Please God, we will, Margery!\" he said to himself, at length.\nThen he ran lightly down the stairs, and old Christopher rose at the\nsound of his step to open the door for him.\n\nAnd so Richard Pynson and Margery Marnell parted, never more to speak to\neach other on this side of the Happy City.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nNote 1.  Any reader acquainted with mediaeval hymns will recognise in\nthis--\n\n\"Urbs coelestis! urbs beata!  Super petram collocata.\"\n\nI have translated a few lines of the hymn for the benefit of the English\nreader; but my heroine must be supposed to sing it in the original\nLatin.\n\nNote 2.  \"Sweetening\" was a process to which our forefathers were\ncompelled by their want of drains, and consisted in leaving a house\nentirely empty for a time, to have the windows opened, the rushes\nrenewed, and to adroit of a general purification.  Families who had the\nmeans generally \"went to sweeten\" at least every summer.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER SEVEN.\n\nBEREAVEMENT, BUT NOT DEATH.\n\n  \"Take from me anything Thou wilt,\n  But go not _Thou_ away!\"\n\nLittle Geoffrey slowly recovered from the illness which had brought him\nto death's door, and though able to run about the house, he was still\nfar from perfect health, when Margery received orders to prepare for\nanother interview with Abbot Bilson.  She rightly divined that this\nwould be more stormy than the last.  Abbot Bilson came now fully\nprepared, and not alone.  He was accompanied by Archbishop Arundel, a\nman of violent passions, and a bitter persecutor of all whom he\nconceived to lean to the opinions of Wycliffe.  When Margery entered the\nroom, and saw the Archbishop, she trembled, as well she might.  She\nmeekly knelt and asked their blessing--the manner in which priests were\ncommonly greeted.  The Abbot gave his, saying, \"May God bless thee, and\nlead thee unto the truth!\"\n\n\"Amen!\" responded Margery.  Arundel, however, refused his benediction\nuntil he had inquired into the matter.\n\n\"Be seated, my daughter!\" said the Abbot.  Margery obeyed.\n\n\"Holy Church, daughter, hath been sore aggrieved by thine evil doing.\nShe demandeth of thee an instant yielding of yon heretical and\npernicious book, the which hath led thee astray; and a renunciation of\nthy heresy; the which done, thou shalt receive apostolic absolution and\nbenediction.\"\n\n\"I know not, reverend father, what ye clepe [call] heresy.  Wherein have\nI sinned?\"\n\n\"In the reading of yon book, and in thy seldom confession.  Moreover, I\ntrow thou holdest with the way of John Wycliffe, yon evil reprobate!\"\nreplied the Archbishop.\n\n\"I cry you mercy, reverend fathers.  I take my belief from no man.  I\ncrede [believe] the words of Christ as I find the same written, and\nconcern not myself with Master Wycliffe or any other.  I know not any\nLollards, neither have I allied myself unto them.\"\n\nThe Archbishop and the Abbot both looked at Lord Marnell--a mute inquiry\nas to whether Margery spoke the truth.\n\n\"I ween it is so, reverend fathers,\" said he.  \"I wis nought of my wife\nher manner of living ere I wedded her, but soothly sithence [since] she\ncame hither, I know of a surety that she hath never companied with any\nsuch evil persons as be these Lollards.\"\n\n\"Hold you _not_ with the way of Wycliffe, daughter?\" inquired the Abbot.\n\n\"I wis not, reverend father,\" answered she, \"for of a truth I know not\nwherein it lieth.  I hold that which I find in the book; and I trow an'\nI keep close by the words of Christ, I cannot stray far from truth.\"\n\n\"The words in yon book be no words of Christ!\" said Arundel.  \"That evil\none Wycliffe, being taught of the devil, hath rendered the holy words of\nthe Latin into pernicious heresy in English.\"\n\n\"I pray you then, father, will you give me the book in Latin, for I wis\na little the Latin tongue, and moreover I can learn of one that hath the\ntongues to wit better the same.\"\n\nThis was not by any means what Arundel intended, and it raised his\nanger.\n\n\"I will not give thee the Latin!\" exclaimed he.  \"I forbid thee to read\nor learn the same, for I well know thou wouldst wrest it to thine evil\npurposes.\"\n\n\"How can you put a right meaning to the words, my daughter?\" mildly\nsuggested the Abbot.\n\n\"I know well that I could in no wise do the same,\" replied Margery,\nhumbly, \"had I not read the promise of Christ Jesu that He would send\nunto His own `_thilk Spyryt of treuthe_,' who should `_teche them al\ntreuthe_,' [John xvi. 13] wherefore by His good help I trust I shall\nread aright.\"\n\n\"That promise was given, daughter, unto the holy apostles.\"\n\n\"It was given, reverend father, unto weak men and evil, else Peter had\nnever denied his Master, ne [neither] had all of them left Him and taken\nto flight, when the servants of the bishops [see Note 1] laid hold on\nHim.  I wis that I have an evil heart like as they had, but meseemeth\nthat mine is not worser than were theirs, wherefore I count that promise\nmade unto myself also.\"\n\n\"Thou art lacking in meekness, Madge,\" said Lord Marnell.\n\n\"I trust not so, good my Lord; but an' if I be, I pray God to give it to\nme.\"\n\n\"Give up the book, Madge!\" said her husband, apparently desirous to\nallay the storm which he had raised, \"and thou shalt then receive\nabsolution, and all will go well.\"\n\n\"I will give up the book, my Lord, in obedience to you,\" replied\nMargery, \"for I wis well that wives be bounden to obey their husbands;\nand soothly it is no great matter, for I know every word therein.  But\nunder your good leave, my Lord, the truth which this book hath taught\nme, neither you nor any other man shall have power to take from me, for\nit is of God, and not of men!\"\n\nShe drew the book from her pocket--ladies wore much larger pockets in\nthose days than they now do--kissed it, and handed it to her husband.\n\n\"Thou hast well done, Madge!\" said Lord Marnell, more kindly than\nbefore, as he passed the book to the Archbishop.  Arundel, with a\nmuttered curse upon all evil teaching, took the book from Lord Marnell\nwith his hand folded in the corner of his gown, as if he thought its\nvery touch would communicate pollution, and flung it into the fire.  The\nfire was a large one, and in a minute the volume was consumed.  Margery\nwatched the destruction of her treasure with swimming eyes.\n\n\"Burn, poor book!\" she said, falteringly, \"and as thy smoke goeth up to\nGod, leave it tell Him that the reading and the loving of His Word is\naccounted a sin by those who ought to be His pastors.\"\n\n\"Woman, wilt not hear the truth?\" cried Arundel.\n\n\"Truly, father, I have heard it, and it shall rest with me unto my dying\nday.  But I trow that if your teaching were truth, ye had never burned\nwith fire the Word of Christ, who hath power, if ye repent not, to\nconsume you also with the like!\"\n\n\"Told I not thee that the evil book which I gave to the fire was not\nChrist His Word, but the work of the devil?\"\n\n\"Yea, truly; and the like said the heathen Jews, `_Wher we seyen not wel\nthat thou art a Samaritan, and hast a deuel_?'  But I find not that\ntheir saying the same made it ever the truer.  What saith Christ in\nanswer?  `_I haue not a deuel; but I honoure my Fadir, and ye han\nunhonourid me_.'\" [John viii. 48, 49.]\n\n\"My daughter,\" said the Abbot, with even more than his usual gentleness,\n\"I misdoubt greatly that you be obstinate in your error.  And if this be\nso, we shall have necessity of deeds the which we should sore lament.\nYou wit, doubtless, that in case you continue thus obstinate, you will\nbe had up afore the King's Grace's Council?\"\n\n\"I am ready,\" answered Margery.\n\n\"You wit also,\" pursued the Abbot, no less gently, \"that you may be\nsentenced unto close prison for such time as pleaseth the King's Grace?\"\n\n\"I am ready,\" said Margery again.\n\nHer examiners looked surprised.\n\n\"Moreover,\" continued the Abbot, in a softer tone than ever, \"wit you\nthat we can allow you no longer to have the charge and teaching of your\nson, who must needs be instructed in the true faith?\"\n\nThe end of the reverend fathers was at length reached.  The quiet words\nof the Abbot produced an effect which the furious abuse of the\nArchbishop had been unable to accomplish.  A cry of mingled terror,\nanguish, and despair, broke from poor Margery's lips.\n\n\"Ye could not--ye could not be so cruel!\" she sobbed.  \"Take from me all\nI have in this world--comfort, freedom, yea, life--only leave me my\nchild!\"\n\n\"Thou seest what thou hast brought on thyself!\" said Arundel.  \"How can\nwe, being the ministers of God His truth, suffer the mind of yon\ninnocent child to be poisoned with like evil doctrine?\"\n\n\"Doth God part the child from the mother?\" faltered Margery.  \"This is\nnone of His doing.  My darling! my darling!\"\n\nLord Marnell pitied his wife.  Her agony touched all that was soft and\ngentle in his not too soft heart.\n\n\"Well, well, Madge!\" he said, kindly; \"I will see that thy child is not\ntaken from thee, if thou wilt obey these reverend fathers in confessing\nof thine error, and wilt humbly beg absolution at their hands.\"\n\nMargery looked up at her husband with an expression of unutterable\ngratitude beaming in her eyes--but the moment she heard his if, her face\nfell instantly.\n\n\"I conceive you, good my Lord,\" she said, mournfully, \"howsoever I thank\nyou.  You will give me back my darling, if I will deny that I hold\nChrist His truth.  I cannot.  I dare not!\"\n\n\"`Christ His truth,' persist you in calling your heresy!\" cried Arundel,\nin a fury.  \"Choose, then, quickly, for the last time, betwixt `Christ\nHis truth' and your child!\"\n\nShe shivered from head to foot as if an ague-fit were on her, and her\nsobs almost mounted to a scream.  No heart that had any pretension to\nhumanity could have helped pitying her.  Her husband did pity her; but\nArundel was carried away by passion, and Bilson had no heart.  Through\nall this tempest, however agonised, firm and unwavering came the\nanswer--\n\n\"Christ!\"\n\nArundel, rising, ordered her to kneel.  Margery knelt down on the\nhearth, her hands clasped on her breast, and her eyes looking up to\nheaven.  Solemnly, and with all that terrific majesty which the Church\nof Rome so well knows how to put into her threats and denunciations, the\nArchbishop cited her to appear before the council on the 17th day of the\nfollowing September.  In the meantime she was to be confined in one of\nthe State dungeons.  Arundel graciously added that he would give her the\nremainder of that day to make her preparations.  Lord Marnell here\ninterposed, and begged the Archbishop to reconsider his decision.  He\nhad anticipated Margery's examination by the council, and possibly her\nbeing sentenced to a term of imprisonment, but he had not bargained for\nthis previous incarceration.  Arundel bluntly refused to alter his\nsentence.\n\nMargery raised her tearful eyes to Lord Marnell.  \"My Lord,\" she said,\n\"and you, reverend fathers, I have one small thing to ask of you.  I\npray you deny me not.\"\n\n\"What is it, Madge?\" asked Lord Marnell.\n\n\"My good Lord,\" she said, pleadingly, \"suffer me to take one last kiss\nof my child, ere ye take me where I shall see him no more!\"\n\nThe Abbot seemed disposed to grant Margery's petition, though the\nArchbishop demurred; but Lord Marnell settled the matter by\nauthoritatively commanding that the mother should be permitted to take\nleave of her child.  Arundel, with rather a bad grace, gave way on this\nsecondary point.  Margery was then dismissed.\n\nShe went up-stairs as if she were walking in a dream, and found Alice\nhiding behind the door for the amusement of little Geoffrey, who was in\nhigh glee.  Margery stood a moment on the threshold, looking at them,\nand mournfully thinking that it was the last time she would ever look on\nthat sunny little face, or hear that silvery laugh.  As she stood there,\nAlice caught sight of her mistress, and her share of the mirth ceased\ninstantly.\n\n\"My Lady! my Lady! what have you, I pray you tell me?  You look as if\nsentence of death had been passed on you!\"\n\nMargery passed her hand dreamily across her brow.\n\n\"Sentence, good Alice, of the evil which is in death!\" she said, softly,\n\"and henceforth death must needs be a glad thing.  But that is to come\nyet.\"\n\nShe sat down, and took the child on her knee, and he nestled his little\ngolden head into her bosom.  For a few minutes she rocked herself and\nhim to and fro in silence, but at length her voice came, and though it\ntrembled a little, it was almost as quiet and silvery as usual.\n\n\"Geoffrey, dost love me?\"\n\n\"Yes, mother, very much.\"\n\n\"Poor child! how wilt do without me!\"\n\n\"Go you hence, mother?\"\n\n\"Yes, my child, I go hence.  Geoffrey, wilt mind ever what I now say\nunto thee?  Wilt never, never forget it, but ever keep it fresh and\nshene, and think thereof whenever thou dost think of me?\"\n\n\"Yes, mother, I shan't forget.\"\n\n\"Alice, thou wilt help him to remember, good lass, if thou be not taken\nfrom him.\"\n\n\"That will I, good my Lady,\" said Alice, sobbing, and only comprehending\nthat something painful had happened.\n\n\"Geoffrey, darling, thou wilt be a good child to thy father?\"\n\n\"I'll try, mother, but--he frighteth me.\"\n\nMargery sighed heavily.\n\n\"List me now, my heart.  Dost remember what I told thee about Jesus\nChrist?\"\n\nGeoffrey answered that he did.\n\n\"Right, my heart.  And lovest Jesus Christ, who died for thee?\"\n\n\"Yes, mother, I love Him and you.\"\n\nThe child's innocent answer nearly upset Margery's half-assumed\ncalmness.  She rocked him a minute longer in silence.  \"Remember, mine\nown sweet heart, ever that nothing but Jesus can save thee.  Thou canst\nnot save thyself.  Beg of Him with all thine heart that He will save\nthee, and love Him all thy life long, even unto _the end_.\"\n\nShe ceased an instant.\n\n\"Now, sweet heart, kiss me.  Give me a brave kiss, mine own--it is the\nlast.  Never shall we kiss again till we kiss in the Happy City!\nFare-thee-well, dearly beloved!  God have thee in His holy keeping!  God\nteach thee what I cannot--what I by reason of mine ignorance know not,\nor what thou by reason of thy tender years canst not yet conceive.  God\nforgive thee thy sins, and help thee in all trouble and woe, and bring\nthee to that blessed home where I shall see thee again, and where they\nsin not, nor grieve, neither part any more!\"\n\nMargery gently detached herself from the child's embrace, and set him\ndown.  She desired Alice to take him away, and then to return and assist\nher in matters respecting which she would tell her particulars when she\nshould have removed the child.  She stood looking after the boy as Alice\nled him away, and he turned his head to say, \"God be wi' ye!\"  [See Note\n2].\n\n\"Never again! never again!\" said Margery to herself in a half-whisper.\n\"The worst part of death is over!  I have nothing left now but Christ.\"\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nNote 1.  Wycliffe always renders \"Bisschopis\" the word translated \"chief\npriests\" in the authorised version.\n\nNote 2.  The farewell phrase which has in modern times been shortened\ninto \"good-bye.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER EIGHT.\n\nA LODGING ON THE COLD GROUND.\n\n  \"Christ is at hand to scorn or bless--\n  Christ suffers in our strife.\"\n\n  Christian Year.\n\nIn the evening, as previously ordered, Margery quitted Marnell Place in\nher litter for her prison in the Tower.  The jailer stared at her, as\nAbbot Bilson, who accompanied her, gave her into his charge, and\nwhisperingly asked the reason for which she was to be incarcerated.\n\n\"Heresy, good friend.\"\n\n\"Heresy!\" said the jailer, staring more than ever.  \"What pity for one\nso marvellous young!  Poor lady! it sorroweth me!\"\n\nWhen Margery was at length locked in, she had time to look round her\nprison.  It was a small, square, whitewashed cell, completely\nunfurnished; all the furniture had to be brought from Marnell Place.\nNot much was allowed.  A mattress and blanket by way of bed, a stool,\nand a crucifix, were the only articles permitted.  The barred window was\nvery small, and very high up.  Here Margery was to remain until\nSeptember.  The days rolled wearily on.  Lord Marnell occasionally\nvisited her; but not often, and he was her sole visitor.  The jailer,\nfor a jailer, was rather kind to his prisoner, whom he evidently pitied;\nand one day he told her, as he brought her the prison allowance for\nsupper, that \"strange things\" were taking place in the political world.\nThere was a rumour in London that \"my Lord of Hereford\" had returned to\nEngland before his period of banishment was over, and had possessed\nhimself of the person of King Richard at Flint Castle.\n\n\"What will he do?\" asked Margery.  \"Soothly I wis not,\" answered the\njailer.  \"I trow he will make himself king.  Any way, I trust it may hap\nfor your Ladyship's good, for it is the wont to release prisoners at the\nbeginning of a new reign.\"\n\nShortly after that, Henry of Bolingbroke fulfilled the jailer's\nprediction, so far as regarded his kingship.  He led Richard in triumph\nthrough London, with every dishonour and indignity which his own evil\nnature could devise; then consigned him to Pontefract to die and sat\ndown on his throne.  _How_ Richard died, Henry best knew.  Thus closed\nthe life and reign of that most ill-treated and loving-hearted man, at\nthe early age of thirty-three.  The little Queen, a widow at eleven, was\nsent back to France--her matchless collection of jewels being retained\nby Henry.  Few men have had more reason to describe themselves as Henry\nIV does in his will--\"I, Henry, _sinful wretch_.\"  [See Note 1.]\n\nThe change of monarchs, however, brought no change for Lady Marnell.  If\nanything, it was the worse for her; for Abbot Bilson was a personal\nfriend of the new King, who was far more violently opposed to the\nLollards than his predecessor had been.\n\nOn the 16th of September, 1400, Lord Marnell was just quitting Margery's\ncell, when the jailer admitted Abbot Bilson, who courteously greeted\nLord Marnell, and replied rather more coldly to the salutation of his\nprisoner.\n\n\"Good morrow, my Lord.  Have you induced this wretched girl to see the\nerror of her ways?\"\n\n\"I assayed it not,\" said Lord Marnell, somewhat sulkily.  \"Farewell,\nMadge,--I will see thee again ere long.\"\n\n\"Farewell, good my Lord,\" said Margery, and for the first time in her\nlife she was sorry to see her husband go.  The truth was, that Lord\nMarnell felt so much vexed with his spiritual advisers, that he was\nseriously afraid, if he remained, of saying something which might cause\nhis own imprisonment.  The jailer locked the door after him, and the\nAbbot and Margery were left together.\n\n\"You have had time, daughter, to think over your sin, in penitence and\nprayer.  Are you yet conscious that you have committed a grievous sin?\"\n\n\"No, father.\"\n\n\"No are?  [i.e., Are you not?] I grieve to hear it.  Fear you not the\nban of Holy Church?\"\n\n\"I fear it not, so Christ confirm it not; He did warn me afore of the\nsame.  `_Thei schulen make ghou withouten the synagogis; but the our\ncometh, that ech man that sleeth ghou deme that he doith seruyse to\nGod_.'\" [John xvi. 2.]\n\n\"Cease thy endless quotations from Scripture!\" cried the Abbot, waxing\nwroth, and forgetting his civilities.\n\nBut Margery only replied by another--\"`_He that is of God herith the\nwordis of God; therefore ye heren not for ye be not of God_.'\" [John\nviii. 47.]\n\n\"Take the curse of the Church, miserable reprobate!\" cried Bilson,\nlosing all command of himself, and smiting her in the face.\n\n\"Take you heed,\" was the answer, \"that you bring not on yourself the\ncurse of Christ, who is the Head and Lord of the Church, for He\nsuffereth not lightly that His sheep be ill handled.\"\n\n\"Aroint thee, sorceress!\" said the abbot.  \"I am no sorceress,\" replied\nMargery, quietly, \"neither do I use evil arts; I speak unto you in the\nwords of Christ--bear you the sin if you will not hear.  But lo! it is\neven that which is written, `_He hath blyndid her yghen_ [their eyes],\n_and he hath maad hard the herte of hem; that thei see not with yghen,\nand undirstonde with herte, and that thei be conuertid, and I heele\nhem_.'\" [John xii. 40.]\n\nThe abbot could bear no more.  He struck her furiously--a blow which\nstretched her senseless on the stone floor of the cell.  Having by this\nprimitive means silenced Margery's \"endless quotations,\" he let himself\nout with a private key.\n\nWhen Lord Marnell returned to the prison that evening, he found Margery\nin what he supposed to be a swoon.  He summoned the jailer, and through\nhim sent for a physician, who applied restoratives, but told Lord\nMarnell at once that Margery had fallen, and had received a heavy blow\non the head.  By the united care of the physician and her husband, she\nslowly returned to consciousness: not, however, fully so at first, for\nshe murmured, \"Mother!\"  When Lord Marnell bent over her and spoke to\nher, she suddenly recognised him as if awaking from a dream.  Yes, she\nreplied to their inquiries, she had certainly fallen, and she thought\nshe had hurt her head; but she would not tell them that the cause of the\nfall was a passionate blow from the Abbot's hand.  The physician asked\nwhen her examination was to take place; and on Lord Marnell replying,\n\"To-morrow,\" he shook his head, and said she would not be able to\nappear.\n\n\"Oh ay, ay, let me go!\" said Margery, \"I would not have delay therein.\nI shall be better by morn, and--\"\n\nBut as she spoke she fainted away, and the doctor, turning to Lord\nMarnell, said--\n\n\"She is no wise fit for it, poor lady!  The inquiry must needs be\ndelayed, and the blame thereof be mine own.\"\n\n\"Then I pray you,\" replied Lord Marnell, \"to say the same unto the\ncouncil; for they heed not me.\"\n\nHe answered that he would go to them as soon as he thought that his\npatient required no further professional assistance.  Margery seemed\nbetter shortly, and Master Simon, for such was the doctor's name,\nrepaired at once to the council charged with the examination of\nprisoners accused of heresy, and told them that their State prisoner,\nthe Lady Marnell, was very ill in her dungeon, and would not be able to\nappear before them for at least some weeks to come.  Arundel, who\npresided, only laughed.  The doctor insisted.\n\n\"Why,\" said be, \"the poor lady is sickening for a fever; let her alone:\nhow can a woman light-headed answer questions upon doctrine and heresy?\"\n\nThe council, governed by Arundel, still seemed unwilling to grant the\nprayer; when, to the surprise of every one present, Abbot Bilson, the\nprincipal witness for the Crown, rose and supported the petition.  The\npuzzled council accordingly granted it.  Arundel was very much under\nBilson's influence, and Bilson had a private reason for his conduct,\nwhich will presently appear.\n\nSo the examination was adjourned until February, and Margery, released\nfor the moment from the struggle with her enemies, was left to combat\nthe fever which had seized her.  Lord Marnell and Master Simon begged\nfor an order of the council to remove poor Margery home, the latter\nasserting that she would never recover in the Tower.  The council\nrefused this application.  They then requested that one of her\nwaiting-women should be allowed to attend her, and that bedding and\nlinen, with such other necessaries as Master Simon might deem fit, might\nbe supplied to the prisoner from her own house.  The council, after a\nprivate consultation among its members, thought fit to grant this\nreasonable prayer.\n\nAlice Jordan was made very happy by an order from Lord Marnell to attend\nher sick mistress.  Everything that Marnell Place could furnish, which\nMaster Simon did not absolutely forbid,--and Master Simon was easy of\npersuasion--was lavished on the whitewashed cell in the Tower.  Alice,\nhowever, was carefully searched every time she passed in and out of the\nTower, to see that she supplied no books nor writing-materials to the\nprisoner, nor took any letters from her.  Poor Margery! the care was\nneedless, for she was just then as incapable of writing as if she had\nnever been taught.\n\nMargery's illness lasted even longer than Master Simon had anticipated.\nOn a dark, cold winter night, when snow was falling thickly outside the\nprison, and a low rushlight burned on the table, dimly lighting up the\nnarrow cell, Margery unexpectedly whispered, \"Who is there?\"\n\n\"I, dear mistress--Alice Jordan.\"\n\n\"Alice Jordan!  Where then am I?  Or was it all a terrible dream?  Is\nthis Lovell Tower?\"  Alice's voice trembled as she said, \"No.\"\n\n\"What then?  Oh!  I know now.  It is the Tower of London, and the end\ncometh nigh.\"\n\n\"Nay, dearest mistress, you fare marvellous better now.\"\n\n\"I mean not the fever-death, good friend, but _the end_--the end of my\nweary pilgrimage, the gate of the Happy City.  Welcome be the end of the\nway, for the way hath been a rough one and a sore!  However sharp be the\nend, I can bear it now.  My soul hath been loosed from earth.  I see\nnothing now, I want nothing but Christ, and to be with Him in the glory.\nAlice, how fareth the child?  I dared not to ask afore, since I came\ninto this place, but I can now.\"\n\n\"I trow he fareth well, good mistress, but of a long season I have not\nseen him.  My Lord hath sent him unto the care of Dame Lovell.\"\n\nMargery's eyes, rather than her voice, expressed her pleasure at this\nnews.\n\n\"Hath my Lord my husband been here sithence I took sick?\"\n\n\"Every day, my Lady; and I trow he sent away the boy for that reason,\nlest his coming hither should give him the sickness.\"\n\n\"Knoweth my mother of my sickness?\"\n\n\"I wis not, my Lady, but I trow that my Lord would tell her, when he\nsent the child down with Master Pynson.\"\n\n\"Master Pynson!  Hath he been hither?\"\n\n\"Yea, good my Lady, he came up, I ween, on Saint Luke's Day [October\n18], and took back the young master with him.\"\n\n\"What said he when ye told him of my prison, Alice?\"\n\n\"He covered his face, and wept sore.\"\n\nMargery turned her face to the wall.  \"A fiery trial!\" she murmured, as\nif to herself--\"a fiery trial for him as well as me!  Is this the way\nwherein the Father will draw him?  If so, Richard, I can bear it.\"\n\nThe 16th of February came.  On the morning of that day, as Lord Marnell\nstepped out of his own house into the open air, with the intention of\npaying his usual visit to Margery, Abbot Bilson came up, radiant and\nsmiling, and carrying under his arm a large parchment roll.\n\n\"Ah, my very good Lord, well met!  Whither away?\"\n\n\"I purpose to see Madge.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" exclaimed the Abbot, who was occupied with an amusement which\ncomes naturally to men of his disposition, and has been wittily denned\nas \"washing one's hands with invisible soap, in imperceptible water.\"\n\n\"What hast under thine arm, reverend father?\" asked Lord Marnell.\n\n\"Ah! this is the indictment of the Lady Marnell.  Your Lordship witteth\nthat she will be examined to-morrow afore the council, and by them\nsentenced.\"\n\n\"You will endeavour yourself, reverend father, that the sentence be made\nas light as may be.\"\n\n\"My Lord, we have but one sentence for heretics,\" said Abbot Bilson,\nwith a smile which showed all his teeth, like a wild beast.  \"The Act\nregarding them was yestermorn sceptred by the King's Grace.\"\n\n\"One!\" remarked Lord Marnell, in some surprise.  \"The sentence now,\nthen, is--?\"\n\n\"_Death_.\"\n\nLord Marnell hastily laid his hand on a buttress, to steady himself,\nwhen he heard this awful news.\n\n\"You have deceived me, father!  You have deceived me!\" he cried.  \"You\ntold me, some months gone, when first I called you into this matter,\nthat the sentence on heretics was prison.\"\n\n\"My good Lord, I pray you remember that I told you but a moment back,\nthat the new Act is just passed.  Ere that the sentence truly was close\nprison; but now--\"\n\nOn finding himself thus inveigled by the cunning of Abbot Bilson, Lord\nMarnell was beside himself with passion.  He burst into a torrent of the\nmost fearful language.  Abbot Bilson stood calmly by, as if quite\naccustomed to such scenes.\n\n\"My good Lord, I pray you blaspheme not, or I must needs appoint you a\nsore penance,\" was all that he mildly observed.\n\nLord Marnell recovered himself by a strong effort, and asked, as\npolitely as he could, what description of death was commanded by the new\nAct.\n\n\"Burning or beheading, at the pleasure of the King's Grace,\" replied the\nAbbot, as unconcernedly as though the choice in question lay between a\ncouple of straws.\n\n\"My wife, being a peeress, will of force be beheaded?\"\n\n\"Likely, I trow,\" replied the Abbot, drawing his cowl closer over his\nhead, as a cold blast of wind came up the street.\n\n\"Father, you must use all effort that the sentence be so pronounced, if\nthe King's Grace remit it not.\"\n\n\"The King's Grace remitteth never sentence on heretics,\" said Bilson,\nwith another of his disagreeable smiles.  \"He is much too true and\nfaithful son of Holy Church therefor.  And as to my poor efforts, my\nLord--\"\n\n\"You _can_, and you _shall_,\" wrathfully answered Lord Marnell, and, not\nto prolong the contest, walked rapidly away.\n\nAbbot Bilson stood looking after him, with an expression on his face not\nunlike that which a triumphant demon might be supposed to exhibit.\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nNote 1.  Henry had previously conspired against the King three times,\nand had even plotted the death of his own father.  His father sentenced\nhim to death, and if Richard had not interposed, Henry would not have\nlived to depose his benefactor.  \"How true is the saying,\" cried poor\nRichard in his agony, \"that we have no greater enemy than the man whom\nwe save from the gallows!\"--See Creton's MS.  Bibl.  Imp. 8448-2\n_Ambassades_.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER NINE.\n\nAN OBDURATE HERETIC.\n\n  \"Great your strength, if great your need.\"\n\n  Henry Kirke White.\n\nIn the evening of the same day, the council sent a physician to report\non the prisoner's health.  Not gentle Master Simon, but a stern,\niron-handed, iron-hearted man, from whom Margery and Alice shrank\ninstinctively.  The physician reported that the Lady Marnell had\nundoubtedly been very ill, but was now better, and ailed nothing but\nweakness; he accordingly recommended that the examination should take\nplace, but that the prisoner, in consideration of her extreme debility,\nshould be indulged with a seat.  Master Simon tried hard to obtain a\nlittle further postponement; but this time the powerful Abbot was\nagainst him, and he gained nothing by his motion.  So, on the morning of\nthe 17th, Margery rose from her sick-bed to appear before the council.\nLord Marnell, who had lately shown her extraordinary kindness, as though\nwith the view of undoing, so far as lay in his power, the evil which his\nrash, though well-meant conduct had originally created, assisted his\nwife into her litter, and rode beside it during the short journey.  On\narriving at the door, where they found a steep flight of steps to mount,\nLord Marnell would not allow Margery to try her strength, but carried\nher up in his arms.  He knew, and so did she, that she would need all\nthe strength she could muster for the trial which was to come.  The\ncouncil-chamber was hung with red cloth, and the benches appropriated to\nspectators were filled to overflowing.  For one moment Margery shrank\nback at the sight of so many strange faces; and a faint tinge of colour\nmounted to her pale cheek as Lord Marnell led her forward to her chair.\nIn the president's seat was the Archbishop of Canterbury, and on his\nleft hand Abbot Bilson.  Several abbots, priors, and other legal and\necclesiastical dignitaries, made up the remainder of the council.\n\nFor eight weary hours, with very short intervals for refreshment, they\nkept that fragile prisoner before them, and all the time she never\nquailed, nor evaded any of their questions.  Twice Master Simon\ninterfered, and begged that wine might be given her, or he would not\nanswer for her further recovery; and once she herself asked for a glass\nof water, and for a few minutes seemed about to faint.\n\nAbbot Bilson came out in his true colours at this examination.  He was\nno longer the mild, persuasive teacher; he now showed himself the\nunforgiving revenger.  The Archbishop pressed the prisoner hard with\nquestions, many of them irrevelant to the indictment; and most of the\nother members of the Council put queries to her.\n\nThey inquired, amongst other things, if she believed that in the\nSacrament of the Lord's Supper the bread and wine became the very body\nand blood of Christ.\n\n\"Nay, certes,\" was Margery's answer.  \"For if Christ, being in life,\ncould hold His own body, and give the same unto His disciples, then were\nit no true human body, for a natural and true body cannot be in two\nseveral places at the self-same moment of time.  Moreover, if the bread\nof the host be verily the body of Christ, then did He eat His own body,\nand that is contrary to very reason.\"\n\n\"The mysteries of the faith be above reason,\" said Arundel.\n\n\"Of a truth, and farther above it, maybe, than we wit; but in no wise\ncontrary thereunto.\"\n\n\"Believe you in Purgatory?\"\n\n\"The Church teacheth the same, and I say not that it may not be true;\nbut I find it not in the book.\"\n\n\"Pray you unto the blessed Virgin Saint Mary, the holy angels, and the\nsaints?\"\n\n\"Soothly, no: it is not in the book.  `_Whateuer thing ye axen the Fadir\nin my name, I schal do that thing_,' saith Christ: but I hear not a word\nof `whatever thing ye shall ask Saint Michael, or Saint Anne.'\"\n\n\"Account you confession unto priests to be right or evil?\"\n\n\"It may be right--I wis not; but I saw it not in the book.  I pray you,\nreverend fathers, if any other part of God His book do name these\nthings, and give leave for the same, that you show it unto me, and\nthereupon I will believe them, but no else.\"\n\nThe above is, of course, a mere sample of the innumerable questions\nwhich were put to the prisoner.  Towards the close of the day, the\nArchbishop and abbots consulted together for a few minutes; and then\nArundel turned to the accused.\n\n\"Margery Marnell, Baroness Marnell of Lymington, the Court demands of\nyou whether you will put your name to this paper, and hold to all things\ntherein contained?\"\n\n\"Let me read the paper, my Lord Archbishop, and then I will give you an\nanswer.\"\n\nThe Archbishop did not wish her to read the paper; but Margery steadily\ndeclined to sign anything in the dark.  At length the council permitted\nit to be read to her.  It contained a promise to abjure all Lollard\ndoctrines, and to perform a severe penance, such as the council should\nlay on her, for the scandal which she had caused to the Church.  Margery\nat once refused to sign anything of the kind.  The Archbishop warned her\nthat in that case she must be prepared to submit to the capital\nsentence.\n\n\"Ye may sentence me,\" she said, in her clear voice, always distinct,\nhowever feeble, \"to what ye will.  I fear you not.  I wis ye have power\nto kill my body, but my soul never shall ye have power to touch.  That\nis Christ's, who witteth full well how to keep it; and to His blessed\nhands, not yours, I commit myself, body and soul.\"\n\nThe Archbishop then passed sentence.  The Court found Margery, Baroness\nMarnell of Lymington, guilty of all crimes whereof she stood indicted,\nand sentenced her to death by burning, in the open place called Tower\nHill, on the 6th day of March next ensuing.\n\nThe prisoner bowed her head when the sentence had been pronounced, and\nthen said as she rose, and stretched out her hand to Lord Marnell, who\ncame forward and supported her, \"I greatly fear, reverend fathers, that\nyour day is yet to come, when you shall receive sentence from a Court\nwhence there is no appeal, and shall be doomed to a dreader fire!\"\n\nWhen Lord Marnell had assisted his wife back into her dungeon, and laid\nher gently on the bed, he turned and shook his fist at the wall.\n\n\"If I, Ralph Marnell of Lymington, had thee here, Abbot Thomas Bilson--\"\n\n\"Thou wouldst forgive him, my good Lord,\" faintly said Margery.\n\n\"Who?  I?  Forgive _him_?  What a woman art thou, Madge!  Nay--by the\nbones of Saint Matthew, I would break every bone in his body!  Forsooth,\nMadge, those knaves the Archbishop and the Abbot have played me a scurvy\ntrick, and gone many times further than I looked for, when I called them\ninto this business.  But it is so always, as I have heard,--thy\nchirurgeon and thy confessor, if they once bear the hand in thy matters,\nwill never let thee go till they have choked thee.  I fear I shall have\nhard labour to get thee out of this scrape.  I will do all I can, be\nthou sure, but thou wist that I am not in favour with the new King as I\nwas with King Richard, whose soul God rest!  Madge, wilt forgive me,\nwife?\"\n\n\"With a very good will, my Lord,\" said Margery.  \"I wis well that thou\nwottedst not all that thou didst.\"\n\n\"Not I, by Saint James of Compostella!\" exclaimed Lord Marnell.  \"Were\nthe good King Richard alive and reigning, I would soon let both the\nArchbishop and the Abbot feel the place too hot for to hold them.  But I\ncan do nothing with Harry of Bolingbroke, looking, too, that he hateth\nthe Lollards as he hateth the devil--and a deal more, I trow, for I\ncount that that prince and he be old friends,\" added Lord Marnell, with\nan air of great disgust.\n\nMargery smiled gravely.  She felt sorry for her husband, who she saw was\nvery miserable himself at the unexpected result of his conduct; but she\ndid not allow herself for an instant to hope that he could save her.\n\n\"Mine own good Lord,\" she said, \"I pray you torment not yourself in\nassaying my relief, neither in thinking that you be the cause of my\ntrouble; for I forgive you as freely as Christ hath forgiven me, and I\ncount that is free enough.\"\n\nLord Marnell stood leaning against the wall, and looking at Margery, who\nlay outside the bed.\n\n\"Of a truth, wife, I conceive thee not.  Thou art here in the Tower\ndungeon, and thou lookest for no good outcoming, and lo! thou art calm\nand peaceful as if thou wert on King Henry's throne!  What means it,\nMadge?\"\n\n\"I trow I am much happier here than I should be on King Henry's throne!\"\nanswered Margery, with a smile.  \"Christ is with me, good husband, and\nwhere Christ is, is peace.  `_Pees I leeue to ghou, my pees I ghyue to\nghou; not as the world ghyueth I ghyue to ghou_' [John xiv. 27].\n`_These thingis I haue spoken to ghou, that ghe haue pees in me.  In the\nworld ghe schulen haue disese; but triste ghe, I haue ouercome the\nworld_?'\" [John xvi. 33.]\n\nWhen Lord Marnell quitted Margery that evening, he hastened to Court,\nand attempted to gain the ear of the King.  Since the deposition of his\nfriend and master, King Richard, he had never appeared there.  He was\nconsequently a stranger to the pages and porters, who tried to get rid\nof him as politely as they could.  At length Lord Marnell caught sight\nof the Earl of Surrey, who with some hesitation consented to introduce\nhim into the privy chamber.  Henry listened to Lord Marnell only until\nhe comprehended the nature of his plea; then met him with a frown and an\nangry--\n\n\"Pardon a Lollard?  Never!\"\n\n\"Please it, your Grace, your noble predecessor, King Richard, though no\nLollard, would have granted me at once, in consideration of my long and\nfaithful service unto him.\"\n\n\"I am not Richard of Bordeaux, but Henry of Bolingbroke!\" was the\nhaughty answer, as the King turned round abruptly, and quitted Lord\nMarnell.\n\n\"By our Lady of Walsingham, I wis full well _that_\" replied the latter,\n_sotto voce_.\n\nAs Lord Marnell quitted the palace, he met in the corridor with the\nPrince of Wales, [Afterwards Henry V] who stopped and saluted him, and\nLord Marnell at once begged for his intercession with his father.  The\nPrince readily promised it, but on learning particulars, the son's brow\ndarkened as the father's had done.  He was very sorry, but he really\ncould not ask the King's pardon for a Lollard.  Lord Marnell would have\ngiven his whole fortune to undo his own work of the last eighteen\nmonths.  He had never dreamed that Abbot Bilson would have summoned the\narchbishop to his aid, nor that Margery would have stood half as firmly\nas she had done.  He only knew her as a fragile, gentle, submissive\ngirl, and never expected to find in her material for the heroine or the\nmartyr.  Lord Marnell tried to procure the mediation of everybody about\nthe Court; but all, while expressing great sympathy with him, declined\nto risk their own necks.  Even the King's sons said they dared not\ncomply with his request.  Prince Thomas [afterwards Henry V] was\nextremely kind--very much grieved that he could not help him; but Prince\nHumphrey [Duke of Gloucester] turned scornfully from him, and Prince\nJohn [the great Duke of Bedford] coldly bade him take heed to his own\nsafety.  The Earl of Somerset, the King's half-brother, shook his head,\nand said he was already suspected by the King to be a Lollard himself,\nand such an application from him would probably seal his own doom.  Lord\nMarnell applied to the Queen [Jeanne of Navarre, the second wife of\nHenry IV]; but she seemed most afraid of all to whom he had spoken, lest\nshe should incur the King's anger, and possibly endanger herself.\n\nThe interval between the day of the examination and that appointed for\nthe execution passed drearily to all parties.  Lord Marnell,\nnotwithstanding all these repulses, exerted himself unremittingly to\nprocure a commutation of the sentence, at least to beheading; but in\nvain.  The King was inexorable.  If the Lady Marnell had chosen to ally\nherself with Lollards, she well knew what she was doing, and must abide\nthe consequences.  Vainly did Lord Marnell represent how young and\ninexperienced she was; in vain did he urge that the Act which made the\nLollards amenable to capital punishment had been passed since her\nindictment, and only a few weeks before.  Henry was not naturally\ndisposed to hear his pleasure called in question; and Abbot Bilson had\nhad possession of the royal ear already.\n\nWhen Alice returned from Marnell Place on the evening of the 26th of\nFebruary, Margery saw, by the expression of her face, that she had heard\nsomething which shocked her.  She asked what it was.\n\n\"You mind, good my Lady, the day that you went with Master Pynson to\nhear a sermon in Bostock Church?\"\n\n\"I trow I shall not lightly forget it,\" was Margery's answer.\n\n\"Master Sastre was a-preaching, was he not?\"\n\n\"Ay.  Wherefore?\"\n\n\"My Lady, he suffered death this forenoon by burning.\"\n\n\"Master Sastre!  Who told thee?\"\n\n\"Christopher it was that told me,--and yon evil man--for sure, though he\nbe a holy priest, yet is he an evil man, or would he never else have so\ndealt with your Ladyship--yon evil man, Abbot Bilson was there, and did\nsore press Master Sastre for to have confessed his error; but Master\nSastre did maintain the same to the end.\"\n\nMargery turned away her head.  The venerable image of Sastre rose up\nbefore her, as he learned forward over the pulpit to say those last\nearnest words.\n\n\"Ah, dear old teacher!\" she whispered to herself.  \"Thou wilt not have\nlong to look among the multitude in the white apparel, for _one_ face\nwhich was upturned to thee that day!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER TEN.\n\nGLORIFYING THE LORD IN THE FIRES.\n\n  \"Ah, little is all loss,\n  And brief the space 'twixt shore and shore,\n  If Thou, Lord Jesus, on us lay,\n  Through the dark waters of our way,\n  The burden which Christopheros bore--\n  To carry Thee across.\"\n\n  Miss Muloch.\n\nAs Lord Marnell sat with Margery in her cell in the evening of the 1st\nof March, she begged him to grant her a favour.  Her contrite husband\nbade her ask what she would.  Margery replied that she greatly wished to\nwrite a last letter to her mother.  Writing-materials were carefully\nkept from her.  Could Lord Marnell supply her with the means of doing\nso?  He said he would attempt it.\n\nWhen Alice returned on the following day from Marnell Place, whither she\nhad been to procure a change of linen for her mistress, she brought with\nher also a loaf of bread.  The jailer demurred at this, but Alice urged\nthat Lady Marnell did not like the bread made by the prison baker, and\nsurely the jailer would not grudge her a loaf from home, for the few\ndays she had to live.  The jailer shook his head, but let it pass.  When\nAlice was safe in the cell, she broke the loaf, and produced from it,\ncunningly imbedded in the soft crumb, several sheets of paper folded\nsurprisingly small, a pen, and a little inkhorn.  Margery's eyes\nglistened when she saw these, and she wrote her letter secretly during\nthe night.  But how to get it out of the prison with safety?  Alice was\nable to provide for this also.  The letter was sewn in one of the\npillows, which would be carried back to Marnell Place after the\nexecution.\n\nThe last day of Lady Marnell's life sped away as other less eventful\ndays do, and the evening of the 5th of March arrived.  Alice, having\njust returned from her usual journey to the house, was disposing of the\narticles which she had brought with her, when the jailer's key grated in\nthe lock, and the door was opened.  Lady Marnell looked up, expecting to\nsee her husband, though it was rather before his usual time for visiting\nher; but on looking up, she saw Abbot Bilson.\n\nThis feline ecclesiastic came forward with bent head and joined hands,\nvouchsafing no reply to Margery's salutation of \"Good even, father,\" nor\nto Alice's humble request for his blessing.  He sat down on a chair, and\nfor some minutes stared at Margery in silence--conduct so strange that\nat length she said, \"Wherefore come you, father?\"\n\n\"To look at thee, child of the devil!\" was the civil answer.\n\nAlice, who had just requested the blessing of the _priest_, was more\nangry than she could bear with the _man_.  She was just on the point of\nsaying something sharp, when Lord Marnell's voice behind the Abbot\ninterposed with--\n\n\"If thou wouldst see a child of the devil, I trow thou hast little need\nto look further than thy mirror!\"\n\nThe Abbot rose calmly, and let Lord Marnell enter.\n\n\"It becometh not poor and humble monks, servitors of God, to lend\nthemselves unto the vanity of mirrors,\" said he, pulling out a large\nrosary, and beginning to tell his beads devoutly.\n\n\"`Servitors of God!'\" cried Lord Marnell, too angry to be prudent.\n\"Dost call thyself a servitor of God?  If God hath no better servitors\nthan thou, I ween He is evil served!\"\n\nThe Abbot cast a glance from the corner of his eye at Lord Marnell, but\nmade no answer, save to tell his beads more devoutly than ever.\n\n\"Hast no other place to tell thy beads in?\" asked that nobleman.\n\nThe Abbot rose without a word, and, pausing at the door, stretched his\nhand over the assembled trio, and muttered some words to himself.\n\n\"Away with thee, Lucifer, and thy maledictions!\" exclaimed Lord Marnell.\n\"There be here who are nearer to the angels than ever thou shalt be!\"\n\nSuddenly the Abbot was gone.  Nobody had seen or heard him depart--he\nseemed to melt into the night, in some strange, mysterious way.\n\n\"He is gone, and Satan his master go with him!\" said Lord Marnell.  \"Ho,\njailer! lock the door, I pray, and leave us three alone together.\"\n\nThe jailer obeyed; and Lord Marnell sat down by the side of Margery's\nbed, and bade Alice lie down on her own pallet, and sleep if she could.\nHe gave the same counsel to Margery; but the latter smiled, and said she\nwould never sleep again in this world.\n\n\"Now, Madge!\" said her husband, \"hast aught on thy mind, good wife, that\nthou wouldst say ere morn?  Aught that I can do for thee?  Trust me, I\nwill do the same right gladly.\"\n\nMargery thanked him fervently; there was a heartiness in his tone which\nwas not often audible.\n\n\"There be a few matters, mine own good Lord, which under thy good\npleasure I would willingly have done.  I would that all my servants\nmight have a year's pay; and for Alice, poor lass! who hath tended me so\nwell and truly, I pray that a small matter of money may be given her by\nthe year: moreover, I would like, if she will--for I would not lay her\nunder bond--that she should keep with Geoffrey while she liveth, or at\nleast until he be a man.  And, good husband, I would that thou wouldst\nteach my poor child to remember me, his mother, but above all, to\nremember the Lord for whom I die, and who, having loved me in the world,\nloveth me unto the end.  [John xiii. 1] Tell him to count nought too\ngood for Christ.  I trust Christ hath set His heart upon him--I have\nprayed for him too much else--and He promised me that whatever thing I\nshould ask the Father in His name He would do that thing.\"  [John xvi.\n16].\n\n\"Hast thou prayed ever for me, good wife?\" asked Lord Marnell.\n\n\"Many times, my good Lord, and I will do so till I die.\"\n\n\"The Church teacheth that dying stoppeth not praying,\" said he.\n\n\"I wis well that the Church so teacheth; but I saw it not in the book;\nhowever, if I find it to be so, I will pray God for thee there also.\"\n\n\"Thou sayest well, Madge; but I trow thou art more angel presently than\nshall I be ever.  I tell thee, Madge--for mayhap it will comfort thee to\nknow it--thy dealings and sayings of late have caused me to think more\non these things than ever did I afore.  It seemeth but a small matter to\nthee, to go through the fire to the glory.  I marvel an' it could be so\nunto me.\"\n\n\"Say not `to the glory,' good husband, but to Christ.  I would not have\nthe glory and lack Christ.  And for thee, I do rejoice and bless God\nheartily, if He will make my poor doings of any good service unto the\nwelfare of thy soul.  And believe me, that if thou art called unto my\nfiery ordeal, Christ will give thee grace and strength equal unto thy\nneed.  It is not much for them who love Christ, if they see Him stand\nbeyond a little fire, to pluck up heart and go through the fire to Him.\nO good husband, take these as my dying words, and teach them to the\nchild for the same, `Christ without everything is an hundredfold better\nthan everything without Christ!'\"  Those last words were ringing in Lord\nMarnell's ears when, about eight o'clock in the morning, he stood on the\nsteps of Marnell Place, looking towards the Tower, and fancying the\nmournful preparations which were going on there.  Margery had thought it\nbest that she should be alone for her fiery trial.  As Lord Marnell\nstood there, lost in thought, he suddenly heard his own name spoken.  He\nturned round, and saw two men before him, in travellers' attire.  One of\nthem was an old man, with venerable white head and beard; the other was\nmuch younger, and Lord Marnell recognised him at once.\n\n\"Master Pynson!  I pray you what brings you here?  Is the boy well?\"\n\n\"He is well,\" answered Richard, in a low tone, \"and Dame Lovell\nlikewise.  We came hither on matters pertaining to my friend who here\nstandeth, and a terrible bruit hath reached us that the Lady Marnell\nwill suffer this morrow.\"\n\n\"It is true,\" said Lord Marnell, sorrowfully.\n\n\"Can no help be found?\" cried Richard, in an agony.  \"I would put my\nlife for hers--yea, an hundred times twice told!\"\n\n\"And I likewise,\" said her husband.  \"No--there is no help.  The King\nwill hear of no remittance.\"\n\n\"When is it?\"\n\n\"At nine o' the clock.  You will come into the house and eat?\"\n\nRichard declined.  He had already secured a chamber at the \"Blue Boar,\"\nand would not trouble his Lordship.\n\n\"Come, Master Carew,\" said he to his companion, \"let us be on our way.\"\n\n\"Go ye for to see her?\" inquired Lord Marnell.\n\n\"I will not lose sight of her,\" answered Richard, \"until she be in the\nParadise of God!\"\n\nLong before nine o'clock on the morning of that 6th of March, a large\ncrowd was already gathered on Tower Hill.  Some came there from a\nfeeling of revenge--glad to see a Lollard burned.  Among these was\nArchbishop Arundel.  Some, from a feeling of deep pity for the poor\nyoung girl who was to be almost the proto-martyr of the new faith.\nAmong these were Pynson and Carew.  The chief part of the concourse,\nhowever, shared neither of these feelings to any great degree, but came\nsimply to see a sight, just as they would have gone to see a royal\nprocession, or any other pageant.\n\nAs nine o'clock struck on the great bell of the Tower, the martyr\nappeared, led forth between the sheriff and Abbot Bilson.  She was\nclothed in one long white garment, falling from her throat to her feet;\nand, notwithstanding the inclemency of the weather, her head, arms, and\nfeet were bare.  No fastening confined her golden hair, which streamed\nfreely over her shoulders and fell around her.  She walked slowly, but\nquite calmly.  Arrived at the place of execution, the sheriff urged her\nto confess.\n\n\"I will confess,\" said Margery, \"to Him who can alone absolve me.\"  And\nlifting up her eyes, she said, \"O Lord God, who art above all things,\nand hast given Thy Son to die for us sely and sinful men, I confess to\nThee that I am a vile sinner, utterly unworthy of Thy grace and mercy.\nThat day by day, for twenty-three years, have I done what I ought not,\nand said what I ought not, and thought what I ought not.  That all my\nlife also have I left undone things the which I ought for to have done.\nWherefore, O Father, let it please Thee of Thy goodness to forgive me,\nand to look not on me, but on Thy Son Christ, in whose rightwise-ness I\nam rightwise, and who hath loved me as Thou hast loved also Him.  O Lord\nGod, turn not away the face of Thy servant, whose heart Thou hast moved\nto pray thus unto Thee!\"\n\nThe Abbot and the sheriff were extremely annoyed, but they did not dare\nto silence her, for the multitude hung breathlessly on her words.\n\n\"There's none so much harm in _that_, any way!\" said a woman who stood\nnear Richard Pynson.\n\n\"Wilt thou confess, sinful heretic?\" asked the Abbot.\n\n\"To God I will and have done,\" answered Margery; \"to man I will not.\"\n\nThere was a short pause, while the sheriff's men, under his direction,\nheaped the wood in the position most favourable for burning quickly.\nThen the sheriff read the indictment in a loud voice.  It was a long\ndocument, and took upwards of twenty minutes to read.  After this, they\npassed a chain round Margery's body, and fastened her to the stake.  The\nsheriff then, with a lighted torch, advanced to set the wood on fire.\n\n\"Will ye allow me that I may speak unto the people?\" asked Margery of\nthe Abbot.\n\n\"No, miserable reprobate!\" said he, \"thou hast spoken too much already!\"\n\n\"I pray Christ forgive you all that you have done unto me!\" was the\nmartyr's answer.\n\nThe sheriff now applied the torch.  Meanwhile Margery stood on the pile\nof wood, with her hands clasped on her bosom, and her eyes lifted up to\nheaven.  What means it?  Does she feel no pain?  How is it that, as the\nflames spring up and roar around her, there is no tremor of the clasped\nhands, no change in the rapturous expression of the white upturned face?\nAnd from the very midst of those flames comes a voice, the silver voice\nof Margery Lovell, as clear and melodious as if she stood quietly in the\nhall at Lovell Tower--\n\n\"_Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to take virtue, and Godhead, and\nwisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory_--\"\n\nBut the voice fails there, and the \"blessing\" is spoken to the angels of\nGod.\n\nAnd from the outskirts of the crowd comes another voice which is very\nlike the voice of Richard Pynson--\n\n\"_I am agen risyng and lyf; he that beleeueth in me, yhe though he be\ndeed, he schal lyue; and ech that lyueth and bileueth into me, schal not\ndye withouten eende_.\"  [John xi. 25].\n\n\"The noble army of martyrs praise Thee,\" softly adds old Carew.\n\nThus did Margery Marnell glorify the Lord in the fires.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER ELEVEN.\n\nMARGERY'S LETTER.\n\n  \"So that day there was dole in Astolat.\"\n\n  Tennyson.\n\nThe winter had just given place to spring, and a bright, fresh morning\nrose on Lovell Tower.  Dame Lovell was busy in the kitchen, as she was\nwhen we first saw her, and so were Mistress Katherine and the\nhandmaidens; but Dame Lovell now wore the white weeds of widowhood, and\nher face was thinner and much graver.  Richard Pynson on his return from\nLondon, had brought her the terrible news of Margery's death; and Dame\nLovell, in the midst of her sorrow, which was very deep, had solemnly\naffirmed that no power on earth should ever induce her to pardon her\nson-in-law for the part which he had taken in the matter.\n\nRichard Pynson, long before this, had mooted the question of his return\nto his father, but Dame Lovell would not hear of it.  He reminded her\nsmilingly that _she_ needed no squire; but she came and put both her\nhands on his shoulders, and made him look her in the face.\n\n\"Thou sayest sooth, Richard, that I need no squire, but I trow I need a\nson.  I am an old lone woman, and shall not keep thee long; and I have\nloved thee as if I had been thine own mother.  Promise me, mine own dear\nlad, that thou wilt not go hence while I live.\"\n\nRichard looked up with the tears in his eyes, and told her, as he kissed\nher hand, that it was no wish of his to depart, and that he would not do\nso without her full consent.\n\n\"That shalt thou have never!\" was the answer.  So Richard remained at\nLovell Tower.  On the morning of which I speak, little Geoffrey, who was\nvery fond of Richard, and was petted by him perhaps rather more than was\ngood for him, had suddenly espied him at the farther end of the garden,\nand instantly rushed after him as fast as his little legs would carry\nhim.  A few minutes afterwards, Cicely came into the kitchen from the\nhall, and announced to her mistress that a strange gentleman wished to\nsee her.  Dame Lovell took off her apron, and rinsed her hands in water.\n\n\"See thou to the marchpane, Kat,\" remarked she to Mistress Katherine, as\nshe went to receive her guest.\n\nIt was no wonder that Cicely had not known him, for some seconds elapsed\nbefore Dame Lovell herself could recognise Lord Marnell.  Six years had\npassed since they met at his marriage to Margery, but he looked at least\ntwenty years older.  His figure was still upright, though much thinner,\nbut the very form of his features seemed changed, and his rich auburn\nhair was now white as drifted snow.  His manner, which had been blunt\nand almost boisterous, was remarkably quiet.  When he saw that Dame\nLovell did not recognise him, he said, with a smile--\n\n\"You know me not, fair mother?\"\n\nDame Lovell's astonishment overcame her enmity for the moment.\n\n\"Troth, I knew thee not, good son! is it truly thou?  Nay, how changed\nart thou!\"\n\n\"I wis that well,\" he answered.  \"Where is Geoffrey?\"\n\n\"I trow he be in the garden with Richard,\" replied Dame Lovell.  \"I will\nbid him hither.\"\n\nLittle Geoffrey, holding Richard's hand, as if he would not part with\nhim for a moment, returned to the house at his grandmother's bidding;\nbut like her, he could not recognise his father, whom he had not seen\nfor some months, until Lord Marnell's well-known voice assured him of\nhis identity.  He rather shrank from him, as usual; but when Lord\nMarnell contrary to his custom, lifted him up and kissed him, he seemed\na little reassured, and sat on his father's knee, staring at him\nintently.  Lord Marnell gave a cordial greeting to Richard, and then,\nobserving how earnestly his little son's eyes were fixed upon him, asked\nhim at what he was looking.\n\n\"What have you done with your hair?\" was Master Geoffrey's puzzled\nanswer.\n\nLord Marnell laughed, and told the child that everybody's hair turned\nwhite as they grew old.\n\n\"But your Lordship's hath done so quickly,\" remarked Richard.\n\n\"That were no great marvel,\" he answered, gravely.\n\nDame Lovell found it rather difficult to keep up her revengeful\ndetermination.  She was naturally a very easy-tempered woman, and the\nevident change, moral as well as physical, in Lord Marnell, touched her,\nand melted her enmity considerably.\n\n\"I pray you, fair mother,\" he said, looking up, \"to leave me tell you\nwherefore I came hither.  Firstly, it was to give you a letter from\nMadge, which she wrote in the Tower unto you.\"  And Lord Marnell,\npassing his hand into his breast, pulled out a small square packet, tied\nwith blue silk, and sealed with yellow wax.  It was directed--\n\n\"_To the hands of my singular good lady and most dear mother, Dame Agnes\nLovell, at Lovell Tower, be these delivered with speed_.\"\n\nDame Lovell kissed the letter, and placed it in her own bosom.  She\ncould not read a word of it, but it was enough that it came from\nMargery.\n\n\"Secondarily,\" pursued Lord Marnell, \"I would fain ask you, fair mother,\nfor to keep Geoffrey here a while longer, for I wis not yet what I shall\ndo.\"\n\n\"That will I, right heartily,\" said Dame Lovell, in a tone as cordial as\nher words.\n\n\"Moreover, an' it stand with your pleasure, I would pray you for to take\nback Alice Jordan, as you will find in yon letter that Madge did desire\nher for to be about Geoffrey, if she would, and she seemeth right fain.\"\n\n\"I will have her with a very good will,\" answered Dame Lovell, \"and she\nshall be next in mine house unto Mistress Katherine, and shall eat at\nthe high table.\"\n\nLord Marnell thanked her sincerely for her readiness to comply with his\nwishes.  He said that Alice should come down to Lovell Tower as soon as\nshe could conveniently set out, and old Christopher, as the most trusty\nof his household, should escort her.  There was silence for a short\ntime, and then, with a kind of shadow of a smile, Lord Marnell said\nsuddenly--\n\n\"Do you hate me, fair mother?\"\n\n\"I did afore I saw thee this morrow,\" replied Dame Lovell, candidly.\n\n\"And wherefore not after?\"\n\n\"Meseemeth thou hast repented thyself of thy deed.\"\n\n\"Repented!\" said Lord Marnell, mournfully.  \"Mother, will you crede me\nif I tell you that no sorrow worser than this can ever befall me, and\nthat had I known what would come of my seeking of Abbot Bilson, I had\nsooner cut off my right hand?\"\n\n\"I do,\" said she.\n\n\"Madge knew it, poor damsel! and she said she forgave me in such manner\nas Christ did forgive herself.  Will you do the like, mother?\"\n\n\"With all mine heart and soul, good son!\" cried Dame Lovell, every shred\nof her animosity vanished, and the tears fairly running down her cheeks.\n\n\"Don't cry, g'ammer!\" exclaimed little Geoffrey, jumping off his\nfather's knee and running to Dame Lovell.  \"What are you crying for?\nSomebody hurt you?  If they have, I'll kill 'em!\"\n\nDame Lovell laughed through her tears at Master Geoffrey's threat.  She\nwas a good deal surprised when Lord Marnell spoke of going away; but he\nsaid he had promised his cousin Sir Ralph that he would stay with him\nnext time he came into the neighbourhood; and he must return to London\nin a day or two.  So he only remained to dinner, and departed\nimmediately afterwards, evoking from Geoffrey the significant remark\nthat \"he liked him a great deal better this time.\"\n\nThat evening, Dame Lovell and Friar Andrew sat down by the fire to\nlisten to that last letter.  Her widow's dress, somewhat resembling that\nof a nun, but pure white, left only her eyes, nose, and mouth visible.\nRichard Pynson, in a rather more ambitious costume than the page's suit\nwherein we made his acquaintance, seated himself in the opposite corner.\nHow like Margery's voice the letter sounded, in that old hall at Lovell\nTower!--so much so, that it seemed scarcely a stretch of fancy to expect\nher to glide down the stair which led from her chamber, where her child\nnow lay sleeping.  How well Richard could recall the scene when, six\nyears before, she came softly down to receive from his hand the\ncherished and fatal volume!\n\nRichard broke the seal, while Friar Andrew threw back his cowl, and Dame\nLovell smoothed her apron, and bent forward to listen.\n\n\"Mine Own Dear Mother,--In as humble and lowly manner as I may, I\ncommend myself unto you, praying you of your daily blessing.\n\n\"Whereas I hear that Richard Pynson hath been here in London on Saint\nLuke's Day last, and hath borne back Geoffrey with him, at the which\nnews I am truly glad, I trow that you have heard of my close prison in\nthe Tower, whence I now write.  I pray you therefore, good mother, not\nto lay this overmuch to heart, neither to grieve for me; for I certify\nunto you that never was I so happy and blessed as now I am, when over\nthe dark water, which is death, I can see a glimpse of the Happy City.\nNeither, good mother, be downcast, I beseech you, when you shall hear\nthat on Sunday, the eve of Saint Anselm, I am to die.  I pray you, dear\nmother, if you knew that on Sunday I should be advanced to some high\nplace in the Court, would you sorrow?  Yea, would you not rejoice\ngreatly therefor?  Wherefore I entreat you, sorrow not now, but rejoice\nrather, for I am to be taken up into an high place, yea, passing high--\neven the Court of Christ Himself, whence also none of those changes and\nevils can cast me down again, which are ever coming upon them who live\nin this world.\n\n\"Moreover, good mother, I do you to wit that this is Christ's truth for\nthe which I suffer, and that Christ Himself is with me.  Yea, I think on\nChrist as He that is standing on the other side of the fire; and shall I\nnot then make haste through the same that I may come at Him?\n\n\"Likewise I do beseech you, mine own dear mother, grieve not when you\nthink that I have had but little joy or gladness in this my short life.\nIf divers children be playing in a garden, and the serving-man do come\nand fetch away some afore others, that they may see their elders, and\nmay have brave gifts the which be ready for them at home, fall they\na-weeping, think you, because they must lose an hour of play?  Nay,\ntruly not, if their hearts be set on the brave gifts afore them.  So,\ngood mother, though you have passed in this weary and evil life nigh\nsixty years, and I only twenty-three, count it, I beseech you, but an\nhour more or less of child's playing, which will surely be made up to us\nwhen we go home, and receive the brave gifts which our Father hath for\nus in His storehouse.  And if I have not known joy as much as some, I\nhave the less for to leave behind me in the case wherein I now am.  For\nyou know, good mother, that at the first I was wedded against mine own\nwill and liking; and though I may and must say unto you for my Lord my\nhusband, that in this evil case he hath been more gentler unto me than\never afore, and hath drawn mine heart much closer unto him, yet nathless\nI may say also that an' I had been with mine own will wedded, I trow\nthat I had had far more for to leave for Christ, and had found far more\nhardship in the doing of it.  For God doeth all His work well; and He\nwist surely what He did when my dear father--whose soul God rest!--was\nlet wed me thus.\n\n\"Behold now, most dear mother, how I have taken from you all cause of\nyour lamentation, and have left you nothing but to rejoice for me!\nWherefore rejoice for me, for at this time a sennight hence, I shall be\nsinging with the angels of God.  I trow that one look at Christ Jesu\nwill pay me all mine account in the small matter I have suffered for\nHim.  I trow that if He but smile, and say, `Thou art welcome, dear\nchild, for I have loved thee,' I shall count the fires of this world but\nlight gear then.  Will you sorrow that I am in good case?  Will you\ngrieve because I am blessed?  Will you count you have lost your child,\nwhen she is singing in the great glory?  Nay, good mother, I wis I have\nwell said in praying you to rejoice rather.\n\n\"And, dear mother, I beseech you that you bring up mine own dear child\nin the same.  I would have him, if I may, as dear unto Christ as I am,\nand as ready to leave all for Christ His sake, as I, his mother, have\ndone.  I say not this, God witteth, to magnify my poor deeds, the which\nI know well be vile enough and want as much and great washing in Christ\nHis blood, as the worst sin that ever I did,--but, good mother, teach my\nboy of Christ!  Count it not anything that he leaveth for Him.  Yea,\nforsooth, rather would I a thousandfold that he should live on a dry\ncrust for Christ, than that he should have many brave dishes and rich\nfare without Him.  To this end I beseech you, most dear mother, that you\nwill have the child learned for to read, and will get that he may read\nGod's Word, which hath shown me how dear and gracious is Christ Jesus.\nI pray you spare no pains ne goods for to do this.\n\n\"Dear mother, I have prayed my Lord my husband that, if she will, Alice\nJordan shall have the care of Geoffrey.  She hath been a good and true\nserving-woman unto me, and she witteth how I would have him ordered.  I\npray you, therefore, if she come unto you, that you would put her about\nhim.  Likewise commend me, I beseech you, unto mine ancient friends and\nfellows, and all the meynie, and bid them learn for to love Christ Jesu,\nand we shall then meet shortly again.  Specially I would desire mine\nhumble service unto dear Father Andrew, and I do beg him for my sake to\nread for himself the blessed book which hath been my comfort.\n\n\"And to end,--for I will weary you no longer, dear friend Richard\nPynson, with reading of mine evil hand, and I give you God's blessing\nand mine for the kindness you have done unto me, and pray you not to\nforget the last words which I said unto you with my voice, but to keep\nfast hold of Christ, till you know and love Him better than any friend\nin this evil world,--so to end, dear mother, I beseech you that you\nwould forgive me all wherein I have been an ill daughter unto you, and\nall things wherein at any time I have troubled you.  Good mother, I am\nhappy.  I am looking out of the night to see the day-dawn breaking.\nCome Sunday, I shall be in heaven.  Come Sunday, by God's mercy--not by\nmine own good, which God witteth is but evil--I shall stand with the\nangels before Christ His throne.  Haste, haste, dear good day that shall\ndeliver me!  And God give you to know Christ, and send us a happy\nmeeting in that His blessed habitation, unto the great gladding of your\nmost loving and dutiful daughter, Margery Marnell.\n\n\"Written this second of March, from the gate of the _Urbs Beata_.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER TWELVE.\n\nEASTWARD HO!\n\n  \"Whether he go to East or West,\n  With Christ he always is at home.\"\n\n  Newton.\n\nFor a few minutes after Richard finished reading the letter, there was\nsilence, unbroken save by the sound of weeping, in the old hall.  Friar\nAndrew cried like a child.  Dame Lovell, too, wept profusely, especially\nat the passage in which Margery begged her forgiveness, and sobbed forth\nthat she had nothing to forgive her.  Richard had hard work to read.  He\nheard her voice in every line, and when he came to the one sentence\naddressed to himself, he very nearly broke down altogether.  After that\nlong pause, Richard, who had been sitting with his head buried in his\nhands, looked up and spoke.\n\n\"Mistress, you mind that I did promise you not to go hence save with\nyour good will?\"\n\n\"Well, Richard?\"\n\n\"May I have the same, good mistress, for a season?\"\n\n\"Where wouldst go, lad?  Dost want to see thy father?  I meant not to\nlet thee from going home at times, so thou leave me not wholly.\"  [Let\nmeans hinder.  The modern signification of this word is exactly the\nopposite of its original meaning.]\n\n\"You do misconceive me, mistress.  I trust soothly, to go but for a\nseason, though mayhap a long one; but not home.  An' you will give me\nleave, and I have my father's goodwill to it, I shall go abroad.\"\n\n\"Go _where_, Richard?\" asked Dame Lovell, in some alarm and no little\nastonishment.\n\n\"Anywhere,\" he answered, listlessly, \"that is far enough away.  I shall\nwend unto the East Country.\"\n\n\"Eh, Richard! thou wilt be slain of robbers!\" cried Friar Andrew.  \"All\nyon country is full filled of Saracens and heathens, who think no more\nof shedding Christian blood than of cooking a capon.\"\n\n\"I shall be slain, good father, I trow, if I stay here.  There is no\npeace heraway in England for them who read God's Word, and I have read\nit.  I should quickly be indicted, I ween; for a Lollard, an' I stayed.\nMaster Carew told me yestre'en, that there were spies hereabouts, and he\ndid trow he was suspected.  And if they take him, they will come next to\nme.\"\n\n\"Richard!  Richard!\" cried Dame Lovell.  \"Thou frightest me, lad!  But\nwilt thou go, soothly?  I wis not how to leave thee do so.\"\n\n\"Dear mistress,\" said Richard, in a low tone, \"I pray God and you to\npardon me, but I fear I am only a poor caitiff coward.  I could not bear\nthe fiery ordeal which Margery has borne.  I will confess to you, good\nlady, that night and day I do pray God to spare me the same.  I had\nbetter go, ere I am tired, and perchance fail and deny my Master.  I\nwill give you to wit of my welfare, in case I should meet any Palmers on\ntheir way home, and may be I can come back, an' there should rise a king\nwho shall give us leave to live.\"\n\n\"Well, my lad!  I trow I must not let thee!\" said Dame Lovell, in a\ngrieved tone.  \"I wis not how to do without thee, Richard; but I ween I\nshould sorrow more to keep thee and bring thee to grief, than in leaving\nthee go away from me.\"\n\nThe following day brought a servant in Lord Marnell's livery, with a\nletter to Richard.\n\n\"_To the hands of Master Richard Pynson, at Lovell Tower, give these_.\n\n\"Good Master Pynson,--I pray you for to look warily unto your ways; for\nI hear by messengers from London that you be suspected for a Lollard,\nand Abbot Bilson hath your name on his list of evil affected unto the\nChurch.  If you can wend for a time unto some other country, I trow you\nwould find your safety in so doing.  I beseech you burn this letter, or\nit may do me a mischief.\n\n\"It hath come into my mind that Madge did name unto me your desire of\nknighthood.  If such be still your wish, I pray you make use of me in\nthis matter.  Let me wit by the bearer of these your pleasure herein,\nand if you desire to watch this even, I will meet you in Bostock Church\nearly on the morrow.\n\n\"I set out on my way to London to-morrow.\n\n\"Commend me in all lowly fashion to my good mother; and with God's\nblessing and mine to the child, I rest, your loving friend, R. Marnell.\"\n\nRichard read Lord Marnell's letter to Dame Lovell, and then at once put\nit in the fire.  He determined to accept the kind offer thus made to\nhim; and accordingly he sent word by the messenger that he would be\nready to meet Lord Marnell in Bostock Church, at any early hour on the\nfollowing morning.\n\nKnighthood was then conferred in two ways.  A knight-banneret was one\ncreated on the field of battle.  An ordinary knight was required to be\nof good family and of a suitable age, and the accolade was given him\nafter a night's fasting and watching in some church.  Other, but less\nimportant ceremonies were also observed.  This latter course was\nnecessarily the one chosen by Richard.  At five o'clock on the following\nmorning, Lord Marnell met him in Bostock Church, and gave him the stroke\non the shoulder with the flat of his sword, which was required to make\nits recipient a knight.  [See Note 1.] Richard thanked Lord Marnell\nfervently for his warning, and also for his kindness in offering him\nknighthood; and told him that he had already resolved to go abroad,\nbefore receiving his letter.\n\n\"I think you will do well,\" said he; \"but I pray you, Sir Richard, to\nlose no time, for spies be about in Marston even now.\"\n\nLate that night, after an affectionate farewell to Dame Lovell and Friar\nAndrew, and a warm kiss to little Geoffrey, who was fast asleep, Sir\nRichard Pynson set out on his long and perilous journey.  Dame Lovell\nsent with him one of her own servants, a man who she knew would imperil\nhis own life sooner than that of Richard; and he returned to her in a\nfew days with the welcome tidings that he had seen Richard safely\nembarked on a vessel for La Rochelle, with Master Carew's son, a youth\nof about eighteen, as his squire.  The servant had, however, more, and\nless agreeable news than this to tell; for as he passed through Marston,\nhe had been told that Master Carew was arrested, and on his journey to\nLondon under a strong guard.\n\nSo set in the bitter persecution, which was to last for many weary\nyears.\n\nA full twelvemonth had passed since Richard's departure.  Of Lord\nMarnell, Dame Lovell had neither seen nor heard anything more.  Alice\nJordan had arrived, to little Geoffrey's great delight; but she had only\nbeen able to report the return of her master to London, as she had left\nthat place the day after his arrival.  Dame Lovell fulfilled her promise\nof promotion for Margery's humble but faithful friend, who was\nhenceforth generally addressed in the house as \"Mistress\" Alice.  Little\nGeoffrey, though somewhat consoled by Alice's appearance, missed Richard\nsorely; and demanded of his grandmother at least once a day, \"when he\nwould come back!\"\n\nThe family and household were seated at supper, on a summer afternoon in\nthe year 1402, when the sound of a horn outside the moat sent one of the\nfarm-servants hurriedly to the gate.  He returned saying, \"A holy\nPalmer, good mistress, seeketh entrance.\"\n\n\"A Palmer! bring him in speedily, good Hodge!\" exclaimed Dame Lovell.\n\"Blessed is the house whereinto entereth a Palmer,--and mayhap he may\ngive us to wit of Richard.\"\n\nThe Palmer was attired in a long coat of coarse brown frieze, with a\nlarge flapped hat, not unlike that of a coal-heaver.  He was conducted\nto the high table, where Friar Andrew served him with meat, and put all\nmanner of questions to him.  He had come, he said, from Damascus, where\nhe had met with a friend of theirs, one Sir Richard Pynson, and he\nbrought a packet from him; which he thereupon took from his wallet, and\ndelivered into Dame Lovell's hands.  It was a large packet, and\nevidently contained something more than merely a letter.  Dame Lovell\nwas highly delighted, particularly when, on opening the parcel, she drew\nout a magnificent piece of baudekyn, one of the richest dress-stuffs\nthen made, and only to be procured from Constantinople.  Beside this the\npacket only contained a letter, which Dame Lovell was sorely puzzled how\nto read.  There was nobody at Lovell Tower who could read except Friar\nAndrew, and he, as has been previously stated, was not by any means a\nfirst-class scholar.  However, Dame Lovell passed him the letter, and\nafter spending some time in the examination of it, he announced that he\nthought he could read it, \"for the lad had written the letters great,\nlike a good lad, as he always was.\"  Richard had, indeed, purposely done\nso, because he anticipated that Friar Andrew would have to read it.  The\nPalmer interposed, saying that he could read well, and offered to read\nthe letter; but this Dame Lovell civilly declined, because she thought\nthere might be secrets in the letter, and she did not know whether the\nPalmer were to be trusted.  Friar Andrew was mechanically retiring into\none of the deep windows, but Dame Lovell stopped him, and requested him\nto follow her to her own room.  She gathered up her baudekyn, and left\nthe servants to entertain the Palmer, who she gave orders should be\nfeasted with the best in the house.\n\n\"Now, father,\" said Dame Lovell, when she had Friar Andrew and the\nletter safe in her own apartment, \"Now read, I pray thee; but we will\nhave no eavesdroppers, and though Palmers be holy men, yet may they\ncarry tales.\"\n\nFriar Andrew sat down, cleared his throat, and began to read rather\ngrandiloquently.  He read syllable by syllable, like a child, and every\nnow and then stumbled over a hard word.  As to the names of places, he\ndeclared himself unable to read those at all.  I therefore purpose to\ngive the letter, not as Andrew read it, but as Richard wrote it.\n\n\"_To the hands of the very worthy Dame, my good lady and mistress, Dame\nAgnes Lovell, of Lovell Tower, be these delivered with all convenient\nspeed_.\n\n\"Dear Mistress and my worthy Dame,--In as humble and lowly wise as may\nbe, I commend myself to your kindly favour, hoping that these may find\nyou in health, as they leave me presently.  I do you to wit, good\nmistress, that I have arrived safely, by the grace of our Lord, at\nDamascus, which is a very fair and rich city, and full of all manner of\nmerchandise; and I have been by Byzantium, and have seen all the holy\nrelics there kept; to wit, the cross of our Lord, and His coat, and the\nsponge and reed wherewith the heathen Jews [`Cursed be they!' interposed\nFriar Andrew] did give Him to drink, and more blessed relics else than I\nhave the time to write of, the which nathless be named, as I think, in\nthe Travels of Sir John Maundeville.  This city of Damascus is very\ngreat, and there be about the same so fair gardens as I never did see at\nany other place; moreover, Saint Paul here dwelt, and was a leech.  [See\nNote 2.] Also I give you to wit, good lady, that I look by our Lord's\nhelp, to go on to the holy city of Jerusalem, the which is from here\nfive days' journey.  And I send you herein a fine piece of baudekyn, the\nbravest I could see, the which I bought in the market at Byzantium, to\nmake you a rare gown for feast-days.  Moreover, I beseech you to say\nunto good Father Andrew, (I count he will read this letter, and\ntherefore do say unto himself), I would fain have sent you somewhat\nlikewise, good father, but as yet I found not to my hand aught that\nwould like you; but I look, when I shall be in Jerusalem, if it be the\nLord's pleasure that I come therein, for to get you some relics, by the\nwhich I wis you will set great store.\"  [\"Thou art a good lad,\" said the\nfriar].\n\n\"Edmund Carew is in health, and is a faithful squire, and a passing\nhonest fellow [see note 3]; but he doth long for to hear news of his\nfather, and my heart also is oft-times sore to wit what is become of\nmine old friend.  If you shall hear of any one who wendeth unto the Land\nof Promise, I beseech you send us news herein.  Likewise would I fain\nknow somewhat of the Lord Marnell, who I guess [see note 4] hath now\nreturned to London.  Is Geoffrey yet with you?  I pray you ask him if he\nremembereth me, for an' he doth, I will bring him a brave thing when I\nshall come: and God's blessing and mine be with the sweet heart, and\nkeep him ever from all evil.\n\n\"I beseech you commend me humbly unto the Lord Marnell, if you see him\nor send to him, and also unto Sir Ralph Marston, when you shall have\nspeech of him; and greet well all the maidens and servants from me.\nPray salute also Mistress Katherine on my part, and specially Mistress\nAlice Jordan.  Moreover, I beseech you to make my most humble duty and\nservice unto my good knight my father, and my good lady my mother, and\nsalute from me lovingly my sistren, who I trust be all in health.  I met\nthis holy Palmer at a church called Our Lady of Sardenak, the which is\nfive miles from this city; and he hath promised me for to deliver my\nletters with safety, and in all convenient haste.  I have written also\nunto my father by him; wherefore, if he come unto you first, as I count\nhe will do, I pray you for my sake to put him in the way to Pynsonlee.\n\n\"I give you to wit also, good mistress, that in this country be some men\nwho call themselves Jacobites,--to wit, disciples of Saint James,--and\nthey be right Lollards, holding that a man should make confession to God\nand no wise unto the priest; and also read they God's Word in their own\ntongue, and not in Latin, the which giveth me much marvel how they came\nin this place, for they do wit nothing of us and of our country.\nNathless, I trow that God learneth [teaches] His own alike in all lands\nand at divers times.\n\n\"I pray you specially, good mistress, that you give me to wit how I may\ncome home.  Doth King Henry still reign? and is he yet evil affected\ntoward the Lollards? for so long as things be in this case, I dare in no\nwise take my way unto you.\n\n\"And now, dear mistress, I pray God to have you in His holy keeping, to\nthe which I commit you all.\n\n\"From your very humble serving-man and loving friend, Richard Pynson.\n\n\"Edmund Carew prayeth me for to make his lowly commendations unto you.\n\n\"Written at Damascus, this xxvii day of November.\"\n\nThis was the first and last letter which Dame Lovell received from\nRichard Pynson.  Probably he wrote many others, but they never came to\nhand.\n\nFriar Andrew, with the greatest difficulty, managed to write back a few\nlines.  His letter took him a whole week to compose and transfer to\npaper.  It was written in short sentences, like a child's epistle; and\nnearly every sentence commenced with Richard's name.  Friar Andrew\ninformed his correspondent that all parties named in his letter were\nwell; that Geoffrey was still with them, sent his loving commendations,\nand said he remembered him, and would never forget him as long as he\nlived; that of Lord Marnell they had only heard a rumour which they\ncould not believe, of his having joined an insurrection in the West;\nthat Master Carew was had up to London and strictly examined by the\ncouncil, but that his answers were so ingeniously evasive that they\ncould lay hold of nothing, and nothing had been found in his house which\ncould criminate him; he had accordingly been dismissed with a caution.\nSir Ralph Marston had privately declared that \"the old fox must have\nhidden his Lollard books in some uncommonly safe place, for I wis he had\nsome.\"  Friar Andrew concluded his letter with a malediction upon \"evil\ncompanions,\" by which he meant the anti-Lollard party; for though Andrew\ncared not a straw about the matter of opinion, he could never forgive\nthem for his favourite's death.  He also besought Richard to \"look well\nto his ways, and have nought to do with heathen Jews and Saracens, who\nall worshipped mawmetis,\" [see note 5] and to come home as soon as he\ncould--which, however, must not be just now.\n\nFriar Andrew then folded his elaborate and arduous piece of composition,\nand directed it in remarkable characters and singular spelling, as\nfollows:--\n\n\"_To ye hondes of ye veraye gode Knyghte, Syr Rechurt Pynsone of\nPinnsonrue, beyng yn ye Halie Londe at Dommosscsc_ (this word gave him\nimmense trouble), _or elsewhar, dilyuher thes_.\"\n\n\"There!\" said the friar, with a deep sigh of relief in conclusion, as he\nexhibited the fruit of his prowess in triumph to Dame Lovell.\n\"Methinketh that Richard himself could not better those letters!\"\n\nDame Lovell looked with unfeigned admiration at the cabalistic\ncharacters, for such they were in her eyes, and declared them \"right\nbrave,\" opining moreover that \"learning was soothly a passing rare\nthing!\"\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nNote 1.  Knighthood is now conferred only by the Sovereign, who is \"the\nfountain of honour,\" or by a viceroy, as representing the Sovereign.  In\nancient times, however, \"a knight could make a knight.\"  When the Duke\nof Suffolk was taken prisoner in battle by a simple squire, he asked,\nbefore surrendering his sword, \"Are you a knight?\"  \"No,\" was the\nanswer.  \"Kneel, then,\" replied Suffolk, \"that I may make you one; for I\nwill never give up my sword to a squire.\"  The squire knelt, and Suffolk\nknighted his captor, and then delivered his sword to one who, by the\nlaws of chivalry, had now become his equal.\n\nNote 2.  The reader does not need to search through the Acts of the\nApostles for any mention of Saint Paul's having been a doctor for it is\none of the endless legends of the Middle Ages, of which Maundeville's\nTravels are full.\n\nNote 3.  A very pleasant companion.  \"Fellow\" and \"companion\" have now\nexchanged meanings, though we still speak of a bed_fellow_ and the\n_fellow_ to a glove.\n\nNote 4.  This \"Americanism\" is really an old English phrase, as many\nmore so-called Americanisms also are.\n\nNote 5.  Idols.  Our forefathers had a rooted idea that Jews and\nMohammedans were idolaters.  Their very word for idols, \"Mawmetis,\" was\na corruption of the name of Mahomet.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER THIRTEEN.\n\nTHE DAY AFTER AGINCOURT.\n\n  \"Urbs Coelestis!  Urbs Beata!\n  Super petram collocata,\n  Urbs in portu satis tuto,\n  De lonquinquo te saluto;\n  Te saluto, te suspiro,\n  Te affecto, te requiro.\"\n\nFourteen years had passed away since the burning of the Lady Marnell.  A\nnew king had risen up, who was not a whit less harshly inclined towards\nthe Lollards than his predecessor had been.  This monarch, Henry the\nFifth, of chivalrous memory, was riding over the field of Agincourt, the\nday after the battle, surrounded by about twenty of his nobles.  Behind\nthe nobles rode their squires, and all around them on the field lay the\ndead and dying.\n\n\"Saw you yonder knight, Master Wentworth,\" inquired one of the squires\nof his next neighbour, \"that we marked a-riding down by the woody knoll\nto the left, shortly afore the fight?  I marvel if he meant to fight.\"\n\n\"He had it, if he meant it not,\" answered the other; \"the knight, you\nwould say, who bore three silver arrows?\"\n\n\"Ay, the same.  What befell him?\"\n\n\"A party of French skirmishers came down upon him and his squire, and\nthey were both forced to draw sword.  The knight defended himself like a\ngallant knight, but--our Lady aid us!--they were twelve to two, or\nthereabouts: it was small marvel that he fell.\"\n\n\"He did fall?  And the squire?\"\n\n\"The squire fought so bravely, that he earned well his gilded spurs.\n[Gilded spurs were the mark of a knight.] He stood over his master where\nhe fell, and I trow the French got not his body so long as the squire\nwas alive; but I saw not the end of it, for my master bade me thence.\"\n\n\"I pray you,\" interposed a third squire, \"wit you who is yon youth that\nrideth by the King's left hand?\"\n\n\"The tall, pale, fair-haired youth on the white horse.\"\n\n\"He.\"\n\n\"That is the Lord Marnell--a new favourite.\"\n\n\"The Lord Marnell!  Is he a kinsman of the Lady Marnell, who--\"\n\n\"Hush!  Yes, her son.\"\n\n\"His father is dead, also, then?\"\n\n\"His father was beheaded about twelve years gone, on account of having\ntaken part in a rebellion, got up by the friends of King Richard; but it\nwas said at the time privily, that an' he had not been suspected of\nLollardism, his part in the rebellion might have been forgiven.\"\n\n\"Where, then, dwelt this youth, his son?\"\n\n\"In the North, I ween, somewhere, with his grandmother, who hath died\nnot long since.  Then the young Lord came down to seek his fortune in\nLondon and the King's Grace saw him, and fancied him.\"\n\nThe squires' conversation, and themselves as well, came to a sudden\nstop, for the King and his suite had halted in front of them.\n\nAlmost in their way, on the ground lay a wounded man.  His visor was\nraised, and his face visible; but his surcoat was slashed and covered\nwith mire and blood, so that the eye could no longer discern the device\nembroidered on it.  A scallop-shell fastened to his helmet, intimated\nthat he had at some past time been a pilgrim to the shrine of Saint\nJames of Compostella; while the red cross upon his shoulder was an\nindisputable indication that he \"came from the East Countrie.\"  His age\nwould have been difficult to guess.  It did not seem to be years which\nhad blanched the hair and beard, and had given to the face a wearied,\ntravel-worn look--a look which so changed the countenance from what it\nmight otherwise have been, that even\n\n  \"--The mother that him bare,\n  If she had been in presence there,\n  She had not known her child.\"  Marmion.\n\nClose to the dying man lay, apparently, his squire--dead; and beside him\nwas a shield, turned with its face to the ground.\n\n\"The very same knight whom we saw a-riding down the knoll!\" said one of\nthe squires, with an oath.  A man was thought very pious in the\nfourteenth and fifteenth centuries if he did not swear pretty freely.\n\"At least I ween it be the same--I should wit well the shield an' I\ncould see it.\"\n\nKing Henry and his nobles were attentively contemplating the wounded\nknight.\n\n\"Light down, my Lord Marnell,\" said the King, \"and see what is the\ndevice upon yon shield.  We would know which of our faithful servants we\nhave unhappily lost.\"\n\nAs the King spoke, the eyes of the dying man suddenly turned to Geoffrey\nMarnell, who sprang lightly from his horse to fulfil the royal order.\nHe knelt down by the shield, and lifted it up to examine the arms; and\nas he turned it, the well-known cognisance of Pynson of Pynsonlee--the\nthree silver arrows--met his eye.  An exclamation of mingled sorrow and\nsurprise burst from Geoffrey's lips.\n\n\"Who is he?\" said Henry, eagerly.\n\n\"Sir Richard Pynson of Pynsonlee, an't please your Grace.\"\n\n\"Ha! the Lollard knight!\" cried the King.  \"Better he than another!  I\nhad bruit of him, and, truly, I looked to have him to the stake when he\nshould return from his Eastern travel.  It is well.\"\n\nThe King and his suite rode on; but Geoffrey was not one of them.  He\nhad thrown down the shield, and had turned to the dear friend of his\nyouth, who lay dying before him.\n\n\"Richard! dear, dear Richard!\" he said, in trembling accents.  \"How came\nyou here?  Have you only come home to die?  O Richard, die not just now!\nBut perchance it were better so,\" he added, in a low tone, recalling\nthe cruel words of the King.  \"Is it thus that thy God hath granted thee\nthat which thou requestedst, and hath not let thee pass through the\nfiery trial?\"\n\nAs Geoffrey thus bemoaned the fate of his old friend, he fancied that he\nsaw Richard's lips move, and he bent his head low to catch his last\nwords.  Faintly, but audibly, those two last words, so full of meaning,\nreached his ear.  And the first of the two was \"Margery!\" and the last\n\"Jesus!\"\n\nThe tears fell from Geoffrey's eyes, as he softly kissed the pale brow\nof the dead; and then, remounting his horse, he galloped after the King.\nThere was no need of his remaining longer; for he could do nothing more\nfor Richard Pynson, when he had clasped hands with Margery Lovell at the\ngates of the _Urbs Beata_.\n\nTHE END.","title":"Mistress Margery","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":34956}