THE CLOISTER AND THE HEARTH

by Charles Reade

Etext Notes:

1. Greek passages are enclosed in angled brackets, e. G. {methua}, and have been transliterated according to:alpha A, a beta B, b gamma G, g delta D, d epsilon E, e zeta Z, z eta Y, y theta Th, th iota I, i kappa K, k lamda L, l mu M, m nu N, n omicron O, o pi P, p rho R, r sigma S, s tau T, t phi Ph, ph chi Ch, ch psi Ps, ps xi X, x upsilon U, u omega W, w

2. All diacritics have been removed from this version

3. References for the Author's footnotes are enclosed in squarebrackets(e. G. (1)) and collected at the end of the chapter they occurin. 

4. There are 100 chapters in the book, each starting with CHAPTER R, where R is the chapter number expressed as a Roman numeral. 

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

A small portion of this tale appeared in Once a Week, July-September, 1859, under the title of "A Good Fight. "

After writing it, I took wider views of the subject, and also feltuneasy at having deviated unnecessarily from the historical outline ofa true story. These two sentiments have cost me more than a year's veryhard labour, which I venture to think has not been wasted. After thisplain statement I trust all who comment on this work will see that todescribe it as a reprint would be unfair to the public and to me. TheEnglish language is copious, and, in any true man's hands, quite ableto convey the truth--namely, that one-fifth of the present work is areprint, and four-fifths of it a new composition. 

CHARLES READE

CHAPTER I

Not a day passes over the earth, but men and women of no note do greatdeeds, speak great words, and suffer noble sorrows. Of these obscureheroes, philosophers, and martyrs, the greater part will never be knowntill that hour, when many that are great shall be small, and the smallgreat; but of others the world's knowledge may be said to sleep: theirlives and characters lie hidden from nations in the annals that recordthem. The general reader cannot feel them, they are presented so curtlyand coldly: they are not like breathing stories appealing to his heart, but little historic hail-stones striking him but to glance off hisbosom: nor can he understand them; for epitomes are not narratives, asskeletons are not human figures. 

Thus records of prime truths remain a dead letter to plain folk: thewriters have left so much to the imagination, and imagination is sorare a gift. Here, then, the writer of fiction may be of use to thepublic--as an interpreter. 

There is a musty chronicle, written in intolerable Latin, and in ita chapter where every sentence holds a fact. Here is told, with harshbrevity, the strange history of a pair, who lived untrumpeted, and diedunsung, four hundred years ago; and lie now, as unpitied, in that sternpage, as fossils in a rock. Thus, living or dead, Fate is still unjustto them. For if I can but show you what lies below that dry chronicler'swords, methinks you will correct the indifference of centuries, and givethose two sore-tried souls a place in your heart--for a day. 

It was past the middle of the fifteenth century; Louis XI was sovereignof France; Edward IV was wrongful king of England; and Philip "theGood, " having by force and cunning dispossessed his cousin Jacqueline, and broken her heart, reigned undisturbed this many years in Holland, where our tale begins. 

Elias, and Catherine his wife, lived in the little town of Tergou. Hetraded, wholesale and retail, in cloth, silk, brown holland, and, above all, in curried leather, a material highly valued by the middlingpeople, because it would stand twenty years' wear, and turn an ordinaryknife, no small virtue in a jerkin of that century, in which folk wereso liberal of their steel; even at dinner a man would leave his meatawhile, and carve you his neighbour, on a very moderate difference ofopinion. 

The couple were well to do, and would have been free from all earthlycare, but for nine children. When these were coming into the world, oneper annum, each was hailed with rejoicings, and the saints were thanked, not expostulated with; and when parents and children were all youngtogether, the latter were looked upon as lovely little playthingsinvented by Heaven for the amusement, joy, and evening solace of peoplein business. 

But as the olive-branches shot up, and the parents grew older, and sawwith their own eyes the fate of large families, misgivings and caremingled with their love. They belonged to a singularly wise andprovident people: in Holland reckless parents were as rare asdisobedient children. So now when the huge loaf came in on a gigantictrencher, looking like a fortress in its moat, and, the tour of thetable once made, seemed to have melted away, Elias and Catherine wouldlook at one another and say, "Who is to find bread for them all when weare gone?"

At this observation the younger ones needed all their filial respect tokeep their little Dutch countenances; for in their opinion dinner andsupper came by nature like sunrise and sunset, and, so long as thatluminary should travel round the earth, so long as the brown loaf goround their family circle, and set in their stomachs only to rise againin the family oven. But the remark awakened the national thoughtfulnessof the elder boys, and being often repeated, set several of the familythinking, some of them good thoughts, some ill thoughts, according tothe nature of the thinkers. 

"Kate, the children grow so, this table will soon be too small. "

"We cannot afford it, Eli, " replied Catherine, answering not his words, but his thought, after the manner of women. 

Their anxiety for the future took at times a less dismal but moremortifying turn. The free burghers had their pride as well as thenobles; and these two could not bear that any of their blood should godown in the burgh after their decease. 

So by prudence and self-denial they managed to clothe all the littlebodies, and feed all the great mouths, and yet put by a small hoardto meet the future; and, as it grew and grew, they felt a pleasure themiser hoarding for himself knows not. 

One day the eldest boy but one, aged nineteen, came to his mother, and, with that outward composure which has so misled some persons as to thereal nature of this people, begged her to intercede with his father tosend him to Amsterdam, and place him with a merchant. "It is the wayof life that likes me: merchants are wealthy; I am good at numbers;prithee, good mother, take my part in this, and I shall ever be, as I amnow, your debtor. "

Catherine threw up her hands with dismay and incredulity. 

"What! leave Tergou!"

"What is one street to me more than another? If I can leave the folk ofTergou, I can surely leave the stones. "

"What! quit your poor father now he is no longer young?"

"Mother, if I can leave you, I can leave"

"What! leave your poor brothers and sisters, that love you so dear?"

"There are enough in the house without me. "

"What mean you, Richart? Who is more thought of than you Stay, have Ispoken sharp to you? Have I been unkind to you?"

"Never that I know of; and if you had, you should never hear of it fromme. Mother, " said Richart gravely, but the tear was in his eye, "it alllies in a word, and nothing can change my mind. There will be one mouthless for you to feed. '

"There now, see what my tongue has done, " said Catherine, and the nextmoment she began to cry. For she saw her first young bird on the edgeof the nest trying his wings to fly into the world. Richart had a calm, strong will, and she knew he never wasted a word. 

It ended as nature has willed all such discourse shall end: youngRichart went to Amsterdam with a face so long and sad as it had neverbeen seen before, and a heart like granite. 

That afternoon at supper there was one mouth less. Catherine looked atRichart's chair and wept bitterly. On this Elias shouted roughly andangrily to the children, "Sit wider, can't ye: sit wider!" and turnedhis head away over the back of his seat awhile, and was silent. 

Richart was launched, and never cost them another penny; but to fit himout and place him in the house of Vander Stegen, the merchant, took allthe little hoard but one gold crown. They began again. Two years passed, Richart found a niche in commerce for his brother Jacob, and Jacob leftTergou directly after dinner, which was at eleven in the forenoon. Atsupper that day Elias remembered what had happened the last time; so itwas in a low whisper he said, "Sit wider, dears!" Now until that moment, Catherine would not see the gap at table, for her daughter Catherine hadbesought her not to grieve to-night, and she had said, "No, sweetheart, I promise I will not, since it vexes my children. " But when Eliaswhispered "Sit wider!" says she, "Ay! the table will soon be too bigfor the children, and you thought it would be too small;" and havingdelivered this with forced calmness, she put up her apron the nextmoment, and wept sore. 

"'Tis the best that leave us, " sobbed she; "that is the cruel part. "

"Nay! nay!" said Elias, "our children are good children, and all aredear to us alike. Heed her not! What God takes from us still seemsbetter that what He spares to us; that is to say, men are by natureunthankful--and women silly. "

"And I say Richart and Jacob were the flower of the flock, " sobbedCatherine. 

The little coffer was empty again, and to fill it they gatheredlike ants. In those days speculation was pretty much confined to thecard-and-dice business. Elias knew no way to wealth but the slow andsure one. "A penny saved is a penny gained, " was his humble creed. Allthat was not required for the business and the necessaries of life wentinto the little coffer with steel bands and florid key. They deniedthemselves in turn the humblest luxuries, and then, catching oneanother's looks, smiled; perhaps with a greater joy than self-indulgencehas to bestow. And so in three years more they had gleaned enough to setup their fourth son as a master-tailor, and their eldest daughter as arobemaker, in Tergou. Here were two more provided for: their own tradewould enable them to throw work into the hands of this pair. But thecoffer was drained to the dregs, and this time the shop too bled alittle in goods if not in coin. 

Alas! there remained on hand two that were unable to get their bread, and two that were unwilling. The unable ones were, 1, Giles, a dwarf, of the wrong sort, half stupidity, half malice, all head and claws andvoice, run from by dogs and unprejudiced females, and sided with throughthick and thin by his mother; 2, Little Catherine, a poor little girlthat could only move on crutches. She lived in pain, but smiled throughit, with her marble face and violet eyes and long silky lashes; andfretful or repining word never came from her lips. The unwilling oneswere Sybrandt, the youngest, a ne'er-do-weel, too much in love with playto work; and Cornelis, the eldest, who had made calculations, and stuckto the hearth, waiting for dead men's shoes. Almost worn out by theirrepeated efforts, and above all dispirited by the moral and physicalinfirmities of those that now remained on hand, the anxious couple wouldoften say, "What will become of all these when we shall be no longerhere to take care of them?" But when they had said this a good manytimes, suddenly the domestic horizon cleared, and then they usedstill to say it, because a habit is a habit, but they uttered it halfmechanically now, and added brightly and cheerfully, "But thanks to St. Bavon and all the saints, there's Gerard. "

Young Gerard was for many years of his life a son apart and he was goinginto the Church, and the Church could always maintain her children byhook or by crook in those days: no great hopes, because his family hadno interest with the great to get him a benefice, and the young man'sown habits were frivolous, and, indeed, such as our cloth merchantwould not have put up with in any one but a clerk that was to be. Histrivialities were reading and penmanship, and he was so wrapped up inthem that often he could hardly be got away to his meals. The daywas never long enough for him; and he carried ever a tinder-box andbrimstone matches, and begged ends of candles of the neighbours, whichhe lighted at unreasonable hours--ay, even at eight of the clock atnight in winter, when the very burgomaster was abed. Endured at home, his practices were encouraged by the monks of a neighbouring convent. They had taught him penmanship, and continued to teach him until one daythey discovered, in the middle of a lesson, that he was teaching them. They pointed this out to him in a merry way: he hung his head andblushed: he had suspected as much himself, but mistrusted his judgmentin so delicate a matter. "But, my son, " said an elderly monk, "how isit that you, to whom God has given an eye so true, a hand so subtle yetfirm, and a heart to love these beautiful crafts, how is it you do notcolour as well as write? A scroll looks but barren unless a border offruit, and leaves, and rich arabesques surround the good words, andcharm the sense as those do the soul and understanding; to say nothingof the pictures of holy men and women departed, with which the severalchapters should be adorned, and not alone the eye soothed with the braveand sweetly blended colours, but the heart lifted by effigies of thesaints in glory. Answer me, my son. "

At this Gerard was confused, and muttered that he had made severaltrials at illuminating, but had not succeeded well; and thus the matterrested. 

Soon after this a fellow-enthusiast came on the scene in the unwontedform of an old lady. Margaret, sister and survivor of the brothers VanEyck, left Flanders, and came to end her days in her native country. Shebought a small house near Tergou. In course of time she heard of Gerard, and saw some of his handiwork: it pleased her so well that she sent herfemale servant, Reicht Heynes, to ask him to come to her. This led to anacquaintance: it could hardly be otherwise, for little Tergou had neverheld so many as two zealots of this sort before. At first the old ladydamped Gerard's courage terribly. At each visit she fished out of holesand corners drawings and paintings, some of them by her own hand, thatseemed to him unapproachable; but if the artist overpowered him, thewoman kept his heart up. She and Reicht soon turned him inside out likea glove: among other things, they drew from him what the good monks hadfailed to hit upon, the reason why he did not illuminate, viz. , thathe could not afford the gold, the blue, and the red, but only the cheapearths; and that he was afraid to ask his mother to buy the choicecolours, and was sure he should ask her in vain. Then Margaret Van Eyckgave him a little brush--gold, and some vermilion and ultramarine, anda piece of good vellum to lay them on. He almost adored her. As he leftthe house Reicht ran after him with a candle and two quarters: hequite kissed her. But better even than the gold and lapis-lazuli to theilluminator was the sympathy to the isolated enthusiast. That sympathywas always ready, and, as he returned it, an affection sprung up betweenthe old painter and the young caligrapher that was doubly characteristicof the time. For this was a century in which the fine arts and thehigher mechanical arts were not separated by any distinct boundary, norwere those who practised them; and it was an age in which artists soughtout and loved one another. Should this last statement stagger a painteror writer of our day, let me remind him that even Christians loved oneanother at first starting. 

Backed by an acquaintance so venerable, and strengthened by femalesympathy, Gerard advanced in learning and skill. His spirits, too, rosevisibly: he still looked behind him when dragged to dinner in themiddle of an initial G; but once seated, showed great social qualities;likewise a gay humour, that had hitherto but peeped in him, shone out, and often he set the table in a roar, and kept it there, sometimes withhis own wit, sometimes with jests which were glossy new to his family, being drawn from antiquity. 

As a return for all he owed his friends the monks, he made themexquisite copies from two of their choicest MSS. , viz. , the life oftheir founder, and their Comedies of Terence, the monastery finding thevellum. 

The high and puissant Prince, Philip "the Good, " Duke of Burgundy, Luxemburg, and Brabant, Earl of Holland and Zealand, Lord of Friesland, Count of Flanders, Artois, and Hainault, Lord of Salins and Macklyn--wasversatile. 

He could fight as well as any king going; and lie could lie as well asany, except the King of France. He was a mighty hunter, and could readand write. His tastes were wide and ardent. He loved jewels like awoman, and gorgeous apparel. He dearly loved maids of honour, and indeedpaintings generally; in proof of which he ennobled Jan Van Eyck. He hadalso a rage for giants, dwarfs, and Turks. These last stood ever plantedabout him, turbaned and blazing with jewels. His agents inveigled themfrom Istamboul with fair promises; but the moment he had got them, hebaptized them by brute force in a large tub; and this done, let themsquat with their faces towards Mecca, and invoke Mahound as much as theypleased, laughing in his sleeve at their simplicity in fancying theywere still infidels. He had lions in cages, and fleet leopards trainedby Orientals to run down hares and deer. In short, he relished allrarities, except the humdrum virtues. For anything singularly pretty ordiabolically ugly, this was your customer. The best of him was, he wasopenhanded to the poor; and the next best was, he fostered the arts inearnest: whereof he now gave a signal proof. He offered prizes for thebest specimens of orfevrerie in two kinds, religious and secular: item, for the best paintings in white of egg, oils, and tempera; these tobe on panel, silk, or metal, as the artists chose: item, for the besttransparent painting on glass: item, for the best illuminating andborder-painting on vellum: item, for the fairest writing on vellum. Theburgomasters of the several towns were commanded to aid all the poorercompetitors by receiving their specimens and sending them with due careto Rotterdam at the expense of their several burghs. When this was criedby the bellman through the streets of Tergou, a thousand mouths opened, and one heart beat--Gerard's. He told his family timidly he should tryfor two of those prizes. They stared in silence, for their breath wasgone at his audacity; but one horrid laugh exploded on the floor likea petard. Gerard looked down, and there was the dwarf, slit and fangedfrom ear to ear at his expense, and laughing like a lion. Nature, relenting at having made Giles so small, had given him as a set-off thebiggest voice on record. His very whisper was a bassoon. He was likethose stunted wide-mouthed pieces of ordnance we see on fortifications;more like a flower-pot than a cannon; but ods tympana how they bellow!

Gerard turned red with anger, the more so as the others began to titter. White Catherine saw, and a pink tinge came on her cheek. She saidsoftly, "Why do you laugh? Is it because he is our brother you thinkhe cannot be capable? Yes, Gerard, try with the rest. Many say you areskilful; and mother and I will pray the Virgin to guide your hand. "

"Thank you, little Kate. You shall pray to our Lady, and our mothershall buy me vellum and the colours to illuminate with. "

"What will they cost, my lad?"

"Two gold crowns" (about three shillings and fourpence English money). 

"What!" screamed the housewife, "when the bushel of rye costs but agroat! What! me spend a month's meal and meat and fire on such vanity asthat: the lightning from Heaven would fall on me, and my children wouldall be beggars. "

"Mother!" sighed little Catherine, imploringly. 

"Oh! it is in vain, Kate, " said Gerard, with a sigh. "I shall have togive it up, or ask the dame Van Eyck. She would give it me, but I thinkshame to be for ever taking from her. "

"It is not her affair, " said Catherine, very sharply; "what has she todo coming between me and my son?" and she left the room with a redface. Little Catherine smiled. Presently the housewife returned with agracious, affectionate air, and two little gold pieces in her hand. 

"There, sweetheart, " said she, "you won't have to trouble dame ordemoiselle for two paltry crowns. "

But on this Gerard fell a thinking how he could spare her purse. 

"One will do, mother. I will ask the good monks to let me send my copyof their 'Terence:' it is on snowy vellum, and I can write no better:so then I shall only need six sheets of vellum for my borders andminiatures, and gold for my ground, and prime colours--one crown willdo. '

"Never tyne the ship for want of a bit of tar, Gerard, " said hischangeable mother. But she added, "Well, there, I will put the crown inmy pocket. That won't be like putting it back in the box. Going to thebox to take out instead of putting in, it is like going to my heart witha knife for so many drops of blood. You will be sure to want it, Gerard. The house is never built for less than the builder counted on. "

Sure enough, when the time came, Gerard longed to go to Rotterdam andsee the Duke, and above all to see the work of his competitors, andso get a lesson from defeat. And the crown came out of the housewife'spocket with a very good grace. Gerard would soon be a priest. It seemedhard if he might not enjoy the world a little before separating himselffrom it for life. 

The night before he went, Margaret Van Eyck asked him to take a letterfor her, and when he came to look at it, to his surprise he found it wasaddressed to the Princess Marie, at the Stadthouse in Rotterdam. 

The day before the prizes were to be distributed, Gerard started forRotterdam in his holiday suit, to wit, a doublet of silver-grey cloth, with sleeves, and a jerkin of the same over it, but without sleeves. From his waist to his heels he was clad in a pair of tight-fittingbuckskin hose fastened by laces (called points) to his doublet. Hisshoes were pointed, in moderation, and secured by a strap that passedunder the hollow of the foot. On his head and the back of his neck hewore his flowing hair, and pinned to his back between his shoulders washis hat: it was further secured by a purple silk ribbon little Kate hadpassed round him from the sides of the hat, and knotted neatly onhis breast; below his hat, attached to the upper rim of his broadwaist-belt, was his leathern wallet. When he got within a league ofRotterdam he was pretty tired, but he soon fell in with a pair that weremore so. He found an old man sitting by the roadside quite worn out, anda comely young woman holding his hand, with a face brimful of concern. The country people trudged by, and noticed nothing amiss; but Gerard, ashe passed, drew conclusions. Even dress tells a tale to those who studyit so closely as he did, being an illuminator. The old man wore a gown, and a fur tippet, and a velvet cap, sure signs of dignity; but thetriangular purse at his girdle was lean, the gown rusty, the fur worn, sure signs of poverty. The young woman was dressed in plain russetcloth: yet snow-white lawn covered that part of her neck the gown leftvisible, and ended half way up her white throat in a little band of goldembroidery; and her head-dress was new to Gerard: instead of hiding herhair in a pile of linen or lawn, she wore an open network of silver cordwith silver spangles at the interstices: in this her glossy auburn hairwas rolled in front into two solid waves, and supported behind in aluxurious and shapely mass. His quick eye took in all this, and the oldman's pallor, and the tears in the young woman's eyes. So when he hadpassed them a few yards, he reflected, and turned back, and came towardsthem bashfully. 

"Father, I fear you are tired. "

"Indeed, my son, I am, " replied the old man, "and faint for lack offood. "

Gerard's address did not appear so agreeable to the girl as to the oldman. She seemed ashamed, and with much reserve in her manner, said, that it was her fault--she had underrated the distance, and imprudentlyallowed her father to start too late in the day. 

"No, no, " said the old man; "it is not the distance, it is the want ofnourishment. "

The girl put her arms round his neck with tender concern, but took thatopportunity of whispering, "Father, a stranger--a young man!"

But it was too late. Gerard, with simplicity, and quite as a matter ofcourse, fell to gathering sticks with great expedition. This done, hetook down his wallet, out with the manchet of bread and the iron flaskhis careful mother had put up, and his everlasting tinder-box; lighted amatch, then a candle-end, then the sticks; and put his iron flask on it. Then down he went on his stomach, and took a good blow: then looking up, he saw the girl's face had thawed, and she was looking down at him andhis energy with a demure smile. He laughed back to her. "Mind the pot, "said he, "and don't let it spill, for Heaven's sake: there's a cleftstick to hold it safe with;" and with this he set off running towards acorn-field at some distance. 

Whilst he was gone, there came by, on a mule with rich purple housings, an old man redolent of wealth. The purse at his girdle was plethoric, the fur on his tippet was ermine, broad and new. 

It was Ghysbrecht Van Swieten, the burgomaster of Tergou. 

He was old, and his face furrowed. He was a notorious miser, and lookedone generally. But the idea of supping with the Duke raised him just nowinto manifest complacency. Yet at the sight of the faded old man and hisbright daughter sitting by a fire of sticks, the smile died out of hisface, and he wore a strange look of pain and uneasiness. He reined inhis mule. 

"Why, Peter, --Margaret, " said he, almost fiercely, "what mummery isthis?" Peter was going to answer, but Margaret interposed hastily, andsaid: "My father was exhausted, so I am warming something to give himstrength before we go on. "

"What! reduced to feed by the roadside like the Bohemians, " saidGhysbrecht, and his hand went into his purse; but it did not seem athome there; it fumbled uncertainly, afraid too large a coin might stickto a finger and come out. 

At this moment who should come bounding up but Gerard. He had two strawsin his hand, and he threw himself down by the fire and relieved Margaretof the cooking part: then suddenly recognizing the burgomaster, hecoloured all over. Ghysbrecht Van Swieten started and glared at him, and took his hand out of his purse. "Oh!" said he bitterly, "I amnot wanted, " and went slowly on, casting a long look of suspicion onMargaret, and hostility on Gerard, that was not very intelligible. However, there was something about it that Margaret could read enoughto blush at, and almost toss her head. Gerard only stared with surprise. "By St. Bavon, I think the old miser grudges us three our quartof soup, " said he. When the young man put that interpretation onGhysbrecht's strange and meaning look, Margaret was greatly relieved, and smiled gaily on the speaker. 

Meanwhile Ghysbrecht plodded on, more wretched in his wealth than thesein their poverty. And the curious thing is, that the mule, the purplehousings, and one-half the coin in that plethoric purse, belonged not toGhysbrecht Van Swieten, but to that faded old man and that comely girl, who sat by a roadside fire to be fed by a stranger. They did not knowthis; but Ghysbrecht knew it, and carried in his heart a scorpion ofhis own begetting; that scorpion is remorse--the remorse that, notbeing penitence, is incurable, and ready for fresh misdeeds upon a freshtemptation. 

Twenty years ago, when Ghysbrecht Van Swieten was a hard and honest man, the touchstone opportunity came to him, and he did an act of heartlessroguery. It seemed a safe one. It had hitherto proved a safe one, thoughhe had never felt safe. To-day he had seen youth, enterprise, and, aboveall, knowledge, seated by fair Margaret and her father on terms thatlook familiar and loving. 

And the fiends are at big ear again. 

CHAPTER II

"The soup is hot, " said Gerard. 

"But how are we to get it to our mouths?" inquired the senior, despondingly. 

"Father, the young man has brought us straws. " And Margaret smiledslily. 

"Ay, ay!" said the old man; "but my poor bones are stiff, and indeed thefire is too hot for a body to kneel over with these short straws. St. John the Baptist, but the young man is adroit!"

For, while he stated his difficulty, Gerard removed it. He untied in amoment the knot on his breast, took his hat off, put a stone into eachcorner of it, then, wrapping his hand in the tail of his jerkin, whippedthe flask off the fire, wedged it in between the stones, and put thehat under the old man's nose with a merry smile. The other tremulouslyinserted the pipe of rye-straw and sucked. Lo and behold, his wan, drawnface was seen to light up more and more, till it quite glowed; and assoon as he had drawn a long breath:

"Hippocrates and Galen!" he cried, "'tis a soupe au vin--the restorativeof restoratives. Blessed be the nation that invented it, and the womanthat made it, and the young man who brings it to fainting folk. Have asuck, my girl, while I relate to our young host the history and virtuesof this his sovereign compound. This corroborative, young sir, wasunknown to the ancients: we find it neither in their treatises ofmedicine, nor in those popular narratives, which reveal many of theirremedies, both in chirurgery and medicine proper. Hector, in the Ilias, if my memory does not play me false--

(Margaret. "Alas! he's off. ")

----was invited by one of the ladies of the poem to drink a draught ofwine; but he declined, on the plea that he was just going into battle, and must not take aught to weaken his powers. Now, if the soupe au vinhad been known in Troy, it is clear that in declining vinum merum uponthat score, he would have added in the hexameter, 'But a soupe au vin, madam, I will degust, and gratefully. ' Not only would this have been butcommon civility--a virtue no perfect commander is wanting in--but notto have done it would have proved him a shallow and improvident person, unfit to be trusted with the conduct of a war; for men going into abattle need sustenance and all possible support, as is proved by this, that foolish generals, bringing hungry soldiers to blows with full ones, have been defeated, in all ages, by inferior numbers. The Romans losta great battle in the north of Italy to Hannibal, the Carthaginian, bythis neglect alone. Now, this divine elixir gives in one moment force tothe limbs and ardour to the spirits; and taken into Hector's body atthe nick of time, would, by the aid of Phoebus, Venus, and the blessedsaints, have most likely procured the Greeks a defeat. For note howfaint and weary and heart-sick I was a minute ago; well, I suck thiscelestial cordial, and now behold me brave as Achilles and strong as aneagle. "

"Oh, father, now? an eagle, alack!"

"Girl, I defy thee and all the world. Ready, I say, like a foamingcharger, to devour the space between this and Rotterdam, and strongto combat the ills of life, even poverty and old age, which lastphilosophers have called the summum malum. Negatur; unless the man'slife has been ill-spent--which, by the bye, it generally has. Now forthe moderns!"

"Father! dear father!"

"Fear me not, girl; I will be brief, unreasonably and unseasonablybrief. The soupe au vin occurs not in modern science; but this is onlyone proof more, if proof were needed, that for the last few hundredyears physicians have been idiots, with their chicken-broth and theirdecoction of gold, whereby they attribute the highest qualities to thatmeat which has the least juice of any meat, and to that metal whichhas less chemical qualities than all the metals; mountebanks! dunces!homicides! Since, then, from these no light is to be gathered, go weto the chroniclers; and first we find that Duguesclin, a French knight, being about to join battle with the English--masters, at that time, ofhalf France, and sturdy strikers by sea and land--drank, not one, butthree soupes au vin in honour of the Blessed Trinity. This done, hecharged the islanders; and, as might have been foretold, killed amultitude, and drove the rest into the sea. But he was only the firstof a long list of holy and hard-hitting ones who have, by this divinerestorative, been sustentated, fortified, corroborated, and consoled. "

"Dear father, prithee add thyself to that venerable company ere thesoup cools. " And Margaret held the hat imploringly in both hands till heinserted the straw once more. 

This spared them the "modern instances, " and gave Gerard an opportunityof telling Margaret how proud his mother would be her soup had profiteda man of learning. 

"Ay! but, " said Margaret, "it would like her ill to see her son give alland take none himself. Why brought you but two straws?"

"Fair mistress, I hoped you would let me put my lips to your straw, there being but two. "

Margaret smiled and blushed. "Never beg that you may command, " said she. "The straw is not mine, 'tis yours: you cut it in yonder field. "

"I cut it, and that made it mine; but after that, your lip touched it, and that made it yours. "

"Did it Then I will lend it you. There--now it is yours again; your liphas touched it. "

"No, it belongs to us both now. Let us divide it. "

"By all means; you have a knife. "

"No, I will not cut it--that would be unlucky. I'll bite it. There Ishall keep my half: you will burn yours, once you get home, I doubt. '

"You know me not. I waste nothing. It is odds but I make a hairpin ofit, or something. "

This answer dashed the novice Gerard, instead of provoking him, to freshefforts, and he was silent. And now, the bread and soup being disposedof, the old scholar prepared to continue his journey. Then came alittle difficulty: Gerard the adroit could not tie his ribbon again asCatherine had tied it. Margaret, after slily eyeing his efforts forsome time, offered to help him; for at her age girls love to be coy andtender, saucy and gentle, by turns, and she saw she had put him out ofcountenance but now. Then a fair head, with its stately crown of auburnhair, glossy and glowing through silver, bowed sweetly towards him; and, while it ravished his eye, two white supple hands played delicately uponthe stubborn ribbon, and moulded it with soft and airy touches. Then aheavenly thrill ran through the innocent young man, and vague glimpsesof a new world of feeling and sentiment opened on him. And these new andexquisite sensations Margaret unwittingly prolonged: it is not naturalto her sex to hurry aught that pertains to the sacred toilet. Nay, whenthe taper fingers had at last subjugated the ends of the knot, her mindwas not quite easy, till, by a manoeuvre peculiar to the female hand, she had made her palm convex, and so applied it with a gentle pressureto the centre of the knot--a sweet little coaxing hand-kiss, as much asto say, "Now be a good knot, and stay so. " The palm-kiss was bestowed onthe ribbon, but the wearer's heart leaped to meet it. 

"There, that is how it was, " said Margaret, and drew back to take onelast keen survey of her work; then, looking up for simple approvalof her skill, received full in her eyes a longing gaze of such ardentadoration, as made her lower them quickly and colour all over. Anindescribable tremor seized her, and she retreated with downcast lashesand tell-tale cheeks, and took her father's arm on the opposite side. Gerard, blushing at having scared her away with his eyes, took theother arm; and so the two young things went downcast and conscious, andpropped the eagle along in silence. 

They entered Rotterdam by the Schiedamze Poort; and, as Gerard wasunacquainted with the town, Peter directed him the way to the HoochStraet, in which the Stadthouse was. He himself was going with Margaretto his cousin, in the Ooster-Waagen Straet, so, almost on entering thegate, their roads lay apart. They bade each other a friendly adieu, andGerard dived into the great town. A profound sense of solitude fell uponhim, yet the streets were crowded. Then he lamented too late that, outof delicacy, he had not asked his late companions who they were andwhere they lived. 

"Beshrew my shamefacedness!" said he. "But their words and theirbreeding were above their means, and something did whisper me they wouldnot be known. I shall never see her more. Oh weary world, I hate you andyour ways. To think I must meet beauty and goodness and learning--threepearls of price--and never see them more!"

Falling into this sad reverie, and letting his body go where it would, he lost his way; but presently meeting a crowd of persons all moving inone direction, he mingled with them, for he argued they must be makingfor the Stadthouse. Soon the noisy troop that contained the moody Gerardemerged, not upon the Stadthouse, but upon a large meadow by the side ofthe Maas; and then the attraction was revealed. Games of all sortswere going on: wrestling, the game of palm, the quintain, legerdemain, archery, tumbling, in which art, I blush to say, women as well as menperformed, to the great delectation of the company. There was also atrained bear, who stood on his head, and marched upright, and bowed withprodigious gravity to his master; and a hare that beat a drum, and acock that strutted on little stilts disdainfully. These things madeGerard laugh now and then; but the gay scene could not really enlivenit, for his heart was not in tune with it. So hearing a young man sayto his fellow that the Duke had been in the meadow, but was gone tothe Stadthouse to entertain the burgomasters and aldermen and thecompetitors for the prizes, and their friends, he suddenly rememberedhe was hungry, and should like to sup with a prince. He left theriver-side, and this time he found the Hooch Straet, and it speedily ledhim to the Stadthouse. But when he got there he was refused, firstat one door, then at another, till he came to the great gate of thecourtyard. It was kept by soldiers, and superintended by a pompousmajor-domo, glittering in an embroidered collar and a gold chain ofoffice, and holding a white staff with a gold knob. There was a crowd ofpersons at the gate endeavouring to soften this official rock. They cameup in turn like ripples, and retired as such in turn. It cost Gerard astruggle to get near him, and when he was within four heads of thegate, he saw something that made his heart beat; there was Peter, withMargaret on his arm, soliciting humbly for entrance. 

"My cousin the alderman is not at home; they say he is here. "

"What is that to me, old man?"

"If you will not let us pass in to him, at least take this leaf from mytablet to my cousin. See, I have written his name; he will come out tous. 

"For what do you take me? I carry no messages, I keep the gate. "

He then bawled, in a stentorian voice, inexorably:

"No strangers enter here, but the competitors and their companies. "

"Come, old man, " cried a voice in the crowd, "you have gotten youranswer; make way. "

Margaret turned half round imploringly:

"Good people, we are come from far, and my father is old; and my cousinhas a new servant that knows us not, and would not let us sit in ourcousin's house. "

At this the crowd laughed hoarsely. Margaret shrank as if they hadstruck her. At that moment a hand grasped hers--a magic grasp; it feltlike heart meeting heart, or magnet steel. She turned quickly round atit, and it was Gerard. Such a little cry of joy and appeal came from herbosom, and she began to whimper prettily. 

They had hustled her and frightened her, for one thing; and her cousin'sthoughtlessness, in not even telling his servant they were coming, was cruel; and the servant's caution, however wise and faithful to hermaster, was bitterly mortifying to her father and her. And to her somortified, and anxious and jostled, came suddenly this kind hand andface. "Hinc illae lacrimae. "

"All is well now, " remarked a coarse humourist; "she hath gotten hersweetheart. "

"Haw! haw! haw!" went the crowd. 

She dropped Gerard's hand directly, and turned round, with eyes flashingthrough her tears:

"I have no sweetheart, you rude men. But I am friendless in your boorishtown, and this is a friend; and one who knows, what you know not, how totreat the aged and the weak. "

The crowd was dead silent. They had only been thoughtless, and now feltthe rebuke, though severe, was just. The silence enabled Gerard to treatwith the porter. 

"I am a competitor, sir. "

"What is your name?" and the man eyed him suspiciously. 

"Gerard, the son of Elias. "

The janitor inspected a slip of parchment he held in his hand:

"Gerard Eliassoen can enter. "

"With my company, these two?"

"Nay; those are not your company they came before you. "

"What matter? They are my friends, and without them I go not in. "

"Stay without, then. "

"That will I not. "

"That we shall see. "

"We will, and speedily. " And with this, Gerard raised a voice ofastounding volume and power, and routed so that the whole street rang:

"Ho! PHILIP, EARL OF HOLLAND!"

"Are you mad?" cried the porter. 

"HERE IS ONE OF YOUR VARLETS DEFIES YOU. "

"Hush, hush!"

"AND WILL NOT LET YOUR GUESTS PASS IN. "

"Hush! murder! The Dukes there. I'm dead, " cried the janitor, quaking. 

Then suddenly trying to overpower Gerard's thunder, he shouted, with allhis lungs:

"OPEN THE GATE, YE KNAVES! WAY THERE FOR GERARD ELIASSOEN AND HISCOMPANY! (The fiends go with him!)"

The gate swung open as by magic. Eight soldiers lowered their pikeshalfway, and made an arch, under which the victorious three marchedin triumphant. The moment they had passed, the pikes clashed togetherhorizontally to bar the gateway, and all but pinned an abdominal citizenthat sought to wedge in along with them. 

Once past the guarded portal, a few steps brought the trio upon a sceneof Oriental luxury. The courtyard was laid out in tables loaded withrich meats and piled with gorgeous plate. Guests in rich and variouscostumes sat beneath a leafy canopy of fresh-cut branches fastenedtastefully to golden, silver, and blue silken cords that traversed thearea; and fruits of many hues, including some artificial ones of gold, silver, and wax, hung pendant, or peeped like fair eyes among the greenleaves of plane-trees and lime-trees. The Duke's minstrels swept theirlutes at intervals, and a fountain played red Burgundy in six jets thatmet and battled in the air. The evening sun darted its fires throughthose bright and purple wine spouts, making them jets and cascades ofmolten rubies, then passing on, tinged with the blood of the grape, shed crimson glories here and there on fair faces, snowy beards, velvet, satin, jewelled hilts, glowing gold, gleaming silver, and sparklingglass. Gerard and his friends stood dazzled, spell-bound. Presentlya whisper buzzed round them, "Salute the Duke! Salute the Duke!" Theylooked up, and there on high, under the dais, was their sovereign, bidding them welcome with a kindly wave of the hand. The men bowed low, and Margaret curtsied with a deep and graceful obeisance. The Duke'shand being up, he gave it another turn, and pointed the new-comers outto a knot of valets. Instantly seven of his people, with an obedientstart, went headlong at our friends, seated them at a table, and putfifteen many-coloured soups before them, in little silver bowls, and asmany wines in crystal vases. 

"Nay, father, let us not eat until we have thanked our good friend, "said Margaret, now first recovering from all this bustle. 

"Girl, he is our guardian angel. "

Gerard put his face into his hands. 

"Tell me when you have done, " said he, "and I will reappear and havemy supper, for I am hungry. I know which of us three is the happiest atmeeting again. "

"Me?" inquired Margaret. 

"No: guess again. "

"Father?"

"No. "

"Then I have no guess which it can be;" and she gave a little crow ofhappiness and gaiety. The soup was tasted, and vanished in a twirlof fourteen hands, and fish came on the table in a dozen forms, withpatties of lobster and almonds mixed, and of almonds and cream, and animmense variety of brouets known to us as rissoles. The next trifle wasa wild boar, which smelt divine. Why, then, did Margaret start away fromit with two shrieks of dismay, and pinch so good a friend as Gerard?Because the Duke's cuisinier had been too clever; had made thisexcellent dish too captivating to the sight as well as taste. He hadrestored to the animal, by elaborate mimicry with burnt sugar and otheredible colours, the hair and bristles he had robbed him of by fire andwater. To make him still more enticing, the huge tusks were carefullypreserved in the brute's jaw, and gave his mouth the winning smile thatcomes of tusk in man or beast; and two eyes of coloured sugar glowedin his head. St. Argus! what eyes! so bright, so bloodshot, sothreatening--they followed a man and every movement of his knife andspoon. But, indeed, I need the pencil of Granville or Tenniel to makeyou see the two gilt valets on the opposite side of the table puttingthe monster down before our friends, with a smiling, self-satisfied, benevolent obsequiousness for this ghastly monster was the flower of allcomestibles--old Peter clasping both hands in pious admiration ofit; Margaret wheeling round with horror-stricken eyes and her hand onGerard's shoulder, squeaking and pinching; his face of unwise delight atbeing pinched, the grizzly brute glaring sulkily on all, and the guestsgrinning from ear to ear. 

"What's to do?" shouted the Duke, hearing the signals of femaledistress. Seven of his people with a zealous start went headlong andtold him. He laughed and said, "Give her of the beef-stuffing, then, andbring me Sir Boar. " Benevolent monarch! The beef-stuffing was his ownprivate dish. On these grand occasions an ox was roasted whole, andreserved for the poor. But this wise as well as charitable prince haddiscovered, that whatever venison, bares, lamb, poultry, etc. , youskewered into that beef cavern, got cooked to perfection, retainingtheir own juices and receiving those of the reeking ox. These he calledhis beef-stuffing, and took delight therein, as did now our trio;for, at his word, seven of his people went headlong, and drove silvertridents into the steaming cave at random, and speared a kid, a cygnet, and a flock of wildfowl. These presently smoked before Gerard andcompany; and Peter's face, sad and slightly morose at the loss of thesavage hog, expanded and shone. After this, twenty different tarts offruits and herbs, and last of all, confectionery on a Titanic scale;cathedrals of sugar, all gilt painted in the interstices of thebas-reliefs; castles with moats, and ditches imitated to the life;elephants, camels, toads; knights on horseback jousting; kings andprincesses looking on trumpeters blowing; and all these personageseating, and their veins filled with sweet-scented juices: works of artmade to be destroyed. The guests breached a bastion, crunched a crusaderand his horse and lance, or cracked a bishop, cope, chasuble, crosierand all, as remorselessly as we do a caraway comfit; sipping meanwhilehippocras and other spiced drinks, and Greek and Corsican wines, whileevery now and then little Turkish boys, turbaned, spangled, jewelled, and gilt, came offering on bended knee golden troughs of rose-water andorange-water to keep the guests' hands cool and perfumed. 

But long before our party arrived at this final stage appetite hadsuccumbed, and Gerard had suddenly remembered he was the bearer of aletter to the Princess Marie, and, in an under-tone, had asked one ofthe servants if he would undertake to deliver it. The man took it witha deep obeisance: "He could not deliver it himself, but would instantlygive it one of the Princess's suite, several of whom were about. "

It may be remembered that Peter and Margaret came here not to dine, butto find their cousin. Well, the old gentleman ate heartily, and--beingmuch fatigued, dropped asleep, and forgot all about his cousin. Margaretdid not remind him; we shall hear why. 

Meanwhile, that Cousin was seated within a few feet of them, at theirbacks, and discovered them when Margaret turned round and screamedat the boar. But he forbore to speak to them, for municipal reasons. Margaret was very plainly dressed, and Peter inclined to threadbare. Sothe alderman said to himself:

"'Twill be time to make up to them when the sun sets and the companydisperses then I will take my poor relations to my house, and none willbe the wiser. "

Half the courses were lost on Gerard and Margaret. They were no greateaters, and just now were feeding on sweet thoughts that have ever beenunfavourable to appetite. But there is a delicate kind of sensuality, to whose influence these two were perhaps more sensitive than any otherpair in that assembly--the delights of colour, music, and perfume, allof which blended so fascinatingly here. 

Margaret leaned back and half closed her eyes, and murmured to Gerard:"What a lovely scene! the warm sun, the green shade, the rich dresses, the bright music of the lutes and the cool music of the fountain, andall faces so happy and gay! and then, it is to you we owe it. "

Gerard was silent all but his eyes; observing which--

"Now, speak not to me, " said Margaret languidly; "let me listen to thefountain: what are you a competitor for?"

He told her. 

"Very well! You will gain one prize, at least. "

"Which? which? have you seen any of my work?"

"I? no. But you will gain a prize. 

"I hope so; but what makes you think so?"

"Because you were so good to my father. "

Gerard smiled at the feminine logic, and hung his head at the sweetpraise, and was silent. 

"Speak not, " murmured Margaret. "They say this is a world of sin andmisery. Can that be? What is your opinion?"

"No! that is all a silly old song, " explained Gerard. "'Tis a byword ourelders keep repeating, out of custom: it is not true. "

"How can you know? You are but a child, " said Margaret, with pensivedignity. 

"Why, only look round! And then thought I had lost you for ever; and youare by my side; and now the minstrels are going to play again. Sin andmisery? Stuff and nonsense!"

The lutes burst out. The courtyard rang again with their delicateharmony. 

"What do you admire most of all these beautiful things, Gerard?"

"You know my name? How is that?"

"White magic. I am a--witch. "

"Angels are never witches. But I can't think how you--"

"Foolish boy! was it not cried at the gate loud enough to deave one?"

"So it was. Where is my head? What do I admire most? If you will sit alittle more that way, I'll tell you. "

"This way?"

"Yes; so that the light may fall on you. There! I see many fair thingshere, fairer than I could have conceived; but the fairest of all, tomy eye, is your lovely hair in its silver frame, and the setting sunkissing it. It minds me of what the Vulgate praises for beauty, 'anapple of gold in a network of silver, ' and oh, what a pity I did notknow you before I sent in my poor endeavours at illuminating! I couldilluminate so much better now. I could do everything better. There, nowthe sun is full on it, it is like an aureole. So our Lady looked, andnone since her until to-day. "

"Oh, fie! it is wicked to talk so. Compare a poor, coarse-favoured girllike me with the Queen of Heaven? Oh, Gerard! I thought you were a goodyoung man. " And Margaret was shocked apparently. 

Gerard tried to explain. "I am no worse than the rest; but how can Ihelp having eyes, and a heart Margaret!"

"Gerard!"

"Be not angry now!"

"Now, is it likely?"

"I love you. "

"Oh, for shame! you must not say that to me, " and Margaret colouredfuriously at this sudden assault. 

"I can't help it. I love you. I love you. "

"Hush, hush! for pity's sake! I must not listen to such words from astranger. I am ungrateful to call you a stranger. Oh! how one may bemistaken! If I had known you were so bold--" And Margaret's bosom beganto heave, and her cheeks were covered with blushes, and she lookedtowards her sleeping father, very much like a timid thing that meditatesactual flight. 

Then Gerard was frightened at the alarm he caused. "Forgive me, " said heimploringly. "How could any one help loving you?"

"Well, sir, I will try and forgive you--you are so good in otherrespects; but then you must promise me never to say you--to say thatagain. "

"Give me your hand then, or you don't forgive me. "

She hesitated; but eventually put out her hand a very little way, veryslowly, and with seeming reluctance. He took it, and held it prisoner. When she thought it had been there long enough, she tried gently to drawit away. He held it tight: it submitted quite patiently to force. What is the use resisting force. She turned her head away, and her longeyelashes drooped sweetly. Gerard lost nothing by his promise. Wordswere not needed here; and silence was more eloquent. Nature was in thatday what she is in ours; but manners were somewhat freer. Then as now, virgins drew back alarmed at the first words of love; but of pruderyand artificial coquetry there was little, and the young soon read oneanother's hearts. Everything was on Gerard's side, his good looks, herbelief in his goodness, her gratitude; and opportunity for at the Duke'sbanquet this mellow summer eve, all things disposed the female natureto tenderness: the avenues to the heart lay open; the senses were sosoothed and subdued with lovely colours, gentle sounds, and delicateodours; the sun gently sinking, the warm air, the green canopy, the coolmusic of the now violet fountain. 

Gerard and Margaret sat hand in hand in silence; and Gerard's eyessought hers lovingly; and hers now and then turned on him timidly andimploringly and presently two sweet unreasonable tears rolled down hercheeks, and she smiled while they were drying: yet they did not takelong. 

And the sun declined; and the air cooled; and the fountain plashed moregently; and the pair throbbed in unison and silence, and this wearyworld looked heaven to them. 

 Oh, the merry days, the merry days when we were young. Oh, the merry days, the merry days when we were young. 

CHAPTER III

A grave white-haired seneschal came to their table, and inquiredcourteously whether Gerard Eliassoen was of their company. Upon Gerard'sanswer, he said:

"The Princess Marie would confer with you, young sir; I am to conductyou to her presence. "

Instantly all faces within hearing turned sharp round, and were bentwith curiosity and envy on the man that was to go to a princess. 

Gerard rose to obey. 

"I wager we shall not see you again, " said Margaret calmly, butcolouring a little. 

"That you will, " was the reply: then he whispered in her ear: "This ismy good princess; but you are my queen. " He added aloud: "Wait for me, Ipray you, I will presently return. "

"Ay, ay!" said Peter, awaking and speaking at one and the same moment. 

Gerard gone, the pair whose dress was so homely, yet they were with theman whom the Princess sent for, became "the cynosure of neighbouringeyes;" observing which, William Johnson came forward, acted surprise, and claimed his relations. 

"And to think that there was I at your backs, and you saw me not"

"Nay, cousin Johnson, I saw you long syne, " said Margaret coldly. 

"You saw me, and spoke not to me?"

"Cousin, it was for you to welcome us to Rotterdam, as it is for usto welcome you at Sevenbergen. Your servant denied us a seat in yourhouse. "

"The idiot!"

"And I had a mind to see whether it was 'like maid like master:' forthere is sooth in bywords. "

William Johnson blushed purple. He saw Margaret was keen, and suspectedhim. He did the wisest thing under the circumstances, trusted to deedsnot words. He insisted on their coming home with him at once, and hewould show them whether they were welcome to Rotterdam or not. 

"Who doubts it, cousin? Who doubts it?" said the scholar. 

Margaret thanked him graciously, but demurred to go just now: saidshe wanted to hear the minstrels again. In about a quarter of an hourJohnson renewed his proposal, and bade her observe that many of theguests had left. Then her real reason came out. 

"It were ill manners to our friend; and he will lose us. He knows notwhere we lodge in Rotterdam, and the city is large, and we have partedcompany once already. "

"Oh!" said Johnson, "we will provide for that. My young man, ahem!I mean my secretary, shall sit here and wait, and bring him on to myhouse: he shall lodge with me and with no other. "

"Cousin, we shall be too burdensome. "

"Nay, nay; you shall see whether you are welcome or not, you and yourfriends, and your friends' friends, if need be; and I shall hear whatthe Princess would with him. "

Margaret felt a thrill of joy that Gerard should be lodged under thesame roof with her; then she had a slight misgiving. 

"But if your young man should be thoughtless, and go play, and Gerardmiss him?"

"He go play? He leave that spot where I put him, and bid him stay? Ho!stand forth, Hans Cloterman. "

A figure clad in black serge and dark violet hose arose, and took twosteps and stood before them without moving a muscle: a solemn, preciseyoung man, the very statue of gravity and starched propriety. At hisaspect Margaret, being very happy, could hardly keep her countenance. But she whispered Johnson, "I would put my hand in the fire for him. Weare at your command, cousin, as soon as you have given him his orders. "

Hans was then instructed to sit at the table and wait for Gerard, andconduct him to Ooster-Waagen Straet. He replied, not in words, butby calmly taking the seat indicated, and Margaret, Peter, and WilliamJohnson went away together. 

"And, indeed, it is time you were abed, father, after all your travel, "said Margaret. This had been in her mind all along. 

Hans Cloterman sat waiting for Gerard, solemn and businesslike. Theminutes flew by, but excited no impatience in that perfect young man. Johnson did him no more than justice when he laughed to scorn the ideaof his secretary leaving his post or neglecting his duty in pursuit ofsport or out of youthful hilarity and frivolity. 

As Gerard was long in coming, the patient Hans--his employer's eye beingno longer on him improved the time by quaffing solemnly, silently, andat short but accurately measured intervals, goblets of Corsican wine. The wine was strong, so was Cloterman's head; and Gerard had been gonea good hour ere the model secretary imbibed the notion that Creationexpected Cloterman to drink the health of all good fellows, andnommement of the Duke of Burgundy there present. With this view hefilled bumper nine, and rose gingerly but solemnly and slowly. Havingreached his full height, he instantly rolled upon the grass, gobletin hand, spilling the cold liquor on more than one ankle--whose ownersfrisked--but not disturbing a muscle in his own long face, which, inthe total eclipse of reason, retained its gravity, primness, andinfallibility. 

The seneschal led Gerard through several passages to the door of thepavilion, where some young noblemen, embroidered and feathered, satsentinel, guarding the heir-apparent, and playing cards by the red lightof torches their servants held. A whisper from the seneschal, and oneof them rose reluctantly, stared at Gerard with haughty surprise, andentered the pavilion. He presently returned, and, beckoning the pair, led then, through a passage or two and landed them in an ante-chamber, where sat three more young gentlemen, feathered, furred, and embroideredlike pieces of fancy work, and deep in that instructive and edifyingbranch of learning, dice. 

"You can't see the Princess--it is too late, " said one. 

Another followed suit:

"She passed this way but now with her nurse. She is gone to bed, dolland all. Deuce--ace again!"

Gerard prepared to retire. The seneschal, with an incredulous smile, replied:

"The young man is here by the Countess's orders; be so good as conducthim to her ladies. "

On this a superb Adonis rose, with an injured look, and led Gerard intoa room where sat or lolloped eleven ladies, chattering like magpies. Two, more industrious than the rest, were playing cat's-cradle withfingers as nimble as their tongues. At the sight of a stranger all thetongues stopped like one piece of complicated machinery, and all theeyes turned on Gerard, as if the same string that checked the tongueshad turned the eyes on. Gerard was ill at ease before, but this batteryof eyes discountenanced him, and down went his eyes on the ground. Thenthe cowards finding, like the hare who ran by the pond and the frogsscuttled into the water, that there was a creature they could frighten, giggled and enjoyed their prowess. Then a duenna said severely, "Mesdames!" and they were all abashed at once as though a modesty stringhad been pulled. This same duenna took Gerard, and marched before himin solemn silence. The young man's heart sank, and he had half a mind toturn and run out of the place. 

"What must princes be, " he thought, "when their courtiers are sofreezing? Doubtless they take their breeding from him they serve. " Thesereflections were interrupted by the duenna suddenly introducing him intoa room where three ladies sat working, and a pretty little girl tuninga lute. The ladies were richly but not showily dressed, and the duennawent up to the one who was hemming a kerchief, and said a few words ina low tone. This lady then turned towards Gerard with a smile, andbeckoned him to come near her. She did not rise, but she laid aside herwork, and her manner of turning towards him, slight as the movement was, was full of grace and ease and courtesy. She began a conversation atonce. 

"Margaret Van Eyck is an old friend of mine, sir, and I am right glad tohave a letter from her hand, and thankful to you, sir, for bringing itto me safely. Marie, my love, this is the gentleman who brought you thatpretty miniature. "

"Sir, I thank you a thousand times, " said the young lady. 

"I am glad you feel her debtor, sweetheart, for our friend would have usto do him a little service in return. 

"I will do anything on earth for him, " replied the young lady withardour. 

"Anything on earth is nothing in the world, " said the Countess ofCharolois quietly. 

"Well, then, I will--What would you have me to do, sir?"

Gerard had just found out what high society he was in. "My sovereigndemoiselle, " said he, gently and a little tremulously, "where there havebeen no pains, there needs no reward. "

But we must obey mamma. All the world must obey

"That is true. Then, our demoiselle, reward me, if you will by lettingme hear the stave you were going to sing and I did interrupt it. "

"What! you love music, sir?"

"I adore it. "

The little princess looked inquiringly at her mother, and received asmile of assent. She then took her lute and sang a romaunt of the day. Although but twelve years old, she was a well-taught and painstakingmusician. Her little claw swept the chords with Courage and precision, and struck out the notes of the arpeggio clear, and distinct, andbright, like twinkling stars; but the main charm was her voice. It wasnot mighty, but it was round, clear, full, and ringing like a bell. Shesang with a certain modest eloquence, though she knew none of the tricksof feeling. She was too young to be theatrical, or even sentimental, so nothing was forced--all gushed. Her little mouth seemed the mouth ofNature. The ditty, too, was as pure as its utterance. As there were noneof those false divisions--those whining slurs, which are now sold sodear by Italian songsters, though every jackal in India delivers themgratis to his customers all night, and sometimes gets shot for them, andalways deserves it--so there were no cadences and fiorituri, the trite, turgid, and feeble expletives of song, the skim-milk with which mindlessmusicians and mindless writers quench fire, wash out colour, and drownmelody and meaning dead. 

While the pure and tender strain was flowing from the pure young throat, Gerard's eyes filled. The Countess watched him with interest, for itwas usual to applaud the Princess loudly, but not with cheek and eye. So when the voice ceased, and the glasses left off ringing, she askeddemurely, "Was he content?"

Gerard gave a little start; the spoken voice broke a charm and broughthim back to earth. 

"Oh, madam!" he cried, "surely it is thus that cherubs and seraphs sing, and charm the saints in heaven. "

"I am somewhat of your opinion, my young friend, " said the Countess, with emotion; and she bent a look of love and gentle pride upon hergirl: a heavenly look, such as, they say, is given to the eye of theshort-lived resting on the short-lived. 

The Countess resumed: "My old friend request me to be serviceable toyou. It is the first favour she has done us the honour of asking us, andthe request is sacred. You are in holy orders, sir?"

Gerard bowed. 

"I fear you are not a priest, you look too young. "

"Oh no, madam; I am not even a sub-deacon. I am only a lector; but nextmonth I shall be an exorcist, and before long an acolyth. "

"Well, Monsieur Gerard, with your accomplishments you can soon passthrough the inferior orders. And let me beg you to do so. For theday after you have said your first mass I shall have the pleasure ofappointing you to a benefice. "

"Oh, madam!"

"And, Marie, remember I make this promise in your name as well as myown. "

"Fear not, mamma: I will not forget. But if he will take my advice, what he will be is Bishop of Liege. The Bishop of Liege is a beautifulbishop. What! do you not remember him, mamma, that day we were at Liege?he was braver than grandpapa himself. He had on a crown, a high one, andit was cut in the middle, and it was full of oh! such beautiful jewels;and his gown stiff with gold; and his mantle, too; and it had a broadborder, all pictures; but, above all, his gloves; you have no suchgloves, mamma. They were embroidered and covered with jewels, andscented with such lovely scent; I smelt them all the time he was givingme his blessing on my head with them. Dear old man! I dare say he willdie soon most old people do and then, sir, you Can be bishop you know, and wear--

"Gently, Marie, gently: bishoprics are for old gentlemen; and this is ayoung gentleman. "

"Mamma! he is not so very young. 

"Not compared with you, Marie, eh?"

"He is a good birth dear mamma; and I am sure he is good enough for abishop. 

"Alas! mademoiselle, you are mistaken"

"I know not that, Monsieur Gerard; but I am a little puzzled to know onwhat grounds mademoiselle there pronounces your character so boldly. "

"Alas! mamma, " said the Princess, "you have not looked at his face, then;" and she raised her eyebrows at her mother's simplicity. 

"I beg your pardon, " said the Countess, "I have. Well, sir, if I cannotgo quite so fast as my daughter, attribute it to my age, not to a wantof interest in your welfare. A benefice will do to begin your Careerwith; and I must take care it is not too far from--what call you theplace?"

"Tergou, madam

"A priest gives up much, " continued the Countess; "often, I fear, helearns too late how much;" and her woman's eye rested a moment on Gerardwith mild pity and half surprise at his resigning her sex and all theheaven they can bestow, and the great parental joys: "at least you shallbe near your friends. Have you a mother?"

"Yes, madam, thanks be to God!"

"Good! You shall have a church near Tergou. She will thank me. And now, sir, we must not detain you too long from those who have a better claimon your society than we have. Duchess, oblige me by bidding one of thepages conduct him to the hall of banquet; the way is hard to find. "

Gerard bowed low to the Countess and the Princess, and backed towardsthe door. 

"I hope it will be a nice benefice, " said the Princess to him, with apretty smile, as he was going out; then, shaking her head with an air ofsolemn misgiving, "but you had better have been Bishop of Liege. "

Gerard followed his new conductor, his heart warm with gratitude; butere he reached the banquet-hall a chill came over him. The mind of onewho has led a quiet, uneventful life is not apt to take in contradictoryfeelings at the same moment and balance them, but rather to beoverpowered by each in turn. While Gerard was with the Countess, theexcitement of so new a situation, the unlooked-for promise the joyand pride it would cause at home, possessed him wholly; but now it waspassion's turn to be heard again. What! give up Margaret, whose softhand he still felt in his, and her deep eyes in his heart? resign herand all the world of love and joy she had opened on him to-day? Therevulsion, when it did come, was so strong that he hastily resolvedto say nothing at home about the offered benefice. "The Countess isso good, " thought he, "she has a hundred ways of aiding a young man'sfortune: she will not compel me to be a priest when she shall learn Ilove one of her sex: one would almost think she does know it, for shecast a strange look on me, and said, 'A priest gives up much, too much. 'I dare say she will give me a place about the palace. " And with thishopeful reflection his mind was eased, and, being now at the entranceof the banqueting hall, he thanked his conductor, and ran hastily withjoyful eyes to Margaret. He came in sight of the table--she was gone. Peter was gone too. Nobody was at the table at all; only a citizen insober garments had just tumbled under it dead drunk, and several personswere raising him to carry him away. Gerard never guessed how importantthis solemn drunkard was to him: he was looking for "Beauty, " andlet the "Beast" lie. He ran wildly round the hall, which was nowcomparatively empty. She was not there. He left the palace: outside hefound a crowd gaping at two great fan-lights just lighted over the gate. He asked them earnestly if they had seen an old man in a gown, and alovely girl pass out. They laughed at the question. "They were staringat these new lights that turn night into day. They didn't trouble theirheads about old men and young wenches, every-day sights. " From anothergroup he learned there was a Mystery being played under canvas hard by, and all the world gone to see it. This revived his hopes, and he wentand saw the Mystery. 

In this representation divine personages, too sacred for me to namehere, came clumsily down from heaven to talk sophistry with the cardinalVirtues, the nine Muses, and the seven deadly sins, all present inhuman shape, and not unlike one another. To enliven which weary stuffin rattled the Prince of the power of the air, and an imp that keptmolesting him and buffeting him with a bladder, at each thwack of whichthe crowd were in ecstasies. When the Vices had uttered good store ofobscenity and the Virtues twaddle, the celestials, including the nineMuses went gingerly back to heaven one by one; for there was but onecloud; and two artisans worked it up with its supernatural freight, and worked it down with a winch, in full sight of the audience. Thesedisposed of, the bottomless pit opened and flamed in the centre of thestage; the carpenters and Virtues shoved the Vices in, and the Virtuesand Beelzebub and his tormentor danced merrily round the place ofeternal torture to the fife and tabor. 

This entertainment was writ by the Bishop of Ghent for the diffusionof religious sentiment by the aid of the senses, and was an averagespecimen of theatrical exhibitions so long as they were in the hands ofthe clergy. But, in course of time, the laity conducted plays, and sothe theatre, I learn from the pulpit, has become profane. 

Margaret was nowhere in the crowd, and Gerard could not enjoy theperformance; he actually went away in Act 2, in the midst of amuch-admired piece of dialogue, in which Justice out-quibbled Satan. Hewalked through many streets, but could not find her he sought. At last, fairly worn out, he went to a hostelry and slept till daybreak. All thatday, heavy and heartsick, he sought her, but could never fall in withher or her father, nor ever obtain the slightest clue. Then he felt shewas false or had changed her mind. He was irritated now, as well as sad. More good fortune fell on him; he almost hated it. At last, on the thirdday, after he had once more been through every street, he said, "She isnot in the town, and I shall never see her again. I will go home. "He started for Tergou with royal favour promised, with fifteen goldenangels in his purse, a golden medal on his bosom, and a heart like alump of lead. 

CHAPTER IV

It was near four o'clock in the afternoon. Eli was in the shop. Hiseldest and youngest sons were abroad. Catherine and her little crippleddaughter had long been anxious about Gerard, and now they were gone alittle way down the road, to see if by good luck he might be visiblein the distance; and Giles was alone in the sitting-room, which I willsketch, furniture and dwarf included. 

The Hollanders were always an original and leading people. They claimto have invented printing (wooden type), oil-painting, liberty, banking, gardening, etc. Above all, years before my tale, they inventedcleanliness. So, while the English gentry, in velvet jerkins andchicken-toed shoes, trode floors of stale rushes, foul receptacle ofbones, decomposing morsels, spittle, dogs, eggs, and all abominations, this hosier's sitting-room at Tergou was floored with Dutch tiles, sohighly glazed and constantly washed, that you could eat off them. Therewas one large window; the cross stone-work in the centre of it wasvery massive, and stood in relief, looking like an actual cross to theinmates, and was eyed as such in their devotions. The panes were verysmall and lozenge-shaped, and soldered to one another with strips oflead: the like you may see to this day in our rural cottages. The chairswere rude and primitive, all but the arm-chair, whose back, at rightangles with its seat, was so high that the sitter's head stopped twofeet short of the top. This chair was of oak, and carved at the summit. There was a copper pail, that went in at the waist, holding holy water, and a little hand-besom to sprinkle it far and wide; and a long, narrow, but massive oak table, and a dwarf sticking to its rim by his teeth, hiseyes glaring, and his claws in the air like a pouncing vampire. Nature, it would seem, did not make Giles a dwarf out of malice prepense; sheconstructed a head and torso with her usual care; but just then herattention was distracted, and she left the rest to chance; the resultwas a human wedge, an inverted cone. He might justly have taken her totask in the terms of Horace, "Amphora coepit Institui; currente rota cur urceus exit?"

His centre was anything but his centre of gravity. Bisected, upper Gileswould have outweighed three lower Giles. But this very disproportionenabled him to do feats that would have baffled Milo. His brawny armshad no weight to draw after them; so he could go up a vertical pole likea squirrel, and hang for hours from a bough by one hand like a cherry byits stalk. If he could have made a vacuum with his hands, as the lizardis said to do with its feet, he would have gone along a ceiling. Now, this pocket-athlete was insanely fond of gripping the dinner-table withboth hands, and so swinging; and then--climax of delight! he would seizeit with his teeth, and, taking off his hands, hold on like grim death byhis huge ivories. 

But all our joys, however elevating, suffer interruption. Little Katecaught Sampsonet in this posture, and stood aghast. She was her mother'sdaughter, and her heart was with the furniture, not with the 12mogymnast. 

"Oh, Giles! how can you? Mother is at hand. It dents the table. "

"Go and tell her, little tale-bearer, " snarled Giles. "You are the onefor making mischief. "

"Am I?" inquired Kate calmly; "that is news to me. "

"The biggest in Tergou, " growled Giles, fastening on again. 

"Oh, indeed!" said Kate drily. 

This piece of unwonted satire launched, and Giles not visibly blasted, she sat down quietly and cried. 

Her mother came in almost at that moment, and Giles hurled himself underthe table, and there glared. 

"What is to do now?" said the dame sharply. Then turning her experiencedeyes from Kate to Giles, and observing the position he had taken up, anda sheepish expression, she hinted at cuffing of ears. 

"Nay, mother, " said the girl; "it was but a foolish word Giles spoke. I had not noticed it at another time; but I was tired and in care forGerard, you know. "

"Let no one be in care for me, " said a faint voice at the door, and intottered Gerard, pale, dusty, and worn out; and amidst uplifted handsand cries of delight, curiosity, and anxiety mingled, dropped exhaustedinto the nearest chair. 

Beating Rotterdam, like a covert, for Margaret, and the long journeyafterwards, had fairly knocked Gerard up. But elastic youth soonrevived, and behold him the centre of an eager circle. First of all theymust hear about the prizes. Then Gerard told them he had been admittedto see the competitors' works, all laid out in an enormous hall beforethe judges pronounced. 

"Oh, mother! oh, Kate! when I saw the goldsmiths' work, I had liked tohave fallen on the floor. I thought not all the goldsmiths on earth hadso much gold, silver, jewels, and craft of design and facture. But, insooth, all the arts are divine. "

Then, to please the females, he described to them the reliquaries, feretories, calices, crosiers, crosses, pyxes, monstrances, and otherwonders ecclesiastical, and the goblets, hanaps, watches, Clocks, chains, brooches, &c. , so that their mouths watered. 

"But, Kate, when I came to the illuminated work from Ghent and Bruges, my heart sank. Mine was dirt by the side of it. For the first minute Icould almost have cried; but I prayed for a better spirit, and presentlyI was able to enjoy them, and thank God for those lovely works, andfor those skilful, patient craftsmen, whom I own my masters. Well, thecoloured work was so beautiful I forgot all about the black and white. But next day, when all the other prizes had been given, they came to thewriting, and whose name think you was called first?"

"Yours, " said Kate. 

The others laughed her to scorn. 

"You may well laugh, " said Gerard, "but for all that, Gerard Eliassoenof Tergou was the name the herald shouted. I stood stupid; they thrustme forward. Everything swam before my eyes. I found myself kneeling ona cushion at the feet of the Duke. He said something to me, but I was sofluttered I could not answer him. So then he put his hand to his side, and did not draw a glaive and cut off my dull head, but gave me a goldmedal, and there it is. " There was a yell and almost a scramble. "Andthen he gave me fifteen great bright golden angels. I had seen onebefore, but I never handled one. Here they are. "

"Oh, Gerard! oh, Gerard!"

"There is one for you, our eldest; and one for you, Sybrandt, and foryou, Little Mischief; and two for thee, Little Lily, because God hathafflicted thee; and one for myself, to buy colours and vellum; and ninefor her that nursed us all, and risked the two crowns upon poor Gerard'shand. "

The gold drew out their characters. Cornelis and Sybrandt clutched eachhis coin with one glare of greediness and another glare of envy at Kate, who had got two pieces. Giles seized his and rolled it along the floorand gambolled after it. Kate put down her crutches and sat down, andheld out her little arms to Gerard with a heavenly gesture of love andtenderness; and the mother, fairly benumbed at first by the shower ofgold that fell on her apron, now cried out, "Leave kissing him, Kate;he is my son, not yours. Ah. Gerard! my boy! I have not loved you as youdeserved. "

Then Gerard threw himself on his knees beside her, and she flung herarms round him and wept for joy and pride upon his neck. 

"Good lad! good lad!" cried the hosier, with some emotion. "I must goand tell the neighbours. Lend me the medal, Gerard; I'll show it my goodfriend Peter Buyskens; he is ever regaling me with how his son Jorianwon the tin mug a shooting at the butts. "

"Ay, do, my man; and show Peter Buyskens one of the angels. Tell himthere are fourteen more where that came from. Mind you bring it meback!"

"Stay a minute, father; there is better news behind, " said Gerard, flushing with joy at the joy he caused. 

"Better! better than this?"

Then Gerard told his interview with the Countess, and the house rangwith joy. 

"Now, God bless the good lady, and bless the dame Van Eyck! A benefice?our son! My cares are at an end. Eli, my good friend and master, now wetwo can die happy whenever our time comes. This dear boy will take ourplace, and none of these loved ones will want a home or a friend. "

From that hour Gerard was looked upon as the stay of the family. Hewas a son apart, but in another sense. He was always in the right, andnothing too good for him. Cornelis and Sybrandt became more and morejealous of him, and longed for the day he should go to his benefice;they would get rid of the favourite, and his reverence's purse would beopen to them. With these views he co-operated. The wound love hadgiven him throbbed duller and duller. His success and the affection andadmiration of his parents made him think more highly of himself, andresent with more spirit Margaret's ingratitude and discourtesy. For allthat, she had power to cool him towards the rest of her sex, and now forevery reason he wished to be ordained priest as soon as he could passthe intermediate orders. He knew the Vulgate already better than most ofthe clergy, and studied the rubric and the dogmas of the Church withhis friends the monks; and, the first time the bishop came that way, heapplied to be admitted "exorcist, " the third step in holy orders. Thebishop questioned him, and ordained him at once. He had to kneel, and, after a short prayer, the bishop delivered to him a little MS. Full ofexorcisms, and said: "Take this, Gerard, and have power to lay handson the possessed, whether baptized or catechumens!" and he took itreverently, and went home invested by the Church with power to cast outdemons. 

Returning home from the church, he was met by little Kate on hercrutches. 

"Oh, Gerard! who, think you, hath sent to our house seeking you?--theburgomaster himself. "

"Ghysbrecht Van Swieten! What would he with me?"

"Nay, Gerard, I know not. But he seems urgent to see you. You are to goto his house on the instant. "

"Well, he is the burgomaster: I will go; but it likes me not. Kate, Ihave seen him cast such a look on me as no friend casts. No matter; suchlooks forewarn the wise. To be sure, he knows. "

"Knows what, Gerard?"

"Nothing. "

"Nothing?"

"Kate, I'll go. "

CHAPTER V

Ghysbrecht Van Swieten was an artful man. He opened on the novice withsomething quite wide of the mark he was really aiming at. "The townrecords, " said he, "are crabbedly written, and the ink rusty with age. "He offered Gerard the honour of transcribing them fair. 

Gerard inquired what he was to be paid. 

Ghysbrecht offered a sum that would have just purchased the pens, ink, and parchment. 

"But, burgomaster, my labour? Here is a year's work. "

"Your labour? Call you marking parchment labour? Little sweat goes tothat, I trow. "

"'Tis labour, and skilled labour to boot; and that is better paid in allcrafts than rude labour, sweat or no sweat. Besides, there's my time. "

"Your time? Why, what is time to you, at two-and-twenty?" Then fixinghis eyes keenly on Gerard, to mark the effect of his words, he said:"Say, rather, you are idle grown. You are in love. Your body is withthese chanting monks, but your heart is with Peter Brandt and hisred-haired girl. "

"I know no Peter Brandt. "

This denial confirmed Ghysbrecht's suspicion that the caster-out ofdemons was playing a deep game. 

"Ye lie!" he shouted. "Did I not find you at her elbow on the road toRotterdam?"

"Ah!"

"Ah! And you were seen at Sevenbergen but t'other day. "

"Was I?'

"Ah and at Peter's house. "

"At Sevenbergen?"

"Ay, at Sevenbergen. "

Now, this was what in modern days is called a draw. It was a guess, putboldly forth as fact, to elicit by the young man's answer whether he hadbeen there lately or not. 

The result of the artifice surprised the crafty one. Gerard started upin a strange state of nervous excitement. 

"Burgomaster, " said he, with trembling voice, "I have not been atSevenbergen these three years, and I know not the name of those you sawme with, nor where they dwelt; but, as my time is precious, thoughyou value it not, give you good day. " And he darted out, with his eyessparkling. 

Ghysbrecht started up in huge ire; but he sank into his chair again. 

"He fears me not. He knows something, if not all. "

Then he called hastily to his trusty servant, and almost dragged him toa window. 

"See you yon man?" he cried. "Haste! follow him! But let him not seeyou. He is young, but old in craft. Keep him in sight all day. Let meknow whither he goes, and what he does. "

It was night when the servant returned. 

"Well? well?" cried Van Swieten eagerly. 

"Master, the young man went from you to Sevenbergen. "

Ghysbrecht groaned. 

"To the house of Peter the Magician. "

CHAPTER VI

"Look into your own heart and write!" said Herr Cant; and earth'scuckoos echoed the cry. Look into the Rhine where it is deepest, and theThames where it is thickest, and paint the bottom. Lower a bucket intoa well of self-deception, and what comes up must be immortal truth, mustn't it? Now, in the first place, no son of Adam ever reads his ownheart at all, except by the habit acquired, and the light gained, fromsome years perusal of other hearts; and even then, with his acquiredsagacity and reflected light, he can but spell and decipher his ownheart, not read it fluently. Half way to Sevenbergen Gerard looked intohis own heart, and asked it why he was going to Sevenbergen. His heartreplied without a moment's hesitation, "We are going out of curiosityto know why she jilted us, and to show her it has not broken our hearts, and that we are quite content with our honours and our benefice inprospectu, and don't want her nor ally of her fickle sex. "

He soon found out Peter Brandt's cottage; and there sat a girl in thedoorway, plying her needle, and a stalwart figure leaned on a long bowand talked to her. Gerard felt an unaccountable pang at the sight ofhim. However, the man turned out to be past fifty years of age, an oldsoldier, whom Gerard remembered to have seen shoot at the butts withadmirable force and skill. Another minute and the youth stood beforethem. Margaret looked up and dropped her work, and uttered a faint cry, and was white and red by turns. But these signs of emotion were swiftlydismissed, and she turned far more chill and indifferent than she wouldif she had not betrayed this agitation. 

"What! is it you, Master Gerard? What on earth brings you here, Iwonder?"

"I was passing by and saw you; so I thought I would give you good day, and ask after your father. "

"My father is well. He will be here anon. "

"Then I may as well stay till he comes. "

"As you will. Good Martin, step into the village and tell my father hereis a friend of his. "

"And not of yours?"

"My father's friends are mine. "

"That is doubtful. It was not like a friend to promise to wait for me, and then make off the moment my back was turned. Cruel Margaret youlittle know how I searched the town for you; how for want of you nothingwas pleasant to me. "

"These are idle words; if you had desired my father's company, or mine, you would have come back. There I had a bed laid for you, sir, at mycousin's, and he would have made much of you, and, who knows, I mighthave made much of you too. I was in the humour that day. You willnot catch me in the same mind again, neither you nor any young man, Iwarrant me. "

"Margaret, I came back the moment the Countess let me go; but you werenot there. "

"Nay, you did not, or you had seen Hans Cloterman at our table; we lefthim to bring you on. "

"I saw no one there, but only a drunken man, that had just tumbleddown. "

"At our table? How was he clad?"

"Nay, I took little heed: in sad-coloured garb. "

At this Margaret's face gradually warmed; but presently, assumingincredulity and severity, she put many shrewd questions, all of whichGerard answered most loyally. Finally, the clouds cleared, and theyguessed how the misunderstanding had come about. Then came a revulsionof tenderness, all the more powerful that they had done each otherwrong; and then, more dangerous still, came mutual confessions. Neitherhad been happy since; neither ever would have been happy but for thisfortunate meeting. 

And Gerard found a MS. Vulgate lying open on the table, and pounced uponit like a hawk. MSS. Were his delight; but before he could get to it twowhite hands quickly came flat upon the page, and a red face over them. 

"Nay, take away your hands, Margaret, that I may see where you arereading, and I will read there too at home; so shall my soul meet yoursin the sacred page. You will not? Nay, then I must kiss them away. " Andhe kissed them so often, that for very shame they were fain to withdraw, and, lo! the sacred book lay open at, "An apple of gold in a network of silver. "

"There, now, " said she, "I had been hunting for it ever so long, and found it but even now--and to be caught!" and with a touch ofinconsistency she pointed it out to Gerard with her white finger. 

"Ay, " said he, "but to-day it is all hidden in that great cap. "

"It is a comely cap, I'm told by some. "

"Maybe; but what it hides is beautiful. "

"It is not: it is hideous. "

"Well, it was beautiful at Rotterdam. "

"Ay, everything was beautiful that day" (with a little sigh). 

And now Peter came in, and welcomed Gerard cordially, and would have himto stay supper. And Margaret disappeared; and Gerard had a nice learnedchat with Peter; and Margaret reappeared with her hair in her silvernet, and shot a glance half arch, half coy, and glided about them, andspread supper, and beamed bright with gaiety and happiness. And inthe cool evening Gerard coaxed her out, and she objected and came; andcoaxed her on to the road to Tergou, and she declined, and came; andthere they strolled up and down, hand in hand; and when he must go, theypledged each other never to quarrel or misunderstand one another again;and they sealed the promise with a long loving kiss, and Gerard wenthome on wings. 

From that day Gerard spent most of his evenings with Margaret, and theattachment deepened and deepened on both sides, till the hours theyspent together were the hours they lived; the rest they counted andunderwent. And at the outset of this deep attachment all went smoothly. Obstacles there were, but they seemed distant and small to the eyes ofhope, youth, and love. The feelings and passions of so many persons, that this attachment would thwart, gave no warning smoke to showtheir volcanic nature and power. The course of true love ran smoothly, placidly, until it had drawn these two young hearts into its current forever. 

And then--

CHAPTER VII

One bright morning unwonted velvet shone, unwonted feathers waved, andhorses' hoofs glinted and ran through the streets of Tergou, and thewindows and balconies were studded with wondering faces. The Frenchambassador was riding through to sport in the neighbouring forest. 

Besides his own suite, he was attended by several servants of the Dukeof Burgundy, lent to do him honour and minister to his pleasure. TheDuke's tumbler rode before him with a grave, sedate majesty, that madehis more noble companions seem light, frivolous persons. But ever andanon, when respect and awe neared the oppressive, he rolled off hishorse so ignobly and funnily, that even the ambassador was fain' toburst out laughing. He also climbed up again by the tail in a wayprovocative of mirth, and so he played his part. Towards the rear of thepageant rode one that excited more attention still--the Duke's leopard. A huntsman, mounted on a Flemish horse of giant prodigious size andpower, carried a long box fastened to the rider's loins by strapscuriously contrived, and on this box sat a bright leopard crouching. She was chained to the huntsman. The people admired her glossy hideand spots, and pressed near, and one or two were for feeling her, and pulling her tail; then the huntsman shouted in a terrible voice, "Beware! At Antwerp one did but throw a handful of dust at her, and theDuke made dust of him. "

"Gramercy!"

"I speak sooth. The good Duke shut him up in prison, in a cell underground, and the rats cleaned the flesh off his bones in a night. Servedhim right for molesting the poor thing. "

There was a murmur of fear, and the Tergovians shrank from tickling theleopard of their sovereign. 

But an incident followed that raised their spirits again. The Duke'sgiant, a Hungarian seven feet four inches high, brought up the rear. This enormous creature had, like some other giants, a treble, flutyvoice of little power. He was a vain fellow, and not conscious of thisnor any defect. Now it happened he caught sight of Giles sitting on thetop of the balcony; so he stopped and began to make fun of him. 

"Hallo! brother!" squeaked he, "I had nearly passed without seeingthee. "

"You are plain enough to see, " bellowed Giles in his bass tones. 

"Come on my shoulder, brother, " squeaked Titan, and held out a shoulderof mutton fist to help him down. 

"If I do I'll cuff your ears, " roared the dwarf. 

The giant saw the homuncule was irascible, and played upon him, beingencouraged thereto by the shouts of laughter. For he did not seethat the people were laughing not at his wit, but at the ridiculousincongruity of the two voices--the gigantic feeble fife, and the pettydeep, loud drum, the mountain delivered of a squeak, and the mole-hillbelching thunder. 

The singular duet came to as singular an end. Giles lost all patienceand self-command, and being a creature devoid of fear, and in a rage toboot, he actually dropped upon the giant's neck, seized his hair withone hand, and punched his head with the other. The giant's first impulsewas to laugh, but the weight and rapidity of the blows soon correctedthat inclination. 

"He! he! Ah! ha! hallo! oh! oh! Holy saints! here! help! or I mustthrottle the imp. I can't! I'll split your skull against the--" and hemade a wild run backwards at the balcony. Giles saw his danger, seizedthe balcony in time with both hands, and whipped over it just as thegiant's head came against it with a stunning crack. The people roaredwith laughter and exultation at the address of their little champion. The indignant giant seized two of the laughers, knocked them togetherlike dumb-bells, shook them and strewed them flat--Catherine shriekedand threw her apron over Giles--then strode wrathfully away after theparty. This incident had consequences no one then present foresaw. Itsimmediate results were agreeable. The Tergovians turned proud of Giles, and listened with more affability to his prayers for parchment. Forhe drove a regular trade with his brother Gerard in this article. Wentabout and begged it gratis, and Gerard gave him coppers for it. 

On the afternoon of the same day, Catherine and her daughter werechatting together about their favourite theme, Gerard, his goodness, hisbenefice, and the brightened prospects of the whole family. 

Their good luck had come to them in the very shape they would havechosen; besides the advantages of a benefice such as the CountessCharolois would not disdain to give, there was the feminine delightat having a priest, a holy man, in their own family. "He will marryCornelis and Sybrandt: for they can wed (good housewives), now, if theywill. Gerard will take care of you and Giles, when we are gone. "

"Yes, mother, and we can confess to him instead of to a stranger, " saidKate. 

"Ay, girl! and he can give the sacred oil to your father and me, andclose our eyes when our time comes. "

"Oh, mother! not for many, many years, I do pray Heaven. Pray speak notof that, it always makes me sad. I hope to go before you, mother dear. No; let us be gay to-day. I am out of pain, mother, quite out ofall pain; it does seem so strange; and I feel so bright and happy, that--mother, Can you keep a secret?"

"Nobody better, child. Why, you know I can. "

"Then I will show you something so beautiful. You never saw the like, Itrow. Only Gerard must never know; for sure he means to surprise us withit; he covers it up so, and sometimes he carries it away altogether. "

Kate took her crutches, and moved slowly away, leaving her mother in anexalted state of curiosity. She soon returned with something in a cloth, uncovered it, and there was a lovely picture of the Virgin, with all herinsignia, and wearing her tiara over a wealth of beautiful hair, whichflowed loose over her shoulders. Catherine, at first, was struck withawe. 

"It is herself, " she cried; "it is the Queen of Heaven. I never saw onelike her to my mind before. "

"And her eyes, mother: lifted to the sky, as if they belonged there, andnot to a mortal creature. And her beautiful hair of burning gold. "

"And to think I have a son that can make the saints live again upon apiece of wood!"

"The reason is, he is a young saint himself, mother. He is too good forthis world; he is here to portray the blessed, and then to go away andbe with them for ever. "

Ere they had half done admiring it, a strange voice was heard at thedoor. By one of the furtive instincts of their sex they hastily hid thepicture in the cloth, though there was no need, And the next moment incame, casting his eyes furtively around, a man that had not entered thehouse this ten years Ghysbrecht Van Swieten. 

The two women were so taken by surprise, that they merely stared athim and at one another, and said, "The burgomaster!" in a tone soexpressive, that Ghysbrecht felt compelled to answer it. 

"Yes! I own the last time I came here was not on a friendly errand. Menlove their own interest--Eli's and mine were contrary. Well, let thisvisit atone the last. To-day I come on your business and none of mine. "Catherine and her daughter exchanged a swift glance of contemptuousincredulity. They knew the man better than he thought. 

"It is about your son Gerard. "

"Ay! ay! you want him to work for the town all for nothing. He told us. "

"I come on no such errand. It is to let you know he has fallen into badhands. "

"Now Heaven and the saints forbid! Man, torture not a mother! Speak out, and quickly: speak ere you have time to coin falsehood: we know thee. "

Ghysbrecht turned pale at this affront, and spite mingled with the othermotives that brought him here. "Thus it is, then, " said he, grinding histeeth and speaking very fast. "Your son Gerard is more like to be fatherof a family than a priest: he is for ever with Margaret, Peter Brandt'sred-haired girl, and loves her like a cow her calf. "

Mother and daughter both burst out laughing. Ghysbrecht stared at them. 

"What! you knew it?"

"Carry this tale to those who know not my son, Gerard. Women are noughtto him. "

"Other women, mayhap. But this one is the apple of his eye to him, orwill be, if you part them not, and soon. Come, dame, make me not wastetime and friendly counsel: my servant has seen them together a scoretimes, handed, and reading babies in one another's eyes like--you know, dame--you have been young, too. "

"Girl, I am ill at ease. Yea, I have been young, and know how blindand foolish the young are. My heart! he has turned me sick in a moment. Kate, if it should be true?"

"Nay, nay!" cried Kate eagerly. "Gerard might love a young woman: allyoung men do: I can't find what they see in them to love so; but if hedid, he would let us know; he would not deceive us. You wicked man!No, dear mother, look not so! Gerard is too good to love a creature ofearth. His love is for our Lady and the saints. Ah! I will show you thepicture there: if his heart was earthly, could he paint the Queenof Heaven like that--look! look!" and she held the picture outtriumphantly, and, more radiant and beautiful in this moment ofenthusiasm than ever dead picture was or will be, over-powered theburgomaster with her eloquence and her feminine proof of Gerard'spurity. His eyes and mouth opened, and remained open: in which statethey kept turning, face and all as if on a pivot, from the picture tothe women, and from the women to the picture. 

"Why, it is herself, " he gasped. 

"Isn't it!" cried Kate, and her hostility was softened. "You admire it?I forgive you for frightening us. "

"Am I in a mad-house?" said Ghysbrecht Van Swieten thoroughly puzzled. "You show me a picture of the girl; and you say he painted it; and thatis a proof he cannot love her. Why, they all paint their sweethearts, painters do. "

"A picture of the girl?" exclaimed Kate, shocked. "Fie! this is no girl;this is our blessed Lady. "

"No, no; it is Margaret Brandt. "

"Oh blind! It is the Queen of Heaven. "

"No; only of Sevenbergen village. "

"Profane man! behold her crown!"

"Silly child! look at her red hair! Would the Virgin be seen in redhair? She who had the pick of all the colours ten thousand years beforethe world began. "

At this moment an anxious face was insinuated round the edge of the opendoor: it was their neighbour Peter Buyskens. 

"What is to do?" said he in a cautious whisper. "We can hear you allacross the street. What on earth is to do?"

"Oh, neighbour! What is to do? Why, here is the burgomaster blackeningour Gerard. "

"Stop!" cried Van Swieten. "Peter Buyskens is come in the nick of time. He knows father and daughter both. They cast their glamour on him. "

"What! is she a witch too?"

"Else the egg takes not after the bird. Why is her father called themagician? I tell you they bewitched this very Peter here; they castunholy spells on him, and cured him of the colic: now, Peter, look andtell me who is that? and you be silent, women, for a moment, if you can;who is it, Peter?"

"Well, to be sure!" said Peter, in reply; and his eye seemed fascinatedby the picture. 

"Who is it?" repeated Ghysbrecht impetuously. 

Peter Buyskens smiled. "Why, you know as well as I do; but what havethey put a crown on her for? I never saw her in a crown, for my part. "

"Man alive! Can't you open your great jaws, and just speak a wench'sname plain out to oblige three people?"

"I'd do a great deal more to oblige one of you than that, burgomaster. If it isn't as natural as life!"

"Curse the man! he won't, he won't--curse him!"

"Why, what have I done now?"

"Oh, sir!" said little Kate, "for pity's sake tell us; are these thefeatures of a living woman, of--of--Margaret Brandt?"

"A mirror is not truer, my little maid. "

"But is it she, sir, for very certain?"

"Why, who else should it be?"

"Now, why couldn't you say so at once?" snarled Ghysbrecht. 

"I did say so, as plain as I could speak, " snapped Peter; and theygrowled over this small bone of contention so zealously, that they didnot see Catherine and her daughter had thrown their aprons over theirheads, and were rocking to and fro in deep distress. The next momentElias came in from the shop, and stood aghast. Catherine, though herface was covered, knew his footstep. 

"That is my poor man, " she sobbed. "Tell him, good Peter Buyskens, for Ihave not the courage. "

Elias turned pale. The presence of the burgomaster in his house, afterso many years of coolness, coupled with his wife's and daughter'sdistress, made him fear some heavy misfortune. 

"Richart! Jacob!" he gasped. 

"No, no!" said the burgomaster; "it is nearer home, and nobody is deador dying, old friend. "

"God bless you, burgomaster! Ah! something has gone off my breast thatwas like to choke me. Now, what is the matter?"

Ghysbrecht then told him all that he told the women, and showed thepicture in evidence. 

"Is that all?" said Eli, profoundly relieved. "What are ye roaring andbellowing for? It is vexing--it is angering, but it is not like death, not even sickness. Boys will be boys. He will outgrow that disease: 'tisbut skin-deep. "

But when Ghysbrecht told him that Margaret was a girl of good character;that it was not to be supposed she would be so intimate if marriage hadnot been spoken of between them, his brow darkened. 

"Marriage! that shall never be, " said he sternly. "I'll stay that; ay, by force, if need be--as I would his hand lifted to cut his throat. I'ddo what old John Koestein did t'other day. "

"And what is that, in Heaven's name?" asked the mother, suddenlyremoving her apron. 

It was the burgomaster who replied:

"He made me shut young Albert Koestein up in the prison of theStadthouse till he knocked under. It was not long: forty-eight hours, all alone, on bread and water, cooled his hot stomach. 'Tell my father Iam his humble servant, ' says he, 'and let me into the sun once more--thesun is worth all the wenches in the world. '"

"Oh, the cruelty of men!" sighed Catherine. 

"As to that, the burgomaster has no choice: it is the law. And if afather says, 'Burgomaster, lock up my son, ' he must do it. A fine thingit would be if a father might not lock up his own son. "

"Well, well! it won't come to that with me and my son. He neverdisobeyed me in his life: he never shall, Where is he? It is pastsupper-time. Where is he, Kate?"

"Alas! I know not, father. "

"I know, " said Ghysbrecht; "he is at Sevenbergen. My servant met him onthe road. "

Supper passed in gloomy silence. Evening descended--no Gerard! Eighto'clock came--no Gerard! Then the father sent all to bed, exceptCatherine. 

"You and I will walk abroad, wife, and talk over this new care. "

"Abroad, my man, at this time? Whither?"

"Why, on the road to Sevenbergen. "

"Oh no; no hasty words, father. Poor Gerard! he never vexed you before. "

"Fear me not. But it must end; and I am not one that trusts to-morrowwith to-day's work. "

The old pair walked hand in hand; for, strange is it may appear tosome of my readers, the use of the elbow to couples walking was notdiscovered in Europe till centuries after this. They sauntered on a longtime in silence. The night was clear and balmy. Such nights, calm andsilent, recall the past from the dead. 

"It is a many years since we walked so late, my man, " said Catherinesoftly. 

"Ay, sweetheart, more than we shall see again (is he never coming, Iwonder?)"

"Not since our courting days, Eli. "

"No. Ay, you were a buxom lass then. "

"And you were a comely lad, as ever a girl's eye stole a look at. I dosuppose Gerard is with her now, as you used to be with me. Nature isstrong, and the same in all our generations. "

"Nay, I hope he has left her by now, confound her, or we shall be hereall night. "

"Eli!"

"Well, Kate?"

"I have been happy with you, sweetheart, for all our rubs--much happier, I trow, than if I had--been--a--a--nun. You won't speak harshly to thepoor child? One can be firm without being harsh. "

"Surely. "

"Have you been happy with me, my poor Eli?"

"Why, you know I have. Friends I have known, but none like thee. Bussme, wife!"

"A heart to share joy and grief with is a great comfort to man or woman. Isn't it, Eli?"

"It is so, my lass. 

 'It doth joy double, And halveth trouble, '

runs the byword. And so I have found it, sweetheart. Ah! here comes theyoung fool. "

Catherine trembled, and held her husband's hand tight. 

The moon was bright, but they were in the shadow of some trees, andtheir son did not see them. He came singing in the moonlight, and hisface shining. 

CHAPTER VIII

While the burgomaster was exposing Gerard at Tergou, Margaret had atrouble of her own at Sevenbergen. It was a housewife's distress, butdeeper than we can well conceive. She came to Martin Wittenhaagen, theold soldier, with tears in her eyes. 

"Martin, there's nothing in the house, and Gerard is coming, and he isso thoughtless. He forgets to sup at home. When he gives over work, thenhe runs to me straight, poor soul; and often he comes quite faint. Andto think I have nothing to set before my servant that loves me so dear. "

Martin scratched his head. "What can I do?"

"It is Thursday; it is your day to shoot; sooth to Say, I counted on youto-day. "

"Nay, " said the soldier, "I may not shoot when the Duke or his friendsare at the chase; read else. I am no scholar. " And he took out of hispouch a parchment with a grand seal. It purported to be a stipend and alicence given by Philip, Duke of Burgundy, to Martin Wittenhaagen, oneof his archers, in return for services in the wars, and for a woundreceived at the Dukes side. The stipend was four merks yearly, to bepaid by the Duke's almoner, and the licence was to shoot three arrowsonce a week, viz. , on Thursday, and no other day, in any of the Duke'sforests in Holland, at any game but a seven-year-old buck or a doecarrying fawn; proviso, that the Duke should not be hunting on that day, or any of his friends. In this case Martin was not to go and disturb thewoods on peril of his salary and his head, and a fine of a penny. 

Margaret sighed and was silent. 

"Come, cheer up, mistress, " said he; "for your sake I'll peril mycarcass; I have done that for many a one that was not worth yourforefinger. It is no such mighty risk either. I'll but step into theskirts of the forest here. It is odds but they drive a hare or a fawnwithin reach of my arrow. "

"Well, if I let you go, you must promise me not to go far, and not tobe seen; far better Gerard went supperless than ill should come to you, faithful Martin. "

The required promise given, Martin took his bow and three arrows, andstole cautiously into the wood: it was scarce a furlong distant. Thehorns were heard faintly in the distance, and all the game was afoot. "Come, " thought Martin, "I shall soon fill the pot, and no one be thewiser. " He took his stand behind a thick oak that commanded a view ofan open glade, and strung his bow, a truly formidable weapon. It wasof English yew, six feet two inches high, and thick in proportion; andMartin, broad-chested, with arms all iron and cord, and used to the bowfrom infancy, could draw a three-foot arrow to the head, and, whenit flew, the eye could scarce follow it, and the bowstring twanged asmusical as a harp. This bow had laid many a stout soldier low in thewars of the Hoecks and Cabbel-jaws. In those days a battlefield was nota cloud of smoke; the combatants were few, but the deaths many--for theysaw what they were about; and fewer bloodless arrows flew than bloodlessbullets now. A hare came cantering, then sat sprightly, and her earsmade a capital V. Martin levelled his tremendous weapon at her. Thearrow flew, the string twanged; but Martin had been in a hurry to pother, and lost her by an inch: the arrow seemed to hit her, but it struckthe ground close to her, and passed under her belly like a flash, andhissed along the short grass and disappeared. She jumped three feetperpendicular and away at the top of her speed. "Bungler!" said Martin. A sure proof he was not an habitual bungler, or he would have blamedthe hare. He had scarcely fitted another arrow to his string when awood-pigeon settled on the very tree he stood under. "Aha!" thought he, "you are small, but dainty. " This time he took more pains; drew his arrowcarefully, loosed it smoothly, and saw it, to all appearance, go cleanthrough the bird, carrying feathers skyward like dust. Instead offalling at his feet, the bird, whose breast was torn, not fairlypierced, fluttered feebly away, and, by a great effort, rose above thetrees, flew some fifty yards and dead at last; but where, he could notsee for the thick foliage. 

"Luck is against me, " said he despondingly. But he fitted another arrow, and eyed the glade keenly. Presently he heard a bustle behind him, andturned round just in time to see a noble buck cross the open, but toolate to shoot at him. He dashed his bow down with an imprecation. Atthat moment a long spotted animal glided swiftly across after the deer;its belly seemed to touch the ground as it went. Martin took up his bowhastily: he recognized the Duke's leopard. "The hunters will not be farfrom her, " said he, "and I must not be seen. Gerard must go supperlessthis night. "

He plunged into the wood, following the buck and leopard, for that washis way home. He had not gone far when he heard an unusual sound aheadof him--leaves rustling violently and the ground trampled. He hurried inthe direction. He found the leopard on the buck's back, tearing himwith teeth and claw, and the buck running in a circle and boundingconvulsively, with the blood pouring down his hide. Then Martin formed adesperate resolution to have the venison for Margaret. He drew his arrowto the head, and buried it in the deer, who, spite of the creature onhis back, bounded high into the air, and fell dead. The leopard went ontearing him as if nothing had happened. 

Martin hoped that the creature would gorge itself with blood, and thenlet him take the meat. He waited some minutes, then walked resolutelyup, and laid his hand on the buck's leg. The leopard gave a frightfulgrowl, and left off sucking blood. She saw Martin's game, and wassulky and on her guard. What was to be done? Martin had heard that wildcreatures cannot stand the human eye. Accordingly, he stood erect, andfixed his on the leopard: the leopard returned a savage glance, andnever took her eye off Martin. Then Martin continuing to look the beastdown, the leopard, brutally ignorant of natural history, flew at hishead with a frightful yell, flaming eyes, and jaws and distended. He hadbut just time to catch her by the throat, before her teeth could crushhis face; one of her claws seized his shoulder and rent it, the other, aimed at his cheek, would have been more deadly still, but Martin wasold-fashioned, and wore no hat, but a scapulary of the same stuff as hisjerkin, and this scapulary he had brought over his head like a hood; thebrute's claw caught in the loose leather. Martin kept her teeth off hisface with great difficulty, and griped her throat fiercely, and shekept rending his shoulder. It was like blunt reaping-hooks grinding andtearing. The pain was fearful; but, instead of cowing the old soldier, it put his blood up, and he gnashed his teeth with rage almost as fierceas hers, and squeezed her neck with iron force. The two pair of eyesflared at one another--and now the man's were almost as furious as thebrute's. She found he was throttling her, and made a wild attemptto free herself, in which she dragged his cowl all over his face andblinded him, and tore her claw out of his shoulder, flesh and all; butstill he throttled her with hand and arm of iron. Presently herlong tail, that was high in the air, went down. "Aha!" cried Martin, joyfully, and gripped her like death; next, her body lost itselasticity, and he held a choked and powerless thing: he gripped itstill, till all motion ceased, then dashed it to the earth; then, panting, removed his cowl: the leopard lay mute at his feet with tongueprotruding and bloody paw; and for the first time terror fell on Martin. "I am a dead man: I have slain the Duke's leopard. " He hastily seizeda few handfuls of leaves and threw them over her; then shouldered thebuck, and staggered away, leaving a trail of blood all the way his ownand the buck's. He burst into Peter's house a horrible figure, bleedingand bloodstained, and flung the deer's carcass down. 

"There--no questions, " said he, "but broil me a steak on't, for I amfaint. "

Margaret did not see he was wounded; she thought the blood was all fromthe deer. 

She busied herself at the fire, and the stout soldier stanched and boundhis own wound apart; and soon he and Gerard and Margaret were suppingroyally on broiled venison. 

They were very merry; and Gerard, with wonderful thoughtfulness, hadbrought a flask of Schiedam, and under its influence Martin revived, and told them how the venison was got; and they all made merry over theexploit. 

Their mirth was strangely interrupted. Margaret's eye became fixed andfascinated, and her cheek pale with fear. She gasped, and could notspeak, but pointed to the window with trembling finger. Their eyesfollowed hers, and there in the twilight crouched a dark form with eyeslike glowworms. 

It was the leopard. 

While they stood petrified, fascinated by the eyes of green fire, theresounded in the wood a single deep bay. Martin trembled at it. 

"They have lost her, and laid muzzled bloodhounds on her scent;they will find her here, and the venison. Good-bye, friends, MartinWittenhaagen ends here. "

Gerard seized his bow, and put it into the soldier's hands. 

"Be a man, " he cried; "shoot her, and fling her into the wood ere theycome up. Who will know?"

More voices of hounds broke out, and nearer. 

"Curse her!" cried Martin; "I spared her once; now she must die, or I, or both more likely;" and he reared his bow, and drew his arrow to thehead. 

"Nay! nay!" cried Margaret, and seized the arrow. It broke in half: thepieces fell on each side the bow. The air at the same time filled withthe tongues of the hounds: they were hot upon the scent. 

"What have you done, wench? You have put the halter round my throat. "

"No!" cried Margaret. "I have saved you: stand back from the window, both! Your knife, quick!"

She seized his long-pointed knife, almost tore it out of his girdle, anddarted from the room. The house was now surrounded with baying dogs andshouting men. 

The glowworm eyes moved not. 

CHAPTER IX

Margaret cut off a huge piece of venison, and ran to the window andthrew it out to the green eyes of fire. They darted on to it with asavage snarl; and there was a sound of rending and crunching: at thismoment, a hound uttered a bay so near and loud it rang through thehouse; and the three at the window shrank together. Then the leopardfeared for her supper, and glided swiftly and stealthily away with ittowards the woods, and the very next moment horses and men and dogs camehelter-skelter past the window, and followed her full cry. Martin andhis companions breathed again: the leopard was swift, and would notbe caught within a league of their house. They grasped hands. Margaretseized this opportunity, and cried a little; Gerard kissed the tearsaway. 

To table once more, and Gerard drank to woman's wit: "'Tis stronger thanman's force, " said he. 

"Ay, " said Margaret, "when those she loves are in danger; not else. "

To-night Gerard stayed with her longer than usual, and went home prouderthan ever of her, and happy as a prince. Some little distance from home, under the shadow of some trees, he encountered two figures: they almostbarred his way. 

It was his father and mother. 

Out so late! what could be the cause?

A chill fell on him. 

He stopped and looked at them: they stood grim and silent. He stammeredout some words of inquiry. 

"Why ask?" said the father; "you know why we are here. "

"Oh, Gerard!" said his mother, with a voice full of reproach yet ofaffection. 

Gerard's heart quaked: he was silent. 

Then his father pitied his confusion, and said to him:

"Nay, you need not to hang your head. You are not the first young foolthat has been caught by a red cheek and a pair of blue eyes. "

"Nay, nay!" put in Catherine, "it was witchcraft; Peter the Magician iswell known for that. "

"Come, Sir Priest, " resumed his father, "you know you must not meddlewith women folk. But give us your promise to go no more to Sevenbergen, and here all ends: we won't be hard on you for one fault. "

"I cannot promise that, father. "

"Not promise it, you young hypocrite!"

"Nay, father, miscall me not: I lacked courage to tell you what I knewwould vex you; and right grateful am I to that good friend, whoever hebe, that has let you wot. 'Tis a load off my mind. Yes, father, I loveMargaret; and call me not a priest, for a priest I will never be. I willdie sooner. "

"That we shall see, young man. Come, gainsay me no more; you will learnwhat 'tis to disrespect a father. "

Gerard held his peace, and the three walked home in gloomy silence, broken only by a deep sigh or two from Catherine. 

From that hour the little house at Tergou was no longer the abode ofpeace. Gerard was taken to task next day before the whole family; andevery voice was loud against him, except little Kate's and the dwarf's, who was apt to take his cue from her without knowing why. As forCornelis and Sybrandt, they were bitterer than their father. Gerardwas dismayed at finding so many enemies, and looked wistfully into hislittle sister's face: her eyes were brimming at the harsh words showeredon one who but yesterday was the universal pet. But she gave him noencouragement: she turned her head away from him and said:

"Dear, dear Gerard, pray to Heaven to cure you of this folly!"

"What, are you against me too?" said Gerard, sadly; and he rose with adeep sigh, and left the house and went to Sevenbergen. 

The beginning of a quarrel, where the parties are bound by affectionthough opposed in interest and sentiment, is comparatively innocent:both are perhaps in the right at first starting, and then it is thata calm, judicious friend, capable of seeing both sides, is a gift fromHeaven. For the longer the dissension endures, the wider and deeper itgrows by the fallibility and irascibility of human nature: these arenot confined to either side, and finally the invariable end isreached--both in the wrong. 

The combatants were unequally matched: Elias was angry, Cornelis andSybrandt spiteful; but Gerard, having a larger and more cultivated mind, saw both sides where they saw but one, and had fits of irresolution, and was not wroth, but unhappy. He was lonely, too, in this struggle. He could open his heart to no one. Margaret was a high-spirited girl:he dared not tell her what he had to endure at home; she was capable ofsiding with his relations by resigning him, though at the cost of herown happiness. Margaret Van Eyck had been a great comfort to him onanother occasion; but now he dared not make her his confidant. Her ownhistory was well known. In early life she had many offers of marriage;but refused them all for the sake of that art, to which a wife's andmother's duties are so fatal: thus she remained single and painted withher brothers. How could he tell her that he declined the benefice shehad got him, and declined it for the sake of that which at his age shehad despised and sacrificed so lightly?

Gerard at this period bade fair to succumb. But the other side had ahorrible ally in Catherine, senior. This good-hearted but uneducatedwoman could not, like her daughter, act quietly and firmly: still lesscould she act upon a plan. She irritated Gerard at times, and so helpedhim; for anger is a great sustainer of the courage: at others she turnedround in a moment and made onslaughts on her own forces. To takea single instance out of many: one day that they were all at home, Catherine and all, Cornelis said: "Our Gerard wed Margaret Brandt? Why, it is hunger marrying thirst. "

"And what will it be when you marry?" cried Catherine. "Gerard canpaint, Gerard can write, but what can you do to keep a woman, ye lazyloon? Nought but wait for your father's shoon. Oh we can see why you andSybrandt would not have the poor boy to marry. You are afraid he willcome to us for a share of our substance. And say that he does, and saythat we give it him, it isn't yourn we part from, and mayhap never willbe. "

On these occasions Gerard smiled slily, and picked up heart, andtemporary confusion fell on Catherine's unfortunate allies. But at last, after more than six months of irritation, came the climax. The fathertold the son before the whole family he had ordered the burgomasterto imprison him in the Stadthouse rather than let him marry Margaret. Gerard turned pale with anger at this, but by a great effort held hispeace. His father went on to say, "And a priest you shall be before theyear is out, nilly-willy. "

"Is it so?" cried Gerard. "Then, hear me, all. By God and St. Bavon Iswear I will never be a priest while Margaret lives. Since force is todecide it, and not love and duty, try force, father; but force shall notserve you, for the day I see the burgomaster come for me, I leave Tergoufor ever, and Holland too, and my father's house, where it seems I havebeen valued all these years, not for myself, but for what is to be gotout of me. "

And he flung out of the room white with anger and desperation. 

"There!" cried Catherine, "that comes of driving young folks too hard. But men are crueller than tigers, even to their own flesh and blood. Now, Heaven forbid he should ever leave us, married or single. "

As Gerard came out of the house, his cheeks pale and his heart panting, he met Reicht Heynes: she had a message for him: Margaret Van Eyckdesired to see him. He found the old lady seated grim as a judge. Shewasted no time in preliminaries, but inquired coldly why he had notvisited her of late: before he could answer, she said in a sarcastictone, "I thought we had been friends, young sir. "

At this Gerard looked the picture of doubt and consternation. 

"It is because you never told her you were in love, " said Reicht Heynes, pitying his confusion. 

"Silence, wench! Why should he tell us his affairs? We are not hisfriends: we have not deserved his confidence. "

"Alas! my second mother, " said Gerard, "I did not dare to tell you myfolly. "

"What folly? Is it folly to love?"

"I am told so every day of my life. "

"You need not have been afraid to tell my mistress; she is always kindto true lovers. "

"Madam--Reicht I was afraid because I was told. .. "

"Well, you were told--?"

"That in your youth you scorned love, preferring art. "

"I did, boy; and what is the end of it? Behold me here a barren stock, while the women of my youth have a troop of children at their side, andgrandchildren at their knee I gave up the sweet joys of wifehood andmotherhood for what? For my dear brothers. They have gone and left melong ago. For my art. It has all but left me too. I have the knowledgestill, but what avails that when the hand trembles. No, Gerard; I lookon you as my son. You are good, you are handsome, you are a painter, though not like some I have known. I will not let you throw your youthaway as I did mine: you shall marry this Margaret. I have inquired, andshe is a good daughter. Reicht here is a gossip. She has told me allabout it. But that need not hinder you to tell me. "

Poor Gerard was overjoyed to be permitted to praise Margaret aloud, andto one who could understand what he loved in her. 

Soon there were two pair of wet eyes over his story; and when the poorboy saw that, there were three. 

Women are creatures brimful of courage. Theirs is not exactly the samequality as manly courage; that would never do, hang it all; we shouldhave to give up trampling on them. No; it is a vicarious courage. Theynever take part in a bull-fight by any chance; but it is remarked thatthey sit at one unshaken by those tremors and apprehensions for thecombatants to which the male spectator--feeble-minded wretch!--issubject. Nothing can exceed the resolution with which they have beenknown to send forth men to battle: as some witty dog says, "Les femmes sont tres braves avec le peur d'autrui. "

By this trait Gerard now profited. Margaret and Reicht were agreed thata man should always take the bull by the horns. Gerard's only course wasto marry Margaret Brandt off-hand; the old people would come to aftera while, the deed once done. Whereas, the longer this misunderstandingcontinued on its present footing, the worse for all parties, especiallyfor Gerard. 

"See how pale and thin they have made him amongst them. "

"Indeed you are, Master Gerard, " said Reicht. "It makes a body sad tosee a young man so wasted and worn. Mistress, when I met him in thestreet to-day, I had liked to have burst out crying: he was so changed. 

"And I'll be bound the others keep their colour; ah, Reicht? such as itis. "

"Oh, I see no odds in them. "

"Of course not. We painters are no match for boors. We are glass, theyare stone. We can't stand the worry, worry, worry of little minds; andit is not for the good of mankind we should be exposed to it. It is hardenough, Heaven knows, to design and paint a masterpiece, without havinggnats and flies stinging us to death into the bargain. "

Exasperated as Gerard was by his father's threat of violence, helistened to these friendly voices telling him the prudent course wasrebellion. But though he listened, he was not convinced. 

"I do not fear my father's violence, " he said, "but I do fear hisanger. When it came to the point he would not imprison me. I would marryMargaret to-morrow if that was my only fear. No; he would disown me. Ishould take Margaret from her father, and give her a poor husband, who would never thrive, weighed down by his parent's curse. Madam! Isometimes think if I could marry her secretly, and then take her awayto some country where my craft is better paid than in this; and aftera year or two, when the storm had blown over, you know, could come backwith money in my purse, and say, 'My dear parents, we do not seek yoursubstance, we but ask you to love us once more as you used, and as wehave never ceased to love you'--but, alas! I shall be told these are thedreams of an inexperienced young man. "

The old lady's eyes sparkled. 

"It is no dream, but a piece of wonderful common-sense in a boy;it remains to be seen whether you have spirit to carry out your ownthought. There is a country, Gerard, where certain fortune awaits youat this moment. Here the arts freeze, but there they flourish, as theynever yet flourished in any age or land. "

"It is Italy!" cried Gerard. "It is Italy!"

"Ay, Italy! where painters are honoured like princes, and scribes arepaid three hundred crowns for copying a single manuscript. Know you notthat his Holiness the Pope has written to every land for skilful scribesto copy the hundreds of precious manuscripts that are pouring into thatfavoured land from Constantinople, whence learning and learned men aredriven by the barbarian Turks?"

"Nay, I know not that; but it has been the dream and hope of my life tovisit Italy, the queen of all the arts; oh, madam! But the journey, andwe are all so poor. "

"Find you the heart to go, I'll find the means. I know where to lay myhand on ten golden angels: they will take you to Rome: and the girl withyou, if she loves you as she ought. "

They sat till midnight over this theme. And, after that day, Gerardrecovered his spirits, and seemed to carry a secret talisman against allthe gibes and the harsh words that flew about his ears at home. 

Besides the money she procured him for the journey, Margaret Van Eyckgave him money's worth. Said she, "I will tell you secrets that Ilearned from masters that are gone from me, and have left no fellowbehind. Even the Italians know them not; and what I tell you now inTergou you shall sell here in Florence. Note my brother Jan's pictures:time, which fades all other paintings, leaves his colours bright as theday they left the easel. The reason is, he did nothing blindly, ina hurry. He trusted to no hireling to grind his colours; he did ithimself, or saw it done. His panel was prepared and prepared again--Iwill show you how--a year before he laid his colour on. Most of them arequite content to have their work sucked up and lost, sooner than notbe in a hurry. Bad painters are always in a hurry. Above all, Gerard, I warn you use but little oil, and never boil it: boiling it melts thatvegetable dross into its heart which it is our business to clear away;for impure oil is death to colour. No; take your oil and pour it intoa bottle with water. In a day or two the water will turn muddy: that ismuck from the oil. Pour the dirty water carefully away and add fresh. When that is poured away, you will fancy the oil is clear. You'remistaken. Reicht, fetch me that!" Reicht brought a glass trough with aglass lid fitting tight. "When your oil has been washed in bottle, putit into this trough with water, and put the trough in the sun all day. You will soon see the water turbid again. But mark, you must not carrythis game too far, or the sun will turn your oil to varnish. When it isas clear as crystal, not too luscious, drain carefully, and cork it uptight. Grind your own prime colours, and lay them on with this oil, andthey shall live. Hubert would put sand or salt in the water to clear theoil quicker. But Jan used to say, 'Water will do it best; give watertime. ' Jan Van Eyck was never in a hurry, and that is why the world willnot forget him in a hurry. "

This and several other receipts, quae nunc perscribere longum est, Margaret gave him with sparkling eyes, and Gerard received them likea legacy from Heaven, so interesting are some things that readuninteresting. Thus provided with money and knowledge, Gerard decided tomarry and fly with his wife to Italy. Nothing remained now but to informMargaret Brandt of his resolution, and to publish the banns as quietlyas possible. He went to Sevenbergen earlier than usual on both theseerrands. He began with Margaret; told her of the Dame Van Eyck'sgoodness, and the resolution he had come to at last, and invited herco-operation. 

She refused it plump. 

"No, Gerard; you and I have never spoken of your family, but when youcome to marriage--" She stopped, then began again. "I do think yourfather has no ill-will to me more than to another. He told PeterBuyskens as much, and Peter told me. But so long as he is bent on yourbeing a priest (you ought have told me this instead of I you), I couldnot marry you, Gerard, dearly as I love you. "

Gerard strove in vain to shake this resolution. He found it very easyto make her cry, but impossible to make her yield. Then Gerard wasimpatient and unjust. 

"Very well!" he cried; "then you are on their side, and you will driveme to be a priest, for this must end one way or another. My parents hateme in earnest, but my lover only loves me in jest. "

And with this wild, bitter speech, he flung away home again, and leftMargaret weeping. 

When a man misbehaves, the effect is curious on a girl who loves himsincerely. It makes her pity him. This, to some of us males, seemsanything but logical. The fault is in our own eye; the logic is tooswift for us. The girl argues thus:--"How unhappy, how vexed, how poorhe must be to misbehave! Poor thing!"

Margaret was full of this sweet womanly pity, when, to her greatsurprise, scarce an hour and a half after he left her, Gerard camerunning back to her with the fragments of a picture in his hand, andpanting with anger and grief. 

"There, Margaret! see! see! the wretches! Look at their spite! They havecut your portrait to pieces. "

Margaret looked, and, sure enough, some malicious hand had cut herportrait into five pieces. She was a good girl, but she was not ice; sheturned red to her very forehead. 

"Who did it?"

"Nay, I know not. I dared not ask; for I should hate the hand that didit, ay, till my dying day. My poor Margaret! The butchers, the ruffians!Six months' work cut out of my life, and nothing to show for it now. See, they have hacked through your very face; the sweet face that everyone loves who knows it. Oh, heartless, merciless vipers!"

"Never mind, Gerard, " said Margaret, panting. "Since this is how theytreat you for my sake--Ye rob him of my portrait, do ye? Well, then, heshall have the face itself, such as it is. "

"Oh, Margaret!"

"Yes, Gerard; since they are so cruel, I will be the kinder: forgiveme for refusing you. I will be your wife: to-morrow, if it is yourpleasure. "

Gerard kissed her hands with rapture, and then her lips; and in a tumultof joy ran for Peter and Martin. They came and witnessed the betrothal;a solemn ceremony in those days, and indeed for more than a centurylater, though now abolished. 

CHAPTER X

The banns of marriage had to be read three times, as in our days; withthis difference, that they were commonly read on week-days, and theyoung couple easily persuaded the cure to do the three readings intwenty-four hours: he was new to the place, and their looks spokevolumes in their favour. They were cried on Monday at matins and atvespers; and, to their great delight, nobody from Tergou was in thechurch. The next morning they were both there, palpitating with anxiety, when, to their horror, a stranger stood up and forbade the banns, Onthe score that the parties were not of age, and their parents notconsenting. 

Outside the church door Margaret and Gerard held a trembling, and almostdespairing consultation; but, before they could settle anything, the manwho had done them so ill a turn approached, and gave them to understandthat he was very sorry to interfere: that his inclination was to furtherthe happiness of the young; but that in point of fact his only means ofgetting a living was by forbidding banns: what then? "The young peoplegive me a crown, and I undo my work handsomely; tell the cure I wasmisinformed, and all goes smoothly. "

"A crown! I will give you a golden angel to do this, " said Gerardeagerly; the man consented as eagerly, and went with Gerard to the cure, and told him he had made a ridiculous mistake, which a sight of theparties had rectified. On this the cure agreed to marry the young couplenext day at ten: and the professional obstructor of bliss went home withGerard's angel. Like most of these very clever knaves, he was a fool, and proceeded to drink his angel at a certain hostelry in Tergou wherewas a green devoted to archery and the common sports of the day. There, being drunk, he bragged of his day's exploit; and who should bethere, imbibing every word, but a great frequenter of the spot, thene'er-do-weel Sybrandt. Sybrandt ran home to tell his father; his fatherwas not at home; he was gone to Rotterdam to buy cloth of the merchants. Catching his elder brother's eye, he made him a signal to come out, andtold him what he had heard. 

There are black sheep in nearly every large family; and these two wereGerard's black brothers. Idleness is vitiating: waiting for the death ofthose we ought to love is vitiating; and these two one-idea'd curs wereready to tear any one to death that should interfere with that miserableinheritance which was their thought by day and their dream by night. Their parents' parsimony was a virtue; it was accompanied by industry, and its motive was love of their offspring; but in these perverse andselfish hearts that homely virtue was perverted into avarice, than whichno more fruitful source of crimes is to be found in nature. 

They put their heads together, and agreed not to tell their mother, whose sentiments were so uncertain, but to go first to the burgomaster. They were cunning enough to see that he was averse to the match, thoughthey could not divine why. 

Ghysbrecht Van Swieten saw through them at once; but he took care notto let them see through him. He heard their story, and putting onmagisterial dignity and coldness, he said;

"Since the father of the family is not here, his duty falleth on me, whoam the father of the town. I know your father's mind; leave all to me;and, above all, tell not a woman a word of this, least of all the womenthat are in your own house: for chattering tongues mar wisest counsels. "

So he dismissed them, a little superciliously: he was ashamed of hisconfederates. 

On their return home they found their brother Gerard seated on a lowstool at their mother's knee: she was caressing his hair with her hand, speaking very kindly to him, and promising to take his part with hisfather and thwart his love no more. The main cause of this change ofmind was characteristic of the woman. She it was who in a moment offemale irritation had cut Margaret's picture to pieces. She had watchedthe effect with some misgivings, and had seen Gerard turn pale as death, and sit motionless like a bereaved creature, with the pieces in hishands, and his eyes fixed on them till tears came and blinded them. Thenshe was terrified at what she had done; and next her heart smote herbitterly; and she wept sore apart; but, being what she was, dared notown it, but said to herself, "I'll not say a word, but I'll make it upto him. " And her bowels yearned over her son, and her feeble violencedied a natural death, and she was transferring her fatal alliance toGerard when the two black sheep came in. Gerard knew nothing of theimmediate cause; on the contrary, inexperienced as he was in the insand outs of females, her kindness made him ashamed of a suspicion hehad entertained that she was the depredator, and he kissed her againand again, and went to bed happy as a prince to think his mother was hismother once more at the very crisis of his fate. 

The next morning, at ten o'clock, Gerard and Margaret were in the churchat Sevenbergen, he radiant with joy, she with blushes. Peter wasalso there, and Martin Wittenhaagen, but no other friend. Secrecy waseverything. Margaret had declined Italy. She could not leave her father;he was too learned and too helpless. But it was settled they shouldretire into Flanders for a few weeks until the storm should be blownover at Tergou. The cure did not keep them waiting long, though itseemed an age. Presently he stood at the altar, and called them to him. They went hand in hand, the happiest in Holland. The cure opened hisbook. 

But ere he uttered a single word of the sacred rite, a harsh voice cried"Forbear!" And the constables of Tergou came up the aisle and seizedGerard in the name of the law. Martin's long knife flashed out directly. 

"Forbear, man!" cried the priest. "What! draw your weapon in a church, and ye who interrupt this holy sacrament, what means this impiety?"

"There is no impiety, father, " said the burgomaster's servantrespectfully. "This young man would marry against his father's will, andhis father has prayed our burgomaster to deal with him according to thelaw. Let him deny it if he can. "

"Is this so, young man?"

Gerard hung his head. 

"We take him to Rotterdam to abide the sentence of the Duke. "

At this Margaret uttered a cry of despair, and the young creatures, whowere so happy a moment ago, fell to sobbing in one another's arms sopiteously, that the instruments of oppression drew back a step and wereashamed; but one of them that was good-natured stepped up under pretenceof separating them, and whispered to Margaret:

"Rotterdam? it is a lie. We but take him to our Stadthouse. "

They took him away on horseback, on the road to Rotterdam; and, after adozen halts, and by sly detours, to Tergou. Just outside the town theywere met by a rude vehicle covered with canvas. Gerard was put intothis, and about five in the evening was secretly conveyed into theprison of the Stadthouse. He was taken up several flights of stairsand thrust into a small room lighted only by a narrow window, with avertical iron bar. The whole furniture was a huge oak chest. 

Imprisonment in that age was one of the highroads to death. It ishorrible in its mildest form; but in those days it implied cold, unbroken solitude, torture, starvation, and often poison. Gerard felt hewas in the hands of an enemy. 

"Oh, the look that man gave me on the road to Rotterdam. There is morehere than my father's wrath. I doubt I shall see no more the light ofday. " And he kneeled down and commended his soul to God. 

Presently he rose and sprang at the iron bar of the window, and clutchedit. This enabled him to look out by pressing his knees against the wall. It was but for a minute; but in that minute he saw a sight such as nonebut a captive can appreciate. 

Martin Wittenhaagen's back. 

Martin was sitting, quietly fishing in the brook near the Stadthouse. 

Gerard sprang again at the window, and whistled. Martin instantly showedthat he was watching much harder than fishing. He turned hastily roundand saw Gerard--made him a signal, and taking up his line and bow, wentquickly off. 

Gerard saw by this that his friends were not idle: yet had rather Martinhad stayed. The very sight of him was a comfort. He held on, lookingat the soldier's retiring form as long as he could, then falling backsomewhat heavily wrenched the rusty iron bar, held only by rusty nails, away from the stone-work just as Ghysbrecht Van Swieten opened the doorstealthily behind him. The burgomaster's eye fell instantly on the iron, and then glanced at the window; but he said nothing. The window was ahundred feet from the ground; and if Gerard had a fancy for jumping out, why should he balk it? He brought a brown loaf and a pitcher of water, and set them on the chest in solemn silence. Gerard's first impulsewas to brain him with the iron bar and fly down the stairs; but theburgomaster seeing something wicked in his eye, gave a little cough, andthree stout fellows, armed, showed themselves directly at the door. 

"My orders are to keep you thus until you shall bind yourself by an oathto leave Margaret Brandt, and return to the Church, to which you havebelonged from your cradle. "

"Death sooner. "

"With all my heart. " And the burgomaster retired. 

Martin went with all speed to Sevenbergen; there he found Margaret paleand agitated, but full of resolution and energy. She was just finishinga letter to the Countess Charolois, appealing to her against theviolence and treachery of Ghysbrecht. 

"Courage!" cried Martin on entering. "I have found him. He is in thehaunted tower, right at the top of it. Ay, I know the place: many a poorfellow has gone up there straight, and come down feet foremost. "

He then told them how he had looked up and seen Gerard's face at awindow that was like a slit in the wall. 

"Oh, Martin! how did he look?"

"What mean you? He looked like Gerard Eliassoen. "

"But was he pale?"

"A little. "

"Looked he anxious? Looked he like one doomed?"

"Nay, nay; as bright as a pewter pot. "

"You mock me. Stay! then that must have been at sight of you. He countson us. Oh, what shall we do? Martin, good friend, take this at once toRotterdam. "

Martin held out his hand for the letter. 

Peter had sat silent all this time, but pondering, and yet, contrary tocustom, keenly attentive to what was going on around him. 

"Put not your trust in princes, " said he. 

"Alas! what else have we to trust in?"

"Knowledge. "

"Well-a-day, father! your learning will not serve us here. "

"How know you that? Wit has been too strong for iron bars ere to-day. 

"Ay, father; but nature is stronger than wit, and she is against us. Think of the height! No ladder in Holland might reach him. "

"I need no ladder; what I need is a gold crown. "

"Nay, I have money, for that matter. I have nine angels. Gerard gavethem me to keep; but what do they avail? The burgomaster will not bebribed to let Gerard free. "

"What do they avail? Give me but one crown, and the young man shall supwith us this night. "

Peter spoke so eagerly and confidently, that for a moment Margaretfelt hopeful; but she caught Martin's eye dwelling upon him with anexpression of benevolent contempt. 

"It passes the powers of man's invention, " said she, with a deep sigh. 

"Invention!" cried the old man. "A fig for invention. What need weinvention at this time of day? Everything has been said that is to besaid, and done that ever will be done. I shall tell you how a Florentineknight was shut up in a tower higher than Gerard's; yet did his faithfulsquire stand at the tower foot and get him out, with no other enginethan that in your hand, Martin, and certain kickshaws I shall buy for acrown. "

Martin looked at his bow, and turned it round in his hand, and seemed tointerrogate it. But the examination left him as incredulous as before. 

Then Peter told them his story, how the faithful squire got the knightout of a high tower at Brescia. The manoeuvre, like most things thatare really scientific, was so simple, that now their wonder was they hadtaken for impossible what was not even difficult. 

The letter never went to Rotterdam. They trusted to Peter's learning andtheir own dexterity. 

It was nine o'clock on a clear moonlight night; Gerard, senior, wasstill away; the rest of his little family had been some time abed. 

A figure stood by the dwarf's bed. It was white, and the moonlight shoneon it. 

With an unearthly noise, between a yell and a snarl, the gymnast rolledoff his bed and under it by a single unbroken movement. A soft voicefollowed him in his retreat. 

"Why, Giles, are you afeard of me?"

At this, Giles's head peeped cautiously up, and he saw it was only hissister Kate. 

She put her finger to her lips. "Hush! lest the wicked Cornelis or thewicked Sybrandt hear us. " Giles's claws seized the side of the bed, andhe returned to his place by one undivided gymnastic. 

Kate then revealed to Giles that she had heard Cornelis and Sybrandtmention Gerard's name; and being herself in great anxiety at his notcoming home all day, had listened at their door, and had made a fearfuldiscovery. Gerard was in prison, in the haunted tower of the Stadthouse. He was there, it seemed, by their father's authority. But here must besome treachery; for how could their father have ordered this cruel act?He was at Rotterdam. She ended by entreating Giles to bear her companyto the foot of the haunted tower, to say a word of comfort to poorGerard, and let him know their father was absent, and would be sure torelease him on his return. 

"Dear Giles, I would go alone, but I am afeard of the spirits that mensay do haunt the tower; but with you I shall not be afeard. "

"Nor I with you, " said Giles. "I don't believe there are any spirits inTergou. I never saw one. This last was the likest one ever I saw; and itwas but you, Kate, after all. "

In less than half an hour Giles and Kate opened the housedoor cautiouslyand issued forth. She made him carry a lantern, though the night wasbright. "The lantern gives me more courage against the evil spirits, "said she. 

The first day of imprisonment is very trying, especially if to thehorror of captivity is added the horror of utter solitude. I observethat in our own day a great many persons commit suicide during the firsttwenty-four hours of the solitary cell. This is doubtless why our Jairiabstain so carefully from the impertinence of watching their littleexperiment upon the human soul at that particular stage of it. 

As the sun declined, Gerard's heart too sank and sank; with the waninglight even the embers of hope went out. He was faint, too, with hunger;for he was afraid to eat the food Ghysbrecht had brought him; and hungeralone cows men. He sat upon the chest, his arms and his head droopingbefore him, a picture of despondency. Suddenly something struck the wallbeyond him very sharply, and then rattled on the floor at his feet. Itwas an arrow; he saw the white feather. A chill ran through him--theymeant then to assassinate him from the outside. He crouched. No moremissiles came. He crawled on all fours, and took up the arrow; there wasno head to it. He uttered a cry of hope: had a friendly hand shot it? Hetook it up, and felt it all over: he found a soft substance attachedto it. Then one of his eccentricities was of grand use to him. Histinder-box enabled him to strike a light: it showed him two things thatmade his heart bound with delight, none the less thrilling for beingsomewhat vague. Attached to the arrow was a skein of silk, and on thearrow itself were words written. 

How his eyes devoured them, his heart panting the while!

Well beloved, make fast the silk to thy knife and lower to us: but holdthine end fast: then count an hundred and draw up. 

Gerard seized the oak chest, and with almost superhuman energy draggedit to the window: a moment ago he could not have moved it. Standing onthe chest and looking down, he saw figures at the tower foot. They wereso indistinct, they looked like one huge form. He waved his bonnet tothem with trembling hand: then he undid the silk rapidly but carefully, and made one end fast to his knife and lowered it till it ceased todraw. Then he counted a hundred. Then pulled the silk carefully up: itcame up a little heavier. At last he came to a large knot, and by thatknot a stout whipcord was attached to the silk. What could this mean?While he was puzzling himself Margaret's voice came up to him, low butclear. "Draw up, Gerard, till you see liberty. " At the word Gerard drewthe whipcord line up, and drew and drew till he came to another knot, and found a cord of some thickness take the place of the whipcord. Hehad no sooner begun to draw this up, than he found that he had now aheavy weight to deal with. Then the truth suddenly flashed on him, andhe went to work and pulled and pulled till the perspiration rolled downhim: the weight got heavier and heavier, and at last he was well-nighexhausted: looking down, he saw in the moonlight a sight that revivedhim: it was as it were a great snake coming up to him out of the deepshadow cast by the tower. He gave a shout of joy, and a score more wildpulls, and lo! a stout new rope touched his hand: he hauled and hauled, and dragged the end into his prison, and instantly passed it throughboth handles of the chest in succession, and knotted it firmly; then satfor a moment to recover his breath and collect his courage. Thefirst thing was to make sure that the chest was sound, and capable ofresisting his weight poised in mid-air. He jumped with all his forceupon it. At the third jump the whole side burst open, and out scuttledthe contents, a host of parchments. 

After the first start and misgiving this gave him, Gerard comprehendedthat the chest had not burst, but opened: he had doubtless jumped uponsome secret spring. Still it shook in some degree his confidence in thechest's powers of resistance; so he gave it an ally: he took the ironbar and fastened it with the small rope across the large rope, andacross the window. He now mounted the chest, and from the chest put hisfoot through the window, and sat half in and half out, with one hand onthat part of the rope which was inside. In the silent night he heard hisown heart beat. 

The free air breathed on his face, and gave him the courage to risk whatwe must all lose one day--for liberty. Many dangers awaited him, but thegreatest was the first getting on to the rope outside. Gerard reflected. Finally, he put himself in the attitude of a swimmer, his body to thewaist being in the prison, his legs outside. Then holding the insiderope with both hands, he felt anxiously with his feet for the outsiderope, and when he had got it, he worked it in between the palms of hisfeet, and kept it there tight: then he uttered a short prayer, and, allthe calmer for it, put his left hand on the sill and gradually wriggledout. Then he seized the iron bar, and for one fearful moment hungoutside from it by his right hand, while his left hand felt for the ropedown at his knees; it was too tight against the wall for his fingers toget round it higher up. The moment he had fairly grasped it, he left thebar, and swiftly seized the rope with the right hand too; but in thismanoeuvre his body necessarily fell about a yard. A stifled cry came upfrom below. Gerard hung in mid-air. He clenched his teeth, and nippedthe rope tight with his feet and gripped it with his hands, and wentdown slowly hand below hand. He passed by one huge rough stone afteranother. He saw there was green moss on one. He looked up and he lookeddown. The moon shone into his prison window: it seemed very near. Thefluttering figures below seemed an awful distance. It made him dizzy tolook down: so he fixed his eyes steadily on the wall close to him, andwent slowly down, down, down. 

He passed a rusty, slimy streak on the wall: it was some ten feet long. The rope made his hands very hot. He stole another look up. 

The prison window was a good way off now. 

Down--down--down--down. 

The rope made his hands sore. 

He looked up. The window was so distant, he ventured now to turn hiseyes downward again; and there, not more than thirty feet below him, were Margaret and Martin, their faithful hands upstretched to catch himshould he fall. He could see their eyes and their teeth shine in themoonlight. For their mouths were open, and they were breathing hard. 

"Take care, Gerard oh, take care! Look not down. "

"Fear me not, " cried Gerard joyfully, and eyed the wall, but came downfaster. 

In another minute his feet were at their hands. They seized him ere hetouched the ground, and all three clung together in one embrace. 

"Hush! away in silence, dear one. "

They stole along the shadow of the wall. 

Now, ere they had gone many yards, suddenly a stream of light shot froman angle of the building, and lay across their path like a barrier offire, and they heard whispers and footsteps close at hand. 

"Back!" hissed Martin. "Keep in the shade. "

They hurried back, passed the dangling rope, and made for a littlesquare projecting tower. They had barely rounded it when the light shottrembling past them, and flickered uncertainly into the distance. 

"A lantern!" groaned Martin in a whisper. "They are after us. "

"Give me my knife, " whispered Gerard. "I'll never be taken alive. "

"No, no!" murmured Margaret; "is there no way out where we are?"

"None! none! But I carry six lives at my shoulder;" and with the word, Martin strung his bow, and fitted an arrow to the string: "in war neverwait to be struck: I will kill one or two ere they shall know wheretheir death comes from:" then, motioning his companions to be quiet hebegan to draw his bow, and, ere the arrow was quite drawn to the head, he glided round the corner ready to loose the string the moment theenemy should offer a mark. 

Gerard and Margaret held their breath in horrible expectation: they hadnever seen a human being killed. 

And now a wild hope, but half repressed, thrilled through Gerard, thatthis watchful enemy might be the burgomaster in person. The soldier, heknew, would send an arrow through a burgher or burgomaster, as he wouldthrough a boar in a wood. 

But who may foretell the future, however near? The bow, instead ofremaining firm, and loosing the deadly shaft, was seen to waver first, then shake violently, and the stout soldier staggered back to them, hisknees knocking and his cheeks blanched with fear. He let his arrow fall, and clutched Gerard's shoulder. 

"Let me feel flesh and blood, " he gasped. "The haunted tower! thehaunted tower!"

His terror communicated itself to Margaret and Gerard. They gaspedrather than uttered an inquiry. 

"Hush!" he cried, "it will hear you up the wall! it is going up thewall! Its head is on fire. Up the wall, as mortal creatures walk upongreen sward. If you know a prayer, say it, for hell is loose to-night. "

"I have power to exorcise spirits, " said Gerard, trembling. "I willventure forth. "

"Go alone then, " said Martin; "I have looked on't once, and live. "

CHAPTER XI

The strange glance of hatred the burgomaster had cast on Gerard, coupledwith his imprisonment, had filled the young man with a persuasion thatGhysbrecht was his enemy to the death, and he glided round the angle ofthe tower, fully expecting to see no supernatural appearance, but somecruel and treacherous contrivance of a bad man to do him a mischief inthat prison, his escape from which could hardly be known. 

As he stole forth, a soft but brave hand crept into his; and Margaretwas by his side, to share this new peril. 

No sooner was the haunted tower visible, than a sight struck their eyesthat benumbed them as they stood. More than halfway up the tower, acreature with a fiery head, like an enormous glowworm, was steadilymounting the wall: the body was dark, but its outline visible throughthe glare from the head, and the whole creature not much less than fourfeet long. 

At the foot of the tower stood a thing in white, that looked exactlylike the figure of a female. Gerard and Margaret palpitated with awe. 

"The rope! the rope! It is going up the rope, " gasped Gerard. 

As they gazed, the glowworm disappeared in Gerard's late prison, butits light illuminated the cell inside and reddened the window. The whitefigure stood motionless below. 

Such as can retain their senses after the first prostrating effect ofthe supernatural are apt to experience terror in one of its strangestforms, a wild desire to fling themselves upon the terrible object. Itfascinates them as the snake the bird. The great tragedian Macreadyused to render this finely in Macbeth, at Banquo's second appearance. He flung himself with averted head at the horrible shadow. This strangeimpulse now seized Margaret. She put down Gerard's hand quietly, andstood bewildered; then, all in a moment, with a wild cry, darted towardsthe spectre. Gerard, not aware of the natural impulse I have spoken of, never doubted the evil one was drawing her to her perdition. He fell onhis knees. 

"Exorcizo vos. In nomine beatae Mariae, exorcizo vos. "

While the exorcist was shrieking his incantations in extremity ofterror, to his infinite relief he heard the spectre utter a feeblecry of fear. To find that hell had also its little weaknesses wasencouraging. He redoubled his exorcisms, and presently he saw theghastly shape kneeling at Margaret's knees, and heard it prayingpiteously for mercy. 

Kate and Giles soon reached the haunted tower. Judge their surprise whenthey found a new rope dangling from the prisoner's window to the ground. 

"I see how it is, " said the inferior intelligence, taking facts as theycame. "Our Gerard has come down this rope. He has got clear. Up I go, and see. "

"No, Giles, no!" said the superior intelligence, blinded by prejudice. "See you not this is glamour? This rope is a line the evil one casts outto wile thee to destruction. He knows the weaknesses of all our hearts;he has seen how fond you are of going up things. Where should our Gerardprocure a rope? how fasten it in the sky like this? It is not in nature. Holy saints protect us this night, for hell is abroad. "

"Stuff!" said the dwarf; "the way to hell is down, and this rope leadsup. I never had the luck to go up such a long rope. It may be years ereI fall in with such a long rope all ready for me. As well be knocked onthe head at once as never know happiness. "

And he sprung on to the rope with a cry of delight, as a cat jumps witha mew on to a table where fish is. All the gymnast was on fire; and theonly concession Kate could gain from him was permission to fasten thelantern on his neck first. 

"A light scares the ill spirits, " said she. 

And so, with his huge arms, and his legs like feathers, Giles went upthe rope faster than his brother came down it. The light at the nape ofhis neck made a glowworm of him. His sister watched his progress, withtrembling anxiety. Suddenly a female figure started out of the solidmasonry, and came flying at her with more than mortal velocity. 

Kate uttered a feeble cry. It was all she could, for her tongue clove toher palate with terror. Then she dropped her crutches, and sank upon herknees, hiding her face and moaning:

"Take my body, but spare my soul!"

Margaret (panting). "Why, it is a woman!"

Kate (quivering). "Why, it is a woman!"

Margaret. "How you scared me!"

Kate. "I am scared enough myself. Oh! oh! oh!"

"This is strange! But the fiery-headed thing? Yet it was with you, andyou are harmless! But why are you here at this time of night?"

"Nay, why are YOU?"

"Perhaps we are on the same errand? Ah! you are his good sister, Kate!"

"And you are Margaret Brandt. "

"Yes. 

"All the better. You love him; you are here. Then Giles was right. Hehas won free. "

Gerard came forward, and put the question at rest. But all furtherexplanation was cut short by a horrible unearthly noise, like asepulchre ventriloquizing:

"PARCHMENT!--PARCHMENT!--PARCHMENT!"

At each repetition, it rose in intensity. They looked up, and there wasthe dwarf, with his hands full of parchments, and his face lighted withfiendish joy and lurid with diabolical fire. The light being at hisneck, a more infernal "transparency" never startled mortal eye. With theword, the awful imp hurled parchment at the astonished heads below. Down came records, like wounded wild-ducks; some collapsed, othersfluttering, and others spread out and wheeling slowly down in airycircles. They had hardly settled, when again the sepulchral roar washeard--"Parchment--parchment!" and down pattered and sailed anotherflock of documents: another followed: they whitened the grass. Finally, the fire-headed imp, with his light body and horny hands, slid down therope like a falling star, and (business before sentiment) proposed tohis rescued brother an immediate settlement for the merchandise he hadjust delivered. 

"Hush!" said Gerard; "you speak too loud. Gather them up, and follow usto a safer place than this. "

"Will you come home with me, Gerard?" said little Kate. 

"I have no home. "

"You shall not say so. Who is more welcome than you will be, after thiscruel wrong, to your father's house?

"Father! I have no father, " said Gerard sternly. "He that was my fatheris turned my gaoler. I have escaped from his hands; I will never comewithin their reach again. "

"An enemy did this, and not our father. "

And she told him what she had overheard Cornelis and Sybrandt say. Butthe injury was too recent to be soothed. Gerard showed a bitterness ofindignation he had hitherto seemed incapable of. 

"Cornelis and Sybrandt are two ill curs that have shown me their teethand their heart a long while; but they could do no more. My father it isthat gave the burgomaster authority, or he durst not have laid a fingeron me, that am a free burgher of this town. So be it, then. I was hisson. I am his prisoner. He has played his part. I shall play mine. Farewell the burgh where I was born, and lived honestly and was put inprison. While there is another town left in creation, I'll never troubleyou again, Tergou. "

"Oh! Gerard! Gerard!"

Margaret whispered her: "Do not gainsay him now. Give his choler time tocool!"

Kate turned quickly towards her. "Let me look at your face?" Theinspection was favourable, it seemed, for she whispered: "It is a comelyface, and no mischief-maker's. "

"Fear me not, " said Margaret, in the same tone. "I could not be happywithout your love, as well as Gerard's. "

"These are comfortable words, " sobbed Kate. Then, looking up, she said, "I little thought to like you so well. My heart is willing, but myinfirmity will not let me embrace you. "

At this hint, Margaret wound gently round Gerard's sister, and kissedher lovingly. 

"Often he has spoken of you to me, Kate; and often I longed for this. "

"You, too, Gerard, " said Kate; "kiss me ere you go; for my heart liesheavy at parting with you this night. "

Gerard kissed her, and she went on her crutches home. The last thingthey heard of her was a little patient sigh. Then the tears came andstood thick in Margaret's eyes. But Gerard was a man, and noticed nothis sister's sigh. 

As they turned to go to Sevenbergen, the dwarf nudged Gerard with hisbundle of parchments and held out a concave claw. 

Margaret dissuaded Gerard. "Why take what is not ours?"

"Oh, spoil an enemy how you can. "

"But may they not make this a handle for fresh violence?"

"How can they? Think you I shall stay in Tergou after this? Theburgomaster robbed me of my liberty; I doubt I should take his life forit, if I could. "

"Oh, fie! Gerard. "

"What! Is life worth more than liberty? Well, I can't take his life, soI take the first thing that comes to hand. "

He gave Giles a few small coins, with which the urchin was gladdened, and shuffled after his sister. Margaret and Gerard were speedily joinedby Martin, and away to Sevenbergen. 

CHAPTER XII

Ghysbrecht Van Swieten kept the key of Gerard's prison in his pouch. Hewaited till ten of the clock ere he visited for he said to himself, "Alittle hunger sometimes does well it breaks 'em. " At ten he crept upthe stairs with a loaf and pitcher, followed by his trusty servant wellarmed. Ghysbrecht listened at the door. There was no sound inside. A grim smile stole over his features. "By this time he will be asdown-hearted as Albert Koestein was, " thought he. He opened the door. 

No Gerard. 

Ghysbrecht stood stupefied. 

Although his face was not visible, his body seemed to lose all motionin so peculiar a way, and then after a little he fell trembling so, thatthe servant behind him saw there was something amiss, and crept closeto him and peeped over his shoulder. At sight of the empty cell, andthe rope, and iron bar, he uttered a loud exclamation of wonder; but hissurprise doubled when his master, disregarding all else, suddenly flunghimself on his knees before the empty chest, and felt wildly all over itwith quivering hands, as if unwilling to trust his eyes in a matter soimportant. 

The servant gazed at him in utter bewilderment. 

"Why, master, what is the matter?"

Ghysbrecht's pale lips worked as if he was going to answer; but theyuttered no sound: his hands fell by his side, and he stared into thechest. 

"Why, master, what avails glaring into that empty box? The lad is notthere. See here! note the cunning of the young rogue; he hath taken outthe bar, and--"

"GONE! GONE! GONE!"

"Gone! What is gone, Holy saints! he is planet-struck!"

"STOP THIEF!" shrieked Ghysbrecht, and suddenly turned, on his servantand collared him, and shook him with rage. "D'ye stand there, knave, andsee your master robbed? Run! fly! A hundred crowns to him that findsit me again. No, no! 'tis in vain. Oh, fool! fool! to leave that in thesame room with him. But none ever found the secret spring before. Noneever would but he. It was to be. It is to be. Lost! lost!" and his yearsand infirmity now gained the better of his short-lived frenzy, and hesank on the chest muttering "Lost! lost!"

"What is lost, master?" asked the servant kindly. 

"House and lands and good name, " groaned Ghysbrecht, and wrung his handsfeebly. 

"WHAT?" cried the servant. 

This emphatic word, and the tone of eager curiosity, struck onGhysbrecht's ear and revived his natural cunning. 

"I have lost the town records, " stammered he, and he looked askant atthe man like a fox caught near a hen-roost. 

"Oh, is that all?"

"Is't not enough? What will the burghers say to me? What will the burghsdo?" Then he suddenly burst out again, "A hundred crowns to him whoshall recover them; all, mind, all that were in this box. If one bemissing, I give nothing. "

"'Tis a bargain, master: the hundred crowns are in my pouch. See you notthat where Gerard Eliassoen is, there are the pieces of sheepskin yourate so high?"

"That is true; that is true, good Dierich: good faithful Dierich. All, mind, all that were in the chest. "

"Master, I will take the constables to Gerard's house, and seize him forthe theft. "

"The theft? ay! good; very good. It is theft. I forgot that. So, as heis a thief now, we will put him in the dungeons below, where the toadsare and the rats. Dierich, that man must never see daylight again. 'Tishis own fault; he must be prying. Quick, quick! ere he has time to talk, you know, time to talk. "

In less than half an hour Dierich Brower and four constables enteredthe hosier's house, and demanded young Gerard of the panic-strickenCatherine. 

"Alas! what has he done now?" cried she; "that boy will break my heart. "

"Nay, dame, but a trick of youth, " said Dierich. "He hath but madeoff with certain skins of parchment, in a frolic doubtless but theburgomaster is answerable to the burgh for their safe keeping, so he isin care about them; as for the youth, he will doubtless be quit for areprimand. "

This smooth speech completely imposed on Catherine; but her daughterwas more suspicious, and that suspicion was strengthened by thedisproportionate anger and disappointment Dierich showed the moment helearned Gerard was not at home, had not been at home that night. 

"Come away then, " said he roughly. "We are wasting time. " He addedvehemently, "I'll find him if he is above ground. "

Affection sharpens the wits, and often it has made an innocent personmore than a match for the wily. As Dierich was going out, Kate made hima signal she would speak with him privately. He bade his men go on, andwaited outside the door. She joined him. 

"Hush!" said she; "my mother knows not. Gerard has left Tergou. "

"How?"

"I saw him last night. "

"Ay! Where?" cried Dierich eagerly. 

"At the foot of the haunted tower. "

"How did he get the rope?"

"I know not; but this I know; my brother Gerard bade me there farewell, and he is many leagues from Tergou ere this. The town, you know, wasalways unworthy of him, and when it imprisoned him, he vowed neverto set foot in it again. Let the burgomaster be content, then. He hasimprisoned him, and he has driven him from his birthplace and from hisnative land. What need now to rob him and us of our good name?"

This might at another moment have struck Dierich as good sense; but hewas too mortified at this escape of Gerard and the loss of a hundredcrowns. 

"What need had he to steal?" retorted he bitterly. 

"Gerard stole not the trash; he but took it to spite the burgomaster, who stole his liberty; but he shall answer to the Duke for it, he shall. As for these skins of parchment you keep such a coil about, look in thenearest brook or stye, and 'tis odds but you find them. "

"Think ye so, mistress?--think ye so?" And Dierich's eyes flashed. "Mayhap you know 'tis so. "

"This I know, that Gerard is too good to steal, and too wise to loadhimself with rubbish, going a journey. "

"Give you good day, then, " said Dierich sharply. "The sheepskin youscorn, I value it more than the skin of any in Tergou. "

And he went off hastily on a false scent. 

Kate returned into the house and drew Giles aside. 

"Giles, my heart misgives me; breathe not to a soul what I say to you. Ihave told Dirk Brower that Gerard is out of Holland, but much I doubt heis not a league from Tergou. "

"Why, where is he, then?"

"Where should he be, but with her he loves? But if so, he must notloiter. These be deep and dark and wicked men that seek him. Giles, Isee that in Dirk Brower's eye makes me tremble. Oh, why cannot I fly toSevenbergen and bid him away? Why am I not lusty and active like othergirls? God forgive me for fretting at His will; but I never felt tillnow what it is to be lame and weak and useless. But you are strong, dearGiles, " added she coaxingly; "you are very strong. "

"Yes, I am strong, " thundered Perpusillus; then, catching sight of hermeaning, "but I hate to go on foot, " he added sulkily. 

"Alas! alas! who will help me if you will not? Dear Giles, do you notlove Gerard?"

"Yes, I like him best of the lot. I'll go to Sevenbergen on PeterBuyskens his mule. Ask you him, for he won't lend her me. "

Kate remonstrated. The whole town would follow him. It would be knownwhither he was gone, and Gerard be in worse danger than before. 

Giles parried this by promising to ride out of the town the oppositeway, and not turn the mule's head towards Sevenbergen till he had gotrid of the curious. 

Kate then assented and borrowed the mule. She charged Giles with a shortbut meaning message, and made him repeat it after her over and over, till he could say it word for word. 

Giles started on the mule, and little Kate retired, and did the lastthing now in her power for her beloved brother--prayed on her knees longand earnestly for his safety. 

CHAPTER XIII

Gerard and Margaret went gaily to Sevenbergen in the first flush ofrecovered liberty and successful adventure. But these soon yieldedto sadder thoughts. Gerard was an escaped prisoner, and liable to beretaken and perhaps punished; and therefore he and Margaret would haveto part for a time. Moreover, he had conceived a hatred to his nativeplace. Margaret wished him to leave the country for a while, but atthe thought of his going to Italy her heart fainted. Gerard, on thecontrary, was reconciled to leaving Margaret only by his desire to visitItaly, and his strong conviction that there he should earn money andreputation, and remove every obstacle to their marriage. He had alreadytold her all that the demoiselle Van Eyck had said to him. He repeatedit, and reminded Margaret that the gold pieces were only given him to goto Italy with. The journey was clearly for Gerard's interest. He was acraftsman and an artist, lost in this boorish place. In Italy they wouldknow how to value him. On this ground above all the unselfish girl gaveher consent; but many tender tears came with it, and at that Gerard, young and loving as herself, cried bitterly with her, and often theyasked one another what they had done, that so many different personsshould be their enemies, and combine, as it seemed, to part them. 

They sat hand in hand till midnight, now deploring their hard fate, nowdrawing bright and hopeful pictures of the future, in the midst of whichMargaret's tears would suddenly flow, and then poor Gerard's eloquencewould die away in a sigh. 

The morning found them resigned to part, but neither had the courage tosay when; and much I doubt whether the hour of parting ever would havestruck. 

But about three in the afternoon, Giles, who had made a circuit of manymiles to avoid suspicion, rode up to the door. They both ran out to him, eager with curiosity. 

"Brother Gerard, " cried he, in his tremendous tones, "Kate bids you runfor your life. They charge you with theft; you have given them a handle. Think not to explain. Hope not for justice in Tergou. The parchments youtook, they are but a blind. She hath seen your death in the men's eyes;a price is on your head. Fly! For Margaret's sake and all who love you, loiter not life away, but fly!"

It was a thunder-clap, and left two white faces looking at one another, and at the terrible messenger. 

Then Giles, who had hitherto but uttered by rote what Catherine badehim, put in a word of his own. 

"All the constables were at our house after you, and so was Dirk Brower. Kate is wise, Gerard. Best give ear to her rede, and fly!"

"Oh, yes, Gerard, " cried Margaret wildly. "Fly on the instant. Ah! thoseparchments; my mind misgave me: why did I let you take them?"

"Margaret, they are but a blind: Giles says so. No matter: the oldcaitiff shall never see them again; I will not go till I have hiddenhis treasure where he shall never find it. " Gerard then, after thankingGiles warmly, bade him farewell, and told him to go back and tell Katehe was gone. "For I shall be gone ere you reach home, " said he. He thenshouted for Martin; and told him what had happened, and begged him to goa little way towards Tergou, and watch the road. 

"Ay!" said Martin, "and if I see Dirk Brower or any of his men, I willshoot an arrow into the oak-tree that is in our garden; and on thatyou must run into the forest hard by, and meet me at the weird hunter'sspring. Then I will guide you through the wood. "

Surprise thus provided against, Gerard breathed again. He went withMargaret, and while she watched the oak-tree tremblingly, fearing everymoment to see an arrow strike among the branches, Gerard dug a deep holeto bury the parchments in. 

He threw them in, one by one. They were nearly all charters and recordsof the burgh; but one appeared to be a private deed between FlorisBrandt, father of Peter, and Ghysbrecht. 

"Why, this is as much yours as his, " said Gerard. "I will read this. "

"Oh, not now, Gerard, not now, " cried Margaret. "Every moment you losefills me with fear; and see, large drops of rain are beginning to fall, and the clouds lower. "

Gerard yielded to this remonstrance; but he put the deed into his bosom, and threw the earth in over the others, and stamped it down. While thusemployed there came a flash of lightning followed by a peal of distantthunder, and the rain came down heavily. Margaret and Gerard ran intothe house, whither they were speedily followed by Martin. 

"The road is clear, " said he, "and a heavy storm coming on. "

His words proved true. The thunder came nearer and nearer till itcrashed overhead: the flashes followed one another close, like thestrokes of a whip, and the rain fell in torrents. Margaret hid her facenot to see the lightning. On this, Gerard put up the rough shutter andlighted a candle. The lovers consulted together, and Gerard blessedthe storm that gave him a few hours more with Margaret. The sun setunperceived, and still the thunder pealed, and the lightning flashed, and the rain poured. Supper was set; but Gerard and Margaret could noteat: the thought that this was the last time they should sup togetherchoked them. The storm lulled a little. Peter retired to rest. ButGerard was to go at peep of day, and neither he nor Margaret couldafford to lose an hour in sleep. Martin sat a while, too; for he wasfitting a new string to his bow, a matter in which he was very nice. 

The lovers murmured their sorrows and their love beside him. 

Suddenly the old man held up his hand to them to be silent. 

They were quiet and listened, and heard nothing. But the next moment afootstep crackled faintly upon the autumn leaves that lay strewn in thegarden at the back door of the house. To those who had nothing to fearsuch a step would have said nothing; but to those who had enemies it wasterrible. For it was a foot trying to be noiseless. 

Martin fitted an arrow to his string and hastily blew out the candle. Atthis moment, to their horror, they heard more than one footstep approachthe other door of the cottage, not quite so noiselessly as the other, but very stealthily--and then a dead pause. 

Their blood froze in their veins. 

"Oh, Kate, oh, Kate! You said fly on the instant. " And Margaret moanedand wrung her hands in anguish and terror and wild remorse for havingkept Gerard. 

"Hush, girl!" said Martin, in a stern whisper. 

A heavy knock fell on the door. 

And on the hearts within. 

CHAPTER XIV

As if this had been a concerted signal, the back door was struck asrudely the next instant. They were hemmed in. But at these alarmingsounds Margaret seemed to recover some share of self-possession. Shewhispered, "Say he was here, but is gone. " And with this she seizedGerard and almost dragged him up the rude steps that led to her father'ssleeping-room. Her own lay next beyond it. 

The blows on the door were repeated. 

"Who knocks at this hour?"

"Open, and you will see!"

"I open not to thieves--honest men are all abed now. "

"Open to the law, Martin Wittenhaagen, or you shall rue it. "

"Why, that is Dirk Brower's voice, I trow. What make you so far fromTergou?"

"Open, and you will know. "

Martin drew the bolt very slowly, and in rushed Dierich and four more. They let in their companion who was at the back door. 

"Now, Martin, where is Gerard Eliassoen?"

"Gerard Eliassoen? Why, he was here but now!"

"Was here?" Dierich's countenance fell. "And where is he now?"

"They say he has gone to Italy. Why, what is to do?"

"No matter. When did he go? Tell me not that he went in such a storm asthis!"

"Here is a coil about Gerard Eliassoen, " said Martin contemptuously. Then he lighted the candle, and seating himself coolly by the fire, proceeded to whip some fine silk round his bow-string at the place wherethe nick of the arrow frets it. 

"I'll tell you, " said he carelessly. "Know you his brother Giles?--alittle misbegotten imp, all head and arms? Well, he came tearing overhere on a mule, and bawled out something, I was too far off to hear thecreature's words, but only its noise. Any way, he started Gerard. For assoon as he was gone, there was such crying and kissing, and then Gerardwent away. They do tell me he has gone to Italy--mayhap you know wherethat is, for I don't. "

Dierich's countenance fell lower and lower at this account. There wasno flaw in it, A cunninger man than Martin would perhaps have told alie too many and raised suspicion. But Martin did his task well. He onlytold the one falsehood he was bade to tell, and of his own head inventednothing. 

"Mates, " said Dierich, "I doubt he speaks sooth. I told the burgomasterhow 'twould be. He met the dwarf galloping Peter Buyskens's mule fromSevenbergen. 'They have sent that imp to Gerard, ' says he, 'so, then, Gerard is at Sevenbergen. ' 'Ah, master!' says I, ''tis too late now. Weshould have thought of Sevenbergen before, instead of wasting our timehunting all the odd corners of Tergou for those cursed parchments thatwe shall never find till we find the man that took 'em. If he was atSevenbergen, ' quoth I, 'and they sent the dwarf to him, it must havebeen to warn him we are after him. He is leagues away by now, ' quoth I. Confound that chalk-faced girl! she has outwitted us bearded men; andso I told the burgomaster, but he would not hear reason. A wet jerkinapiece, that is all we shall get, mates, by this job. "

Martin grinned coolly in Dierich's face. 

"However, " added the latter, "to content the burgomaster, we will searchthe house. "

Martin turned grave directly. 

This change of countenance did not escape Dierich. He reflected amoment. 

"Watch outside two of you, one on each side of the house, that no onejump from the upper windows. The rest come with me. "

And he took the candle and mounted the stairs, followed by three of hiscomrades. 

Martin was left alone. 

The stout soldier hung his head. All had gone so well at first; and nowthis fatal turn! Suddenly it occurred to him that all was not yet lost. Gerard must be either in Peter's room or Margaret's; they were not sovery high from the ground. Gerard would leap out. Dierich had left a manbelow; but what then? For half a minute Gerard and he would be two toone, and in that brief space, what might not be done?

Martin then held the back door ajar and watched. The light shone inPeter's room. "Curse the fool!" said he, "is he going to let them takehim like a girl?"

The light now passed into Margaret's bedroom. Still no window wasopened. Had Gerard intended to escape that way, he would not have waitedtill the men were in the room. Martin saw that at once, and left thedoor, and came to the foot-stair and listened. 

He began to think Gerard must have escaped by the window while all themen were in the house. The longer the silence continued, the strongergrew this conviction. But it was suddenly and rudely dissipated. 

Faint cries issued from the inner bedroom--Margaret's. 

"They have taken him, " groaned Martin; "they have got him. "

It now flashed across Martin's mind that if they took Gerard away, hislife was not worth a button; and that, if evil befell him, Margaret'sheart would break. He cast his eyes wildly round like some savage beastseeking an escape, and in a twinkling formed a resolution terriblycharacteristic of those iron times and of a soldier driven to bay. Hestepped to each door in turn, and imitating Dierich Brower's voice, said sharply, "Watch the window!" He then quietly closed and boltedboth doors. He then took up his bow and six arrows; one he fitted to hisstring, the others he put into his quiver. His knife he placed upon achair behind him, the hilt towards him; and there he waited at the footof the stair with the calm determination to slay those four men, or beslain by them. Two, he knew, he could dispose of by his arrows, erethey could get near him, and Gerard and he must take their chancehand-to-hand with the remaining pair. Besides, he had seen menpanic-stricken by a sudden attack of this sort. Should Brower and hismen hesitate but an instant before closing with him, he should shootthree instead of two, and then the odds would be on the right side. 

He had not long to wait. The heavy steps sounded in Margaret's room, andcame nearer and nearer. 

The light also approached, and voices. 

Martin's heart, stout as it was, beat hard, to hear men coming thus totheir death, and perhaps to his; more likely so than not: for four islong odds in a battlefield of ten feet square, and Gerard might be boundperhaps, and powerless to help. But this man, whom we have seen shake inhis shoes at a Giles-o'-lanthorn, never wavered in this awful moment ofreal danger, but stood there, his body all braced for combat, and hiseye glowing, equally ready to take life and lose it. Desperate game! towin which was exile instant and for life, and to lose it was to die thatmoment upon that floor he stood on. 

Dierich Brower and his men found Peter in his first sleep. They openedhis cupboards, they ran their knives into an alligator he had nailed tohis wall; they looked under his bed: it was a large room, and apparentlyfull of hiding-places, but they found no Gerard. 

Then they went on to Margaret's room, and the very sight of it wasdiscouraging--it was small and bare, and not a cupboard in it; therewas, however, a large fireplace and chimney. Dierich's eye fell on thesedirectly. Here they found the beauty of Sevenbergen sleeping on an oldchest not a foot high, and no attempt made to cover it; but the sheetswere snowy white, and so was Margaret's own linen. And there she lay, looking like a lily fallen into a rut. 

Presently she awoke, and sat up in the bed, like one amazed; then, seeing the men, began to scream faintly, and pray for mercy. 

She made Dierich Brower ashamed of his errand. 

"Here is a to-do, " said he, a little confused. "We are not going to hurtyou, my pretty maid. Lie you still, and shut your eyes, and think ofyour wedding-night, while I look up this chimney to see if Master Gerardis there. "

"Gerard! in my room?"

"Why not? They say that you and he--"

"Cruel! you know they have driven him away from me--driven him from hisnative place. This is a blind. You are thieves; you are wicked men; youare not men of Sevenbergen, or you would know Margaret Brandt betterthan to look for her lover in this room of all others in the world. Oh, brave! Four great hulking men to come, armed to the teeth, to insult onepoor honest girl! The women that live in your own houses must be naught, or you would respect them too much to insult a girl of good character. "

"There! come away, before we hear worse, " said Dierich hastily. "Heis not in the chimney. Plaster will mend what a cudgel breaks; but awoman's tongue is a double-edged dagger, and a girl is a woman with hermother's milk still in her. " And he beat a hasty retreat. "I told theburgomaster how 'twould be. "

CHAPTER XV

Where is the woman that cannot act a part? Where is she who will notdo it, and do it well, to save the man she loves? Nature on these greatoccasions comes to the aid of the simplest of the sex, and teaches herto throw dust in Solomon's eyes. The men had no sooner retired thanMargaret stepped out of bed, and opened the long chest on which she hadbeen lying down in her skirt and petticoat and stockings, and nightdressover all; and put the lid, bed-clothes and all, against the wall: thenglided to the door and listened. The footsteps died away through herfather's room and down the stairs. 

Now in that chest there was a peculiarity that it was almost impossiblefor a stranger to detect. A part of the boarding of the room had beenbroken, and Gerard being applied to to make it look neater, and beingshort of materials, had ingeniously sawed away a space sufficient justto admit Margaret's soi-disant bed, and with the materials thus acquiredhe had repaired the whole room. As for the bed or chest, it reallyrested on the rafters a foot below the boards. Consequently it was fulltwo feet deep, though it looked scarce one. 

All was quiet. Margaret kneeled and gave thanks to Heaven. Then sheglided from the door and leaned over the chest, and whispered tenderly, "Gerard!"

Gerard did not reply. 

She then whispered a little louder, "Gerard, all is safe, thank Heaven!You may rise; but oh! be cautious!"

Gerard made no reply. 

She laid her hand upon his shoulder--"Gerard!"

No reply. 

"Oh, what is this?" she cried, and her hands ran wildly over his faceand his bosom. She took him by the shoulders; she shook him; she liftedhim; but he escaped from her trembling hands, and fell back, not like aman, but like a body. A great dread fell on her. The lid had been down. She had lain upon it. The men had been some time in the room. With allthe strength of frenzy she tore him out of the chest. She bore him inher arms to the window. She dashed the window open. The sweet air camein. She laid him in it and in the moonlight. His face was the colour ofashes; his body was all limp and motionless. She felt his heart. Horror!it was as still as the rest! Horror of horrors! she had stifled him withher own body. 

The mind cannot all at once believe so great and sudden and strange acalamity. Gerard, who had got alive into that chest scarce five minutesago, how could he be dead?

She called him by all the endearing names that heart could think ortongue could frame. She kissed him and fondled him and coaxed him andimplored him to speak to her. 

No answer to words of love, such as she had never uttered to him before, nor thought she could utter. Then the poor creature, trembling all over, began to say over that ashy face little foolish things that were at onceterrible and pitiable. 

"Oh, Gerard! I am very sorry you are dead. I am very sorry I have killedyou. Forgive me for not letting the men take you; it would have beenbetter than this. Oh, Gerard! I am very, very sorry for what I havedone. " Then she began suddenly to rave. 

"No! no! such things can't be, or there is no God. It is monstrous. Howcan my Gerard be dead? How can I have killed my Gerard? I love him. Oh, God! you know how I love him. He does not. I never told him. If he knewmy heart, he would speak to me, he would not be so deaf to his poorMargaret. It is all a trick to make me cry out and betray him; but no!I love him too well for that. I'll choke first. " And she seized her ownthroat, to check her wild desire to scream in her terror and anguish. 

"If he would but say one word. Oh, Gerard! don't die without a word. Have mercy on me and scold me, but speak to me: if you are angry withme, scold me! curse me! I deserve it: the idiot that killed the man sheloved better than herself. Ah I am a murderess. The worst in all theworld. Help! help! I have murdered him. Ah! ah! ah! ah! ah!"

She tore her hair, and uttered shriek after shriek, so wild, sopiercing, they fell like a knell upon the ears of Dierich Brower and hismen. All started to their feet and looked at one another. 

CHAPTER XVI

Martin Wittenhaagen, standing at the foot of the stairs with his arrowdrawn nearly to the head and his knife behind him, was struck withamazement to see the men come back without Gerard: he lowered his bowand looked open-mouthed at them. They, for their part, were equallypuzzled at the attitude they had caught him in. 

"Why, mates, was the old fellow making ready to shoot at us?"

"Stuff!" said Martin, recovering his stolid composure; "I was but tryingmy new string. There! I'll unstring my bow, if you think that. "

"Humph!" said Dierich suspiciously, "there is something more in you thanI understand: put a log on, and let us dry our hides a bit ere we go. "

A blazing fire was soon made, and the men gathered round it, and theirclothes and long hair were soon smoking from the cheerful blaze. Then itwas that the shrieks were heard in Margaret's room. They all started up, and one of them seized the candle and ran up the steps that led to thebedrooms. 

Martin rose hastily too, and being confused by these sudden screams, andapprehending danger from the man's curiosity, tried to prevent him fromgoing there. 

At this Dierich threw his arms round him from behind, and called on theothers to keep him. The man that had the candle got clear away, and allthe rest fell upon Martin, and after a long and fierce struggle, in thecourse of which they were more than once all rolling on the floor, withMartin in the middle, they succeeded in mastering the old Samson, andbinding him hand and foot with a rope they had brought for Gerard. 

Martin groaned aloud. He saw the man had made his way to Margaret's roomduring the struggle, and here was he powerless. 

"Ay, grind your teeth, you old rogue, " said Dierich, panting with thestruggle. "You shan't use them. "

"It is my belief, mates, that our lives were scarce safe while this oldfellow's bones were free. "

"He makes me think this Gerard is not far off, " put in another. 

"No such luck, " replied Dierich. "Hallo, mates. Jorian Ketel is a longtime in that girl's bedroom. Best go and see after him, some of us. "

The rude laugh caused by this remark had hardly subsided, when hastyfootsteps were heard running along over head. 

"Oh, here he comes, at last. Well, Jorian, what is to do now up there?"

CHAPTER XVII

Jorian Ketel went straight to Margaret's room, and there, to hisinfinite surprise, he found the man he had been in search of, pale andmotionless, his head in Margaret's lap, and she kneeling over him, mutenow, and stricken to stone. Her eyes were dilated yet glazed, and sheneither saw the light nor heard the man, nor cared for anything onearth, but the white face in her lap. 

Jorian stood awe-struck, the candle shaking in his hand. 

"Why, where was he, then, all the time?"

Margaret heeded him not. Jorian went to the empty chest and inspectedit. He began to comprehend. The girl's dumb and frozen despair movedhim. 

"This is a sorry sight, " said he; "it is a black night's work: all fora few skins! Better have gone with us than so. She is past answering me, poor wench. Stop! let us try whether--"

He took down a little round mirror, no bigger than his hand, and put itto Gerard's mouth and nostrils, and held it there. When he withdrew it, it was dull. 

"THERE IS LIFE IN HIM!" said Jorian Ketel to himself. 

Margaret caught the words instantly, though only muttered, and it was ifa statue should start into life and passion. She rose and flung her armsround Jorian's neck. 

"Oh, bless the tongue that tells me so!" and she clasped the great roughfellow again and again, eagerly, almost fiercely. 

"There, there! let us lay him warm, said Jorian; and in a moment heraised Gerard and laid him on the bed-clothes. Then he took out a flaskhe carried, and filled his hand twice with Schiedamze, and flung itsharply each time in Gerard's face. The pungent liquor co-operated withhis recovery--he gave a faint sigh. Oh, never was sound so joyful tohuman ear! She flew towards him, but then stopped, quivering for fearshe should hurt him. She had lost all confidence in herself. 

"That is right--let him alone, " said Jorian; "don't go cuddling him asyou did me, or you'll drive his breath back again. Let him alone: he issure to come to. 'Tisn't like as if he was an old man. "

Gerard sighed deeply, and a faint streak of colour stole to his lips. Jorian made for the door. He had hardly reached it, when he found hislegs seized from behind. 

It was Margaret! She curled round his knees like a serpent, and kissedhis hand, and fawned on him. "You won't tell? You have saved his life;you have not the heart to thrust him back into his grave, to undo yourown good work?"

"No, no! It is not the first time I have done you two a good turn; 'twasI told you in the church whither we had to take him. Besides, what isDierich Brower to me? I'll see him hanged ere I'll tell him. But Iwish you'd tell me where the parchments are! There are a hundred crownsoffered for them. That would be a good windfall for my Joan and thechildren, you know. "

"Ah! they shall have those hundred crowns. 

"What! are the things in the house?" asked Jorian eagerly. 

"No; but I know where they are; and by God and St. Bavon I swear youshall have them to-morrow. Come to me for them when you will, but comealone. "

"I were made else. What! share the hundred crowns with Dirk Brower? Andnow may my bones rot in my skin if I let a soul know the poor boy ishere. "

He then ran off, lest by staying longer he should excite suspicion, and have them all after him. And Margaret knelt, quivering from head tofoot, and prayed beside Gerard and for Gerard. 

"What is to do?" replied Jorian to Dierich Brower's query; "why, we havescared the girl out of her wits. She was in a kind of fit. "

"We had better all go and doctor her, then. "

"Oh, yes! and frighten her into the churchyard. Her father is a doctor, and I have roused him, and set him to bring her round. Let us see thefire, will ye?"

His off-hand way disarmed all suspicion. And soon after the party agreedthat the kitchen of the "Three Kings" was much warmer than Peter'shouse, and they departed, having first untied Martin. 

"Take note, mate, that I was right, and the burgomaster wrong, " saidDierich Brower at the door; "I said we should be too late to catch him, and we were too late. "

Thus Gerard, in one terrible night, grazed the prison and the grave. 

And how did he get clear at last? Not by his cunningly contrivedhiding-place, nor by Margaret's ready wit; but by a good impulse inone of his captors, by the bit of humanity left in a somewhat recklessfellow's heart, aided by his desire of gain. So mixed and seeminglyincongruous are human motives, so shortsighted our shrewdest counsels. 

They whose moderate natures or gentle fates keep them, in life'spassage, from the fierce extremes of joy and anguish our nature iscapable of, are perhaps the best, and certainly the happiest ofmankind. But to such readers I should try in vain to convey what blissunspeakable settled now upon these persecuted lovers, Even to those whohave joyed greatly and greatly suffered, my feeble art can present but apale reflection of Margaret's and Gerard's ecstasy. 

To sit and see a beloved face come back from the grave to the world, tohealth and beauty, by swift gradations; to see the roses return to theloved cheek, love's glance to the loved eye, and his words to the lovedmouth--this was Margaret's--a joy to balance years of sorrow. Itwas Gerard's to awake from a trance, and find his head pillowed onMargaret's arm; to hear the woman he adored murmur new words of eloquentlove, and shower tears and tender kisses and caresses on him. He neverknew, till this sweet moment, how ardently, how tenderly, she lovedhim. He thanked his enemies. They wreathed their arms sweetly round eachother, and trouble and danger seemed a world, an age behind them. Theycalled each other husband and wife. Were they not solemnly betrothed?And had they not stood before the altar together? Was not the blessingof Holy Church upon their union?--her curse on all who would part them?

But as no woman's nerves can bear with impunity so terrible a strain. Presently Margaret turned faint, and sank on Gerard's shoulder, smilingfeebly, but quite, quite unstrung. Then Gerard was anxious, and wouldseek assistance. But she held him with a gentle grasp, and implored himnot to leave her for a moment. 

"While I can lay my hand on you, I feel you are safe, not else. FoolishGerard! nothing ails me. I am weak, dearest, but happy, oh! so happy!"

Then it was Gerard's turn to support that dear head, with its greatwaves of hair flowing loose over him, and nurse her, and soothe her, quivering on his bosom, with soft encouraging words and murmurs of love, and gentle caresses. Sweetest of all her charms is a woman's weakness toa manly heart. 

Poor things! they were happy. To-morrow they must part. But that wasnothing to them now. They had seen Death, and all other troubles seemedlight as air. While there is life there is hope; while there is hopethere is joy. Separation for a year or two, what was it to them, whowere so young, and had caught a glimpse of the grave? The future wasbright, the present was Heaven: so passed the blissful hours. 

Alas! their innocence ran other risks besides the prison and the grave. They were in most danger from their own hearts and their inexperience, now that visible danger there was none. 

CHAPTER XVIII

Ghysbrecht Van Swieten could not sleep all night for anxiety. He wasafraid of thunder and lightning, or he would have made one of the partythat searched Peter's house. As soon as the storm ceased altogether, he crept downstairs, saddled his mule, and rode to the "Three Kings" atSevenbergen. There he found his men sleeping, some on the chairs, someon the tables, some on the floor. He roused them furiously, and heardthe story of their unsuccessful search, interlarded with praises oftheir zeal. 

"Fool! to let you go without me, " cried the burgomaster. "My life on'the was there all the time. Looked ye under the girl's bed?"

"No; there was no room for a man there. "

"How know ye that, if ye looked not?" snarled Ghysbrecht. "Ye shouldhave looked under her bed, and in it too, and sounded all the panelswith your knives. Come, now, get up, and I shall show ye how to search. "

Dierich Brower got up and shook himself. "If you find him, call me ahorse and no man. "

In a few minutes Peter's house was again surrounded. 

The fiery old man left his mule in the hands of Jorian Ketel, and, withDierich Brower and the others, entered the house. 

The house was empty. 

Not a creature to be seen, not even Peter. They went upstairs, andthen suddenly one of the men gave a shout, and pointed through Peter'swindow, which was open. The others looked, and there, at some littledistance, walking quietly across the fields with Margaret and Martin, was the man they sought. Ghysbrecht, with an exulting yell, descendedthe stairs and flung himself on his mule; and he and his men set off inhot pursuit. 

CHAPTER XIX

Gerard warned by recent peril, rose before daybreak and waked Martin. The old soldier was astonished. He thought Gerard had escaped by thewindow last night. Being consulted as to the best way for him to leavethe country and elude pursuit, he said there was but one road safe. "Imust guide you through the great forest to a bridle-road I know of. Thiswill take you speedily to a hostelry, where they will lend you a swifthorse; and then a day's gallop will take you out of Holland. But let usstart ere the folk here quit their beds. "

Peter's house was but a furlong and a half from the forest. Theystarted, Martin with his bow and three arrows, for it was Thursday;Gerard with nothing but a stout oak staff Peter gave him for thejourney. 

Margaret pinned up her kirtle and farthingale, for the road was wet. Peter went as far as his garden hedge with them, and then with moreemotion than he often bestowed on passing events, gave the young man hisblessing. 

The sun was peeping above the horizon as they crossed the stony fieldand made for the wood. They had crossed about half, when Margaret, whokept nervously looking back every now and then, uttered a cry, and, following her instinct, began to run towards the wood, screaming withterror all the way. 

Ghysbrecht and his men were in hot pursuit. 

Resistance would have been madness. Martin and Gerard followedMargaret's example. The pursuers gained slightly on them; but Martinkept shouting, "Only win the wood! only win the wood!"

They had too good a start for the men on foot, and their hearts boundedwith hope at Martin's words, for the great trees seemed now to stretchtheir branches like friendly arms towards them, and their leaves like ascreen. 

But an unforeseen danger attacked them. The fiery old burgomaster flunghimself on his mule, and, spurring him to a gallop, he headed not hisown men only, but the fugitives. His object was to cut them off. Theold man came galloping in a semicircle, and got on the edge of the wood, right in front of Gerard; the others might escape for aught he cared. 

Margaret shrieked, and tried to protect Gerard by clasping him; but heshook her off without ceremony. 

Ghysbrecht in his ardour forgot that hunted animals turn on the hunter;and that two men can hate, and two can long to kill the thing they hate. 

Instead of attempting to dodge him, as the burgomaster made sure hewould, Gerard flew right at him, with a savage, exulting cry, and struckat him with all his heart, and soul and strength. The oak staff camedown on Ghysbrecht's face with a frightful crash, and laid him underhis mule's tail beating the devil's tattoo with his heels, his facestreaming, and his collar spattered with blood. 

The next moment the three were in the wood. The yell of dismay andvengeance that burst from Ghysbrecht's men at that terrible blow whichfelled their leader, told the fugitives that it was now a race for lifeor death. 

"Why run?" cried Gerard, panting. "You have your bow, and I have this, "and he shook his bloody staff. 

"Boy!" roared Martin; "the GALLOWS! Follow me, " and he fled into thewood. Soon they heard a cry like a pack of hounds opening on sight ofthe game. The men were in the wood, and saw them flitting amongst thetrees. Margaret moaned and panted as she ran; and Gerard clenched histeeth and grasped his staff. The next minute they came to a stiff hazelcoppice. Martin dashed into it, and shouldered the young wood aside asif it were standing corn. 

Ere they had gone fifty yards in it they came to four blind paths. 

Martin took one. "Bend low, " said he. And, half creeping, they glidedalong. Presently their path was again intersected with other littletortuous paths. They took one of them. It seemed to lead back; butit soon took a turn, and, after a while, brought them to a thick pinegrove, where the walking was good and hard. There were no paths here;and the young fir-trees were so thick, you could not see three yardsbefore your nose. 

When they had gone some way in this, Martin sat down; and, havinglearned in war to lose all impression of danger with the danger itself, took a piece of bread and a slice of ham out of his wallet, and beganquietly to eat his breakfast. 

The young ones looked at him with dismay. He replied to their looks. 

"All Sevenbergen could not find you now; you will lose your purse, Gerard, long before you get to Italy; is that the way to carry a purse?"

Gerard looked, and there was a large triangular purse, entangled by itschains to the buckle and strap of his wallet. 

"This is none of mine, " said he. "What is in it, I wonder?" and hetried to detach it; but in passing through the coppice it had becomeinextricably entangled in his strap and buckle. "It seems loath to leaveme, " said Gerard, and he had to cut it loose with his knife. The purse, on examination, proved to be well provided with silver coins of allsizes, but its bloated appearance was greatly owing to a number ofpieces of brown paper folded and doubled. A light burst on Gerard. "Why, it must be that old thief's; and see! stuffed with paper to deceive theworld!"

The wonder was how the burgomaster's purse came on Gerard. 

They hit at last upon the right solution. The purse must have beenat Ghysbrecht's saddle-bow, and Gerard rushing at his enemy, hadunconsciously torn it away, thus felling his enemy and robbing him, witha single gesture. 

Gerard was delighted at this feat, but Margaret was uneasy. 

"Throw it away, Gerard, or let Martin take it back. Already they callyou a thief. I cannot bear it. "

"Throw it away! give it him back? not a stiver! This is spoil lawfullywon in battle from an enemy. Is it not, Martin?"

"Why, of course. Send him back the brown paper, and you will; but thepurse or the coin--that were a sin. "

"Oh, Gerard!" said Margaret, "you are going to a distant land. We needthe goodwill of Heaven. How can we hope for that if we take what is notours?"

But Gerard saw it in a different light. 

"It is Heaven that gives it me by a miracle, and I shall cherish itaccordingly, " said this pious youth. "Thus the favoured people spoiledthe Egyptians, and were blessed. "

"Take your own way, " said Margaret humbly; "you are wiser than I am. Youare my husband, " added she, in a low murmuring voice; "is it for me togainsay you?"

These humble words from Margaret, who, till that day, had held thewhip-hand, rather surprised Martin for the moment. They recurred to himsome time afterwards, and then they surprised him less. 

Gerard kissed her tenderly in return for her wife-like docility, andthey pursued their journey hand in hand, Martin leading the way, into the depths of the huge forest. The farther they went, the moreabsolutely secure from pursuit they felt. Indeed, the townspeople neverventured so far as this into the trackless part of the forest. 

Impetuous natures repent quickly. Gerard was no sooner out of all dangerthan his conscience began to prick him. 

"Martin, would I had not struck quite so hard. "

"Whom? Oh! let that pass, he is cheap served. "

"Martin, I saw his grey hairs as my stick fell on him. I doubt they willnot from my sight this while. "

Martin grunted with contempt. "Who spares a badger for his grey hairs?The greyer your enemy is, the older; and the older the craftier and thecraftier the better for a little killing. "

"Killing? killing, Martin? Speak not of killing!" and Gerard shook allover. 

"I am much mistook if you have not, " said Martin cheerfully. 

"Now Heaven forbid!"

"The old vagabond's skull cracked like a walnut. Aha!"

"Heaven and the saints forbid it!"

"He rolled off his mule like a stone shot out of a cart. Said I tomyself, 'There is one wiped out, '" and the iron old soldier grinnedruthlessly. 

Gerard fell on his knees and began to pray for his enemy's life. 

At this Martin lost his patience. "Here's mummery. What! you that set upfor learning, know you not that a wise man never strikes his enemy butto kill him? And what is all this coil about killing of old men? If ithad been a young one, now, with the joys of life waiting for him, wine, women, and pillage! But an old fellow at the edge of the grave, why notshove him in? Go he must, to-day or to-morrow; and what better place forgreybeards? Now, if ever I should be so mischancy as to last so longas Ghysbrecht did, and have to go on a mule's legs instead of MartinWittenhaagen's, and a back like this (striking the wood of his bow), instead of this (striking the string), I'll thank and bless anyyoung fellow who will knock me on the head, as you have done that oldshopkeeper; malison on his memory. 

"Oh, culpa mea! culpa mea!" cried Gerard, and smote upon his breast. 

"Look there!" cried Martin to Margaret scornfully, "he is a priest atheart still--and when he is not in ire, St. Paul, what a milksop!"

"Tush, Martin!" cried Margaret reproachfully: then she wreathed her armsround Gerard, and comforted him with the double magic of a woman's senseand a woman's voice. 

"Sweetheart!" murmured she, "you forget: you went not a step out of theway to harm him, who hunted you to your death. You fled from him. He itwas who spurred on you. Then did you strike; but in self-defence anda single blow, and with that which was in your hand. Malice had drawnknife, or struck again and again. How often have men been smitten withstaves not one but many blows, yet no lives lost! If then your enemyhas fallen, it is through his own malice, not yours, and by the will ofGod. "

"Bless you, Margaret; bless you for thinking so!"

"Yes; but, beloved one, if you have had the misfortune to kill thatwicked man, the more need is there that you fly with haste from Holland. Oh, let us on. "

"Nay, Margaret, " said Gerard. "I fear not man's vengeance, thanks toMartin here and this thick wood: only Him I fear whose eye pierces theforest and reads the heart of man. If I but struck in self-defence, 'tis well; but if in hate, He may bid the avenger of blood follow me toItaly--to Italy? ay, to earth's remotest bounds. "

"Hush!" said Martin peevishly. "I can't hear for your chat. "

"What is it?"

"Do you hear nothing, Margaret; my ears are getting old. "

Margaret listened, and presently she heard a tuneful sound, like asingle stroke upon a deep ringing bell. She described it so to Martin. 

"Nay, I heard it, " said he. 

"And so did I, " said Gerard; "it was beautiful. Ah! there it is again. How sweetly it blends with the air. It is a long way off. It is beforeus, is it not?"

"No, no! the echoes of this wood confound the ear of a stranger. Itcomes from the pine grove. "

"What! the one we passed?"

"Why, Martin, is this anything? You look pale. "

"Wonderful!" said Martin, with a sickly sneer. "He asks me is itanything? Come, on, on! at any rate, let us reach a better place thanthis. "

"A better place--for what?"

"To stand at bay, Gerard, " said Martin gravely; "and die like soldiers, killing three for one. "

"What's that sound?"

"IT IS THE AVENGER OF BLOOD. "

"Oh, Martin, save him! Oh, Heaven be merciful What new mysterious perilis this?"

"GIRL, IT'S A BLOODHOUND. "

CHAPTER XX

The courage, like the talent, of common men, runs in a narrow groove. Take them but an inch out of that, and they are done. Martin's couragewas perfect as far as it went. He had met and baffled many dangers inthe course of his rude life, and these familiar dangers he could facewith Spartan fortitude, almost with indifference; but he had neverbeen hunted by a bloodhound, nor had he ever seen that brute's unerringinstinct baffled by human cunning. Here then a sense of the supernaturalcombined with novelty to ungenteel his heart. After going a few steps, he leaned on his bow, and energy and hope oozed out of him. Gerard, towhom the danger appeared slight in proportion as it was distant, urgedhim to flight. 

"What avails it?" said Martin sadly; "if we get clear of the wood weshall die cheap; here, hard by, I know a place where we may die dear. "

"Alas! good Martin, " cried Gerard, "despair not so quickly; there mustbe some way to escape. "

"Oh, Martin!" cried Margaret, "what if we were to part company? Gerard'slife alone is forfeit. Is there no way to draw the pursuit on us twainand let him go safe?"

"Girl, you know not the bloodhound's nature. He is not on this man'strack or that; he is on the track of blood. My life on't they have takenhim to where Ghysbrecht fell, and from the dead man's blood to the manthat shed it that cursed hound will lead them, though Gerard should runthrough an army or swim the Meuse. " And again he leaned upon his bow, and his head sank. 

The hound's mellow voice rang through the wood. 

 A cry more tunable Was never halloed to, nor cheered with horn, In Crete, in Sparta, or in Thessaly. 

Strange that things beautiful should be terrible and deadly' The eyeof the boa-constrictor, while fascinating its prey, is lovely. No royalcrown holds such a jewel; it is a ruby with the emerald's green lightplaying ever upon it. Yet the deer that sees it loses all power ofmotion, and trembles, and awaits his death and even so, to comparehearing with sight, this sweet and mellow sound seemed to fascinateMartin Wittenhaagen. He stood uncertain, bewildered, and unnerved. Gerard was little better now. Martin's last words had daunted him, Hehad struck an old man and shed his blood, and, by means of that veryblood, blood's four-footed avenger was on his track. Was not the fingerof Heaven in this?

Whilst the men were thus benumbed, the woman's brain was all activity. The man she loved was in danger. 

"Lend me your knife, " said she to Martin. He gave it her. 

"But 'twill be little use in your hands, " said he. 

Then Margaret did a sly thing. She stepped behind Gerard, and furtivelydrew the knife across her arm, and made it bleed freely; then stooping, smeared her hose and shoes; and still as the blood trickled she smearedthem; but so adroitly that neither Gerard nor Martin saw. Then sheseized the soldier's arm. 

"Come, be a man!" she said, "and let this end. Take us to some thickplace, where numbers will not avail our foes. "

"I am going, " said Martin sulkily. "Hurry avails not; we cannot shun thehound, and the place is hard by;" then turning to the left, he led theway, as men go to execution. 

He soon brought them to a thick hazel coppice, like the one that hadfavoured their escape in the morning. 

"There, " said he, "this is but a furlong broad, but it will serve ourturn. "

"What are we to do?"

"Get through this, and wait on the other side; then as they comestraggling through, shoot three, knock two on the head, and the restwill kill us. "

"Is that all you can think of?" said Gerard. 

"That is all. "

"Then, Martin Wittenhaagen, I take the lead, for you have lost yourhead. Come, can you obey so young a man as I am?"

"Oh, yes, Martin, " cried Margaret, "do not gainsay Gerard! He is wiserthan his years. "

Martin yielded a sullen assent. 

"Do then as you see me do, " said Gerard; and drawing his huge knife, hecut at every step a hazel shoot or two close by the ground, and turninground twisted them breast-high behind him among the standing shoots. Martin did the same, but with a dogged hopeless air. When they hadthus painfully travelled through the greater part of the coppice, thebloodhound's deep bay came nearer and nearer, less and less musical, louder and sterner. 

Margaret trembled. 

Martin went down on his stomach and listened. 

"I hear a horse's feet. "

"No, " said Gerard; "I doubt it is a mule's. That cursed Ghysbrecht isstill alive: none other would follow me up so bitterly. "

"Never strike your enemy but to slay him, " said Martin gloomily. 

"I'll hit harder this time, if Heaven gives me the chance, " said Gerard. 

At last they worked through the coppice, and there was an open wood. Thetrees were large, but far apart, and no escape possible that way. 

And now with the hound's bay mingled a score of voices hooping andhallooing. 

"The whole village is out after us, " said Martin. 

"I care not, " said Gerard. "Listen, Martin. I have made the track smoothto the dog, but rough to the men, that we may deal with them apart. Thus the hound will gain on the men, and as soon as he comes out of thecoppice we must kill him. "

"The hound? There are more than one. "

"I hear but one. "

"Ay! but one speaks, the others run mute; but let the leading hound losethe scent, then another shall give tongue. There will be two dogs, atleast, or devils in dog's hides. "

"Then we must kill two instead of one. The moment they are dead, intothe coppice again, and go right back. "

"That is a good thought, Gerard, " said Martin, plucking up heart. 

"Hush! the men are in the wood. "

Gerard now gave his orders in a whisper. 

"Stand you with your bow by the side of the coppice--there, in theditch. I will go but a few yards to yon oak-tree, and hide behind it;the dogs will follow me, and, as they come out, shoot as many as youcan, the rest will I brain as they come round the tree. "

Martin's eye flashed. They took up their places. 

The hooping and hallooing came closer and closer, and soon even therustling of the young wood was heard, and every now and then theunerring bloodhound gave a single bay. 

It was terrible! the branches rustling nearer and nearer, and theinevitable struggle for life and death coming on minute by minute, and that death-knell leading it. A trembling hand was laid on Gerard'sshoulder. It made him start violently, strung up as he was. 

"Martin says if we are forced to part company, make for that highash-tree we came in by. "

"Yes! yes! yes! but go back for Heaven's sake! don't come here, all outin the open!"

She ran back towards Martin; but, ere she could get to him, suddenly ahuge dog burst out of the coppice, and stood erect a moment. Margaretcowered with fear, but he never noticed her. Scent was to him what sightis to us. He lowered his nose an instant, and the next moment, with anawful yell, sprang straight at Gerard's tree and rolled head-over-heelsdead as a stone, literally spitted with an arrow from the bow thattwanged beside the coppice in Martin's hand. That same moment out cameanother hound and smelt his dead comrade. Gerald rushed out at him;but ere he could use his cudgel, a streak of white lightning seemed tostrike the hound, and he grovelled in the dust, wounded desperately, butnot killed, and howling piteously. 

Gerard had not time to despatch him: the coppice rustled too near: itseemed alive. Pointing wildly to Martin to go back, Gerard ran a fewyards to the right, then crept cautiously into the thick coppice just asthree men burst out. These had headed their comrades considerably: therest were following at various distances. Gerard crawled back almost onall-fours. Instinct taught Martin and Margaret to do the same upon theirline of retreat. Thus, within the distance of a few yards, the pursuersand pursued were passing one another upon opposite tracks. 

A loud cry announced the discovery of the dead and the wounded hound. Then followed a babble of voices, still swelling as fresh pursuersreached the spot. The hunters, as usual on a surprise, were wastingtime, and the hunted ones were making the most of it. 

"I hear no more hounds, " whispered Martin to Margaret, and he washimself again. 

It was Margaret's turn to tremble and despair. 

"Oh, why did we part with Gerard? They will kill my Gerard, and I notnear him. "

"Nay, nay! the head to catch him is not on their shoulders. You bade himmeet us at the ash-tree?"

"And so I did. Bless you, Martin, for thinking of that. To theash-tree!"

"Ay! but with less noise. "

They were now nearly at the edge of the coppice, when suddenlythey heard hooping and hallooing behind them. The men had satisfiedthemselves the fugitives were in the coppice, and were beating back. 

"No matter, " whispered Martin to his trembling companion. "We shall havetime to win clear and slip back out of sight by hard running. Ah!"

He stooped suddenly; for just as he was going to burst out of thebrushwood, his eye caught a figure keeping sentinel. It was GhysbrechtVan Swieten seated on his mule; a bloody bandage was across his nose, the bridge of which was broken; but over this his eyes peered keenly, and it was plain by their expression he had heard the fugitives rustle, and was looking out for them. Martin muttered a terrible oath, andcautiously strung his bow, then with equal caution fitted his last arrowto the string. Margaret put her hands to her face, but said nothing. She saw this man must die or Gerard. After the first impulse she peeredthrough her fingers, her heart panting to her throat. 

The bow was raised, and the deadly arrow steadily drawn to its head, when at that moment an active figure leaped on Ghysbrecht from behind soswiftly, it was like a hawk swooping on a pigeon. A kerchief went overthe burgomaster, in a turn of the hand his head was muffled in it, andhe was whirled from his seat and fell heavily upon the ground, where helay groaning with terror; and Gerard jumped down after him. 

"Hist, Martin! Martin!"

Martin and Margaret came out, the former openmouthed crying, "Now fly!fly! while they are all in the thicket; we are saved. "

At this crisis, when safety seemed at hand, as fate would have it, Margaret, who had borne up so bravely till now, began to succumb, partlyfrom loss of blood. 

"Oh, my beloved, fly!" she gasped. "Leave me, for I am faint. "

"No! no!" cried Gerard. "Death together, or safety. Ah! the mule! mounther, you, and I'll run by your side. "

In a moment Martin was on Ghysbrecht's mule, and Gerard raised thefainting girl in his arms and placed her on the saddle, and relievedMartin of his bow. 

"Help! treason! murder! murder!" shrieked Ghysbrecht, suddenly rising onhis hams. 

"Silence, cur, " roared Gerard, and trode him down again by the throat asmen crush an adder. 

"Now, have you got her firm? Then fly! for our lives! for our lives!"

But even as the mule, urged suddenly by Martin's heel, scattered theflints with his hind hoofs ere he got into a canter, and even as Gerardwithdrew his foot from Ghysbrecht's throat to run, Dierich Brower andhis five men, who had come back for orders, and heard the burgomaster'scries, burst roaring out of the coppice on them. 

CHAPTER XXI

Speech is the familiar vent of human thoughts; but there are emotions sosimple and overpowering, that they rush out not in words, but eloquentsounds. At such moments man seems to lose his characteristics, and tobe merely one of the higher animals; for these, when greatly agitated, ejaculate, though they cannot speak. 

There was something terrible and truly animal, both in the roarof triumph with which the pursuers burst out of the thicket on ourfugitives, and the sharp cry of terror with which these latter dartedaway. The pursuers hands clutched the empty air, scarce two feet behindthem, as they fled for life. Confused for a moment, like lions that misstheir spring, Dierich and his men let Gerard and the mule put ten yardsbetween them. Then they flew after with uplifted weapons. They weresure of catching them; for this was not the first time the parties hadmeasured speed. In the open ground they had gained visibly on the threethis morning, and now, at last, it was a fair race again, to be settledby speed alone. A hundred yards were covered in no time. Yet still thereremained these ten yards between the pursuers and the pursued. 

This increase of speed since the morning puzzled Dierich Brower. Thereason was this. When three run in company, the pace is that of theslowest of the three. From Peter's house to the edge of the forestGerard ran Margaret's pace; but now he ran his own; for the mule wasfleet, and could have left them all far behind. Moreover, youth andchaste living began to tell. Daylight grew imperceptibly between thehunted ones and the hunters. Then Dierich made a desperate effort, andgained two yards; but in a few seconds Gerard had stolen them quietlyback. The pursuers began to curse. 

Martin heard, and his face lighted up. "Courage, Gerard! courage, bravelad! they are straggling. "

It was so. Dierich was now headed by one of his men, and another droppedinto the rear altogether. 

They came to a rising ground, not sharp, but long; and here youth, andgrit, and sober living told more than ever. 

Ere he reached the top, Dierich's forty years weighed him down likeforty bullets. "Our cake is dough, " he gasped. "Take him dead, if youcan't alive;" and he left running, and followed at a foot's pace. JorianKetel tailed off next; and then another, and so, one by one, Gerard ranthem all to a standstill, except one who kept on stanch as a bloodhound, though losing ground every minute. His name, if I am not mistaken, was Eric Wouverman. Followed by him, they came to a rise in the wood, shorter, but much steeper than the last. 

"Hand on mane!" cried Martin. 

Gerard obeyed, and the mule helped him up the hill faster even than hewas running before. 

At the sight of this manoeuvre, Dierich's man lost heart, and, being nowfull eighty yards behind Gerard, and rather more than that in advance ofhis nearest comrade, he pulled up short, and, in obedience to Dierich'sorder, took down his crossbow, levelled it deliberately, and just as thetrio were sinking out of sight over the crest of the hill, sent the boltwhizzing among them. 

There was a cry of dismay; and, next moment, as if a thunder-bolt hadfallen on them, they were all lying on the ground, mule and all. 

CHAPTER XXII

The effect was so sudden and magical, that the shooter himself wasstupefied for an instant. Then he hailed his companions to join him ineffecting the capture, and himself set off up the hill; but, ere he hadgot half way, up rose the figure of Martin Wittenhaagen with a bent bowin his hand. Eric Wouverman no sooner saw him in this attitude, than hedarted behind a tree, and made himself as small as possible. Martin'sskill with that weapon was well known, and the slain dog was a keenreminder of it. 

Wouverman peered round the bark cautiously: there was the arrow's pointstill aimed at him. He saw it shine. He dared not move from his shelter. 

When he had been at peep-ho some minutes, his companions came up ingreat force. 

Then, with a scornful laugh, Martin vanished, and presently was heard toride off on the mule. 

All the men ran up together. The high ground commanded a view of anarrow but almost interminable glade. 

They saw Gerard and Margaret running along at a prodigious distance;they looked like gnats; and Martin galloping after them ventre a terre. 

The hunters were outwitted as well as outrun. A few words will explainMartin's conduct. We arrive at causes by noting coincidences; yet, nowand then, coincidences are deceitful. As we have all seen a hare tumbleover a briar just as the gun went off, and so raise expectations, thendash them to earth by scudding away untouched, so the burgomaster's muleput her foot in a rabbit-hole at or about the time the crossbow boltwhizzed innocuous over her head: she fell and threw both her riders. Gerard caught Margaret, but was carried down by her weight and impetus;and, behold, the soil was strewed with dramatis personae. 

The docile mule was up again directly, and stood trembling. Martin wasnext, and looking round saw there was but one in pursuit; on this hemade the young lovers fly on foot, while he checked the enemy as I haverecorded. 

He now galloped after his companions, and when after a long race hecaught them, he instantly put Gerard and Margaret on the mule, and ranby their side till his breath failed, then took his turn to ride, and soin rotation. Thus the runner was always fresh, and long ere they relaxedtheir speed all sound and trace of them was hopelessly lost to Dierichand his men. These latter went crestfallen back to look after theirchief and their winged bloodhound. 

CHAPTER XXIII

Life and liberty, while safe, are little thought of: for why? they arematters of course. Endangered, they are rated at their real value. Inthis, too, they are like sunshine, whose beauty men notice not at noonwhen it is greatest, but towards evening, when it lies in flakes oftopaz under shady elms. Yet it is feebler then; but gloom lies besideit, and contrast reveals its fire. Thus Gerard and Margaret, though theystarted at every leaf that rustled louder than its fellows, glowed allover with joy and thankfulness as they glided among the friendly treesin safety and deep tranquil silence, baying dogs and brutal voices yetringing in their mind's ears. 

But presently Gerard found stains of blood on Margaret's ankles. 

"Martin! Martin! help! they have wounded her: the crossbow!"

"No, no!" said Margaret, smiling to reassure him; "I am not wounded, norhurt at all. "

"But what is it, then, in Heaven's name?" cried Gerard, in greatagitation. 

"Scold me not, then!" and Margaret blushed. 

"Did I ever scold you?"

"No, dear Gerard. Well, then, Martin said it was blood those cruel dogsfollowed; so I thought if I could but have a little blood on my shoon, the dogs would follow me instead, and let my Gerard wend free. So Iscratched my arm with Martin's knife--forgive me! Whose else could Itake? Yours, Gerard? Ah, no. You forgive me?" said she beseechingly, andlovingly and fawningly, all in one. 

"Let me see this scratch first, " said Gerard, choking with emotion. "There, I thought so. A scratch? I call it a cut--a deep, terrible, cruel cut. "

Gerard shuddered at sight of it. 

"She might have done it with her bodkin, " said the soldier. "Milksop!that sickens at sight of a scratch and a little blood. "

"No, no. I could look on a sea of blood, but not on hers. Oh, Margaret!how could you be so cruel?"

Margaret smiled with love ineffable. "Foolish Gerard, " murmured she, "tomake so much of nothing. " And she flung the guilty arm round his neck. "As if I would not give all the blood in my heart for you, let alonea few drops from my arm. " And with this, under the sense of his recentdanger, she wept on his neck for pity and love; and he wept with her. 

"And I must part from her, " he sobbed; "we two that love so dear--onemust be in Holland, one in Italy. Ah me! ah me! ah me!"

At this Margaret wept afresh, but patiently and silently. Instinct isnever off its guard, and with her unselfishness was an instinct. To utter her present thoughts would be to add to Gerard's misery atparting, so she wept in silence. 

Suddenly they emerged upon a beaten path, and Martin stopped. 

"This is the bridle-road I spoke of, " said he hanging his head; "andthere away lies the hostelry. "

Margaret and Gerard cast a scared look at one another. 

"Come a step with me, Martin, " whispered Gerard. When he had drawn himaside, he said to him in a broken voice, "Good Martin, watch over herfor me! She is my wife; yet I leave her. See Martin! here is gold--itwas for my journey; it is no use my asking her to take it--she wouldnot; but you will for her, will you not? Oh, Heaven! and is this all Ican do for her? Money? But poverty is a curse. You will not let her wantfor anything, dear Martin? The burgomaster's silver is enough for me. "

"Thou art a good lad, Gerard. Neither want nor harm shall come to her. I care more for her little finger than for all the world; and were shenought to me, even for thy sake would I be a father to her. Go witha stout heart, and God be with thee going and coming. " And the roughsoldier wrung Gerard's hand, and turned his head away, with unwontedfeeling. 

After a moment's silence he was for going back to Margaret, but Gerardstopped him. "No, good Martin; prithee, stay here behind this thicket, and turn your head away from us, while I-oh, Martin! Martin!"

By this means Gerard escaped a witness of his anguish at leaving her heloved, and Martin escaped a piteous sight. He did not see the pooryoung things kneel and renew before Heaven those holy vows cruel men hadinterrupted. He did not see them cling together like one, and then tryto part, and fail, and return to one another, and cling again, likedrowning, despairing creatures. But he heard Gerard sob, and sob, andMargaret moan. 

At last there was a hoarse cry, and feet pattered on the hard road. 

He started up, and there was Gerard running wildly, with both handsclasped above his head, in prayer, and Margaret tottering back towardshim with palms extended piteously, as if for help, and ashy cheek andeyes fixed on vacancy. 

He caught her in his arms, and spoke words of comfort to her; but hermind could not take them in; only at the sound of his voice she moanedand held him tight, and trembled violently. 

He got her on the mule, and put his arm around her, and so, supportingher frame, which, from being strong like a boy, had now turned allrelaxed and powerless, he took her slowly and sadly home. 

She did not shed one tear, nor speak one word. 

At the edge of the wood he took her off the mule, and bade her go acrossto her father's house. She did as she was bid. 

Martin to Rotterdam. Sevenbergen was too hot for him. 

Gerard, severed from her he loved, went like one in a dream. He hired ahorse and a guide at the little hostelry, and rode swiftly towards theGerman frontier. But all was mechanical; his senses felt blunted; treesand houses and men moved by him like objects seen through a veil. Hiscompanions spoke to him twice, but he did not answer. Only once he criedout savagely, "Shall we never be out of this hateful country?"

After many hours' riding they came to the brow of a steep hill; a smallbrook ran at the bottom. 

"Halt!" cried the guide, and pointed across the valley. "Here isGermany. "

"Where?"

"On t'other side of the bourn. No need to ride down the hill, I trow. "

Gerard dismounted without a word, and took the burgomaster's purse fromhis girdle: while he opened it, "You will soon be out of this hatefulcountry, " said his guide, half sulkily; "mayhap the one you are going towill like you no better; any way, though it be a church you have robbed, they cannot take you, once across that bourn. "

These words at another time would have earned the speaker an admonitionor a cuff. They fell on Gerard now like idle air. He paid the lad insilence, and descended the hill alone. The brook was silvery; it ranmurmuring over little pebbles, that glittered, varnished by the clearwater; he sat down and looked stupidly at them. Then he drank of thebrook; then he laved his hot feet and hands in it; it was very cold:it waked him. He rose, and taking a run, leaped across it into Germany. Even as he touched the strange land he turned suddenly and looked back. "Farewell, ungrateful country!" he cried. "But for her it would cost menought to leave you for ever, and all my kith and kin, and--the motherthat bore me, and--my playmates, and my little native town. Farewell, fatherland--welcome the wide world! omne so-lum for-ti p p-at-r-a. " Andwith these brave words in his mouth he drooped suddenly with arms andlegs all weak, and sat down and sobbed bitterly upon the foreign soil. 

When the young exile had sat a while bowed down, he rose and dashed thetears from his eyes like a man; and not casting a single glance morebehind him, to weaken his heart, stepped out into the wide world. 

His love and heavy sorrow left no room in him for vulgar misgivings. Compared with rending himself from Margaret, it seemed a small thing togo on foot to Italy in that rude age. 

All nations meet in a convent. So, thanks to his good friends the monks, and his own thirst of knowledge, he could speak most of the languagesneeded on that long road. He said to himself, "I will soon be at Rome;the sooner the better now. "

After walking a good league, he came to a place where four waysmet. Being country roads, and serpentine, they had puzzled many aninexperienced neighbour passing from village to village. Gerard took outa little dial Peter had given him, and set it in the autumn sun, and bythis compass steered unhesitatingly for Rome inexperienced as a youngswallow flying south; but unlike the swallow, wandering south alone. 

CHAPTER XXIV

Not far on this road he came upon a little group. Two men in sober suitsstood leaning lazily on each side of a horse, talking to one another. The rider, in a silk doublet and bright green jerkin and hose, bothof English cloth, glossy as a mole, lay flat on his stomach in theafternoon sun, and looked an enormous lizard. His velvet cloak (flamingyellow) was carefully spread over the horse's loins. 

"Is aught amiss?" inquired Gerard. 

"Not that I wot of, " replied one of the servants. 

"But your master, he lies like a corpse. Are ye not ashamed to let himgrovel on the ground?"

"Go to; the bare ground is the best cure for his disorder. If you getsober in bed, it gives you a headache; but you leap up from the hardground like a lark in spring. Eh, Ulric?"

"He speaks sooth, young man, " said Ulric warmly. 

"What, is the gentleman drunk?"

The servants burst into a hoarse laugh at the simplicity of Gerard'squestion. But suddenly Ulric stopped, and eyeing him all over, said verygravely, "Who are you, and where born, that know not the Count is everdrunk at this hour?" And Gerard found himself a suspected character. 

"I am a stranger, " said he, "but a true man, and one that lovesknowledge; therefore ask I questions, and not for love of prying. "

"If you be a true man, " said Ulric shrewdly, "then give us trinkgeld forthe knowledge we have given you. "

Gerard looked blank, but putting a good face on it, said, "Trinkgeld youshall have, such as my lean purse can spare, an if you will tell me whyye have ta'en his cloak from the man and laid it on the beast. "

Under the inspiring influence of coming trinkgeld, two solutions wereinstantly offered Gerard at once: the one was, that should the Countcome to himself (which, being a seasoned toper, he was apt to do allin a minute), and find his horse standing sweating in the cold, whilea cloak lay idle at hand, he would fall to cursing, and peradventureto laying on; the other, more pretentious, was, that a horse is a poormilksop, which, drinking nothing but water, has to be cockered up andwarmed outside; but a master, being a creature ever filled with goodbeer, has a store of inward heat that warms him to the skin, and rendersa cloak a mere shred of idle vanity. 

Each of the speakers fell in love with his theory, and, to tell thetruth, both had taken a hair or two of the dog that had bitten theirmaster to the brain; so their voices presently rose so high, that thegreen sot began to growl instead of snoring. In their heat they did notnotice this. 

Ere long the argument took a turn that sooner or later was pretty sureto enliven a discussion in that age. Hans, holding the bridle with hisright hand, gave Ulric a sound cuff with his left; Ulric returned itwith interest, his right hand being free; and at it they went, dingdong, over the horse's mane, pommelling one another, and jagging thepoor beast, till he ran backward, and trode with iron heel upon apromontory of the green lord; he, like the toad stung by Ithuriel'sspear, started up howling, with one hand clapped to the smart and theother tugging at his hilt. The servants, amazed with terror, let thehorse go; he galloped off whinnying, the men in pursuit of him cryingout with fear, and the green noble after them, volleying curses, hisnaked sword in his hand, and his body rebounding from hedge to hedge inhis headlong but zigzag career down the narrow lane. 

"In which hurtling" Gerard turned his back on them all, and went calmlysouth, glad to have saved the four tin farthings he had got ready fortrinkgeld, but far too heavy hearted even to smile at their drunkenextravagance. 

The sun was nearly setting, and Gerard, who had now for some time beenhoping in vain to find an inn by the way, was very ill at ease. To makematters worse, black clouds gathered over the sky. 

Gerard quickened his pace almost to a run. 

It was in vain; down came the rain in torrents, drenched the bewilderedtraveller, and seemed to extinguish the very sun-for his rays, alreadyfading, could not cope with this new assailant. 

Gerard trudged on, dark, and wet, and in an unknown region. "Fool! toleave Margaret, " said he. 

Presently the darkness thickened. 

He was entering a great wood. Huge branches shot across the narrow road, and the benighted stranger groped his way in what seemed an interminableand inky cave with a rugged floor, on which he stumbled and stumbled ashe went. 

On, and on, and on, with shivering limbs and empty stomach, and faintingheart, till the wolves rose from their lairs and bayed all round thewood. 

His hair bristled; but he grasped his cudgel, and prepared to sell hislife dear. 

There was no wind; and his excited ear heard light feet patter at timesover the newly fallen leaves, and low branches rustle with creaturesgliding swiftly past them. 

Presently in the sea of ink there was a great fiery star close to theground. He hailed it as he would his patron saint. "CANDLE! a CANDLE!"he shouted, and tried to run. But the dark and rugged way soon stoppedthat. The light was more distant than he had thought. But at last, inthe very heart of the forest, he found a house, with lighted candlesand loud voices inside it. He looked up to see if there was a signboard. There was none. "Not an inn after all!" said he sadly. "No matter; whatChristian would turn a dog out into this wood to-night?" and with thishe made for the door that led to the voices. He opened it slowly, andput his head in timidly. He drew it out abruptly, as if slapped in theface, and recoiled into the rain and darkness. 

He had peeped into a large but low room, the middle of which was filledby a huge round stove, or clay oven, that reached to the ceiling;round this, wet clothes were drying-some on lines, and some morecompendiously, on rustics. These latter habiliments, impregnated withthe wet of the day, but the dirt of a life, and lined with what anotherfoot traveller in these parts call "rammish clowns, " evolved rankvapours and compound odours inexpressible, in steaming clouds. 

In one corner was a travelling family, a large one: thence flowed intothe common stock the peculiar sickly smell of neglected brats. Garlicfilled up the interstices of the air. And all this with closed window, and intense heat of the central furnace, and the breath of at leastforty persons. 

They had just supped. 

Now Gerard, like most artists, had sensitive organs, and the potenteffluvia struck dismay into him. But the rain lashed him outside, andthe light and the fire tempted him in. 

He could not force his way all at once through the palpable perfumes, but he returned to the light again and again, like the singed moth. At last he discovered that the various smells did not entirely mix, nofiend being there to stir them round. Odour of family predominated intwo corners; stewed rustic reigned supreme in the centre; and garlic inthe noisy group by the window. He found, too, by hasty analysis, that ofthese the garlic described the smallest aerial orbit, and the scent ofreeking rustic darted farthest--a flavour as if ancient goats, or thefathers of all foxes, had been drawn through a river, and were heredried by Nebuchadnezzar. 

So Gerard crept into a corner close to the door. But though the solidityof the main fetors isolated them somewhat, the heat and reeking vapourscirculated, and made the walls drip; and the home-nurtured novice foundsomething like a cold snake wind about his legs, and his head turn to agreat lump of lead; and next, he felt like choking, sweetly slumbering, and dying, all in one. 

He was within an ace of swooning, but recovered to a deep sense ofdisgust and discouragement; and settled to go back to Holland at peepof day. This resolution formed, he plucked up a little heart; and beingfaint with hunger, asked one of the men of garlic whether this was notan inn after all?

"Whence come you, who know not 'The Star of the Forest'?" was the reply. 

"I am a stranger; and in my country inns have aye a sign. "

"Droll country yours! What need of a sign to a public-house--a placethat every soul knows?"

Gerard was too tired and faint for the labour of argument, so he turnedthe conversation, and asked where he could find the landlord?

At this fresh display of ignorance, the native's contempt rose too highfor words. He pointed to a middle-aged woman seated on the other sideof the oven; and turning to his mates, let them know what an outlandishanimal was in the room. Thereat the loud voices stopped, one by one, asthe information penetrated the mass; and each eye turned, as on a pivot, following Gerard, and his every movement, silently and zoologically. 

The landlady sat on a chair an inch or two higher than the rest, betweentwo bundles. From the first, a huge heap of feathers and wings, she wastaking the downy plumes, and pulling the others from the quills, and sofilling bundle two littering the floor ankle-deep, and contributing tothe general stock a stuffy little malaria, which might have played adistinguished part in a sweet room, but went for nothing here. Gerardasked her if he could have something to eat. 

She opened her eyes with astonishment. "Supper is over this hour andmore. 

"But I had none of it, good dame. "

"Is that my fault? You were welcome to your share for me. "

"But I was benighted, and a stranger; and belated sore against my will. "

"What have I to do with that? All the world knows 'The Star of theForest' sups from six till eight. Come before six, ye sup well; comebefore eight, ye sup as pleases Heaven; come after eight, ye get a cleanbed, and a stirrup cup, or a horn of kine's milk, at the dawning. "

Gerard looked blank. "May I go to bed, then, dame?" said he sulkily "forit is ill sitting up wet and fasting, and the byword saith, 'He sups whosleeps. '"

"The beds are not come yet, " replied the landlady. "You will sleep whenthe rest do. Inns are not built for one. "

It was Gerard's turn to be astonished. "The beds were not come! what, inHeaven's name, did she mean?" But he was afraid to ask for every wordhe had spoken hitherto had amazed the assembly, and zoological eyes wereupon him--he felt them. He leaned against the wall, and sighed audibly. 

At this fresh zoological trait, a titter went round the watchfulcompany. 

"So this is Germany, " thought Gerard; "and Germany is a great country byHolland. Small nations for me. "

He consoled himself by reflecting it was to be his last, as well as hisfirst, night in the land. His reverie was interrupted by an elbow driveninto his ribs. He turned sharp on his assailant, who pointed across theroom. Gerard looked, and a woman in the corner was beckoning him. Hewent towards her gingerly, being surprised and irresolute, so that to aspectator her beckoning finger seemed to be pulling him across the floorwith a gut-line. When he had got up to her, "Hold the child, " saidshe, in a fine hearty voice; and in a moment she plumped the bairn intoGerard's arms. 

He stood transfixed, jelly of lead in his hands, and sudden horror inhis elongated countenance. 

At this ruefully expressive face, the lynx-eyed conclave laughed loudand long. 

"Never heed them, " said the woman cheerfully; "they know no better;how should they, bred an' born in a wood?" She was rummaging among herclothes with the two penetrating hands, one of which Gerard had setfree. Presently she fished out a small tin plate and a dried pudding;and resuming her child with one arm, held them forth to Gerard with theother, keeping a thumb on the pudding to prevent it from slipping off. 

"Put it in the stove, " said she; "you are too young to lie downfasting. "

Gerard thanked her warmly. But on his way to the stove, his eye fell onthe landlady. "May I, dame?" said he beseechingly. 

"Why not?" said she. 

The question was evidently another surprise, though less startling thanits predecessors. 

Coming to the stove, Gerard found the oven door obstructed by "therammish clowns. " They did not budge. He hesitated a moment. The landladysaw, calmly put down her work, and coming up, pulled a hircine man ortwo hither, and pushed a hircine man or two thither, with the impassivecountenance of a housewife moving her furniture. "Turn about is fairplay, " she said; "ye have been dry this ten minutes and better. "

Her experienced eye was not deceived; Gorgonii had done stewing, andbegun baking. Debarred the stove, they trundled home, all but one, whostood like a table, where the landlady had moved him to, like a table. And Gerard baked his pudding; and getting to the stove, burst intosteam. 

The door opened, and in flew a bundle of straw. 

It was hurled by a hind with a pitchfork. Another and another cameflying after it, till the room was like a clean farmyard. These werethen dispersed round the stove in layers, like the seats in an arena, and in a moment the company was all on its back. 

The beds had come. 

Gerard took out his pudding, and found it delicious. While he wasrelishing it, the woman who had given it him, and who was now abed, beckoned him again. He went to her bundle side. "She is waiting foryou, " whispered the woman. Gerard returned to the stove, and gobbled. The rest of his sausage, casting uneasy glances at the landlady, seatedsilent as fate amid the prostrate multitude. The food bolted, he went toher, and said, "Thank you kindly, dame, for waiting for me. "

"You are welcome, " said she calmly, making neither much nor little ofthe favour; and with that began to gather up the feathers. But Gerardstopped her. "Nay, that is my task;" and he went down on his knees, andcollected them with ardour. She watched him demurely. 

"I wot not whence ye come, " said she, with a relic of distrust; adding, more cordially, "but ye have been well brought up;--y' have had a goodmother, I'll go bail. "

At the door she committed the whole company to Heaven, in a formula, anddisappeared. Gerard to his straw in the very corner-for the guests layround the sacred stove by seniority, i. E. Priority of arrival. 

This punishment was a boon to Gerard, for thus he lay on the shore ofodour and stifling heat, instead of in mid-ocean. 

He was just dropping off, when he was awaked by a noise; and lo therewas the hind remorselessly shaking and waking guest after guest, to askhim whether it was he who had picked up the mistress's feathers. 

"It was I, " cried Gerard. 

"Oh, it was you, was it?" said the other, and came striding rapidly overthe intermediate sleepers. "She bade me say, 'One good turn deservesanother, ' and so here's your nightcap, " and he thrust a great oaken mugunder Gerard's nose. 

"I thank her, and bless her; here goes--ugh!" and his gratitude ended ina wry face; for the beer was muddy, and had a strange, medicinal twangnew to the Hollander. 

"Trinke aus!" shouted the hind reproachfully. 

"Enow is as good as a feast, " said the youth Jesuitically. 

The hind cast a look of pity on this stranger who left liquor in hismug. "Ich brings euch, " said he, and drained it to the bottom. 

And now Gerard turned his face to the wall and pulled up two handfuls ofthe nice clean straw, and bored in them with his finger, and so made ascabbard, and sheathed his nose in it. And soon they were all asleep;men, maids, wives, and children all lying higgledy-piggledy, and snoringin a dozen keys like an orchestra slowly tuning; and Gerard's body layon straw in Germany, and his spirit was away to Sevenbergen. 

When he woke in the morning he found nearly all his fellow-passengersgone. One or two were waiting for dinner, nine o'clock; it was nowsix. He paid the landlady her demand, two pfenning, or about an Englishhalfpenny, and he of the pitchfork demanded trinkgeld, and getting atrifle more than usual, and seeing Gerard eye a foaming milk-pail he hadjust brought from the cow, hoisted it up bodily to his lips. "Drink yourfill, man, " said he, and on Gerard offering to pay for the deliciousdraught, told him in broad patois that a man might swallow a skinful ofmilk, or a breakfast of air, without putting hand to pouch. At the doorGerard found his benefactress of last night, and a huge-chested artisan, her husband. 

Gerard thanked her, and in the spirit of the age offered her a creutzerfor her pudding. 

But she repulsed his hand quietly. "For what do you take me?" said she, colouring faintly; "we are travellers and strangers the same as you, andbound to feel for those in like plight. "

Then Gerard blushed in his turn and stammered excuses. 

The hulking husband grinned superior to them both. 

"Give the vixen a kiss for her pudding, and cry quits, " said he, with anair impartial, judge-like and Jove-like. 

Gerard obeyed the lofty behest, and kissed the wife's cheek. "A blessinggo with you both, good people, " said he. 

"And God speed you, young man!" replied the honest couple; and with thatthey parted, and never met again in this world. 

The sun had just risen: the rain-drops on the leaves glittered likediamonds. The air was fresh and bracing, and Gerard steered south, anddid not even remember his resolve of overnight. 

Eight leagues he walked that day, and in the afternoon came upon a hugebuilding with an enormous arched gateway and a postern by its side. 

"A monastery!" cried he joyfully; "I go no further lest I fare worse. " Heapplied at the postern, and on stating whence he came and whither bound, was instantly admitted and directed to the guestchamber, a large andlofty room, where travellers were fed and lodged gratis by the charityof the monastic orders. Soon the bell tinkled for vespers, and Gerardentered the church of the convent, and from his place heard a servicesung so exquisitely, it seemed the choir of heaven. But one thing waswanting, Margaret was not there to hear it with him, and this madehim sigh bitterly in mid rapture. At supper, plain but wholesome andabundant food, and good beer, brewed in the convent, were set beforehim and his fellows, and at an early hour they were ushered into a largedormitory, and the number being moderate, had each a truckle bed, andfor covering, sheepskins dressed with the fleece on; but previously tothis a monk, struck by his youth and beauty, questioned him, and soondrew out his projects and his heart. When he was found to be conventbred, and going alone to Rome, he became a personage, and in the morningthey showed him over the convent and made him stay and dine in therefectory. They also pricked him a route on a slip of parchment, and theprior gave him a silver guilden to help him on the road, and advised himto join the first honest company he should fall in with, "and not facealone the manifold perils of the way. "

"Perils?" said Gerard to himself. 

That evening he came to a small straggling town where was one inn; ithad no sign; but being now better versed in the customs of the country, he detected it at once by the coats of arms on its walls. These belongedto the distinguished visitors who had slept in it at differentepochs since its foundation, and left these customary tokens of theirpatronage. At present it looked more like a mausoleum than a hotel. Nothing moved nor sounded either in it or about it. Gerard hammered onthe great oak door: no answer. He hallooed: no reply. After a while hehallooed louder, and at last a little round window, or rather hole inthe wall, opened, a man's head protruded cautiously, like a tortoise'sfrom its shell, and eyed Gerard stolidly, but never uttered a syllable. 

"Is this an inn?" asked Gerard, with a covert sneer. 

The head seemed to fall into a brown study; eventually it nodded, butlazily. 

"Can I have entertainment here?"

Again the head pondered and ended by nodding, but sullenly, and seemed askull overburdened with catch-penny interrogatories. 

"How am I to get within, an't please you?"

At this the head popped in, as if the last question had shot it; and ahand popped out, pointed round the corner of the building, and slammedthe window. 

Gerard followed the indication, and after some research discoveredthat the fortification had one vulnerable part, a small low door on itsflank. As for the main entrance, that was used to keep out thieves andcustomers, except once or twice in a year, when they entered together, i. E. , when some duke or count arrived in pomp with his train of gaudyruffians. 

Gerard, having penetrated the outer fort, soon found his way to thestove (as the public room was called from the principal article in it), and sat down near the oven, in which were only a few live embers thatdiffused a mild and grateful heat. 

After waiting patiently a long time, he asked a grim old fellow with along white beard, who stalked solemnly in, and turned the hour-glass, and then was stalking out, when supper would be. The grisly Ganymedecounted the guests on his fingers--"When I see thrice as many here asnow. " Gerard groaned. 

The grisly tyrant resented the rebellious sound. "Inns are not builtfor one, " said he; "if you can't wait for the rest, look out for anotherlodging. "

Gerard sighed. 

At this the greybeard frowned. 

After a while company trickled steadily in, till full eighty persons ofvarious conditions were congregated, and to our novice the place becamea chamber of horrors; for here the mothers got together and comparedringworms, and the men scraped the mud off their shoes with theirknives, and left it on the floor, and combed their long hair out, inmates included, and made their toilet, consisting generally of a dryrub. Water, however, was brought in ewers. Gerard pounced on one ofthese, but at sight of the liquid contents lost his temper and saidto the waiter, "Wash you first your water, and then a man may wash hishands withal. "

"An' it likes you not, seek another inn!"

Gerard said nothing, but went quietly and courteously besought an oldtraveller to tell him how far it was to the next inn. 

"About four leagues. "

Then Gerard appreciated the grim pleasantry of the unbending sire. 

That worthy now returned with an armful of wood, and counting thetravellers, put on a log for every six, by which act of raw justice thehotter the room the more heat he added. Poor Gerard noticed this littleflaw in the ancient man's logic, but carefully suppressed every symptomof intelligence, lest his feet should have to carry his brains fourleagues farther that night. 

When perspiration and suffocation were far advanced, they brought inthe table-cloths; but oh, so brown, so dirty, and so coarse; they seemedlike sacks that had been worn out in agriculture and come down to this, or like shreads from the mainsail of some worn-out ship. The Hollander, who had never seen such linen even in nightmare, uttered a faint cry. 

"What is to do?" inquired a traveller. Gerard pointed ruefully tothe dirty sackcloth. The other looked at it with lack lustre eye, andcomprehended nought. 

A Burgundian soldier with his arbalest at his back came peeping overGerard's shoulder, and seeing what was amiss, laughed so loud that theroom rang again, then slapped him on the back and cried, "Courage! lediable est mort. "

Gerard stared: he doubted alike the good tidings and theirrelevancy; but the tones were so hearty and the arbalestrier's face, notwithstanding a formidable beard, was so gay and genial, that hesmiled, and after a pause said drily, "Il a bien faite avec l'eau etlinge du pays on allait le noircir a ne se reconnaitre plus. "

"Tiens, tiens!" cried the soldier, "v'la qui parle le Francais peu s'enfaut, " and he seated himself by Gerard, and in a moment was talkingvolubly of war, women, and pillage, interlarding his discourse withcurious oaths, at which Gerard drew away from him more or less. 

Presently in came the grisly servant, and counted them all on hisfingers superciliously, like Abraham telling sheep; then went out again, and returned with a deal trencher and deal spoon to each. 

Then there was an interval. Then he brought them a long mug apiece madeof glass, and frowned. By-and-by he stalked gloomily in with a hunch ofbread apiece, and exit with an injured air. Expectation thus raised, the guests sat for nearly an hour balancing the wooden spoons, and withtheir own knives whittling the bread. Eventually, when hope was extinct, patience worn out, and hunger exhausted, a huge vessel was broughtin with pomp, the lid was removed, a cloud of steam rolled forth, andbehold some thin broth with square pieces of bread floating. This, though not agreeable to the mind, served to distend the body. Slices ofStrasbourg ham followed, and pieces of salt fish, both so highly saltedthat Gerard could hardly swallow a mouthful. Then came a kind of gruel, and when the repast had lasted an hour and more, some hashed meat highlypeppered and the French and Dutch being now full to the brim with theabove dainties, and the draughts of beer the salt and spiced meats hadprovoked, in came roasted kids, most excellent, and carp and trout freshfrom the stream. Gerard made an effort and looked angrily at them, but"could no more, " as the poets say. The Burgundian swore by the liver andpike-staff of the good centurion, the natives had outwitted him. Thenturning to Gerard, he said, "Courage, l'ami, le diable est mort, " asloudly as before, but not with the same tone of conviction. The cannynatives had kept an internal corner for contingencies, and polished thekid's very bones. 

The feast ended with a dish of raw animalcula in a wicker cage. A cheesehad been surrounded with little twigs and strings; then a hole madein it and a little sour wine poured in. This speedily bred a small butnumerous vermin. When the cheese was so rotten with them that onlythe twigs and string kept it from tumbling to pieces and walking offquadrivious, it came to table. By a malicious caprice of fate, cageand menagerie were put down right under the Dutchman's organ ofself-torture. He recoiled with a loud ejaculation, and hung to the benchby the calves of his legs. 

"What is the matter?" said a traveller disdainfully. "Does the goodcheese scare ye? Then put it hither, in the name of all the saints!"

"Cheese!" cried Gerard, "I see none. These nauseous reptiles have madeaway with every bit of it. "

"Well, " replied another, "it is not gone far. By eating of the mites weeat the cheese to boot. "

"Nay, not so, " said Gerard. "These reptiles are made like us, and digesttheir food and turn it to foul flesh even as we do ours to sweet; aswell might you think to chew grass by eating of grass-fed beeves, as toeat cheese by swallowing these uncleanly insects. "

Gerard raised his voice in uttering this, and the company received theparadox in dead silence, and with a distrustful air, like any otherstranger, during which the Burgundian, who understood German butimperfectly, made Gerard Gallicize the discussion. He patted hisinterpreter on the back. "C'est bien, mon gars; plus fin que toi n'estpas bete, " and administered his formula of encouragement; and Gerardedged away from him; for next to ugly sights and ill odours, the poorwretch disliked profaneness. 

Meantime, though shaken in argument, the raw reptiles were duly eatenand relished by the company, and served to provoke thirst, a principalaim of all the solids in that part of Germany. So now the company drankgarausses all round, and their tongues were unloosed, and oh, the Babel!But above the fierce clamour rose at intervals, like some hero's war-cryin battle, the trumpet-like voice of the Burgundian soldier shoutinglustily, "Courage, camarades, le diable est mort!"

Entered grisly Ganymede holding in his hand a wooden dish with circlesand semicircles marked on it in chalk. He put it down on the tableand stood silent, sad, and sombre, as Charon by Styx waiting for hisboat-load of souls. Then pouches and purses were rummaged, and eachthrew a coin into the dish. Gerard timidly observed that he had drunknext to no beer, and inquired how much less he was to pay than theothers. 

"What mean you?" said Ganymede roughly. "Whose fault is it you have notdrunken? Are all to suffer because one chooses to be a milksop? You willpay no more than the rest, and no less. "

Gerard was abashed. 

"Courage, petit, le diable est mort, " hiccoughed the soldier and flungGanymede a coin. 

"You are bad as he is, " said the old man peevishly; "you are paying toomuch;" and the tyrannical old Aristides returned him some coin out ofthe trencher with a most reproachful countenance. And now the man whomGerard had confuted an hour and a half ago awoke from a brown study, inwhich he had been ever since, and came to him and said, "Yes, but thehoney is none the worse for passing through the bees' bellies. "

Gerard stared. The answer had been so long on the road he hadn't an ideawhat it was an answer to. Seeing him dumfounded, the other concluded himconfuted, and withdrew calmed. 

The bedrooms were upstairs, dungeons with not a scrap of furnitureexcept the bed, and a male servant settled inexorably who should sleepwith whom. Neither money nor prayers would get a man a bed to himselfhere; custom forbade it sternly. You might as well have asked tomonopolize a see-saw. They assigned to Gerard a man with a great blackbeard. He was an honest fellow enough, but not perfect; he would not goto bed, and would sit on the edge of it telling the wretched Gerard byforce, and at length, the events of the day, and alternately laughingand crying at the same circumstances, which were not in the smallestdegree pathetic or humorous, but only dead trivial. At last Gerard puthis fingers in his ears, and lying down in his clothes, for the sheetswere too dirty for him to undress, contrived to sleep. But in an hour ortwo he awoke cold, and found that his drunken companion had got all thefeather bed; so mighty is instinct. They lay between two beds; the lowerone hard and made of straw, the upper soft and filled with featherslight as down. Gerard pulled at it, but the experienced drunkard heldit fast mechanically. Gerard tried to twitch it away by surprise, butinstinct was too many for him. On this he got out of bed, and kneelingdown on his bedfellow's unguarded side, easily whipped the prize awayand rolled with it under the bed, and there lay on one edge of it, andcurled the rest round his shoulders. Before he slept he often heardsomething grumbling and growling above him, which was some littlesatisfaction. Thus instinct was outwitted, and victorious Reason laychuckling on feathers, and not quite choked with dust. 

At peep of day Gerard rose, flung the feather bed upon his snoringcompanion, and went in search of milk and air. 

A cheerful voice hailed him in French: "What ho! you are up with thesun, comrade. "

"He rises betimes that lies in a dog's lair, " answered Gerard crossly. 

"Courage, l'ami! le diable est mort, " was the instant reply. The soldierthen told him his name was Denys, and he was passing from Flushing inZealand to the Duke's French dominions; a change the more agreeable tohim, as he should revisit his native place, and a host of pretty girlswho had wept at his departure, and should hear French spoken again. "Andwho are you, and whither bound?"

"My name is Gerard, and I am going to Rome, " said the more reservedHollander, and in a way that invited no further confidences. 

"All the better; we will go together as far as Burgundy. "

"That is not my road. "

"All roads take to Rome. "

"Ay, but the shortest road thither is my way. "

"Well, then, it is I who must go out of my way a step for the sakeof good company, for thy face likes me, and thou speakest French, ornearly. "

"There go two words to that bargain, " said Gerard coldly. "I steer byproverbs, too. They do put old heads on young men's shoulders. 'Bon loupmauvais compagnon, dit le brebis;' and a soldier, they say, is near akinto a wolf. "

"They lie, " said Denys; "besides, if he is, 'les loups ne se mangent pasentre eux. '"

"Aye but, sir soldier, I am not a wolf; and thou knowest, a bien petiteoccasion se saisit le loup du mouton. '"

"Let us drop wolves and sheep, being men; my meaning is, that a goodsoldier never pillages-a comrade. Come, young man, too much suspicionbecomes not your years. They who travel should learn to read faces;methinks you might see lealty in mine sith I have seen it in yourn. Isit yon fat purse at your girdle you fear for?" (Gerard turned pale. )"Look hither!" and he undid his belt, and poured out of it a doublehandful of gold pieces, then returned them to their hiding-place. "There is a hostage for you, " said he; "carry you that, and let us becomrades, " and handed him his belt, gold and all. 

Gerard stared. "If I am over prudent, you have not enow. " But he flushedand looked pleased at the other's trust in him. 

"Bah! I can read faces; and so must you, or you'll never take your fourbones safe to Rome. "

"Soldier, you would find me a dull companion, for my heart is veryheavy, " said Gerard, yielding. 

"I'll cheer you, mon gars. "

"I think you would, " said Gerard sweetly; "and sore need have I of akindly voice in mine ear this day. "

"Oh! no soul is sad alongside me. I lift up their poor little heartswith my consigne: 'Courage, tout le monde, le diable est mort. ' Ha! ha!"

"So be it, then, " said Gerard. "But take back your belt, for I couldnever trust by halves. We will go together as far as Rhine, and God gowith us both!"

"Amen!" said Denys, and lifted his cap. "En avant!"

The pair trudged manfully on, and Denys enlivened the weary way. Hechattered about battles and sieges, and things which were new to Gerard;and he was one of those who make little incidents wherever they go. Hepassed nobody without addressing them. "They don't understand it, butit wakes them up, " said he. But whenever they fell in with a monkor priest. He pulled a long face, and sought the reverend father'sblessing, and fearlessly poured out on him floods of German words insuch order as not to produce a single German sentence--He doffed hiscap to every woman, high or low, he caught sight of, and with eagle eyediscerned her best feature, and complimented her on it in his nativetongue, well adapted to such matters; and at each carrion crow ormagpie, down came his crossbow, and he would go a furlong off the roadto circumvent it; and indeed he did shoot one old crow with laudableneatness and despatch, and carried it to the nearest hen-roost, andthere slipped in and set it upon a nest. "The good-wife will say, 'Alack, here is Beelzebub ahatching of my eggs. '"

"No, you forget he is dead, " objected Gerard. 

"So he is, so he is. But she doesn't know that, not having the luckto be acquainted with me, who carry the good news from city to city, uplifting men's hearts. "

Such was Denys in time of peace. 

Our travellers towards nightfall reached a village; it was a very smallone, but contained a place of entertainment. They searched for it, and found a small house with barn and stables. In the former was theeverlasting stove, and the clothes drying round it on lines, and atraveller or two sitting morose. Gerard asked for supper. 

"Supper? We have no time to cook for travellers; we only providelodging, good lodging for man and beast. You can have some beer. "

"Madman, who, born in Holland, sought other lands!" snorted Gerard inDutch. The landlady started. 

"What gibberish is that?" asked she, and crossed herself with looks ofsuperstitious alarm. "You can buy what you like in the village, and cookit in our oven; but, prithee, mutter no charms nor sorceries here, goodman; don't ye now, it do make my flesh creep so. "

They scoured the village for food, and ended by supping on roasted eggsand brown bread. 

At a very early hour their chambermaid came for them. It was arosy-cheeked old fellow with a lanthorn. 

They followed him. He led them across a dirty farmyard, where they hadmuch ado to pick their steps, and brought them into a cow-house. There, on each side of every cow, was laid a little clean straw, and a tiedbundle of ditto for a pillow. The old man looked down on this his workwith paternal pride. Not so Gerard. "What, do you set Christian men tolie among cattle?"

"Well, it is hard upon the poor beasts. They have scarce room to turn. "

"Oh! what, it is not hard on us, then?"

"Where is the hardship? I have lain among them all my life. Look at me!I am fourscore, and never had a headache in all my born days--all alongof lying among the kye. Bless your silly head, kine's breath is tentimes sweeter to drink nor Christians'. You try it!" and he slammed thebedroom door. 

"Denys, where are you?" whined Gerard. 

"Here, on her other side. "

"What are you doing?"

"I know not; but as near as I can guess, I think I must be going tosleep. What are you at?

"I am saying my prayers. "

"Forget me not in them!"

"Is it likely? Denys, I shall soon have done: do not go to sleep, I wantto talk. 

"Despatch then! for I feel--augh like floating-in the sky on a warmcloud. "

"Denys!"

"Augh! eh! hallo! is it time to get up?"

"Alack, no. There, I hurried my orisons to talk; and look at you, goingto sleep! We shall be starved before morning, having no coverlets. "

"Well, you know what to do. "

"Not I, in sooth. "

"Cuddle the cow. "

"Thank you. "

"Burrow in the straw, then. You must be very new to the world, togrumble at this. How would you bear to lie on the field of battle on afrosty night, as I did t'other day, stark naked, with nothing to keep mewarm but the carcass of a fellow I had been and helped kill?"

"Horrible! horrible! Tell me all about it! Oh, but this is sweet. "

"Well, we had a little battle in Brabant, and won a little victory, butit cost us dear; several arbalestriers turned their toes up, and I amongthem. "

"Killed, Denys? come now!"

"Dead as mutton. Stuck full of pike-holes till the blood ran out ofme, like the good wine of Macon from the trodden grapes. It is rightbounteous in me to pour the tale in minstrel phrase, for--augh--I amsleepy. Augh--now where was I?"

"Left dead on the field of battle, bleeding like a pig; that is to say, like grapes, or something; go on, prithee go on, 'tis a sin to sleep inthe midst of a good story. "

"Granted. Well, some of those vagabonds, that strip the dead soldier onthe field of glory, came and took every rag off me; they wrought me nofurther ill, because there was no need. "

"No; you were dead. "

"C'est convenu. This must have been at sundown; and with the night camea shrewd frost that barkened the blood on my wounds, and stopped all therivulets that were running from my heart, and about midnight I awoke asfrom a trance. '

"And thought you were in heaven?" asked Gerard eagerly, being a youthinoculated with monkish tales. 

"Too frost-bitten for that, mon gars; besides, I heard the woundedgroaning on all sides, so I knew I was in the old place. I saw I couldnot live the night through without cover. I groped about shivering andshivering; at last one did suddenly leave groaning. 'You are sped, ' saidI, so made up to him, and true enough he was dead, but warm, you know. I took my lord in my arms, but was too weak to carry him, so rolled withhim into a ditch hard by; and there my comrades found me in the morningproperly stung with nettles, and hugging a dead Fleming for the barelife. "

Gerard shuddered. "And this is war; this is the chosen theme of poetsand troubadours, and Reden Ryckers. Truly was it said by the men of old, dulce bellum inexpertis. "

"Tu dis?"

"I say-oh, what stout hearts some men have!"

"N'est-ce pas, p'tit? So after that sort--thing--this sort thing isheaven. Soft--warm--good company, comradancow--cou'age--diable--m-ornk!"

And the glib tongue was still for some hours. 

In the morning Gerard was wakened by a liquid hitting his eye, and itwas Denys employing the cow's udder as a squirt. 

"Oh, fie!" cried Gerard, "to waste the good milk;" and he took a hornout of his wallet. "Fill this! but indeed I see not what right we haveto meddle with her milk at all. "

"Make your mind easy! Last night la camarade was not nice; but whatthen, true friendship dispenses with ceremony. To-day we make as freewith her. "

"Why, what did she do, poor thing?"

"Ate my pillow. "

"Ha! ha!"

"On waking I had to hunt for my head, and found it down in the stablegutter. She ate our pillow from us, we drink our pillow from her. Avotre sante, madame; et sans rancune;" and the dog drank her milk to herown health. 

"The ancient was right though, " said Gerard. "Never have I risen sorefreshed since I left my native land. Henceforth let us shun greattowns, and still lie in a convent or a cow-house; for I'd liever sleepon fresh straw, than on linen well washed six months agone; and thebreath of kine it is sweeter than that of Christians, let alone thegarlic, which men and women folk affect, but cowen abhor from, and so doI, St. Bavon be my witness!"

The soldier eyed him from head to foot: "Now but for that little tuft onyour chin I should take you for a girl; and by the finger-nails of St. Luke, no ill-favoured one neither. "

These three towns proved types and repeated themselves with slightvariations for many a weary league; but even when he could get neither aconvent nor a cow-house, Gerard learned in time to steel himself tothe inevitable, and to emulate his comrade, whom he looked on as almostsuperhuman for hardihood of body and spirit. 

There was, however, a balance to all this veneration. 

Denys, like his predecessor Achilles, had his weak part, his very weakpart, thought Gerard. 

His foible was "woman. "

Whatever he was saying or doing, he stopped short at sight of afarthingale, and his whole soul became occupied with that garment andits inmate till they had disappeared; and sometimes for a good whileafter. 

He often put Gerard to the blush by talking his amazing German to suchfemales as he caught standing or sitting indoors or out, at which theystared; and when he met a peasant girl on the road, he took off his capto her and saluted her as if she was a queen; the invariable effect ofwhich was, that she suddenly drew herself up quite stiff like a soldieron parade, and wore a forbidding countenance. 

"They drive me to despair, " said Denys. "Is that a just return to acivil bonnetade? They are large, they are fair, but stupid as swans. "

"What breeding can you expect from women that wear no hose?" inquiredGerard; "and some of them no shoon? They seem to me reserved and modest, as becomes their sex, and sober, whereas the men are little better thanbeer-barrels. Would you have them brazen as well as hoseless?"

"A little affability adorns even beauty, " sighed Denys. 

"Then let these alone, sith they are not to your taste, " retortedGerard. "What, is there no sweet face in Burgundy that would pale to seeyou so wrapped up in strange women?"

"Half-a-dozen that would cry their eyes out. "

"Well then!"

"But it is a long way to Burgundy. "

"Ay, to the foot, but not to the heart. I am there, sleeping and waking, and almost every minute of the day. "

"In Burgundy? Why, I thought you had never--"

"In Burgundy?" cried Gerard contemptuously. "No, in sweet Sevenbergen. Ah! well-a-day! well-a-day!"

Many such dialogues as this passed between the pair on the long andweary road, and neither could change the other. 

One day about noon they reached a town of some pretensions, and Gerardwas glad, for he wanted to buy a pair of shoes; his own were quite wornout. They soon found a shop that displayed a goodly array, and made upto it, and would have entered it, but the shopkeeper sat on the doorsteptaking a nap, and was so fat as to block up the narrow doorway; the verylight could hardly struggle past his "too, too solid flesh, " much less acarnal customer. 

My fair readers, accustomed, when they go shopping, to be met half waywith nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles, and waved into a seat, whilealmost at the same instant an eager shopman flings himself halfacross the counter in a semi-circle to learn their commands, can bestappreciate this mediaeval Teuton, who kept a shop as a dog keeps akennel, and sat at the exclusion of custom snoring like a pig. 

Denys and Gerard stood and contemplated this curiosity; emblem, permitme to remark, of the lets and hindrances to commerce that characterizedhis epoch. 

"Jump over him!"

"The door is too low. "

"March through him!"

"The man is too thick. "

"What is the coil?" inquired a mumbling voice from the interior;apprentice with his mouth full. 

"We want to get into your shop?"

"What for, in Heaven's name??!!!"

"Shoon, lazy bones!"

The ire of the apprentice began to rise at such an explanation. "Andcould ye find no hour out of all the twelve to come pestering us forshoon, but the one little, little hour my master takes his nap, and Isit down to my dinner, when all the rest of the world is full long ago?"

Denys heard, but could not follow the sense. "Waste no more time talkingtheir German gibberish, " said he; "take out thy knife and tickle his fatribs. "

"That I will not, " said Gerard. 

"Then here goes; I'll prong him with this. "

Gerard seized the mad fellow's arm in dismay, for he had been longenough in the country to guess that the whole town would take part inany brawl with the native against a stranger. But Denys twisted awayfrom him, and the cross-bow bolt in his hand was actually on the road tothe sleeper's ribs; but at that very moment two females crossed the roadtowards him; he saw the blissful vision, and instantly forgot what hewas about, and awaited their approach with unreasonable joy. 

Though companions, they were not equals, except in attractiveness to aBurgundian crossbow man; for one was very tall, the other short, andby one of those anomalies which society, however primitive, speedilyestablishes, the long one held up the little one's tail. The tall onewore a plain linen coif on her head, a little grogram cloak over hershoulders, a grey kirtle, and a short farthingale or petticoat of brightred cloth, and feet and legs quite bare, though her arms were veiled intight linen sleeves. 

The other a kirtle broadly trimmed with fur, her arms in double sleeves, whereof the inner of yellow satin clung to the skin; the outer, allbefurred, were open at the inside of the elbow, and so the arm passedthrough and left them dangling. Velvet head-dress, huge purse at girdle, gorgeous train, bare legs. And thus they came on, the citizen's wifestrutting, and the maid gliding after, holding her mistress's traindevoutly in both hands, and bending and winding her lithe body prettilyenough to do it. Imagine (if not pressed for time) a bantam, with aguineahen stepping obsequious at its stately heel. 

This pageant made straight for the shoemaker's shop. Denys louted low;the worshipful lady nodded graciously, but rapidly, having businesson hand, or rather on foot; for in a moment she poked the point of herlittle shoe into the sleeper, and worked it round in him like a gimlet, till with a long snarl he woke. The incarnate shutter rising andgrumbling vaguely, the lady swept in and deigned him no further notice. He retreated to his neighbour's shop, the tailor's, and sitting on thestep, protected it from the impertinence of morning calls. Neighboursshould be neighbourly. 

Denys and Gerard followed the dignity into the shop, where sat theapprentice at dinner; the maid stood outside with her insteps crossed, leaning against the wall, and tapping it with her nails. 

"Those, yonder, " said the dignity briefly, pointing with an imperiouslittle white hand to some yellow shoes gilded at the toe. While theapprentice stood stock still neutralized by his dinner and his duty, Denys sprang at the shoes, and brought them to her; she smiled, andcalmly seating herself, protruded her foot, shod, but hoseless, andscented. Down went Denys on his knees, and drew off her shoe, and triedthe new ones on the white skin devoutly. Finding she had a willingvictim, she abused the opportunity, tried first one pair, then another, then the first again, and so on, balancing and hesitating for about halfan hour, to Gerard's disgust, and Denys's weak delight. At last she wasfitted, and handed two pair of yellow and one pair of red shoes out toher servant. Then was heard a sigh. It burst from the owner of the shop:he had risen from slumber, and was now hovering about, like a partridgenear her brood in danger. 

"There go all my coloured shoes, " said he, as they disappeared in thegirl's apron. 

The lady departed: Gerard fitted himself with a stout pair, asked theprice, paid it without a word, and gave his old ones to a beggar in thestreet, who blessed him in the marketplace, and threw them furiouslydown a well in the suburbs. The comrades left the shop, and in it twomelancholy men, that looked, and even talked, as if they had been robbedwholesale. 

"My shoon are sore worn, " said Denys, grinding his teeth; "but I'll gobarefoot till I reach France, ere I'll leave my money with such churlsas these. "

The Dutchman replied calmly, "They seem indifferent well sewn. "

As they drew near the Rhine, they passed through forest after forest, and now for the first time ugly words sounded in travellers' mouths, seated around stoves. "Thieves!" "black gangs!" "cut-throats!" etc. 

The very rustics were said to have a custom hereabouts of murdering theunwary traveller in these gloomy woods, whose dark and devious windingenabled those who were familiar with them to do deeds of rapine andblood undetected, or if detected, easily to baffle pursuit. 

Certain it was, that every clown they met carried, whether for offenceor defence, a most formidable weapon; a light axe, with a short pike atthe head, and a long slender handle of ash or yew, well seasoned. Thesethe natives could all throw with singular precision, so as to makethe point strike an object at several yard's distance, or could slaya bullock at hand with a stroke of the blade. Gerard bought one andpractised with it. Denys quietly filed and ground his bolt sharp, whistling the whilst; and when they entered a gloomy wood, he wouldunsling his crossbow and carry it ready for action; but not so much likea traveller fearing an attack, as a sportsman watchful not to miss asnap shot. 

One day, being in a forest a few leagues from Dusseldorf, as Gerard waswalking like one in a dream, thinking of Margaret, and scarce seeing theroad he trode, his companion laid a hand on his shoulder, and strunghis crossbow with glittering eye. "Hush!" said he, in a low whisper thatstartled Gerard more than thunder. Gerard grasped his axe tight, andshook a little: he heard a rustling in the wood hard by, and at thesame moment Denys sprang into the wood, and his crossbow went to hisshoulder, even as he jumped. Twang! went the metal string; and after aninstant's suspense he roared, "Run forward, guard the road, he is hit!he is hit!"

Gerard darted forward, and as he ran a young bear burst out of the woodright upon him; finding itself intercepted, it went upon its hind legswith a snarl, and though not half grown, opened formidable jaws and longclaws. Gerard, in a fury of excitement and agitation, flung himself onit, and delivered a tremendous blow on its nose with his axe, and thecreature staggered; another, and it lay grovelling, with Gerard hackingit. 

"Hallo! stop! you are mad to spoil the meat. "

"I took it for a robber, " said Gerard, panting. "I mean, I had madeready for a robber, so I could not hold my hand. "

"Ay, these chattering travellers have stuffed your head full of thievesand assassins; they have not got a real live robber in their wholenation. Nay, I'll carry the beast; bear thou my crossbow. "

"We will carry it by turns, then, " said Gerard, "for 'tis a heavy load:poor thing, how its blood drips. Why did we slay it?"

"For supper and the reward the baillie of the next town shall give us. "

"And for that it must die, when it had but just begun to live; andperchance it hath a mother that will miss it sore this night, and lovesit as ours love us; more than mine does me. "

"What, know you not that his mother was caught in a pitfall last month, and her skin is now at the tanner's? and his father was stuck full ofcloth-yard shafts t'other day, and died like Julius Caesar, with hishands folded on his bosom, and a dead dog in each of them?"

But Gerard would not view it jestingly. "Why, then, " said he, "we havekilled one of God's creatures that was all alone in the world-as I amthis day, in this strange land. "

"You young milksop, " roared Denys, "these things must not be lookedat so, or not another bow would be drawn nor quarrel fly in forest norbattlefield. Why, one of your kidney consorting with a troop of pikemenshould turn them to a row of milk-pails; it is ended, to Rome thou goestnot alone, for never wouldst thou reach the Alps in a whole skin. I takethee to Remiremont, my native place, and there I marry thee to my youngsister, she is blooming as a peach. Thou shakest thy head? ah! I forgot;thou lovest elsewhere, and art a one woman man, a creature to me scarceconceivable. Well then I shall find thee, not a wife, nor a leman, buta friend; some honest Burgundian who shall go with thee as far as Lyons;and much I doubt that honest fellow will be myself, into whose liquorthou has dropped sundry powders to make me love thee; for erst I endurednot doves in doublet and hose. From Lyons, I say, I can trust theeby ship to Italy, which being by all accounts the very stronghold ofmilksops, thou wilt there be safe: they will hear thy words, and makethee their duke in a twinkling. "

Gerard sighed. "In sooth I love not to think of this Dusseldorf, wherewe are to part company, good friend. "

They walked silently, each thinking of the separation at hand; thethought checked trifling conversation, and at these moments it is arelief to do something, however insignificant. Gerard asked Denys tolend him a bolt. "I have often shot with a long bow, but never with oneof these!"

"Draw thy knife and cut this one out of the cub, " said Denys slily. 

"Nay, Day, I want a clean one. "

Denys gave him three out of his quiver. 

Gerard strung the bow, and levelled it at a bough that had fallen intothe road at some distance. The power of the instrument surprised him;the short but thick steel bow jarred him to the very heel as it wentoff, and the swift steel shaft was invisible in its passage; only thedead leaves, with which November had carpeted the narrow road, flewabout on the other side of the bough. 

"Ye aimed a thought too high, " said Denys. 

"What a deadly thing! no wonder it is driving out the longbow--toMartin's much discontent. "

"Ay, lad, " said Denys triumphantly, "it gains ground every day, in spiteof their laws and their proclamations to keep up the yewen bow, becauseforsooth their grandsires shot with it, knowing no better. You see, Gerard, war is not pastime. Men will shoot at their enemies with thehittingest arm and the killingest, not with the longest and missingest. "

"Then these new engines I hear of will put both bows down; for thesewith a pinch of black dust, and a leaden ball, and a child's finger, shall slay you Mars and Goliath, and the Seven Champions. "

"Pooh! pooh!" said Denys warmly; "petrone nor harquebuss shall ever putdown Sir Arbalest. Why, we can shoot ten times while they are puttingtheir charcoal and their lead into their leathern smoke belchers, andthen kindling their matches. All that is too fumbling for the field ofbattle; there a soldier's weapon needs be aye ready, like his heart. "

Gerard did not answer, for his ear was attracted by a sound behindthem. It was a peculiar sound, too, like something heavy, but not hard, rushing softly over the dead leaves. He turned round with some littlecuriosity. A colossal creature was coming down the road at about sixtypaces' distance. 

He looked at it in a sort of calm stupor at first, but the next moment, he turned ashy pale. 

"Denys!" he cried. "Oh, God! Denys!"

Denys whirled round. 

It was a bear as big as a cart-horse. 

It was tearing along with its huge head down, running on a hot scent. 

The very moment he saw it Denys said in a sickening whisper--

"THE CUB!"

Oh! the concentrated horror of that one word, whispered hoarsely, withdilating eyes! For in that syllable it all flashed upon them both likea sudden stroke of lightning in the dark--the bloody trail, the murderedcub, the mother upon them, and it. DEATH. 

All this in a moment of time. The next, she saw them. Huge as she was, she seemed to double herself (it was her long hair bristling with rage):she raised her head big as a hull's, her swine-shaped jaws opened wideat them, her eyes turned to blood and flame, and she rushed upon them, scattering the leaves about her like a whirlwind as she came. 

"Shoot!" screamed Denys, but Gerard stood shaking from head to foot, useless. 

"Shoot, man! ten thousand devils, shoot! too late! Tree! tree!" and hedropped the cub, pushed Gerard across the road, and flew to the firsttree and climbed it, Gerard the same on his side; and as they fled, bothmen uttered inhuman howls like savage creatures grazed by death. 

With all their speed one or other would have been torn to fragments atthe foot of his tree; but the bear stopped a moment at the cub. 

Without taking her bloodshot eyes off those she was hunting, she smeltit all round, and found, how, her Creator only knows, that it was dead, quite dead. She gave a yell such as neither of the hunted ones had everheard, nor dreamed to be in nature, and flew after Denys. She reared andstruck at him as he climbed. He was just out of reach. 

Instantly she seized the tree, and with her huge teeth tore a greatpiece out of it with a crash. Then she reared again, dug her claws deepinto the bark, and began to mount it slowly, but as surely as a monkey. 

Denys's evil star had led him to a dead tree, a mere shaft, and of novery great height. He climbed faster than his pursuer, and was soon atthe top. He looked this way and that for some bough of another tree tospring to. There was none; and if he jumped down, he knew the bear wouldbe upon him ere he could recover the fall, and make short work of him. Moreover, Denys was little used to turning his back on danger, and hisblood was rising at being hunted. He turned to bay. 

"My hour is come, " thought he. "Let me meet death like a man. " Hekneeled down and grasped a small shoot to steady himself, drew his longknife, and clenching his teeth, prepared to jab the huge brute as soonas it should mount within reach. 

Of this combat the result was not doubtful. 

The monster's head and neck were scarce vulnerable for bone and massesof hair. The man was going to sting the bear, and the bear to crack theman like a nut. 

Gerard's heart was better than his nerves. He saw his friend's mortaldanger, and passed at once from fear to blindish rage. He slipped downhis tree in a moment, caught up the crossbow, which he had dropped inthe road, and running furiously up, sent a bolt into the bear's bodywith a loud shout. The bear gave a snarl of rage and pain, and turnedits head irresolutely. 

"Keep aloof!" cried Denys, "or you are a dead man. "

"I care not;" and in a moment he had another bolt ready and shot itfiercely into the bear, screaming, "Take that! take that!"

Denys poured a volley of oaths down at him. "Get away, idiot!"

He was right: the bear finding so formidable and noisy a foe behindher, slipped growling down the tree, rending deep furrows in it as sheslipped. Gerard ran back to his tree and climbed it swiftly. But whilehis legs were dangling some eight feet from the ground, the bear camerearing and struck with her fore paw, and out flew a piece of bloodycloth from Gerard's hose. He climbed, and climbed; and presently heheard as it were in the air a voice say, "Go out on the bough!" Helooked, and there was a long massive branch before him shooting upwardsat a slight angle: he threw his body across it, and by a series ofconvulsive efforts worked up it to the end. 

Then he looked round panting. 

The bear was mounting the tree on the other side. He heard her clawsscrape, and saw her bulge on both sides of the massive tree. Her eye notbeing very quick, she reached the fork and passed it, mounting the mainstem. Gerard drew breath more freely. The bear either heard him, orfound by scent she was wrong: she paused; presently she caught sight ofhim. She eyed him steadily, then quietly descended to the fork. 

Slowly and cautiously she stretched out a paw and tried the bough. Itwas a stiff oak branch, sound as iron. Instinct taught the creaturethis: it crawled carefully out on the bough, growling savagely as itcame. 

Gerard looked wildly down. He was forty feet from the ground. Deathbelow. Death moving slow but sure on him in a still more horribleform. His hair bristled. The sweat poured from him. He sat helpless, fascinated, tongue-tied. 

As the fearful monster crawled growling towards him, incongruousthoughts coursed through his mind. Margaret: the Vulgate, where itspeaks of the rage of a she-bear robbed of her whelps--Rome--Eternity. 

The bear crawled on. And now the stupor of death fell on the doomed man;he saw the open jaws and bloodshot eyes coming, but in a mist. 

As in a mist he heard a twang; he glanced down; Denys, white and silentas death, was shooting up at the bear. The bear snarled at the twang. But crawled on. Again the crossbow twanged, and the bear snarled, andcame nearer. Again the cross bow twanged; and the next moment the bearwas close upon Gerard, where he sat, with hair standing stiff on end andeyes starting from their sockets, palsied. The bear opened her jaws likea grave, and hot blood spouted from them upon Gerard as from a pump. Thebough rocked. The wounded monster was reeling; it clung, it stuck itssickles of claws deep into the wood; it toppled, its claws held firm, but its body rolled off, and the sudden shock to the branch shook Gerardforward on his stomach with his face upon one of the bear's strainingpaws. At this, by a convulsive effort, she raised her head up, up, tillhe felt her hot fetid breath. Then huge teeth snapped together loudlyclose below him in the air, with a last effort of baffled hate. Theponderous carcass rent the claws out of the bough, then pounded theearth with a tremendous thump. There was a shout of triumph below, and the very next instant a cry of dismay, for Gerard had swooned, andwithout an attempt to save himself, rolled headlong from the perilousheight. 

CHAPTER XXV

Denys caught at Gerard, and somewhat checked his fall; but it may bedoubted whether this alone would have saved him from breaking hisneck, or a limb. His best friend now was the dying bear, on whose hairycarcass his head and shoulders descended. Denys tore him off her. It wasneedless. She panted still, and her limbs quivered, but a hare was notso harmless; and soon she breathed her last; and the judicious Denyspropped Gerard up against her, being soft, and fanned him. He came toby degrees, but confused, and feeling the bear around him, rolled away, yelling. 

"Courage, " cried Denys, "le diable est mort. "

"Is it dead? quite dead?" inquired Gerard from behind a tree; for hiscourage was feverish, and the cold fit was on him just now, and had beenfor some time. 

"Behold, " said Denys, and pulled the brute's ear playfully, and openedher jaws and put in his head, with other insulting antics; in the midstof which Gerard was violently sick. 

Denys laughed at him. 

"What is the matter now?" said he, "also, why tumble off your perch justwhen we had won the day?"

"I swooned, I trow. "

"But why?"

Not receiving an answer, he continued, "Green girls faint as soonas look at you, but then they choose time and place. What woman everfainted up a tree?"

"She sent her nasty blood all over me. I think the smell must haveoverpowered me! Faugh! I hate blood. "

"I do believe it potently. "

"See what a mess she has made me

"But with her blood, not yours. I pity the enemy that strives to satisfyyou. "'

"You need not to brag, Maitre Denys; I saw you under the tree, thecolour of your shirt. "

"Let us distinguish, " said Denys, colouring; "it is permitted to tremblefor a friend. "

Gerard, for answer, flung his arms round Denys's neck in silence. 

"Look here, " whined the stout soldier, affected by this little gush ofnature and youth, "was ever aught so like a woman? I love thee, littlemilksop--go to. Good! behold him on his knees now. What new caprice isthis?"

"Oh, Denys, ought we not to return thanks to Him who has saved both ourlives against such fearful odds?" And Gerard kneeled, and prayed aloud. And presently he found Denys kneeling quiet beside him, with his handsacross his bosom after the custom of his nation, and a face as long ashis arm. When they rose, Gerard's countenance was beaming. 

"Good Denys, " said he, "Heaven will reward thy piety. "

"Ah, bah! I did it out of politeness, " said the Frenchman. "It was toplease thee, little one. C'est egal, 'twas well and orderly prayed, andedified me to the core while it lasted. A bishop had scarce handled thematter better; so now our evensong being sung, and the saints enlistedwith us--marchons. "

Ere they had taken two steps, he stopped. "By-the-by, the cub!"

"Oh, no, no!" cried Gerard. 

"You are right. It is late. We have lost time climbing trees, andtumbling off 'em, and swooning, and vomiting, and praying; and the bruteis heavy to carry. And now I think on't, we shall have papa after itnext; these bears make such a coil about an odd cub. What is this? youare wounded! you are wounded!"

"Not I. "

"He is wounded; miserable that I am!"

"Be calm, Denys. I am not touched; I feel no pain anywhere. "

"You? you only feel when another is hurt, " cried Denys, with greatemotion; and throwing himself on his knees, he examined Gerard's legwith glistening eyes. 

"Quick! quick! before it stiffens, " he cried, and hurried him on. 

"Who makes the coil about nothing now?" inquired Gerard composedly. 

Denys's reply was a very indirect one. 

"Be pleased to note, " said he, "that I have a bad heart. You were manenough to save my life, yet I must sneer at you, a novice in war. Wasnot I a novice once myself? Then you fainted from a wound, and I thoughtyou swooned for fear, and called you a milksop. Briefly, I have a badtongue and a bad heart. "

"Denys!"

"Plait-il?"

"You lie. "

"You are very good to say so, little one, and I am eternally obliged toyou, " mumbled the remorseful Denys. 

Ere they had walked many furlongs, the muscles of the wounded legcontracted and stiffened, till presently Gerard could only just put histoe to the ground, and that with great pain. 

At last he could bear it no longer. 

"Let me lie down and die, " he groaned, "for this is intolerable. "

Denys represented that it was afternoon, and the nights were now frosty;and cold and hunger ill companions; and that it would be unreasonableto lose heart, a certain great personage being notoriously defunct. SoGerard leaned upon his axe, and hobbled on; but presently he gave in, all of a sudden, and sank helpless in the road. 

Denys drew him aside into the wood, and to his surprise gave him hiscrossbow and bolts, enjoining him strictly to lie quiet, and if anyill-looking fellows should find him out and come to him, to bid themkeep aloof; and should they refuse, to shoot them dead at twenty paces. "Honest men keep the path; and, knaves in a wood, none but fools doparley with them. " With this he snatched up Gerard's axe, and set offrunning--not, as Gerard expected, towards Dusseldorf, but on the roadthey had come. 

Gerard lay aching and smarting; and to him Rome, that seemed so near atstarting, looked far, far off, now that he was two hundred miles nearerit. But soon all his thoughts turned Sevenbergen-wards. How sweet itwould be one day to hold Margaret's hand, and tell her all he had gonethrough for her! The very thought of it, and her, soothed him; and inthe midst of pain and irritation of the nerves be lay resigned, andsweetly, though faintly, smiling. 

He had lain thus more than two hours, when suddenly there were shouts;and the next moment something struck a tree hard by, and quivered in it. 

He looked, it was an arrow. 

He started to his feet. Several missiles rattled among the boughs, andthe wood echoed with battle-cries. Whence they came he could not tell, for noises in these huge woods are so reverberated, that a strangeris always at fault as to their whereabout; but they seemed to fillthe whole air. Presently there was a lull; then he heard the fiercegalloping of hoofs; and still louder shouts and cries arose, mingledwith shrieks and groans; and above all, strange and terrible sounds, like fierce claps of thunder, bellowing loud, and then dying off incracking echoes; and red tongues of flame shot out ever and anon amongthe trees, and clouds of sulphurous smoke came drifting over his head. And all was still. 

Gerard was struck with awe. "What will become of Denys?" he cried. "Oh, why did you leave me? Oh, Denys, my friend! my friend!"

Just before sunset Denys returned, almost sinking under a hairy bundle. It was the bear's skin. 

Gerard welcomed him with a burst of joy that astonished him. 

"I thought never to see you again, dear Denys. Were you in the battle?"

"No. What battle?"

"The bloody battle of men, or fiends, that raged in the wood a whileagone;" and with this he described it to the life, and more fully than Ihave done. 

Denys patted him indulgently on the back. 

"It is well, " said he; "thou art a good limner; and fever is a greatspur to the imagination. One day I lay in a cart-shed with a crackedskull, and saw two hosts manoeuvre and fight a good hour on eight feetsquare, the which I did fairly describe to my comrade in due order, onlynot so gorgeously as thou, for want of book learning. 

"What, then, you believe me not? when I tell you the arrows whizzed overmy head, and the combatants shouted, and--"

"May the foul fiends fly away with me if I believe a word of it. "

Gerard took his arm, and quietly pointed to a tree close by. 

"Why, it looks like--it is-a broad arrow, as I live!" And he went close, and looked up at it. 

"It came out of the battle. I heard it, and saw it. "

"An English arrow. "

"How know you that?"

"Marry, by its length. The English bowmen draw the bow to the ear, others only to the right breast. Hence the English loose a three-footshaft, and this is one of them, perdition seize them! Well, if this isnot glamour, there has been a trifle of a battle. And if there has beena battle in so ridiculous a place for a battle as this, why then 'tisno business of mine, for my Duke hath no quarrel hereabouts. So let's tobed, " said the professional. And with this he scraped together a heap ofleaves, and made Gerard lie on it, his axe by his side. He then lay downbeside him, with one hand on his arbalest, and drew the bear-skin overthem, hair inward. They were soon as warm as toast, and fast asleep. 

But long before the dawn Gerard woke his comrade. 

"What shall I do, Denys, I die of famine?"

"Do? why, go to sleep again incontinent: qui dort dine. "

"But I tell you I am too hungry to sleep, " snapped Gerard. 

"Let us march, then, " replied Denys, with paternal indulgence. 

He had a brief paroxysm of yawns; then made a small bundle of bears'ears, rolling them up in a strip of the skin, cut for the purpose; andthey took the road. 

Gerard leaned on his axe, and propped by Denys on the other side, hobbled along, not without sighs. 

"I hate pain. " said Gerard viciously. 

"Therein you show judgment, " replied papa smoothly. 

It was a clear starlight night; and soon the moon rising revealed theend of the wood at no great distance: a pleasant sight, since Dusseldorfthey knew was but a short league further. 

At the edge of the wood they came upon something so mysterious that theystopped to gaze at it, before going up to it. Two white pillars rosein the air, distant a few paces from each other; and between them stoodmany figures, that looked like human forms. 

"I go no farther till I know what this is, " said Gerard, in an agitatedwhisper. "Are they effigies of the saints, for men to pray to on theroad? or live robbers waiting to shoot down honest travellers? Nay, living men they cannot be, for they stand on nothing that I see. Oh!Denys, let us turn back till daybreak; this is no mortal sight. "

Denys halted, and peered long and keenly. "They are men, " said he, atlast. Gerard was for turning back all the more. "But men that will neverhurt us, nor we them. Look not to their feet, for that they stand on!"

"Where, then, i' the name of all the saints?"

"Look over their heads, " said Denys gravely. 

Following this direction, Gerard presently discerned the outline ofa dark wooden beam passing from pillar to pillar; and as the pair gotnearer, walking now on tiptoe, one by one dark snake-like cords came outin the moonlight, each pendent from the beam to a dead man, and tight aswire. 

Now as they came under this awful monument of crime and wholesalevengeance a light air swept by, and several of the corpses swung, orgently gyrated, and every rope creaked. Gerard shuddered at this ghastlysalute. So thoroughly had the gibbet, with its sickening load, seizedand held their eyes, that it was but now they perceived a fire rightunderneath, and a living figure sitting huddled over it. His axe laybeside him, the bright blade shining red in the glow. He was asleep. 

Gerard started, but Denys only whispered, "courage, comrade, here is afire. "

"Ay! but there is a man at it. "

"There will soon be three;" and he began to heap some wood on it thatthe watcher had prepared; during which the prudent Gerard seized theman's axe, and sat down tight on it, grasping his own, and examining thesleeper. There was nothing outwardly distinctive in the man. He wore thedress of the country folk, and the hat of the district, a three-corneredhat called a Brunswicker, stiff enough to turn a sword cut, and with athick brass hat-band. The weight of the whole thing had turned his earsentirely down, like a fancy rabbit's in our century; but even this, though it spoiled him as a man, was nothing remarkable. They had of latemet scores of these dog's-eared rustics. The peculiarity was, this clownwatching under a laden gallows. What for?

Denys, if he felt curious, would not show it; he took out two bears'ears from his bundle, and running sticks through them, began to toastthem. "'Twill be eating coined money, " said he; "for the burgomasterof Dusseldorf had given us a rix-dollar for these ears, as proving thedeath of their owners; but better a lean purse than a lere stomach. "

"Unhappy man!" cried Gerard, "could you eat food here?"

"Where the fire is lighted there must the meat roast, and where itroasts there must it be eaten; for nought travels worse than yourroasted meat. "

"Well, eat thou, Denys, an thou canst! but I am cold and sick; there isno room for hunger in my heart after what mine eyes have seen, " and heshuddered over the fire. "Oh! how they creak! and who is this man, Iwonder? what an ill-favoured churl!"

Denys examined him like a connoisseur looking at a picture, and indue course delivered judgment. "I take him to be of the refuse of thatcompany, whereof these (pointing carelessly upward) were the cream, andso ran their heads into danger. 

"At that rate, why not stun him before he wakes?" and Gerard fidgetedwhere he sat. 

Denys opened his eyes with humorous surprise. "For one who sets up fora milksop you have the readiest hand. Why should two stun one? tush! hewakes: note now what he says at waking, and tell me. "

These last words were hardly whispered when the watcher opened his eyes. At sight of the fire made up, and two strangers eyeing him keenly, hestared, and there was a severe and pretty successful effort to be calm;still a perceptible tremor ran all over him. Soon he manned himself, and said gruffly. "Good morrow. But at the very moment of saying it hemissed his axe, and saw how Gerard was sitting upon it, with his ownlaid ready to his hand. He lost countenance again directly. Denys smiledgrimly at this bit of byplay. 

"Good morrow!" said Gerard quietly, keeping his eye on him. 

The watcher was now too ill at ease to be silent. "You make free withmy fire, " said he; but he added in a somewhat faltering voice, "you arewelcome. "

Denys whispered Gerard. The watcher eyed them askant. 

"My comrade says, sith we share your fire, you shall share his meat. "

"So be it, " said the man warmly. "I have half a kid hanging on a bushhard by, I'll go fetch it;" and he arose with a cheerful and obligingcountenance, and was retiring. 

Denys caught up his crossbow, and levelled it at his head. The man fellon his knees. 

Denys lowered his weapon, and pointed him back to his place. He rose andwent back slowly and unsteadily, like one disjointed; and sick at heartas the mouse, that the cat lets go a little way, and then darts andreplaces. 

"Sit down, friend, " said Denys grimly, in French. 

The man obeyed finger and tone, though he knew not a word of French. 

"Tell him the fire is not big enough for more than thee. He will take mymeaning. "

This being communicated by Gerard, the man grinned; ever since Denysspoke he had seemed greatly relieved. "I wist not ye were strangers, "said he to Gerard. 

Denys cut a piece of bear's ear, and offered it with grace to him he hadjust levelled crossbow at. 

He took it calmly, and drew a piece of bread from his wallet, anddivided it with the pair. Nay, more, he winked and thrust his hand intothe heap of leaves he sat on (Gerard grasped his axe ready to brain him)and produced a leathern bottle holding full two gallons. He put it tohis mouth, and drank their healths, then handed it to Gerard; he passedit untouched to Denys. 

"Mort de ma vie!" cried the soldier, "it is Rhenish wine, and fitfor the gullet of an archbishop. Here's to thee, thou prince of goodfellows, wishing thee a short life and a merry one! Come, Gerard, sup!sup! Pshaw, never heed them, man! they heed not thee. Natheless, did Ihang over such a skin of Rhenish as this, and three churls sat beneath adrinking it and offered me not a drop, I'd soon be down among them. "

"Denys! Denys!"

"My spirit would cut the cord, and womp would come my body amongst ye, with a hand on the bottle, and one eye winking, t'other. "

Gerard started up with a cry of horror and his fingers to his ears, andwas running from the place, when his eye fell on the watcher's axe. Thetangible danger brought him back. He sat down again on the axe with hisfingers in his ears. 

"Courage, l'ami, le diable est mort!" shouted Denys gaily, and offeredhim a piece of bear's ear, put it right under his nose as he stopped hisears. Gerard turned his head away with loathing. 

"Wine!" he gasped. "Heaven knows I have much need of it, with suchcompanions as thee and--"

He took a long draught of the Rhenish wine: it ran glowing through hisveins, and warmed and strengthened his heart, but could not check histremors whenever a gust of wind came. As for Denys and the other, theyfeasted recklessly, and plied the bottle unceasingly, and drank healthsand caroused beneath that creaking sepulchre and its ghastly tenants. 

"Ask him how they came here, " said Denys, with his mouth full, andpointing up without looking. 

On this question being interpreted to the watcher, he replied thattreason had been their end, diabolical treason and priest-craft. Hethen, being rendered communicative by drink, delivered a long prosynarrative, the purport of which was as follows. These honest gentlemenwho now dangled here so miserably were all stout men and true, andlived in the forest by their wits. Their independence and thriving stateexcited the jealousy and hatred of a large portion of mankind, and manyattempts were made on their lives and liberties; these the Virgin andtheir patron saints, coupled with their individual skill and courageconstantly baffled. But yester eve a party of merchants came slowly ontheir mules from Dusseldorf. The honest men saw them crawling, and letthem penetrate near a league into the forest, then set upon them tomake them disgorge a portion of their ill-gotten gains. But alas!the merchants were no merchants at all, but soldiers of more than onenation, in the pay of the Archbishop of Cologne; haubergeons had theybeneath their gowns, and weapons of all sorts at hand; natheless, thehonest men fought stoutly, and pressed the traitors hard, when lo!horsemen, that had been planted in ambush many hours before, gallopedup, and with these new diabolical engines of war, shot leaden bullets, and laid many an honest fellow low, and so quelled the courage of othersthat they yielded them prisoners. These being taken red-handed, thevictors, who with malice inconceivable had brought cords knotted roundtheir waists, did speedily hang, and by their side the dead ones, tomake the gallanter show. "That one at the end was the captain. He neverfelt the cord. He was riddled with broad arrows and leaden balls or everthey could take him: a worthy man as ever cried, 'Stand and deliver!'but a little hasty, not much: stay! I forgot; he is dead. Very hasty, and obstinate as a pig. That one in the--buff jerkin is the lieutenant, as good a soul as ever lived: he was hanged alive. This one here, Inever could abide; no (not that one; that is Conrad, my bosom friend); Imean this one right overhead in the chicken-toed shoon; you were alwayscarrying tales, ye thief, and making mischief; you know you were; and, sirs, I am a man that would rather live united in a coppice than in aforest with backbiters and tale-bearers: strangers, I drink to you. "And so he went down the whole string, indicating with the neck of thebottle, like a showman with his pole, and giving a neat description ofeach, which though pithy was invariably false; for the showman had noreal eye for character, and had misunderstood every one of these people. 

"Enough palaver!" cried Denys. "Marchons! Give me his axe: now tell himhe must help you along. "

The man's countenance fell, but he saw in Denys's eye that resistancewould be dangerous; he submitted. Gerard it was who objected. He said, "Y pensez-vous? to put my hand on a thief, it maketh my flesh creep. "

"Childishness! all trades must live. Besides, I have my reasons. Be notyou wiser than your elder. "

"No. Only if I am to lean on him I must have my hand in my bosom, stillgrasping the haft of my knife. "

"It is a new attitude to walk in; but please thyself. "

And in that strange and mixed attitude of tender offices and deadlysuspicion the trio did walk. I wish I could draw them--I would not trustto the pen. 

The light of the watch-tower at Dusseldorf was visible as soon as theycleared the wood, and cheered Gerard. When, after an hour's march, theblack outline of the tower itself and other buildings stood out clear tothe eye, their companion halted and said gloomily, "You may as well slayme out of hand as take me any nearer the gates of Dusseldorf town. "

On this being communicated to Denys, he said at once, "Let him go then, for in sooth his neck will be in jeopardy if he wends much further withus. " Gerard acquiesced as a matter of course. His horror of a criminaldid not in the least dispose him to active co-operation with the law. But the fact is, that at this epoch no private citizen in any partof Europe ever meddled with criminals but in self-defence, except, by-the-by, in England, which, behind other nations in some things, wascenturies before them all in this. 

The man's personal liberty being restored, he asked for his axe. It wasgiven him. To the friends' surprise he still lingered. Was he to havenothing for coming so far out of his way with them?

"Here are two batzen, friend. 

"Add the wine, the good Rhenish?"

"Did you give aught for it?"

"Ay! the peril of my life. "

"Hum! what say you, Denys?"

"I say it was worth its weight in gold. Here, lad, here be silvergroshen, one for every acorn on that gallows tree; and here is one morefor thee, who wilt doubtless be there in due season. "

The man took the coins, but still lingered. 

"Well! what now?" cried Gerard, who thought him shamefully overpaidalready. "Dost seek the hide off our bones?"

"Nay, good sirs, but you have seen to-night how parlous a life is mine. Ye be true men, and your prayers avail; give me then a small trifle of aprayer, an't please you; for I know not one. "

Gerard's choler began to rise at the egotistical rogue; moreover, eversince his wound he had felt gusts of irritability. However, he bit hislip and said, "There go two words to that bargain; tell me first, is ittrue what men say of you Rhenish thieves, that ye do murder innocent andunresisting travellers as well as rob them?"

The other answered sulkily, "They you call thieves are not to blame forthat; the fault lies with the law. "

"Gramercy! so 'tis the law's fault that ill men break it?"

"I mean not so; but the law in this land slays an honest man an if hedo but steal. What follows? he would be pitiful, but is discouragedherefrom; pity gains him no pity, and doubles his peril: an he but cuta purse his life is forfeit; therefore cutteth he the throat to boot, tosave his own neck: dead men tell no tales. Pray then for the poor soulwho by bloody laws is driven to kill or else be slaughtered; were thereless of this unreasonable gibbeting on the highroad, there should beless enforced cutting of throats in dark woods, my masters. "

"Fewer words had served, " replied Gerard coldly. "I asked a question, Iam answered, " and suddenly doffing his bonnet--

"'Obsecro Deum omnipotentem, ut, qua cruce jam pendent isti quindecimlatrones fures et homicidae, in ea homicida fur et latro tu pependerisquam citissime, pro publica salute, in honorem justi Dei cui sit gloria, in aeternum, Amen. '"

"And so good day. "

The greedy outlaw was satisfied last. "That is Latin, " he muttered, "andmore than I bargained for. " So indeed it was. 

And he returned to his business with a mind at ease. The friendspondered in silence the many events of the last few hours. 

At last Gerard said thoughtfully, "That she-bear saved both our lives-byGod's will. "

"Like enough, " replied Denys; "and talking of that, it was lucky we didnot dawdle over our supper. "

"What mean you?"

"I mean they are not all hanged; I saw a refuse of seven or eight asblack as ink around our fire. "

"When? when?"

"Ere we had left it five minutes. "

"Good heavens! and you said not a word. "

"It would but have worried you, and had set our friend a looking back, and mayhap tempted him to get his skull split. All other danger wasover; they could not see us, we were out of the moonshine, and indeed, just turning a corner. Ah! there is the sun; and here are the gates ofDusseldorf. Courage, l'ami, le diable est mort!"

"My head! my head!" was all poor Gerard could reply. 

So many shocks, emotions, perils, horrors, added to the wound, hisfirst, had tried his youthful body and sensitive nature too severely. 

It was noon of the same day. 

In a bedroom of "The Silver Lion" the rugged Denys sat anxious, watchinghis young friend. 

And he lay raging with fever, delirious at intervals, and one word forever on his lips. 

"Margaret!--Margaret Margaret!"

CHAPTER XXVI

It was the afternoon of the next day. Gerard was no longer lightheaded, but very irritable and full of fancies; and in one of these he beggedDenys to get him a lemon to suck. Denys, who from a rough soldier hadbeen turned by tender friendship into a kind of grandfather, got uphastily, and bidding him set his mind at ease, "lemons he should have inthe twinkling of a quart pot, " went and ransacked the shops for them. 

They were not so common in the North as they are now, and he was absenta long while, and Gerard getting very impatient, when at last the dooropened. But it was not Denys. Entered softly an imposing figure; an oldgentleman in a long sober gown trimmed with rich fur, cherry-colouredhose, and pointed shoes, with a sword by his side in a morocco scabbard, a ruff round his neck not only starched severely, but treacherouslystiffened in furrows by rebatoes, or a little hidden framework of wood;and on his head a four-cornered cap with a fur border; on his chin andbosom a majestic white beard. Gerard was in no doubt as to the vocationof his visitor, for, the sword excepted, this was familiar to him as thefull dress of a physician. Moreover, a boy followed at his heels witha basket, where phials, lint, and surgical tools rather courted thanshunned observation. The old gentleman came softly to the bedside, andsaid mildly and sotto voce, "How is't with thee, my son?"

Gerard answered gratefully that his wound gave him little pain now; buthis throat was parched, and his head heavy. 

"A wound! they told me not of that. Let me see it. Ay, ay, a good cleanbite. The mastiff had sound teeth that took this out, I warrant me;"and the good doctor's sympathy seemed to run off to the quadruped he hadconjured, his jackal. 

"This must be cauterized forthwith, or we shall have you starting backfrom water, and turning somersaults in bed under our hands. 'Tis theyear for raving curs, and one hath done your business; but we willbaffle him yet. Urchin, go heat thine iron. "

"But, sir, " edged in Gerard, "'twas no dog, but a bear. "

"A bear! Young man, " remonstrated the senior severely, "think what yousay; 'tis ill jesting with the man of art who brings his grey hairs andlong study to heal you. A bear, quotha! Had you dissected as many bearsas I, or the tithe, and drawn their teeth to keep your hand in, youwould know that no bear's jaw ever made this foolish trifling wound. Itell you 'twas a dog, and since you put me to it, I even deny that itwas a dog of magnitude, but neither more nor less than one of theselittle furious curs that are so rife, and run devious, biting each manlyleg, and laying its wearer low, but for me and my learned brethren, whostill stay the mischief with knife and cautery. "

"Alas, sir! when said I 'twas a bear's jaw? I said, 'A bear:' it was hispaw, now. "

"And why didst not tell me that at once?"

"Because you kept telling me instead. "

"Never conceal aught from your leech, young man, " continued the senior, who was a good talker, but one of the worst listeners in Europe. "Well, it is an ill business. All the horny excrescences of animals, to wit, claws of tigers, panthers, badgers, cats, bears, and the like, andhorn of deer, and nails of humans, especially children, are imbued withdirest poison. Y'had better have been bitten by a cur, whatever you maysay, than gored by bull or stag, or scratched by bear. However, shalthave a good biting cataplasm for thy leg; meantime keep we thebody cool: put out thy tongue!-good!-fever. Let me feel thy pulse:good!--fever. I ordain flebotomy, and on the instant. "

"Flebotomy! that is bloodletting: humph! Well, no matter, if 'tis sureto cure me, for I will not lie idle here. " The doctor let him know thatflebotomy was infallible, especially in this case. 

"Hans, go fetch the things needful, and I will entertain the patientmeantime with reasons. "

The man of art then explained to Gerard that in disease the bloodbecomes hot and distempered and more or less poisonous; but a portion ofthis unhealthy liquid removed, Nature is fain to create a purer fluid tofill its place. Bleeding, therefore, being both a cooler and a purifier, was a specific in all diseases, for all diseases were febrile, whateverempirics might say. 

"But think not, " said he warmly, "that it suffices to bleed; any paltrybarber can open a vein (though not all can close it again). The art isto know what vein to empty for what disease. T'other day they brought meone tormented with earache. I let him blood in the right thigh, and awayflew his earache. By-the-by, he has died since then. Another came withthe toothache. I bled him behind the ear, and relieved him in a jiffy. He is also since dead as it happens. I bled our bailiff between thethumb and forefinger for rheumatism. Presently he comes to me witha headache and drumming in the ears, and holds out his hand over thebasin; but I smiled at his folly, and bled him in the left ankle soreagainst his will, and made his head as light as a nut. "

Diverging then from the immediate theme after the manner of enthusiasts, the reverend teacher proceeded thus:

"Know, young man, that two schools of art contend at this momentthroughout Europe. The Arabian, whose ancient oracles are Avicenna, Rhazes, Albucazis; and its revivers are Chauliac and Lanfranc; andthe Greek school, whose modern champions are Bessarion, Platinus, andMarsilius Ficinus, but whose pristine doctors were medicine's veryoracles, Phoebus, Chiron, Aesculapius, and his sons Podalinus andMachaon, Pythagoras, Democritus, Praxagoras, who invented the arteries, and Dioctes, 'qui primus urinae animum dedit. ' All these taught orally. Then came Hippocrates, the eighteenth from Aesculapius, and of him wehave manuscripts; to him we owe 'the vital principle. ' He also inventedthe bandage, and tapped for water on the chest; and above all hedissected; yet only quadrupeds, for the brutal prejudices of the paganvulgar withheld the human body from the knife of science. Him followedAristotle, who gave us the aorta, the largest blood-vessel in the humanbody. "

"Surely, sir, the Almighty gave us all that is in our bodies, and notAristotle, nor any Grecian man, " objected Gerard humbly. 

"Child! of course He gave us the thing; but Aristotle did more, he gaveus the name of the thing. But young men will still be talking. Thenext great light was Galen; he studied at Alexandria, then the homeof science. He, justly malcontent with quadrupeds, dissected apes, ascoming nearer to man, and bled like a Trojan. Then came Theophilus, whogave us the nerves, the lacteal vessels, and the pia mater. "

This worried Gerard. "I cannot lie still and hear it said that mortalman bestowed the parts which Adam our father took from Him, who made himof the clay, and us his sons. "

"Was ever such perversity?" said the doctor, his colour rising. "Who isthe real donor of a thing to man? he who plants it secretly in thedark recesses of man's body, or the learned wight who reveals it tohis intelligence, and so enriches his mind with the knowledge of it?Comprehension is your only true possession. Are you answered?"

"I am put to silence, sir. "

"And that is better still; for garrulous patients are ill to cure, especially in fever; I say, then, that Eristratus gave us the cerebralnerves and the milk vessels; nay, more, he was the inventor oflithotomy, whatever you may say. Then came another whom I forget; you dosomewhat perturb me with your petty exceptions. Then came Ammonius, theauthor of lithotrity, and here comes Hans with the basin-to stay yourvolubility. Blow thy chafer, boy, and hand me the basin; 'tis well. Arabians, quotha! What are they but a sect of yesterday who about theyear 1000 did fall in with the writings of those very Greeks, and readthem awry, having no concurrent light of their own? for their demigod, and camel-driver, Mahound, impostor in science as in religion, hadstrictly forbidden them anatomy, even of the lower animals, the which hewho severeth from medicine, 'tollit solem e mundo, ' as Tully quoth. Nay, wonder not at my fervour, good youth; where the general weal stands injeopardy, a little warmth is civic, humane, and honourable. Now there issettled of late in this town a pestilent Arabist, a mere empiric, who, despising anatomy, and scarce knowing Greek from Hebrew, hath yetspirited away half my patients; and I tremble for the rest. Put forththine ankle; and thou, Hans, breathe on the chafer. "

Whilst matters were in this posture, in came Denys with the lemons, andstood surprised. "What sport is toward?" said he, raising his brows. 

Gerard coloured a little, and told him the learned doctor was going toflebotomize him and cauterize him; that was all. 

"Ay! indeed; and yon imp, what bloweth he hot coals for?"

"What should it be for, " said the doctor to Gerard, "but to cauterizethe vein when opened and the poisonous blood let free? 'Tis the onlysafe way. Avicenna indeed recommends a ligature of the vein; but how'tis to be done he saith not, nor knew he himself I wot, nor any of thespawn of Ishmael. For me, I have no faith in such tricksy expedients;and take this with you for a safe principle: 'Whatever an Arab orArabist says is right, must be wrong. '"

"Oh, I see now what 'tis for, " said Denys; "and art thou so simple asto let him put hot iron to thy living flesh? didst ever keep thy littlefinger but ten moments in a candle? and this will be as many minutes. Art not content to burn in purgatory after thy death? must thou needsbuy a foretaste on't here?"

"I never thought of that, " said Gerard gravely; "the good doctor spakenot of burning, but of cautery; to be sure 'tis all one, but cauterysounds not so fearful as burning. "

"Imbecile! That is their art; to confound a plain man with dark words, till his hissing flesh lets him know their meaning. Now listen to whatI have seen. When a soldier bleeds from a wound in battle, these leechessay, 'Fever. Blood him!' and so they burn the wick at t'other end too. They bleed the bled. Now at fever's heels comes desperate weakness; thenthe man needs all his blood to live; but these prickers and burners, having no forethought, recking nought of what is sure to come in a fewhours, and seeing like brute beasts only what is under their noses, having meantime robbed him of the very blood his hurt had spared him tobattle that weakness withal; and so he dies exhausted. Hundreds have Iseen so scratched and pricked out of the world, Gerard, and tall fellowstoo; but lo! if they have the luck to be wounded where no doctor canbe had, then they live; this too have I seen. Had I ever outlived thatfield in Brabant but for my most lucky mischance, lack of chirurgery?The frost chocked all my bleeding wounds, and so I lived. A chirurgeonhad pricked yet one more hole in this my body with his lance, anddrained my last drop out, and my spirit with it. Seeing them thusdistraught in bleeding of the bleeding soldier, I place no trust inthem; for what slays a veteran may well lay a milk-and-water bourgeoislow. "

"This sounds like common sense, " sighed Gerard languidly, "but noneed to raise your voice so; I was not born deaf, and just now I hearacutely. "

"Common sense! very common sense indeed, " shouted the bad listener;"why, this is a soldier; a brute whose business is to kill men, not curethem. " He added in very tolerable French, "Woe be to you, unlearnedman, if you come between a physician and his patient; and woe be to you, misguided youth, if you listen to that man of blood. "

"Much obliged, " said Denys, with mock politeness; "but I am a true man, and would rob no man of his name. I do somewhat in the way of blood, butnot worth mention in this presence. For one I slay, you slay a score;and for one spoonful of blood I draw, you spill a tubful. The world isstill gulled by shows. We soldiers vapour with long swords, and even inwar be-get two foes for every one we kill; but you smooth gownsmen, withsoft phrases and bare bodkins, 'tis you that thin mankind. "

"A sick chamber is no place for jesting, " cried the physician. 

"No, doctor, nor for bawling, " said the patient peevishly. 

"Come, young man, " said the senior kindly, "be reasonable. Cuilibetin sua arte credendum est. My whole life has been given to this art. Istudied at Montpelier; the first school in France, and by consequence inEurope. There learned I Dririmancy, Scatomancy, Pathology, Therapeusis, and, greater than them all, Anatomy. For there we disciples ofHippocrates and Galen had opportunities those great ancients never knew. Goodbye, quadrupeds and apes, and paganism, and Mohammedanism; we boughtof the churchwardens, we shook the gallows; we undid the sexton's workof dark nights, penetrated with love of science and our kind; all theauthorities had their orders from Paris to wink; and they winked. Godsof Olympus, how they winked! The gracious king assisted us: he sent ustwice a year a living criminal condemned to die, and said, 'Deal ye withhim as science asks; dissect him alive, if ye think fit. '"

"By the liver of Herod, and Nero's bowels, he'll make me blush for theland that bore me, an' if he praises it any more, " shouted Denys at thetop of his voice. 

Gerard gave a little squawk, and put his fingers in his ears; butspeedily drew them out and shouted angrily, and as loudly, "you greatroaring, blaspheming bull of Basan, hold your noisy tongue!"

Denys summoned a contrite look. 

"Tush, slight man, " said the doctor, with calm contempt, and vibrateda hand over him as in this age men make a pointer dog down charge; thenflowed majestic on. "We seldom or never dissected the living criminal, except in part. We mostly inoculated them with such diseases as thebarren time afforded, selecting of course the more interesting ones. "

"That means the foulest, " whispered Denys meekly. 

"These we watched through all their stages to maturity. "

"Meaning the death of the poor rogue, " whispered Denys meekly. 

"And now, my poor sufferer, who best merits your confidence, thishonest soldier with his youth, his ignorance, and his prejudices, or agreybeard laden with the gathered wisdom of ages?"

"That is, " cried Denys impatiently, "will you believe what a jackdaw ina long gown has heard from a starling in a long gown, who heard it froma jay-pie, who heard it from a magpie, who heard it from a popinjay; orwill you believe what I, a man with nought to gain by looking awry, norspeaking false, have seen; nor heard with the ears which are given usto gull us, but seen with these sentinels mine eye, seen, seen; to wit, that fevered and blooded men die, that fevered men not blooded live?stay, who sent for this sang-sue? Did you?"

"Not I. I thought you had. "

"Nay, " explained the doctor, "the good landlord told me one was 'down'in his house; so I said to myself, 'A stranger, and in need of my art, 'and came incontinently. "

"It was the act of a good Christian, sir. "

"Of a good bloodhound, " cried Denys contemptuously. "What, art thou sogreen as not to know that all these landlords are in league with certainof their fellow-citizens, who pay them toll on each booty? Whateveryou pay this ancient for stealing your life blood, of that the landlordtakes his third for betraying you to him. Nay, more, as soon as everyour blood goes down the stair in that basin there, the landlord willsee it or smell it, and send swiftly to his undertaker and get his thirdout of that job. For if he waited till the doctor got downstairs, thedoctor would be beforehand and bespeak his undertaker, and then he wouldget the black thirds. Say I sooth, old Rouge et Noir? dites!"

"Denys, Denys, who taught you to think so ill of man?"

"Mine eyes, that are not to be gulled by what men say, seeing this manya year what they do, in all the lands I travel. "

The doctor with some address made use of these last words to escapethe personal question. "I too have eyes as well as thou, and go not bytradition only, but by what I have seen, and not only seen, but done. I have healed as many men by bleeding as that interloping Arabist haskilled for want of it. 'Twas but t'other day I healed one threatenedwith leprosy; I but bled him at the tip of the nose. I cured last yeara quartan ague: how? bled its forefinger. Our cure lost his memory. Ibrought it him back on the point of my lance; I bled him behind theear. I bled a dolt of a boy, and now he is the only one who can tell hisright hand from his left in a whole family of idiots. When the plaguewas here years ago, no sham plague, such as empyrics proclaim every sixyears or so, but the good honest Byzantine pest, I blooded an aldermanfreely, and cauterized the symptomatic buboes, and so pulled him outof the grave; whereas our then chirurgeon, a most pernicious Arabist, caught it himself, and died of it, aha, calling on Rhazes, Avicenna, and Mahound, who, could they have come, had all perished as miserably ashimself. "

"Oh, my poor ears, " sighed Gerard. 

"And am I fallen so low that one of your presence and speech rejects myart and listens to a rude soldier, so far behind even his own miserabletrade as to bear an arbalest, a worn-out invention, that Germanchildren shoot at pigeons with, but German soldiers mock at since everarquebusses came and put them down?"

"You foul-mouthed old charlatan, " cried Denys, "the arbalest isshouldered by taller men than ever stood in Rhenish hose, and even nowit kills as many more than your noisy, stinking arquebus, as the lancetdoes than all our toys together. Go to! He was no fool who first calledyou 'leeches. ' Sang-sues! va!"

Gerard groaned. "By the holy virgin, I wish you were both at Jericho, bellowing. '

"Thank you comrade. Then I'll bark no more, but at need I'll bite. Ifhe has a lance, I have a sword; if he bleeds you, I'll bleed him. Themoment his lance pricks your skin, little one, my sword-hilt knocksagainst his ribs; I have said it. "

And Denys turned pale, folded his arms, and looked gloomy and dangerous. 

Gerard sighed wearily. "Now, as all this is about me, give me leave tosay a word. "

"Ay! let the young man choose life or death for himself. "

Gerard then indirectly rebuked his noisy counsellors by contrast andexample. He spoke with unparalleled calmness, sweetness, and gentleness. And these were the words of Gerard the son of Eli. "I doubt not you bothmean me well; but you assassinate me between you. Calmness and quiet areeverything to me; but you are like two dogs growling over a bone. Andin sooth, bone I should be, did this uproar last long. "

There was a dead silence, broken only by the silvery voice of Gerard, as he lay tranquil, and gazed calmly at the ceiling, and trickled intowords. 

"First, venerable sir, I thank you for coming to see me, whether fromhumanity, or in the way of honest gain; all trades must live. 

"Your learning, reverend sir, seems great, to me at least, and for yourexperience, your age voucheth it. 

"You say you have bled many, and of these many, many have not diedthereafter, but lived, and done well. I must needs believe you. "

The physician bowed; Denys grunted. 

"Others, you say, you have bled, and-they are dead. I must needs believeyou. 

"Denys knows few things compared with you, but he knows them well. He isa man not given to conjecture. This I myself have noted. He says he hasseen the fevered and blooded for the most part die; the fevered and notblooded live. I must needs believe him. 

"Here, then, all is doubt. 

"But thus much is certain; if I be bled, I must pay you a fee, and beburnt and excruciated with a hot iron, who am no felon. 

"Pay a certain price in money and anguish for a doubtful remedy, thatwill I never. 

"Next to money and ease, peace and quiet are certain goods, above all ina sick-room; but 'twould seem men cannot argue medicine without heat andraised voices; therefore, sir, I will essay a little sleep, and Denyswill go forth and gaze on the females of the place, and I will keepyou no longer from those who can afford to lay out blood and money inflebotomy and cautery. "

The old physician had naturally a hot temper; he had often during thisbattle of words mastered it with difficulty, and now it mastered him. The most dignified course was silence; he saw this, and drew himself up, and made loftily for the door, followed close by his little boy and bigbasket. 

But at the door he choked, he swelled, he burst. He whirled and cameback open-mouthed, and the little boy and big basket had towhisk semicircularly not to be run down, for de minimis non curatMedicina-even when not in a rage. 

"Ah! you reject my skill, you scorn my art. My revenge shall be to leaveyou to yourself; lost idiot, take your last look at me, and at the sun. Your blood be on your head!" And away he stamped. 

But on reaching the door he whirled and came back; his wicker tailtwirling round after him like a cat's. 

"In twelve hours at furthest you will be in the secondary stage offever. Your head will split. Your carotids will thump. Aha! And let buta pin fall, you will jump to the ceiling. Then send for me; and I'll notcome. " He departed. But at the door-handle gathered fury, wheeled andcame flying, with pale, terror-stricken boy and wicker tail whiskingafter him. "Next will come--CRAMPS of the STOMACH. Aha!

"Then--BILIOUS VOMIT. Aha!

"Then--COLD SWEAT, and DEADLY STUPOR. 

"Then--CONFUSION OF ALL THE SENSES. 

"Then--BLOODY VOMIT. 

"And after that nothing can save you, not even I; and if I could I wouldnot, and so farewell!"

Even Denys changed colour at threats so fervent and precise; but Gerardonly gnashed his teeth with rage at the noise, and seized his hardbolster with kindling eye. 

This added fuel to the fire, and brought the insulted ancient back fromthe impassable door, with his whisking train. 

"And after that--MADNESS!

"And after that--BLACK VOMIT

"And then--CONVULSIONS!

"And then--THAT CESSATION OF ALL VITAL FUNCTIONS THE VULGAR CALL'DEATH, ' for which thank your own Satanic folly and insolence. Farewell. " He went. He came. He roared, "And think not to be buried inany Christian church-yard; for the bailiff is my good friend, and Ishall tell him how and why you died: felo de se! felo de se! Farewell. "

Gerard sprang to his feet on the bed by some supernatural gymnasticpower excitement lent him, and seeing him so moved, the vindictiveorator came back at him fiercer than ever, to launch some master-threatthe world has unhappily lost; for as he came with his whisking train, and shaking his fist, Gerard hurled the bolster furiously in his faceand knocked him down like a shot, the boy's head cracked under hisfalling master's, and crash went the dumb-stricken orator into thebasket, and there sat wedged in an inverted angle, crushing phialafter phial. The boy, being light, was strewed afar, but in a squattingposture; so that they sat in a sequence, like graduated specimens, thesmaller howling. But soon the doctor's face filled with horror, and heuttered a far louder and unearthly screech, and kicked and struggledwith wonderful agility for one of his age. 

He was sitting on the hot coals. 

They had singed the cloth and were now biting the man. Struggling wildlybut vainly to get out of the basket, he rolled yelling over with itsideways, and lo! a great hissing; then the humane Gerard ran andwrenched off the tight basket not without a struggle. The doctor lay onhis face groaning, handsomely singed with his own chafer, and slaked amoment too late by his own villainous compounds, which, however, beingas various and even beautiful in colour as they were odious in taste, had strangely diversified his grey robe, and painted it more gaudy thanneat. 

Gerard and Denys raised him up and consoled him. "Courage, man, 'tisbut cautery; balm of Gilead, why, you recommend it but now to my comradehere. "

The physician replied only by a look of concentrated spite, and went outin dead silence, thrusting his stomach forth before him in the drollestway. The boy followed him next moment but in that slight interval heleft off whining, burst into a grin, and conveyed to the culprits by anunrefined gesture his accurate comprehension of, and rapturous thoughcompressed joy at, his master's disaster. 

CHAPTER XXVII

THE worthy physician went home and told his housekeeper he was in agonyfrom "a bad burn. " Those were the words. For in phlogistic as in otherthings, we cauterize our neighbour's digits, but burn our own fingers. His housekeeper applied some old women's remedy mild as milk. Hesubmitted like a lamb to her experience: his sole object in the caseof this patient being cure: meantime he made out his bill for brokenphials, and took measures to have the travellers imprisoned at once. Hemade oath before a magistrate that they, being strangers and indebted tohim, meditated instant flight from the township. 

Alas! it was his unlucky day. His sincere desire and honest endeavour toperjure himself were baffled by a circumstance he had never foreseen norindeed thought possible. 

He had spoken the truth. 

And IN AN AFFIDAVIT!

The officers, on reaching "The Silver Lion", found the birds were flown. 

They went down to the river, and from intelligence they received there, started up the bank in hot pursuit. 

This temporary escape the friends owed to Denys's good sense andobservation. After a peal of laughter, that it was a cordial to hear, and after venting his watchword three times, he turned short grave, andtold Gerard Dusseldorf was no place for them. "That old fellow, " saidhe, "went off unnaturally silent for such a babbler: we are strangershere; the bailiff is his friend: in five minutes we shall lie in adungeon for assaulting a Dusseldorf dignity, are you strong enough tohobble to the water's edge? it is hard by. Once there you have but tolie down in a boat instead of a bed; and what is the odds?"

"The odds, Denys? untold, and all in favour of the boat. I pine forRome; for Rome is my road to Sevenbergen; and then we shall lie in theboat, but ON the Rhine, the famous Rhine; the cool, refreshing Rhine. I feel its breezes coming: the very sight will cure a littlehop-'o-my-thumb fever like mine; away! away!"

Finding his excitable friend in this mood, Denys settled hastily withthe landlord, and they hurried to the river. On inquiry they found totheir dismay that the public boat was gone this half hour, and no otherwould start that day, being afternoon. By dint, however, of asking agreat many questions, and collecting a crowd, they obtained an offer ofa private boat from an old man and his two sons. 

This was duly ridiculed by a bystander. "The current is too strong forthree oars. "

"Then my comrade and I will help row, " said the invalid. 

"No need, " said the old man. "Bless your silly heart, he owns t'otherboat. "

There was a powerful breeze right astern; the boatmen set a broad sail, and rowing also, went off at a spanking rate. 

"Are ye better, lad, for the river breeze?"

"Much better. But indeed the doctor did me good. "

"The doctor? Why, you would none of his cures. "

"No, but I mean--you will say I am nought--but knocking the old fooldown--somehow--it soothed me. "

"Amiable dove! how thy little character opens more and more every day, like a rosebud. I read thee all wrong at first. "

"Nay, Denys, mistake me not, neither. I trust I had borne with his idlethreats, though in sooth his voice went through my poor ears; but he wasan infidel, or next door to one, and such I have been taught to abhor. Did he not as good as say, we owed our inward parts to men with longGreek names, and not to Him, whose name is but a syllable, but whosehand is over all the earth? Pagan!"

"So you knocked him down forthwith--like a good Christian. "

"Now, Denys, you will still be jesting. Take not an ill man's part. Hadit been a thunderbolt from Heaven, he had met but his due; yet he tookbut a sorry bolster from this weak arm. "

"What weak arm?" inquired Denys, with twinkling eyes. "I have livedamong arms, and by Samson's hairy pow never saw I one more like acatapult. The bolster wrapped round his nose and the two ends kissedbehind his head, and his forehead resounded, and had he been Goliath, or Julius Caesar, instead of an old quacksalver, down he had gone. St. Denys guard me from such feeble opposites as thou! and above all fromtheir weak arms--thou diabolical young hypocrite. "

The river took many turns, and this sometimes brought the wind on theirside instead of right astern. Then they all moved to the weather sideto prevent the boat heeling over too much all but a child of about fiveyears old, the grandson of the boatman, and his darling; this urchinhad slipped on board at the moment of starting, and being too lightto affect the boat's trim, was above, or rather below, the laws ofnavigation. 

They sailed merrily on, little conscious that they were pursued by awhole posse of constables armed with the bailiff's writ, and that theirpursuers were coming up with them; for if the wind was strong, so wasthe current. 

And now Gerard suddenly remembered that this was a very good way toRome, but not to Burgundy. "Oh, Denys, " said he, with an almost alarmedlook, "this is not your road. "

"I know it, " said Denys quietly; "but what can I do? I cannot leave theetill the fever leaves thee; and it is on thee still, for thou artboth red and white by turns; I have watched thee. I must e'en go on toCologne, I doubt, and then strike across. "

"Thank Heaven, " said Gerard joyfully. He added eagerly, with a littletouch of self-deception, "'Twere a sin to be so near Cologne and not seeit. Oh, man, it is a vast and ancient city such as I have often dreamedof, but ne'er had the good luck to see. Me miserable, by what hardfortune do I come to it now? Well then, Denys, " continued the young manless warmly, "it is old enough to have been founded by a Roman ladyin the first century of grace, and sacked by Attila the barbarous, andafterwards sore defaced by the Norman Lothaire. And it has a churchfor every week in the year forbye chapels and churches innumerableof convents and nunneries, and above all, the stupendous minster yetunfinished, and therein, but in their own chapel, lie the three kingsthat brought gifts to our Lord, Melchior gold, and Gaspar frankincense, and Balthazar the black king, he brought myrrh; and over their bonesstands the shrine the wonder of the world; it is of ever-shining brassbrighter than gold, studded with images fairly wrought, and inlaid withexquisite devices, and brave with colours; and two broad stripes run toand fro, of jewels so great, so rare, each might adorn a crown orransom its wearer at need; and upon it stand the three kings curiouslycounterfeited, two in solid silver, richly gilt; these be bareheaded;but he of Aethiop ebony, and beareth a golden crown; and in the midstour blessed Lady, in virgin silver, with Christ in her arms; and at thecorners, in golden branches, four goodly waxen tapers do burn night andday. Holy eyes have watched and renewed that light unceasingly forages, and holy eyes shall watch them in saecula. I tell thee, Denys, theoldest song, the oldest Flemish or German legend, found them burning, and they shall light the earth to its grave. And there is St. Ursel'schurch, a British saint's, where lie her bones and all the other virginsher fellows; eleven thousand were they who died for the faith, being putto the sword by barbarous Moors, on the twenty-third day of October, twohundred and thirty-eight. Their bones are piled in the vaults, and manyof their skulls are in the church. St. Ursel's is in a thin golden case, and stands on the high altar, but shown to humble Christians only onsolemn days. "

"Eleven thousand virgins!" cried Denys. "What babies German men musthave been in days of yore. Well, would all their bones might turn fleshagain, and their skulls sweet faces, as we pass through the gates. 'Tisodds but some of them are wearied of their estate by this time. "

"Tush, Denys!" said Gerard; "why wilt thou, being good, still makethyself seem evil? If thy wishing-cap be on, pray that we may meet themeanest she of all those wise virgins in the next world, and to thatend let us reverence their holy dust in this one. And then there is thechurch of the Maccabees, and the cauldron in which they and theirmother Solomona were boiled by a wicked king for refusing to eat swine'sflesh. "

"Oh, peremptory king! and pig-headed Maccabees! I had eaten bacon withmy pork liever than change places at the fire with my meat. "

"What scurvy words are these? it was their faith. "

"Nay, bridle thy choler, and tell me, are there nought but churchesin this thy so vaunted city? for I affect rather Sir Knight than SirPriest. "

"Ay, marry, there is an university near a hundred years old; and thereis a market-place, no fairer in the world, and at the four sides ofit houses great as palaces; and there is a stupendous senate-house allcovered with images, and at the head of them stands one of stout HermanGryn, a soldier like thyself, lad. "

"Ay. Tell me of him! what feat of arms earned him his niche?"

"A rare one. He slew a lion in fair combat, with nought but his cloakand a short sword. He thrust the cloak in the brute's mouth, and cuthis spine in twain, and there is the man's effigy and eke the lion's toprove it. The like was never done but by three more, I ween; Samsonwas one, and Lysimachus of Macedon another, and Benaiah, a captain ofDavid's host. "

"Marry! three tall fellows. I would like well to sup with them allto-night. "

"So would not I, " said Gerard drily. 

"But tell me, " said Denys, with some surprise, "when wast thou inCologne?"

"Never but in the spirit. I prattle with the good monks by the way, andthey tell me all the notable things both old and new. 

"Ay, ay, have not I seen your nose under their very cowls? But when Ispeak of matters that are out of sight, my words they are small, and thething it was big; now thy words be as big or bigger than the things; arta good limner with thy tongue; I have said it; and for a saint, as readywith hand, or steel, or bolster--as any poor sinner living; and so, shall I tell thee which of all these things thou hast described draws meto Cologne?"

"Ay, Denys. "

"Thou, and thou only; no dead saint, but my living friend and comradetrue; 'tis thou alone draws Denys of Burgundy to Cologne?"

Gerard hung his head. 

At this juncture one of the younger boatmen suddenly inquired what wasamiss with "little turnip-face?"

His young nephew thus described had just come aft grave as a judge, andburst out crying in the midst without more ado. On this phenomenon, so sharply defined, he was subjected to many interrogatories, somecoaxingly uttered, some not. Had he hurt himself? had he over-atehimself? was he frightened? was he cold? was he sick? was he an idiot?

To all and each he uttered the same reply, which English writers renderthus, oh! oh! oh! and French writers thus, hi! hi! hi! So fixed areFiction's phonetics. 

"Who can tell what ails the peevish brat?" snarled the young boatmanimpatiently. "Rather look this way and tell me whom be these after!"The old man and his other son looked, and saw four men walking alongthe east bank of the river; at the sight they left rowing awhile, andgathered mysteriously in the stern, whispering and casting glancesalternately at their passengers and the pedestrians. 

The sequel may show they would have employed speculation better intrying to fathom the turnip-face mystery; I beg pardon of my age: I meanthe deep mind of dauntless infancy. 

"If 'tis as I doubt, " whispered one of the young men, "why not give thema squeak for their lives; let us make for the west bank. "

The old man objected stoutly. "What, " said he, "run our heads intotrouble for strangers! are ye mad? Nay, let us rather cross to the eastside; still side with the strong arm! that is my rede. What say you, Werter?"

"I say, please yourselves. "

What age and youth could not decide upon, a puff of wind settled mostimpartially. Came a squall, and the little vessel heeled over; the menjumped to windward to trim her; but to their horror they saw in the veryboat from stem to stern a ditch of water rushing to leeward, and thenext moment they saw nothing, but felt the Rhine, the cold and rushingRhine. 

"Turnip-face" had drawn the plug. 

The officers unwound the cords from their waists. 

Gerard could swim like a duck; but the best swimmer, canted out of aboat capsized, must sink ere he can swim. The dark water bubbled loudlyover his head, and then he came up almost blind and deaf for a moment;the next, he saw the black boat bottom uppermost, and figures clingingto it; he shook his head like a water-dog, and made for it by a sort ofunthinking imitation; but ere he reached it he heard a voice behind himcry not loud but with deep manly distress, "Adieu, comrade, adieu!"

He looked, and there was poor Denys sinking, sinking, weighed down byhis wretched arbalest. His face was pale, and his eyes staring wide, and turned despairingly on his dear friend. Gerard uttered a wild cryof love and terror, and made for him, cleaving the water madly; but thenext moment Denys was under water. 

The next, Gerard was after him. 

The officers knotted a rope and threw the end in. 

CHAPTER XXVIII

Things good and evil balance themselves in a remarkable manner andalmost universally. The steel bow attached to the arbalestrier's back, and carried above his head, had sunk him. That very steel bow, owingto that very position, could not escape Gerard's hands, one of whichgrasped it, and the other went between the bow and the cord, which wasas good. The next moment, Denys, by means of his crossbow, was hoistedwith so eager a jerk that half his body bobbed up out of water. 

"Now, grip me not! grip me not!" cried Gerard, in mortal terror of thatfatal mistake. 

"Pas si bete, " gurgled Denys. 

Seeing the sort of stuff he had to deal with, Gerard was hopeful andcalm directly. "On thy back, " said he sharply, and seizing the arbalest, and taking a stroke forward, he aided the desired movement. "Hand onmy shoulder! slap the water with the other hand! No--with a downwardmotion; so. Do nothing more than I bid thee. " Gerard had got hold ofDenys's long hair, and twisting it hard, caught the end between his sideteeth, and with the strong muscles of his youthful neck easily kept upthe soldier's head, and struck out lustily across the current. A momenthe had hesitated which side to make for, little knowing the awfulimportance of that simple decision; then seeing the west bank a triflenearest, he made towards it, instead of swimming to jail like a goodboy, and so furnishing one a novel incident. Owing to the force of thecurrent they slanted considerably, and when they had covered near ahundred yards, Denys murmured uneasily, "How much more of it?"

"Courage, " mumbled Gerard. "Whatever a duck knows, a Dutchman knows; artsafe as in bed. "

The next moment, to their surprise, they found themselves in shallowwater, and so waded ashore. Once on terra firma, they looked at oneanother from head to foot as if eyes could devour, then by one impulseflung each an arm round the other's neck, and panted there with heartstoo full to speak. And at this sacred moment life was sweet as heaven toboth; sweetest perhaps to the poor exiled lover, who had just saved hisfriend. Oh, joy to whose height what poet has yet soared, or ever triedto soar? To save a human life; and that life a loved one. Such momentsare worth living for, ay, three score years and ten. And then, calmer, they took hands, and so walked along the bank hand in hand like a pairof sweethearts, scarce knowing or caring whither they went. 

The boat people were all safe on the late concave, now convex craft, Herr Turnip-face, the "Inverter of things, " being in the middle. Allthis fracas seemed not to have essentially deranged his habits. At leasthe was greeting when he shot our friends into the Rhine, and greetingwhen they got out again. 

"Shall we wait till they right the boat?"

"No, Denys, our fare is paid; we owe them nought. Let us on, andbriskly. "

Denys assented, observing that they could walk all the way to Cologne onthis bank. 

"I fare not to Cologne, " was the calm reply. 

"Why, whither then?"

"To Burgundy. "

"To Burgundy? Ah, no! that is too good to be sooth. "

"Sooth 'tis, and sense into the bargain. What matters it to me how I goto Rome?"

"Nay, nay; you but say so to pleasure me. The change is too sudden; andthink me not so ill-hearted as take you at your word. Also did I not seeyour eyes sparkle at the wonders of Cologne? the churches, the images, the relics

"How dull art thou, Denys; that was when we were to enjoy them together. Churches! I shall see plenty, go Rome-ward how I will. The bones ofsaints and martyrs; alas! the world is full of them; but a friend likethee, where on earth's face shall I find another? No, I will not turnthee farther from the road that leads to thy dear home, and her thatpines for thee. Neither will I rob myself of thee by leaving thee. SinceI drew thee out of Rhine I love thee better than I did. Thou art mypearl: I fished thee; and must keep thee. So gainsay me not, or thouwilt bring back my fever; but cry courage, and lead on; and hey forBurgundy!"

Denys gave a joyful caper. "Courage! va pour la Bourgogne. Oh! soyestranquille! cette fois il est bien decidement mort, ce coquin-la. " Andthey turned their backs on the Rhine. 

On this decision making itself clear, across the Rhine there was acommotion in the little party that had been watching the discussion, andthe friends had not taken many steps ere a voice came to them over thewater. "HALT!"

Gerard turned, and saw one of those four holding out a badge of officeand a parchment slip. His heart sank; for he was a good citizen, andused to obey the voice that now bade him turn again to Dusseldorf--theLaw's. 

Denys did not share his scruples. He was a Frenchman, and despised everyother nation, laws, inmates, and customs included. He was a soldier, and took a military view of the situation. Superior force opposed; riverbetween; rear open; why, 'twas retreat made easy. He saw at a glancethat the boat still drifted in mid-stream, and there was no ferry nearerthan Dusseldorf. "I shall beat a quick retreat to that hill, " said he, "and then, being out of sight, quick step. "

They sauntered off. 

"Halt! in the bailiff's name, " cried a voice from the shore. 

Denys turned round and ostentatiously snapped his fingers at thebailiff, and proceeded. 

"Halt! in the archbishop's name. "

Denys snapped his fingers at his grace, and proceeded. 

"Halt! in the emperor's name. "

Denys snapped his fingers at his majesty, and proceeded. 

Gerard saw this needless pantomime with regret, and as soon as they hadpassed the brow of the hill, said, "There is now but one course, we mustrun to Burgundy instead of walking;" and he set off, and ran the bestpart of a league without stopping. 

Denys was fairly blown, and inquired what on earth had become ofGerard's fever. "I begin to miss it sadly, " said he drily. 

"I dropped it in Rhine, I trow, " was the reply. 

Presently they came to a little village, and here Denys purchased a loafand a huge bottle of Rhenish wine. "For, " he said, "we must sleep insome hole or corner. If we lie at an inn, we shall be taken in ourbeds. " This was no more than common prudence on the old soldier's part. 

The official network for catching law-breakers, especially plebeianones, was very close in that age; though the co-operation of the publicwas almost null, at all events upon the Continent. The innkeepers wereeverywhere under close surveillance as to their travellers, for whoseacts they were even in some degree responsible, more so it would seemthan for their sufferings. 

The friends were both glad when the sun set; and delighted, when, aftera long trudge under the stars (for the moon, if I remember right, didnot rise till about three in the morning) they came to a large barnbelonging to a house at some distance. A quantity of barley had beenlately thrashed; for the heap of straw on one side the thrashing-floorwas almost as high as the unthrashed corn on the other. 

"Here be two royal beds, " said Denys; "which shall we lie on, the mow, or the straw?"

"The straw for me, " said Gerard. 

They sat on the heap, and ate their brown bread, and drank their wine, and then Denys covered his friend up in straw, and heaped it high abovehim, leaving him only a breathing hole: "Water, they say, is death tofevered men; I'll make warm water on't, anyhow. "

Gerard bade him make his mind easy. "These few drops from Rhine cannotchill me. I feel heat enough in my body now to parch a kennel, or boil acloud if I was in one. " And with this epigram his consciousness went sorapidly, he might really be said to "fall asleep. "

Denys, who lay awake awhile, heard that which made him nestle closer. Horses' hoofs came ringing up from Dusseldorf, and the wooden barnvibrated as they rattled past howling in a manner too well known andunderstood in the 15th century, but as unfamiliar in Europe now as a redIndian's war-whoop. 

Denys shook where he lay. 

Gerard slept like a top. 

It all swept by, and troop and howls died away. 

The stout soldier drew a long breath, whistled in a whisper, closed hiseyes, and slept like a top, too. 

In the morning he sat up and put out his hand to wake Gerard. It lightedon the young man's forehead, and found it quite wet. Denys then in hisquality of nurse forbore to wake him. "It is ill to check sleep or sweatin a sick man, " said he. "I know that far, though I ne'er minced ape norgallows-bird. "

After waiting a good hour he felt desperately hungry; so he turned, andin self-defence went to sleep again. 

Poor fellow, in his hard life he had been often driven to thismanoeuvre. At high noon he was waked by Gerard moving, and found himsitting up with the straw smoking round him like a dung-hill. Animalheat versus moisture. Gerard called him "a lazy loon. " He quietlygrinned. 

They set out, and the first thing Denys did was to give Gerard hisarbalest, etc. , and mount a high tree on the road. "Coast clear to thenext village, " said he, and on they went. 

On drawing near the village, Denys halted and suddenly inquired ofGerard how he felt. 

"What! can you not see? I feel as if Rome was no further than yonhamlet. "

"But thy body, lad; thy skin?"

"Neither hot nor cold; and yesterday 'twas hot one while and coldanother. But what I cannot get rid of is this tiresome leg. "

"Le grand malheur! Many of my comrades have found no such difficulty. "

"Ah! there it goes again; itches consumedly. "

"Unhappy youth, " said Denys solemnly, "the sum of thy troubles is this:thy fever is gone, and thy wound is--healing. Sith so it is, " added heindulgently, "I shall tell thee a little piece of news I had otherwisewithheld. "

"What is't?" asked Gerard, sparkling with curiosity. 

"THE HUE AND CRY IS OUT AFTER US: AND ON FLEET HORSES. "

"Oh!"

CHAPTER XXIX

Gerard was staggered by this sudden communication, and his colour cameand went. Then he clenched his teeth with ire. For men of any spiritat all are like the wild boar; he will run from a superior force, owingperhaps to his not being an ass; but if you stick to his heels too longand too close, and, in short, bore him, he will whirl, and come tearingat a multitude of hunters, and perhaps bore you. Gerard then set histeeth and looked battle, But the next moment his countenance fell, andhe said plaintively, "And my axe is in Rhine. "

They consulted together. Prudence bade them avoid that village; hungersaid "buy food. "

Hunger spoke loudest. Prudence most convincingly. They settled to strikeacross the fields. 

They halted at a haystack and borrowed two bundles of hay, and lay onthem in a dry ditch out of sight, but in nettles. 

They sallied out in turn and came back with turnips. These they munchedat intervals in their retreat until sunset. 

Presently they crept out shivering into the rain and darkness, and gotinto the road on the other side of the village. 

It was a dismal night, dark as pitch, and blowing hard. They couldneither see, nor hear, nor be seen, nor heard; and for aught I know, passed like ghosts close to their foes. These they almost forgot in thenatural horrors of the black tempestuous night, in which they seemed togrope and hew their way as in black marble. When the moon rose they weremany a league from Dusseldorf. But they still trudged on. Presently theycame to a huge building. 

"Courage!" cried Denys, "I think I know this convent. Aye it is. We arein the see of Juliers. Cologne has no power here. "

The next moment they were safe within the walls. 

CHAPTER XXX

Here Gerard made acquaintance with a monk, who had constructed thegreat dial in the prior's garden, and a wheel for drawing water, anda winnowing machine for the grain, etc. , and had ever some ingeniousmechanism on hand. He had made several psalteries and two dulcimers, andwas now attempting a set of regalles, or little organ for the choir. 

Now Gerard played the humble psaltery a little; but the monk touchedthat instrument divinely, and showed him most agreeably what a novicehe was in music. He also illuminated finely, but could not write sobeautifully as Gerard. Comparing their acquirements with the earnestnessand simplicity of an age in which accomplishments implied a true naturalbent, Youth and Age soon became like brothers, and Gerard was pressedhard to stay that night. He consulted Denys, who assented with a ruefulshrug. 

Gerard told his old new friend whither he was going, and described theirlate adventures, softening down the bolster. 

"Alack!" said the good old man, "I have been a great traveller in myday, but none molested me. " He then told him to avoid inns; they werealways haunted by rogues and roysterers, whence his soul might take harmeven did his body escape, and to manage each day's journey so as to lieat some peaceful monastery; then suddenly breaking off and looking assharp as a needle at Gerard, he asked him how long since he had beenshriven? Gerard coloured up and replied feebly--

"Better than a fortnight. "

"And thou an exorcist! No wonder perils have overtaken thee. Come, thoumust be assoiled out of hand. "

"Yes, father, " said Gerard, "and with all mine heart;" and was sinkingdown to his knees, with his hands joined, but the monk stopped him halffretfully--

"Not to me! not to me! not to me! I am as full of the world as thou orany be that lives in't. My whole soul it is in these wooden pipes, andsorry leathern stops, which shall perish--with them whose minds arefixed on such like vanities. "

"Dear father, " said Gerard, "they are for the use of the Church, andsurely that sanctifies the pains and labour spent on them?"

"That is just what the devil has been whispering in mine ear thiswhile, " said the monk, putting one hand behind his back and shaking hisfinger half threateningly, half playfully, at Gerard. "He was even sokind and thoughtful as to mind me that Solomon built the Lord a housewith rare hangings, and that this in him was counted gracious and nosin. Oh! he can quote Scripture rarely. But I am not so simple a monkas you think, my lad, " cried the good father, with sudden defiance, addressing not Gerard but--Vacancy. "This one toy finished, vigils, fasts, and prayers for me; prayers standing, prayers lying on the chapelfloor, and prayers in a right good tub of cold water. " He nudged Gerardand winked his eye knowingly. "Nothing he hates and dreads like seeingus monks at our orisons up to our chins in cold water. For corpus domataqua. So now go confess thy little trumpery sins, pardonable in youthand secularity, and leave me to mine, sweet to me as honey, and to beexpiated in proportion. "

Gerard bowed his head, but could not help saying, "Where shall I find aconfessor more holy and clement?"

"In each of these cells, " replied the monk simply (they were now in thecorridor) "there, go to Brother Anselm, yonder. "

Gerard followed the monk's direction, and made for a cell; but the doorswere pretty close to one another, and it seems he mistook; for justas he was about to tap, he heard his old friend crying to him in anagitated whisper, "Nay! nay! nay!" He turned, and there was the monkat his cell-door, in a strange state of anxiety, going up and downand beating the air double-handed, like a bottom sawyer. Gerard reallythought the cell he was at must be inhabited by some dangerous wildbeast, if not by that personage whose presence in the convent had beenso distinctly proclaimed. He looked back inquiringly and went on to thenext door. Then his old friend nodded his head rapidly, bursting in amoment into a comparatively blissful expression of face, and shot backinto his den. He took his hour-glass, turned it, and went to work on hisregalles; and often he looked up, and said to himself, "Well-a-day, thesands how swift they run when the man is bent over earthly toys. "

Father Anselm was a venerable monk, with an ample head, and a face alldignity and love. Therefore Gerard in confessing to him, and replying tohis gentle though searching questions, could not help thinking, "Here isa head!--Oh dear! oh dear! I wonder whether you will let me draw it whenI have done confessing. " And so his own head got confused, and he forgota crime or two. However, he did not lower the bolstering this time, nor was he so uncandid as to detract from the pagan character of thebolstered. 

The penance inflicted was this: he was to enter the convent church, andprostrating himself, kiss the lowest step of the altar three times;then kneeling on the floor, to say three paternosters and a credo: "thisdone, come back to me on the instant. "

Accordingly, his short mortification performed, Gerard returned, andfound Father Anselm spreading plaster. 

"After the soul the body, " said he; "know that I am the chirurgeon here, for want of a better. This is going on thy leg; to cool it, not to burnit; the saints forbid. "

During the operation the monastic leech, who had naturally beeninterested by the Dusseldorf branch of Gerard's confession, rather sidedwith Denys upon "bleeding. " "We Dominicans seldom let blood nowadays;the lay leeches say 'tis from timidity and want of skill; but, in sooth, we have long found that simples will cure most of the ills that canbe cured at all. Besides, they never kill in capable hands; and otherremedies slay like thunderbolts. As for the blood, the Vulgate saithexpressly it is the life of a man. ' And in medicine or law, as indivinity, to be wiser than the All-wise is to be a fool. Moreover, simples are mighty. The little four-footed creature that kills thepoisonous snake, if bitten herself, finds an herb powerful enough toquell that poison, though stronger and of swifter operation than anymortal malady; and we, taught by her wisdom, and our own traditions, still search and try the virtues of those plants the good God hathstrewed this earth with, some to feed men's bodies, some to heal them. Only in desperate ills we mix heavenly with earthly virtue. We steepthe hair or the bones of some dead saint in the medicine, and thus workmarvellous cures. "

"Think you, father, it is along of the reliques? for Peter a Floris, alearned leech and no pagan, denies it stoutly. "

"What knows Peter a Floris? And what know I? I take not on me to saywe can command the saints, and will they nill they, can draw corporalvirtue from their blest remains. But I see that the patient drinkingthus in faith is often bettered as by a charm. Doubtless faith in therecipient is for much in all these cures. But so 'twas ever. A sickwoman, that all the Jewish leeches failed to cure, did but touchChrist's garment and was healed in a moment. Had she not touched thatsacred piece of cloth she had never been healed. Had she without faithnot touched it only, but worn it to her grave, I trow she had been nonethe better for't. But we do ill to search these things too curiously. All we see around us calls for faith. Have then a little patience. We shall soon know all. Meantime, I, thy confessor for the nonce, dostrictly forbid thee, on thy soul's health, to hearken learned lay folkon things religious. Arrogance is their bane; with it they shut heaven'sopen door in their own faces. Mind, I say, learned laics. Unlearned oneshave often been my masters in humility, and may be thine. Thy wound iscared for; in three days 'twill be but a scar. And now God speed thee, and the saints make thee as good and as happy as thou art thoughtfuland gracious. " Gerard hoped there was no need to part yet, for he wasto dine in the refectory. But Father Anselm told him, with a shade ofregret just perceptible and no more, that he did not leave his cell thisweek, being himself in penitence; and with this he took Gerard's headdelicately in both hands, and kissed him on the brow, and almost beforethe cell door had closed on him, was back to his pious offices. Gerardwent away chilled to the heart by the isolation of the monastic life, and saddened too. "Alas!" he thought, "here is a kind face I must neverlook to see again on earth; a kind voice gone from mine ear and my heartfor ever. There is nothing but meeting and parting in this sorrowfulworld. Well-a-day! well-a-day!" This pensive mood was interrupted bya young monk who came for him and took him to the refectory; there hefound several monks seated at a table, and Denys standing like a poker, being examined as to the towns he should pass through: the friarsthen clubbed their knowledge, and marked out the route, noting all thereligious houses on or near that road; and this they gave Gerard. Thensupper, and after it the old monk carried Gerard to his cell, and theyhad an eager chat, and the friar incidentally revealed the cause ofhis pantomime in the corridor. "Ye had well-nigh fallen into BrotherJerome's clutches. Yon was his cell. "

"Is Father Jerome an ill man, then?"

"An ill man!" and the friar crossed himself; "a saint, an anchorite, thevery pillar of this house! He had sent ye barefoot to Loretto. Nay, Iforgot, y'are bound for Italy; the spiteful old saint upon earth, hadsent ye to Canterbury or Compostella. But Jerome was born old and witha cowl; Anselm and I were boys once, and wicked beyond anything youcan imagine" (Gerard wore a somewhat incredulous look): "this keeps ushumble more or less, and makes us reasonably lenient to youth and hotblood. "

Then, at Gerard's earnest request, one more heavenly strain upon thepsalterion, and so to bed, the troubled spirit calmed, and the soreheart soothed. 

I have described in full this day, marked only by contrast, a day thatcame like oil on waves after so many passions and perils--because itmust stand in this narrative as the representative of many such dayswhich now succeeded to it. For our travellers on their weary wayexperienced that which most of my readers will find in the longerjourney of life, viz. , that stirring events are not evenly distributedover the whole road, but come by fits and starts, and as it were, inclusters. To some extent this may be because they draw one another bylinks more or less subtle. But there is more in it than that. It happensso. Life is an intermittent fever. Now all narrators, whether of historyor fiction, are compelled to slur these barren portions of time or elseline trunks. The practice, however, tends to give the unguarded readera wrong arithmetical impression, which there is a particular reasonfor avoiding in these pages as far as possible. I invite therefore yourintelligence to my aid, and ask you to try and realize that, althoughthere were no more vivid adventures for a long while, one day's marchsucceeded another; one monastery after another fed and lodged themgratis with a welcome always charitable, sometimes genial; and thoughthey met no enemy but winter and rough weather, antagonists not alwayscontemptible, yet they trudged over a much larger tract of territorythan that, their passage through which I have described so minutely. Andso the pair, Gerard bronzed in the face and travel-stained from head tofoot, and Denys with his shoes in tatters, stiff and footsore both ofthem, drew near the Burgundian frontier. 

CHAPTER XXXI

Gerard was almost as eager for this promised land as Denys; for thelatter constantly chanted its praises, and at every little annoyanceshowed him "they did things better in Burgundy;" and above all played onhis foible by guaranteeing clean bedclothes at the inns of that polishednation. "I ask no more, " the Hollander would say; "to think that I havenot lain once in a naked bed since I left home! When I look at theirlinen, instead of doffing habit and hose, it is mine eyes and nose Iwould fain be shut of. "

Denys carried his love of country so far as to walk twenty leagues inshoes that had exploded, rather than buy of a German churl, who wouldthrow all manner of obstacles in a customer's way, his incivility, hisdinner, his body. 

Towards sunset they found themselves at equal distances from a littletown and a monastery, only the latter was off the road. Denys was forthe inn, Gerard for the convent. Denys gave way, but on condition thatonce in Burgundy they should always stop at an inn. Gerard consentedto this the more readily that his chart with its list of convents endedhere. So they turned off the road. And now Gerard asked with surprisewhence this sudden aversion to places that had fed and lodged themgratis so often. The soldier hemmed and hawed at first, but at last hiswrongs burst forth. It came out that this was no sudden aversion, but anancient and abiding horror, which he had suppressed till now, but withinfinite difficulty, and out of politeness: "I saw they had put powderin your drink, " said he, "so I forbore them. However, being the last, why not ease my mind? Know then I have been like a fish out of waterin all those great dungeons. You straightway levant with some oldshaveling: so you see not my purgatory. "

"Forgive me! I have been selfish. "

"Ay, ay, I forgive thee, little one; 'tis not thy fault: art not thefirst fool that has been priest-rid, and monk-hit. But I'll notforgive them my misery. " Then, about a century before Henry VIII. 'scommissioners, he delivered his indictment. These gloomy piles wereall built alike. Inns differed, but here all was monotony. Great gate, little gate, so many steps and then a gloomy cloister. Here the dortour, there the great cold refectory, where you must sit mumchance, or atleast inaudible, he who liked to speak his mind out; "and then, "said he, "nobody is a man here, but all are slaves, and of what? of apeevish, tinkling bell, that never sleeps. An 'twere a trumpet now, ayesounding alarums, 'twouldn't freeze a man's heart so. Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, and you must sit to meat with may be no stomach for food. Ereyour meat settles in your stomach, tinkle, tinkle! and ye must to churchwith may be no stomach for devotion: I am not a hog at prayers, for one. Tinkle, tinkle, and now you must to bed with your eyes open. Well, bythen you have contrived to shut them, some uneasy imp of darkness hasgot to the bell-rope, and tinkle, tinkle, it behoves you say a prayer inthe dark, whether you know one or not. If they heard the sort of prayersI mutter when they break my rest with their tinkle! Well, you drop offagain and get about an eyeful of sleep: lo, it is tinkle, tinkle, formatins. "

"And the only clapper you love is a woman's, " put in Gerard halfcontemptuously. 

"Because there is some music in that even when it scolds, " was the stoutreply. "And then to be always checked. If I do but put my finger in thesalt-cellar, straightway I hear, 'Have you no knife that you finger thesalt?' And if I but wipe my knife on the cloth to save time, then 'tis, 'Wipe thy knife dirty on the bread, and clean upon the cloth!' Oh smallof soul! these little peevish pedantries fall chill upon good fellowshiplike wee icicles a-melting down from strawen eaves. "

"I hold cleanliness no pedantry, " said Gerard. "Shouldst learn bettermanners once for all. "

"Nay; 'tis they who lack manners. They stop a fellow's mouth at everyword. "

"At every other word, you mean; every obscene or blasphemous one. "

"Exaggerator, go to! Why, at the very last of these dungeons I found thepoor travellers sitting all chilled and mute round one shaveling, likerogues awaiting their turn to be hanged; so to cheer them up, I did butcry out, 'Courage, tout le monde, le dia--

"Connu! what befell?"

"Marry, this. 'Blaspheme not!' quo' the bourreau. 'Plait-il, ' say I. Doesn't he wheel and wyte on me in a sort of Alsatian French, turningall the P's into B's. I had much ado not to laugh in his face. "

"Being thyself unable to speak ten words of his language without afault. "

"Well, all the world ought to speak French. What avail so many jargonsexcept to put a frontier atwixt men's hearts?"

"But what said he?"

"What signifies it what a fool says?"

"Oh, not all the words of a fool are folly, or I should not listen toyou. "

"Well, then, he said, 'Such as begin by making free with the devil'sname, aye end by doing it with all the names in heaven. ' 'Father, ' saidI, 'I am a soldier, and this is but my "consigne" or watchword. " 'Oh, then, it is just a custom?' said he. I not divining the old fox, andthinking to clear myself, said, 'Ay, it was. ' 'Then that is ten timesworse, ' said he. ''Twill bring him about your ears one of these days. Hestill comes where he hears his name often called. ' Observe! no gratitudefor the tidings which neither his missals nor his breviary had ever lethim know. Then he was so good as to tell me, soldiers do commonly thecrimes for which all other men are broke on the wheel; a savoir murder, rape, and pillage. "

"And is't not true?"

"True or not, it was ill manners, " replied Denys guardedly. "And sosays this courteous host of mine, 'Being the foes of mankind, why makeenemies of good spirits into the bargain, by still shouting the names ofevil ones?' and a lot more stuff. "

"Well, but, Denys, whether you hearken his rede, or slight it, whereforeblame a man for raising his voice to save your soul?"

"How can his voice save my soul, when he keeps turning of his P's intoB's. "

Gerard was staggered: ere he could recover at this thunderbolt ofGallicism, Denys went triumphant off at a tangent, and stigmatized allmonks as hypocrites. "Do but look at them, how they creep about andcannot eye you like honest men. "

"Nay, " said Gerard eagerly, "that modest downcast gaze is part of theirdiscipline, 'tis 'custodia oculorum'. "

"Cussed toads eating hoc hac horum? No such thing; just so looks acut-purse. Can't meet a true man's eye. Doff cowl, monk; and behold, a thief; don cowl thief, and lo, a monk. Tell me not they will ever beable to look God Almighty in the face, when they can't even look a trueman in the face down here. Ah, here it is, black as ink! into the wellwe go, comrade. Misericorde, there goes the tinkle already. 'Tis thebest of tinkles though; 'tis for dinner: stay, listen! I thought so: thewolf in my stomach cried 'Amen!'" This last statement he confirmed withtwo oaths, and marched like a victorious gamecock into the convent, thinking by Gerard's silence he had convinced him, and not dreaming howprofoundly he had disgusted him. 

CHAPTER XXXII

In the refectory allusion was made, at the table where Gerard sat, to the sudden death of the monk who had undertaken to write out freshcopies of the charter of the monastery, and the rule, etc. 

Gerard caught this, and timidly offered his services. There was ahesitation which he mistook. "Nay, not for hire, my lords, but for love, and as a trifling return for many a good night's lodging the brethren ofyour order have bestowed on me a poor wayfarer. "

A monk smiled approvingly; but hinted that the late brother was anexcellent penman, and his work could not be continued but by a master. Gerard on this drew from his wallet with some trepidation a vellum deed, the back of which he had cleaned and written upon by way of specimen. The monk gave quite a start at sight of it, and very hastily went upthe hall to the high table, and bending his knee so as just to touch inpassing the fifth step and the tenth, or last, presented it to the priorwith comments. Instantly a dozen knowing eyes were fixed on it, and abuzz of voices was heard; and soon Gerard saw the prior point more thanonce, and the monk came back, looking as proud as Punch, with a savourycrustade ryal, or game pie gravied and spiced, for Gerard, and a silvergrace cup full of rich pimentum. This latter Gerard took, and bowinglow, first to the distant prior, then to his own company, quaffed, andcirculated the cup. 

Instantly, to his surprise, the whole table hailed him as a brother:"Art convent bred, deny it not?" He acknowledged it, and gave Heaventhanks for it, for otherwise he had been as rude and ignorant as hisbrothers, Sybrandt and Cornelis. 

"But 'tis passing strange how you could know, " said he. 

"You drank with the cup in both hands, " said two monks, speakingtogether. 

The voices had for some time been loudish round a table at the bottomof the hall; but presently came a burst of mirth so obstreperous andprolonged, that the prior sent the very sub-prior all down the hall tocheck it, and inflict penance on every monk at the table. And Gerard'scheek burned with shame; for in the heart of the unruly merriment hisear had caught the word "courage!" and the trumpet tones of Denys ofBurgundy. 

Soon Gerard was installed in feu Werter's cell, with wax lights, and alittle frame that could be set at any angle, and all the materials ofcaligraphy. The work, however, was too much for one evening. Then camethe question, how could he ask Denys, the monk-hater, to stay longer?However, he told him, and offered to abide by his decision. He wasagreeably surprised when Denys said graciously, "A day's rest will doneither of us harm. Write thou, and I'll pass the time as I may. "

Gerard's work was vastly admired; they agreed that the records of themonastery had gained by poor Werter's death. The sub-prior forced arix-dollar on Gerard, and several brushes and colours out of the conventstock, which was very large. He resumed his march warm at heart, forthis was of good omen; since it was on the pen he relied to makehis fortune and recover his well-beloved. "Come, Denys, " said hegood-humouredly, "see what the good monks have given me; now, do try tobe fairer to them; for to be round with you, it chilled my friendshipfor a moment to hear even you call my benefactors 'hypocrites. '"

"I recant, " said Denys. 

"Thank you! thank you! Good Denys. "

"I was a scurrilous vagabond. "

"Nay, nay, say not so, neither!"

"But we soldiers are rude and hasty. I give myself the lie, and I offerthose I misunderstood all my esteem. 'Tis unjust that thousands shouldbe defamed for the hypocrisy of a few. "

"Now are you reasonable. You have pondered what I said?"

"Nay, it is their own doing. "

Gerard crowed a little, we all like to be proved in the right; andwas all attention when Denys offered to relate how his conversion waseffected. 

"Well then, at dinner the first day a young monk beside me did open hisjaws and laughed right out and most musically. 'Good, ' said I, 'at lastI have fallen on a man and not a shorn ape. ' So, to sound him further, I slapped his broad back and administered my consigne. 'Heaven forbid!'says he. I stared. For the dog looked as sad as Solomon; a better mimesaw you never, even at a Mystery. 'I see war is no sharpener of thewits, ' said he. 'What are the clergy for but to fight the foul fiend?and what else are the monks for?

 "The fiend being dead, The friars are sped. "

You may plough up the convents, and we poor monks shall have nought todo--but turn soldiers, and so bring him to life again. ' Then there was agreat laugh at my expense. 'Well, you are the monk for me, ' said I. 'Andyou are the crossbowman for me, ' quo' he. 'And I'll be bound you couldtell us tales of the war should make our hair stand on end. ' 'Excusez!the barber has put that out of the question, ' quoth I, and then I hadthe laugh. "

"What wretched ribaldry!" observed Gerard pensively. 

The candid Denys at once admitted he had seen merrier jests hatched withless cackle. "'Twas a great matter to have got rid of hypocrisy. 'So, 'said I, 'I can give you the chaire de poule, if that may content ye. ''That we will see, ' was the cry, and a signal went round. "

Denys then related, bursting with glee, how at bedtime he had been takento a cell instead of the great dortour, and strictly forbidden to sleep;and to aid his vigil, a book had been lent him of pictures representinga hundred merry adventures of monks in pursuit of the female laity;and how in due course he had been taken out barefooted and down to theparlour, where was a supper fit for the duke, and at it twelve jollyfriars, the roaringest boys he had ever met in peace or war. How thestory, the toast, the jest, the wine-cup had gone round, and somehad played cards with a gorgeous pack, where Saint Theresa, and SaintCatherine, etc. , bedizened with gold, stood for the four queens; andblack, white, grey, and crutched friars for the four knaves; and hadstaked their very rosaries, swearing like troopers when they lost. Andhow about midnight a sly monk had stolen out, but had by him and othersbeen as cannily followed into the garden, and seen to thrust his handinto the ivy and out with a rope-ladder. With this he had run up onthe wall, which was ten feet broad, yet not so nimbly but what a russetkirtle had popped up from the outer world as quick as he; and so tobilling and cooing: that this situation had struck him as rather felinethan ecclesiastical, and drawn from him the appropriate comment of a"mew!" The monks had joined the mewsical chorus, and the lay visitorshrieked and been sore discomforted; but Abelard only cried, "What, areye there, ye jealous miauling knaves? ye shall caterwaul to some tuneto-morrow night. I'll fit every man-jack of ye with a fardingale. " Thatthis brutal threat had reconciled him to stay another day--at Gerard'srequest. 

Gerard groaned. 

Meantime, unable to disconcert so brazen a monk, and the demoisellebeginning to whimper, they had danced caterwauling in a circle, thenbestowed a solemn benediction on the two wall-flowers, and off tothe parlour, where they found a pair lying dead drunk, and othertwo affectionate to tears. That they had straightway carried off theinanimate, and dragged off the loving and lachymose, kicked them allmerrily each into his cell. 

"And so shut up in measureless content. "

Gerard was disgusted: and said so. 

Denys chuckled, and proceeded to tell him how the next day he and theyoung monks had drawn the fish-ponds and secreted much pike, carp, tench, and eel for their own use: and how, in the dead of night, he hadbeen taken shoeless by crooked ways into the chapel, a ghost-like place, being dark, and then down some steps into a crypt below the chapelfloor, where suddenly paradise had burst on him. 

"'Tis there the holy fathers retire to pray, " put in Gerard. 

"Not always, " said Denys; "wax candles by the dozen were lighted, andprincely cheer; fifteen soups maigre, with marvellous twangs of venison, grouse, and hare in them, and twenty different fishes (being Friday), cooked with wondrous art, and each he between two buxom lasses, and eachlass between two lads with a cowl; all but me: and to think I had to wooby interpreter. I doubt the knave put in three words for himself andone for me; if he didn't, hang him for a fool. And some of the weakervessels were novices, and not wont to hold good wine; had to be coaxedere they would put it to their white teeth; mais elles s'y faisaient;and the story, and the jest, and the cup went round (by-the-by, they hadflagons made to simulate breviaries); and a monk touched the cittern, and sang ditties with a voice tunable as a lark in spring. The posiesdid turn the faces of the women folk bright red at first: but elles s'yfaisaient. "

Here Gerard exploded. 

"Miserable wretches! Corrupters of youth! Perverters of innocence! butfor your being there, Denys, who have been taught no better, oh, would God the church had fallen on the whole gang. Impious, abominablehypocrites!"

"Hypocrites?" cried Denys, with unfeigned surprise. "Why, that is what Iclept them ere I knew them: and you withstood me. Nay, they are sinners;all good fellows are that; but, by St. Denys his helmeted skull, nohypocrites, but right jolly roaring blades. "

"Denys, " said Gerard solemnly, "you little know the peril you ran thatnight. That church you defiled amongst you is haunted; I had it fromone of the elder monks. The dead walk there, their light feet have beenheard to patter o'er the stones. "

"Misericorde!" whispered Denys. 

"Ay, more, " said Gerard, lowering his voice almost to a whisper;"celestial sounds have issued from the purlieus of that very crypt youturned into a tavern. Voices of the dead holding unearthly communionhave chilled the ear of midnight, and at times, Denys, the faithful intheir nightly watches have even heard music from dead lips; and chords, made by no mortal finger, swept by no mortal hand, have rung faintly, like echoes, deep among the dead in those sacred vaults. "

Denys wore a look of dismay. "Ugh! if I had known, mules and wain-ropeshad not hauled me thither; and so" (with a sigh) "I had lost a merrytime. "

Whether further discussion might have thrown any more light upon theseghostly sounds, who can tell? for up came a "bearded brother" from themonastery, spurring his mule, and waving a piece of vellum in his hand. It was the deed between Ghysbrecht and Floris Brandt. Gerard valued itdeeply as a remembrance of home: he turned pale at first but to think hehad so nearly lost it, and to Denys's infinite amusement not only gave apiece of money to the lay brother, but kissed the mule's nose. 

"I'll read you now, " said Gerard, "were you twice as ill written;and--to make sure of never losing you"--here he sat down, and taking outneedle and thread, sewed it with feminine dexterity to his doublet, andhis mind, and heart, and soul were away to Sevenbergen. 

They reached the promised land, and Denys, who was in high spirits, doffed his bonnet to all the females; who curtsied and smiled in return;fired his consigne at most of the men; at which some stared, somegrinned, some both; and finally landed his friend at one of thelong-promised Burgundian inns. 

"It is a little one, " said he, "but I know it of old for a good one;Les Trois Poissons. ' But what is this writ up? I mind not this;" and hepointed to an inscription that ran across the whole building in a singleline of huge letters. "Oh, I see. 'Ici on loge a pied et a cheval, '"said Denys, going minutely through the inscription, and lookingbumptious when he had effected it. 

Gerard did look, and the sentence in question ran thus:

"ON NE LOGE CEANS A CREDIT; CE BONHOMME EST MORT, LES MAUVAIS PAIEURSL'ONT TUE. "

CHAPTER XXXIII

They met the landlord in the passage. 

"Welcome, messieurs, " said he, taking off his cap, with a low bow. 

"Come, we are not in Germany, " said Gerard. 

In the public room they found the mistress, a buxom woman of forty. Shecurtsied to them, and smiled right cordially "Give yourself the troubleof sitting ye down, fair sir, " said she to Gerard, and dusted two chairswith her apron, not that they needed it. 

"Thank you, dame, " said Gerard. "Well, " thought he, "this is a politenation: the trouble of sitting down? That will I with singular patience;and presently the labour of eating, also the toil of digestion, andfinally, by Hercules his aid, the strain of going to bed, and thestruggle of sinking fast asleep. 

"Why, Denys, what are you doing? ordering supper for only two?"

"Why not?"

"What, can we sup without waiting for forty more? Burgundy forever!"

"Aha! Courage, camarade. Le dia--"

"C'est convenu. "

The salic law seemed not to have penetrated to French inns. In this oneat least wimple and kirtle reigned supreme; doublets and hose were fewin number, and feeble in act. The landlord himself wandered objectless, eternally taking off his cap to folk for want of thought; and the women, as they passed him in turn, thrust him quietly aside without looking athim, as we remove a live twig in bustling through a wood. 

A maid brought in supper, and the mistress followed her, empty handed. 

"Fall to, my masters, " said she cheerily; "y'have but one enemy here;and he lies under your knife. " (I shrewdly suspect this of formula. )

They fell to. The mistress drew her chair a little toward the table; andprovided company as well as meat; gossiped genially with them like oldacquaintances: but this form gone through, the busy dame was soon offand sent in her daughter, a beautiful young woman of about twenty, who took the vacant seat. She was not quite so broad and genial as theelder, but gentle and cheerful, and showed a womanly tenderness forGerard on learning the distance the poor boy had come, and had to go. She stayed nearly half-an-hour, and when she left them Gerard said, "This an inn? Why, it is like home. "

"Qui fit Francois il fit courtois, " said Denys, bursting with gratifiedpride. 

"Courteous? nay, Christian; to welcome us like home guests and oldfriends, us vagrants, here to-day and gone to-morrow. But indeed whobetter merits pity and kindness than the worn traveller far from hisfolk? Hola! here's another. "

The new-comer was the chambermaid, a woman of about twenty-five, witha cocked nose, a large laughing mouth, and a sparkling black eye, and abare arm very stout but not very shapely. 

The moment she came in, one of the travellers passed a somewhat freejest on her; the next the whole company were roaring at his expense, so swiftly had her practised tongue done his business. Even as, ina passage of arms between a novice and a master of fence, foilsclash--novice pinked. On this another, and then another, must break alance with her; but Marion stuck her great arms upon her haunches, andheld the whole room in play. This country girl possessed in perfectionthat rude and ready humour which looks mean and vulgar on paper, butcarries all before it spoken: not wit's rapier; its bludgeon. Nature haddone much for her in this way, and daily practice in an inn the rest. 

Yet shall she not be photographed by me, but feebly indicated: for itwas just four hundred years ago, the raillery was coarse, she returnedevery stroke in kind, and though a virtuous woman, said things withoutwinking, which no decent man of our day would say even among men. 

Gerard sat gaping with astonishment. This was to him almost a newvariety of "that interesting species, " homo. He whispered "Denys, NowI see why you Frenchmen say 'a woman's tongue is her sword:'" just thenshe levelled another assailant; and the chivalrous Denys, to consoleand support "the weaker vessel, " the iron kettle among the clay pots, administered his consigne, "Courage, ma mie, le---" etc. 

She turned on him directly. "How can he be dead as long as there is anarcher left alive?" (General laughter at her ally's expense. )

"It is 'washing day, ' my masters, " said she, with sudden gravity. 

"Apres? We travellers cannot strip and go bare while you wash ourclothes, " objected a peevish old fellow by the fireside, who had keptmumchance during the raillery, but crept out into the sunshine ofcommonplaces. 

"I aimed not your way, ancient man, " replied Marion superciliously. "Butsince you ask me" (here she scanned him slowly from head to foot), "Itrow you might take a turn in the tub, clothes and all, and no harmdone" (laughter). "But what I spoke for, I thought this young sire mightlike his beard starched. "

Poor Gerard's turn had come; his chin crop was thin and silky. 

The loudest of all the laughers this time was the traitor Denys, whosebeard was of a good length, and singularly stiff and bristly; so thatShakespeare, though he never saw him, hit him in the bull's eye. 

 "Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard. " --As You Like It. 

Gerard bore the Amazonian satire mighty calmly. He had little personalvanity. "Nay, 'chambriere, '" said he, with a smile, "mine is allunworthy your pains; take you this fair growth in hand!" and he pointedto Denys's vegetable. 

"Oh, time for that, when I starch the besoms. "

Whilst they were all shouting over this palpable hit, the mistressreturned, and in no more time than it took her to cross the threshold, did our Amazon turn to a seeming Madonna meek and mild. 

Mistresses are wonderful subjugators. Their like I think breathes noton the globe. Housemaids, decide! It was a waste of histrionic abilitythough; for the landlady had heard, and did not at heart disapprove, thepeals of laughter. 

"Ah, Marion, lass, " said she good-humouredly, "if you laid me anegg every time you cackle, 'L'es Trois Poissons' would never lack anomelet. "

"Now, dame, " said Gerard, "what is to pay?"

"What for?"

"Our supper. "

"Where is the hurry? cannot you be content to pay when you go? lose theguest, find the money, is the rule of 'The Three Fish. '"

"But, dame, outside 'The Three Fish' it is thus written--'Ici-on neloge--"

"Bah! Let that flea stick on the wall! Look hither, " and she pointedto the smoky ceiling, which was covered with hieroglyphics. These wereaccounts, vulgo scores; intelligible to this dame and her daughter, whowrote them at need by simply mounting a low stool, and scratching witha knife so as to show lines of ceiling through the deposit of smoke. Thedame explained that the writing on the wall was put there to frightenmoneyless folk from the inn altogether, or to be acted on at odd timeswhen a non-paying face should come in and insist on being served. "Wecan't refuse them plump, you know. The law forbids us. "

"And how know you mine is not such a face?"

"Out fie! it is the best face that has entered 'The Three Fish' thisautumn. "

"And mine, dame?" said Denys; "dost see no knavery here?"

She eyed him calmly. "Not such a good one as the lad's; nor ever willbe. But it is the face of a true man. For all that, " added she drily, "an I were ten years younger, I'd as lieve not meet that face on a darknight too far from home. "

Gerard stared. Denys laughed. "Why, dame, I would but sip the night dewoff the flower; and you needn't take ten years off, nor ten days, to beworth risking a scratched face for. "

"There, our mistress, " said Marion, who had just come in, "said I nott'other day you could make a fool of them still, an if you were properlyminded?"

"I dare say ye did; it sounds like some daft wench's speech. "

"Dame, " said Gerard, "this is wonderful. "

"What? Oh! no, no, that is no wonder at all. Why, I have been here allmy life; and reading faces is the first thing a girl picks up in aninn. "

Marion. "And frying eggs the second; no, telling lies; frying eggs isthe third, though. "

The Mistress. "And holding her tongue the last, and modesty the dayafter never at all. "

Marion. "Alack! Talk of my tongue. But I say no more. She under whosewing I live now deals the blow. I'm sped--'tis but a chambermaid gone. Catch what's left on't!" and she staggered and sank backwards on to thehandsomest fellow in the room, which happened to be Gerard. 

"Tic! tic!" cried he peevishly; "there, don't be stupid! that is tooheavy a jest for me. See you not I am talking to the mistress?"

Marion resumed her elasticity with a grimace, made two little boundsinto the middle of the floor, and there turned a pirouette. "There, mistress, " said she, "I give in; 'tis you that reigns supreme with themen, leastways with male children. "

"Young man, " said the mistress, "this girl is not so stupid as herdeportment; in reading of faces, and frying of omelets, there we aregreat. 'Twould be hard if we failed at these arts, since they are aboutall we do know. "

"You do not quite take me, dame, " said Gerard. "That honesty in a faceshould shine forth to your experienced eye, that seems reasonable: buthow by looking on Denys here could you learn his one little foible, hisinsanity, his miserable mulierosity?" Poor Gerard got angrier the morehe thought of it. 

"His mule--his what?" (crossing herself with superstitious awe at thepolysyllable). 

"Nay, 'tis but the word I was fain to invent for him. "

"Invent? What, can a child like you make other words than grow inBurgundy by nature? Take heed what ye do! why, we are overrun with themalready, especially bad ones. Lord, these be times. I look to hear of anew thistle invented next. "

"Well then, dame, mulierose--that means wrapped up, body and soul, in women. So prithee tell me; how did you ever detect the noodle'smulierosity?"

"Alas! good youth, you make a mountain of a molehill. We that are womenbe notice-takers; and out of the tail of our eye see more than most mencan, glaring through a prospect glass. Whiles I move to and fro doingthis and that, my glance is still on my guests, and I did notice thatthis soldier's eyes were never off the womenfolk: my daughter, orMarion, or even an old woman like me, all was gold to him: and there asat glowering; oh, you foolish, foolish man! Now you still turned to thespeaker, her or him, and that is common sense. "

Denys burst into a hoarse laugh. "You never were more out. Why, thissilky, smooth-faced companion is a very Turk--all but his beard. He iswhat d'ye call 'em oser than ere an archer in the Duke's body-guard. Heis more wrapped up in one single Dutch lass called Margaret, than I amin the whole bundle of ye, brown and fair. "

"Man alive, that is just the contrary, " said the hostess. "Yourn is thebane, and hisn the cure. Cling you still to Margaret, my dear. I hopeshe is an honest girl. "

"Dame, she is an angel. "

"Ay, ay, they are all that till better acquainted. I'd as lieve have herno more than honest, and then she will serve to keep you out of worsecompany. As for you, soldier, there is trouble in store for you. Youreyes were never made for the good of your soul. "

"Nor of his pouch either, " said Marion, striking in, "and his lips, theywill sip the dew, as he calls it, off many a bramble bush. "

"Overmuch clack! Marion overmuch clack. "

"Ods bodikins, mistress; ye didn't hire me to be one o' your threefishes, did ye?" and Marion sulked thirty seconds. 

"Is that the way to speak to our mistress?" remonstrated the landlord, who had slipped in. 

"Hold your whisht, " said his wife sharply; "it is not your business tocheck the girl; she is a good servant to you. "

"What, is the cock never to crow, and the hens at it all day?"

"You can crow as loud as you like, my man out o' doors. But the henmeans to rule the roost. "

"I know a byword to that tune. " said Gerard. 

"Do ye, now? out wi't then. "

 "Femme veut en toute saison, Estre dame en sa mason. "

"I never heard it afore; but 'tis as sooth as gospel. Ay, they thatset these bywords a rolling had eyes and tongues, and tongues and eyes. Before all the world give me an old saw. "

"And me a young husband, " said Marion. "Now there was a chance for youall, and nobody spoke. Oh! it is too late now, I've changed my mind. "

"All the better for some poor fellow, " suggested Denys. 

And now the arrival of the young mistress, or, as she was called, thelittle mistress, was the signal for them all to draw round the fire, like one happy family, travellers, host, hostess, and even servants inthe outer ring, and tell stories till bedtime. And Gerard in his turntold a tremendous one out of his repertory, a MS. Collection of "acts ofthe saints, " and made them all shudder deliciously; but soon after beganto nod, exhausted by the effort, I should say. The young mistress saw, and gave Marion a look. She instantly lighted a rush, and laying herhand on Gerard's shoulder, invited him to follow her. She showed him aroom where were two nice white beds, and bade him choose. 

"Either is paradise, " said he. "I'll take this one. Do you know, I havenot lain in a naked bed once since I left my home in Holland. "

"Alack! poor soul!" said she; "well, then, the sooner my flax and yourdown (he! he!) come together, the better; so--allons!" and she held outher cheek as business-like as if it had been her hand for a fee. 

"Allons? what does that mean?"

"It means 'good-night. ' Ahem! What, don't they salute the chambermaid inyour part?"

"Not all in a moment. "

"What, do they make a business on't?"

"Nay, perverter of words, I mean we make not so free with strange women. 

"They must be strange women if they do not think you strange fools, then. Here is a coil. Why, all the old greasy greybeards that lie at ourinn do kiss us chambermaids; faugh! and what have we poor wretches toset on t'other side the compt but now and then a nice young----? Alack!time flies, chambermaids can't be spared long in the nursery, so howis't to be?"

"An't please you arrange with my comrade for both. He is mulierose; I amnot. "

"Nay, 'tis the curb he will want, not the spur. Well! well! you shallto bed without paying the usual toll; and oh, but 'tis sweet to fallin with a young man who can withstand these ancient ill customs, andgainsay brazen hussies. Shalt have thy reward. "

"Thank you! But what are you doing with my bed?"

"Me? oh, only taking off these sheets, and going to put on the pair thedrunken miller slept in last night. "

"Oh, no! no! You cruel, black-hearted thing! There! there!"

"A la bonne heure! What will not perseverance effect? But note now thefrowardness of a mad wench! I cared not for't a button. I am dead sickof that sport this five years. But you denied me; so then forthwith Ibehoved to have it; belike had gone through fire and water for't. Alas, young sir, we women are kittle cattle; poor perverse toads: excuse us:and keep us in our place, savoir, at arm's length; and so good-night!"

At the door she turned and said, with a complete change of tone andmanner: "The Virgin guard thy head, and the holy Evangelists watch thebed where lies a poor young wanderer far from home! Amen!"

And the next moment he heard her run tearing down the stairs, and soon apeal of laughter from the salle betrayed her whereabouts. 

"Now that is a character, " said Gerard profoundly, and yawned over thediscovery. 

In a very few minutes he was in a dry bath of cold, clean linen, inexpressibly refreshing to him after so long disuse: then came adelicious glow; and then--Sevenbergen. 

In the morning Gerard awoke infinitely refreshed, and was for rising, but found himself a close prisoner. His linen had vanished. Now thiswas paralysis; for the nightgown is a recent institution. In Gerard'scentury, and indeed long after, men did not play fast and loose withclean sheets (when they could get them), but crept into them clothedwith their innocence, like Adam: out of bed they seem to have taken mostafter his eldest son. 

Gerard bewailed his captivity to Denys; but that instant the dooropened, and in sailed Marion with their linen, newly washed and ironed, on her two arms, and set it down on the table. 

"Oh you good girl, " cried Gerard. 

"Alack, have you found me out at last?"

"Yes, indeed. Is this another custom?"

"Nay, not to take them unbidden: but at night we aye questiontravellers, are they for linen washed. So I came into you, but you wereboth sound. Then said I to the little mistress, 'La! where is the senseof waking wearied men, t'ask them is Charles the Great dead, and wouldthey liever carry foul linen or clean, especially this one with a skinlike cream? 'And so he has, I declare, ' said the young mistress. "

"That was me, " remarked Denys, with the air of a commentator. 

"Guess once more, and you'll hit the mark. "

"Notice him not, Marion, he is an impudent fellow; and I am sure wecannot be grateful enough for your goodness, and I am sorry I everrefused you--anything you fancied you should like. "

"Oh, are ye there, " said l'espiegle. "I take that to mean you wouldfain brush the morning dew off, as your bashful companion calls it; wellthen, excuse me, 'tis customary, but not prudent. I decline. Quits withyou, lad. "

"Stop! stop!" cried Denys, as she was making off victorious, "I amcurious to know how many, of ye were here last night a-feasting youreyes on us twain. 

"'Twas so satisfactory a feast as we weren't half a minute over't. Who?why the big mistress, the little mistress, Janet, and me, and the wholeposse comitatus, on tiptoe. We mostly make our rounds the last thing, not to get burned down; and in prodigious numbers. Somehow that makethus bolder, especially where archers lie scattered about. "

"Why did not you tell me? I'd have lain awake. "

"Beau sire, the saying goes that the good and the ill are all one whiletheir lids are closed. So we said, 'Here is one who will serve God bestasleep, Break not his rest!'"

"She is funny, " said Gerard dictatorially. 

"I must be either that or knavish. "

"How so?"

"Because 'The Three Fish' pay me to be funny. You will eat before youpart? Good! then I'll go see the meat be fit for such worshipful teeth. "

"Denys!"

"What is your will?"

"I wish that was a great boy, and going along with us, to keep uscheery. "

"So do not I. But I wish it was going along with us as it is. "

"Now Heaven forefend! A fine fool you would make of yourself. "

They broke their fast, settled their score, and said farewell. Thenit was they found that Marion had not exaggerated the "custom of thecountry. " The three principal women took and kissed them right heartily, and they kissed the three principal women. The landlord took and kissedthem, and they kissed the landlord; and the cry was, "Come back, thesooner the better!"

"Never pass 'The Three Fish'; should your purses be void, bringyourselves: 'le sieur credit' is not dead for you. "

And they took the road again. 

They came to a little town, and Denys went to buy shoes. The shopkeeperwas in the doorway, but wide awake. He received Denys with a bow downto the ground. The customer was soon fitted, and followed to the street, and dismissed with graceful salutes from the doorstep. 

The friends agreed it was Elysium to deal with such a shoemaker as this. "Not but what my German shoes have lasted well enough, " said Gerard thejust. 

Outside the town was a pebbled walk. 

"This is to keep the burghers's feet dry, a-walking o' Sundays withtheir wives and daughters, " said Denys. 

Those simple words of Denys, one stroke of a careless tongue, painted"home" in Gerard's heart. "Oh, how sweet!" said he. 

"Mercy! what is this? A gibbet! and ugh, two skeletons thereon!Oh, Denys, what a sorry sight to woo by!"

"Nay, " said Denys, "a comfortable sight; for every rogue i' the airthere is one the less a-foot. "

A little farther on they came to two pillars, and between these was ahuge wheel closely studded with iron prongs; and entangled in these werebones and fragments of cloth miserably dispersed over the wheel. 

Gerard hid his face in his hands. "Oh, to think those patches and bonesare all that is left of a man! of one who was what we are now. "

"Excusez! a thing that went on two legs and stole; are we no more thanthat?"

"How know ye he stole? Have true men never suffered death and torturetoo?"

"None of my kith ever found their way to the gibbet, I know. "

"The better their luck. Prithee, how died the saints?"

"Hard. But not in Burgundy. "

"Ye massacred them wholesale at Lyons, and that is on Burgundy'sthreshold. To you the gibbet proves the crime, because you read notstory. Alas! had you stood on Calvary that bloody day we sigh for tothis hour, I tremble to think you had perhaps shouted for joy at thegibbet builded there; for the cross was but the Roman gallows, FatherMartin says. "

"The blaspheming old hound!"

"Oh, fie! fie! a holy and a book-learned man. Ay, Denys, y'had readthem, that suffered there, by the bare light of the gibbet. 'Drivein the nails!' y'had cried: 'drive in the spear!' Here be threemalefactors. Three 'roues. ' Yet of those little three one was the firstChristian saint, and another was the Saviour of the world which gibbetedhim. "

Denys assured him on his honour they managed things better in Burgundy. He added, too, after profound reflection, that the horrors Gerard hadalluded to had more than once made him curse and swear with rage whentold by the good cure in his native village at Eastertide: "but theychanced in an outlandish nation, and near a thousand years agone. Mortde ma vie, let us hope it is not true; or at least sore exaggerated. Dobut see how all tales gather as they roll!"

Then he reflected again, and all in a moment turned red with ire. "Doye not blush to play with your book-craft on your unlettered friend, andthrow dust in his eyes, evening the saints with these reptiles?"

Then suddenly he recovered his good humour. "Since your heart beats forvermin, feel for the carrion crows! they be as good vermin as these;would ye send them to bed supperless, poor pretty poppets? Why, thesebe their larder; the pangs of hunger would gnaw them dead, but for coldcut-purse hung up here and there. "

Gerard, who had for some time maintained a dead silence, informed himthe subject was closed between them, and for ever. "There are things, "said he, "in which our hearts seem wide as the poles asunder, and ekeour heads. But I love thee dearly all the same, " he added, with infinitegrace and tenderness. 

Towards afternoon they heard a faint wailing noise on ahead; it grewdistincter as they proceeded. Being fast walkers they soon came up withits cause: a score of pikemen, accompanied by several constables, weremarching along, and in advance of them was a herd of animals they weredriving. These creatures, in number rather more than a hundred, were ofvarious ages, only very few were downright old: the males were downcastand silent. It was the females from whom all the outcry came. In otherwords, the animals thus driven along at the law's point were men andwomen. 

"Good Heaven!" cried Gerard, "what a band of them! But stay, surely allthose children cannot be thieves; why, there are some in arms. What onearth is this, Denys?"

Denys advised him to ask that "bourgeois" with the badge; "This isBurgundy: here a civil question ever draws a civil reply. "

Gerard went up to the officer, and removing his cap, a civility whichwas immediately returned, said, "For our Lady's sake, sir, what do yewith these poor folk?"

"Nay, what is that to you, my lad?" replied the functionarysuspiciously. 

"Master, I'm a stranger, and athirst for knowledge. "

"That is another matter. What are we doing? ahem. Why we--Dost hear, Jacques? Here is a stranger seeks to know what we are doing, " and thetwo machines were tickled that there should be a man who did not knowsomething they happened to know. In all ages this has tickled. However, the chuckle was brief and moderated by the native courtesy, and theofficial turned to Gerard again. "What we are doing? hum!" and now hehesitated, not from any doubt as to what he was doing, but because hewas hunting for a single word that should convey the matter. 

"Ce que nous faisons, mon gars?--Mais--dam--NOUS TRANSVASONS. "

"You decant? that should mean you pour from one vessel to another. "

"Precisely. " He explained that last year the town of Charmes had beensore thinned by a pestilence, whole houses emptied and trades short ofhands. Much ado to get in the rye, and the flax half spoiled. So thebailiff and aldermen had written to the duke's secretary; and the dukehe sent far and wide to know what town was too full. "That are we, " hadthe baillie of Toul writ back. "Then send four or five score of yourtownsfolk, " was the order. "Was not this to decant the full town intothe empty, and is not the good duke the father of his people, and willnot let the duchy be weakened, nor its fair towns laid waste by swordnor pestilence; but meets the one with pike, and arbalest (touching hiscap to the sergeant and Denys alternately), and t'other with policy?LONG LIVE THE DUKE!"

The pikemen of course were not to be outdone in loyalty; so they shoutedwith stentorian lungs "LONG LIVE THE DUKE!" Then the decanted ones, partly because loyalty was a non-reasoning sentiment in those days, partly perhaps because they feared some further ill consequence shouldthey alone be mute, raised a feeble, tremulous shout, "Long live theDuke!"

But, at this, insulted nature rebelled. Perhaps indeed the shamsentiment drew out the real, for, on the very heels of that royal noise, a loud and piercing wail burst from every woman's bosom, and a deep, deep groan from every man's; oh! the air filled in a moment with womanlyand manly anguish. Judge what it must have been when the rude pikemenhalted unbidden, all confused; as if a wall of sorrow had started upbefore them. 

"En avant, " roared the sergeant, and they marched again, but mutteringand cursing. 

"Ah the ugly sound, " said the civilian, wincing. "Les malheureux!" criedhe ruefully: for where is the single man can hear the sudden agony ofa multitude and not be moved? "Les ingrats! They are going whencethey were de trop to where they will be welcome: from starvation toplenty--and they object. They even make dismal noises. One would thinkwe were thrusting them forth from Burgundy. "

"Come away, " whispered Gerard, trembling; "come away, " and the friendsstrode forward. 

When they passed the head of the column, and saw the men walk with theireyes bent in bitter gloom upon the ground, and the women, some carrying, some leading little children, and weeping as they went, and the poorbairns, some frolicking, some weeping because "their mammies" wept, Gerard tried hard to say a word of comfort, but choked and could utternothing to the mourners; but gasped, "Come on, Denys, I cannot mock suchsorrow with little words of comfort. " And now, artist-like, all his aimwas to get swiftly out of the grief he could not soothe. He almost rannot to hear these sighs and sobs. 

"Why, mate, " said Denys, "art the colour of a lemon. Man alive, take notother folk's troubles to heart! not one of those whining milksops therebut would see thee, a stranger, hanged without winking. "

Gerard scarce listened to him. 

"Decant them?" he groaned; "ay, if blood were no thicker than wine. Princes, ye are wolves. Poor things! Poor things! Ah, Denys! Denys!with looking on their grief mine own comes home to me. Well-a-day! ah, well-a-day!"

"Ay, now you talk reason. That you, poor lad, should be driven all theway from Holland to Rome is pitiful indeed. But these snivelling curs, where is their hurt? There is six score of 'em to keep one anothercompany: besides, they are not going out of Burgundy. "

"Better for them if they had never been in it. "

"Mechant, va! they are but going from one village to another, a mule'sjourney! whilst thou--there, no more. Courage, camarade, le diable estmort. "

Gerard shook his head very doubtfully, but kept silence for about amile, and then he said thoughtfully, "Ay, Denys, but then I am sustainedby booklearning. These are simple folk that likely thought their villagewas the world: now what is this? more weeping. Oh! 'tis a sweet worldHumph! A little girl that hath broke her pipkin. Now may I hang on oneof your gibbets but I'll dry somebody's tears, " and he pounced savagelyupon this little martyr, like a kite on a chick, but with more generousintentions. It was a pretty little lass of about twelve; the tears wereraining down her two peaches, and her palms lifted to heaven in thatutter, though temporary, desolation which attends calamity at twelve;and at her feet the fatal cause, a broken pot, worth, say the fifth of amodern farthing. 

"What, hast broken thy pot, little one?" said Gerard, acting intensestsympathy. 

"Helas! bel gars; as you behold;" and the hands came down from the skyand both pointed at the fragments. A statuette of adversity. 

"And you weep so for that?"

"Needs I must, bel gars. My mammy will massacre me. Do they not already"(with a fresh burst of woe) "c-c-call me J-J-Jean-net-on C-c-casse tout?It wanted but this; that I should break my poor pot. Helas! fallait-ildonc, mere de Dieu?"

"Courage, little love, " said Gerard; "'tis not thy heart lies broken;money will soon mend pots. See now, here is a piece of silver, andthere, scarce a stone's throw off, is a potter; take the bit of silverto him, and buy another pot, and the copper the potter will give theekeep that to play with thy comrades. "

The little mind took in all this, and smiles began to struggle with thetears: but spasms are like waves, they cannot go down the very momentthe wind of trouble is lulled. So Denys thought well to bring up hisreserve of consolation "Courage, ma mie, le diable est mort!" cried thatinventive warrior gaily. Gerard shrugged his shoulders at such a way ofcheering a little girl, "What a fine thing Is a lute with one string, "

said he. 

The little girl's face broke into warm sunshine. 

"Oh, the good news! oh, the good news!" she sang out with such heartfeltjoy, it went off into a honeyed whine; even as our gay old tunes havea pathos underneath "So then, " said she, "they will no longer be able tothreaten us little girls with him, making our lives a burden!" And shebounded off "to tell Nanette, " she said. 

There is a theory that everything has its counterpart; if true, Denys itwould seem had found the mind his consigne fitted. 

While he was roaring with laughter at its unexpected success andGerard's amazement, a little hand pulled his jerkin and a little facepeeped round his waist. Curiosity was now the dominant passion in thatsmall but vivid countenance. 

"Est-ce toi qui l'a tue, beau soldat?"

"Oui, ma mie, " said Denys, as gruffly as ever he could, rightly deemingthis would smack of supernatural puissance to owners of bell-liketrebles. "C'est moi. Ca vaut une petite embrassade--pas?"

"Je crois ben. Aie! aie!"

"Qu'as-tu?"

"Ca pique! ca pique!"

"Quel dommage! je vais la couper. "

"Nein, ce n'est rien; et pisque t'as tue ce mechant. T'es fierementbeau, tout d' meme, toi; t'es lien miex que ma grande soeur. 

"Will you not kiss me, too, ma mie?" said Gerard. 

"Je ne demande par miex. Tiens, tiens, tiens! c'est doulce celle-ci. Ah!que j'aimons les hommes! Des fames, ca ne m'aurait jamais donne l'arjan, blanc, plutot ca m'aurait ri au nez. C'est si peu de chose, les fames. Serviteur, beaulx sires! Bon voiage; et n'oubliez point la Jeanneton!"

"Adieu, petit coeur, " said Gerard, and on they marched; but presentlylooking back they saw the contemner of women in the middle of the road, making them a reverence, and blowing them kisses with little May morningface. 

"Come on, " cried Gerard lustily. "I shall win to Rome yet. Holy St. Bavon, what a sunbeam of innocence hath shot across our bloodthirstyroad! Forget thee, little Jeanneton? not likely, amidst all thisslobbering, and gibbeting, and decanting. Come on, thou laggard!forward!"

"Dost call this marching?" remonstrated Denys; "why, we shall walk o'erChristmas Day and never see it. "

At the next town they came to, suddenly an arbalestrier ran out of atavern after them, and in a moment his beard and Denys's were like twobrushes stuck together. It was a comrade. He insisted on their cominginto the tavern with him, and breaking a bottle of wine. In course ofconversation, he told Denys there was an insurrection in the Duke'sFlemish provinces, and soldiers were ordered thither from all parts ofBurgundy. "Indeed, I marvelled to see thy face turned this way. 

"I go to embrace my folk that I have not seen these three years. Ye canquell a bit of a rising without me I trow. "

Suddenly Denys gave a start. "Dost hear Gerard? this comrade is boundfor Holland. "

"What then? ah, a letter! a letter to Margaret! but will he be so good, so kind?"

The soldier with a torrent of blasphemy informed him he would not onlytake it, but go a league or two out of his way to do it. 

In an instant out came inkhorn and paper from Gerard's wallet; and hewrote a long letter to Margaret, and told her briefly what I fear I havespun too tediously; dwelt most on the bear, and the plunge in the Rhine, and the character of Denys, whom he painted to the life. And with manyendearing expressions bade her to be of good cheer; some trouble andperil there had been, but all that was over now, and his only grief leftwas, that he could not hope to have a word from her hand till he shouldreach Rome. He ended with comforting her again as hard as he could. Andso absorbed was he in his love and his work, that he did not see all thepeople in the room were standing peeping, to watch the nimble and truefinger execute such rare penmanship. 

Denys, proud of his friend's skill, let him alone, till presently thewriter's face worked, and soon the scalding tears began to run down hisyoung cheeks, one after another, on the paper where he was then writingcomfort, comfort. Then Denys rudely repulsed the curious, and asked hiscomrade with a faltering voice whether he had the heart to let so sweeta love-letter miscarry? The other swore by the face of St. Luke he wouldlose the forefinger of his right hand sooner. 

Seeing him so ready, Gerard charged him also with a short, cold letterto his parents; and in it he drew hastily with his pen two handsgrasping each other, to signify farewell. By-the-by, one drop ofbitterness found its way into his letter to Margaret. But of that anon. 

Gerard now offered money to the soldier. He hesitated, but declined it. "No, no! art comrade of my comrade; and may" (etc. ) "but thy love forthe wench touches me. I'll break another bottle at thy charge an thouwilt, and so cry quits. "

"Well said, comrade, " cried Denys. "Hadst taken money, I had invitedthee to walk in the courtyard and cross swords with me. "

"Whereupon I had cut thy comb for thee, " retorted the other. 

"Hadst done thy endeavour, drole, I doubt not. "

They drank the new bottle, shook hands, adhered to custom, and parted onopposite routes. 

This delay, however, somewhat put out Denys's calculations, and eveningsurprised them ere they reached a little town he was making for, wherewas a famous hotel. However, they fell in with a roadside auberge, andDenys, seeing a buxom girl at the door, said, "This seems a decentinn, " and led the way into the kitchen. They ordered supper, to whichno objection was raised, only the landlord requested them to pay for itbeforehand. It was not an uncommon proposal in any part of the world. Still it was not universal, and Denys was nettled, and dashed his handsomewhat ostentatiously into his purse and pulled out a gold angel. "Count me the change, and speedily, " said he. "You tavern-keepers aremore likely to rob me than I you. "

While the supper was preparing, Denys disappeared, and was eventuallyfound by Gerard in the yard, helping Manon, his plump but not brightdecoy duck, to draw water, and pouring extravagant compliments into herdullish ear. Gerard grunted and returned to table, but Denys did notcome in for a good quarter of an hour. 

"Uphill work at the end of a march, " said he, shrugging his shoulders. 

"What matters that to you!" said Gerard drily. "The mad dog bites allthe world. "

"Exaggerator. You know I bite but the fairer half. Well, here comessupper; that is better worth biting. "

During supper the girl kept constantly coming in and out, and lookingpoint-blank at them, especially at Denys; and at last in leaning overhim to remove a dish, dropped a word in his ear; and he replied with anod. 

As soon as supper was cleared away, Denys rose and strolled to the door, telling Gerard the sullen fair had relented, and given him a littlerendezvous in the stable-yard. 

Gerard suggested that the calf-pen would have been a more appropriatelocality. "I shall go to bed, then, " said he, a little crossly. "Whereis the landlord? out at this time of night? no matter. I know our room. Shall you be long, pray?"

"Not I. I grudge leaving the fire and thee. But what can I do? There aretwo sorts of invitations a Burgundian never declines. "

Denys found a figure seated by the well. It was Manon; but insteadof receiving him as he thought he had a right to expect, coming byinvitation, all she did was to sob. He asked her what ailed her? Shesobbed. Could he do anything for her? She sobbed. 

The good-natured Denys, driven to his wits' end, which was no greatdistance, proffered the custom of the country by way of consolation. Sherepulsed him roughly. "Is it a time for fooling?" said she, and sobbed. 

"You seem to think so, " said Denys, waxing wroth. But the next moment headded tenderly, "and I, who could never bear to see beauty in distress. "

"It is not for myself. "

"Who then? your sweetheart?"

"Oh, que nenni. My sweetheart is not on earth now: and to think I havenot an ecu to buy masses for his soul;" and in this shallow nature thegrief seemed now to be all turned in another direction. 

"Come, come, " said Denys, "shalt have money to buy masses for thy deadlad; I swear it. Meantime tell me why you weep. "

"For you. "

"For me? Art mad?"

"No; I am not mad. 'Tis you that were mad to open your purse beforehim. "

The mystery seemed to thicken, and Denys, wearied of stirring up themud by questions, held his peace to see if it would not clear of itself. Then the girl, finding herself no longer questioned, seemed to gothrough some internal combat. At last she said, doggedly and aloud, "Iwill. The Virgin give me courage? What matters it if they kill me, sincehe is dead? Soldier, the landlord is out. "

"Oh, is he?"

"What, do landlords leave their taverns at this time of night? alsosee what a tempest! We are sheltered here, but t'other side it blows ahurricane. "

Denys said nothing. 

"He is gone to fetch the band. "

"The band! what band?"

"Those who will cut your throat and take your gold. Wretched man; to goand shake gold in an innkeeper's face!"

The blow came so unexpectedly it staggered even Denys, accustomed as hewas to sudden perils. He muttered a single word, but in it a volume. 

"Gerard!"

"Gerard! What is that? Oh, 'tis thy comrade's name, poor lad. Get himout quick ere they come; and fly to the next town. "

"And thou?"

"They will kill me. "

"That shall they not. Fly with us. "

"'Twill avail me nought: one of the band will be sent to kill me. Theyare sworn to slay all who betray them. "

"I'll take thee to my native place full thirty leagues from hence, andput thee under my own mother's wing, ere they shall hurt a hair o' thyhead. But first Gerard. Stay thou here whilst I fetch him!"

As he was darting off, the girl seized him convulsively, and with allthe iron strength excitement lends to women. "Stay me not! for pity'ssake, " he cried; "'tis life or death. "

"Sh!--sh!" whispered the girl, shutting his mouth hard with her hand, and putting her pale lips close to him, and her eyes, that seemed toturn backwards, straining towards some indistinct sound. 

He listened. 

He heard footsteps, many footsteps, and no voices. She whispered in hisear, "They are come. " And trembled like a leaf. 

Denys felt it was so. Travellers in that number would never have come indead silence. 

The feet were now at the very door. 

"How many?" said he, in a hollow whisper. 

"Hush!" and she put her mouth to his very ear. And who, that had seenthis man and woman in that attitude, would have guessed what freezinghearts were theirs, and what terrible whispers passed between them?

"How armed?"

"Sword and dagger: and the giant with his axe. They call him the Abbot. "

"And my comrade?"

"Nothing can save him. Better lose one life than two. Fly!"

Denys's blood froze at this cynical advice. "Poor creature, you know nota soldier's heart. "

He put his head in his hands a moment, and a hundred thoughts of dangersbaffled whirled through his brain. 

"Listen, girl! There is one chance for our lives, if thou wilt but betrue to us. Run to the town; to the nearest tavern, and tell the firstsoldier there, that a soldier here is sore beset, but armed, and hislife to be saved if they will but run. Then to the bailiff. But firstto the soldiers. Nay, not a word, but buss me, good lass, and fly! men'slives hang on thy heels. "

She kilted up her gown to run. He came round to the road with her, sawher cross the road cringing with fear, then glide away, then turn intoan erect shadow, then melt away in the storm. 

And now he must get to Gerard. But how? He had to run the gauntlet ofthe whole band. He asked himself, what was the worst thing they coulddo? for he had learned in war that an enemy does, not what you hope hewill do, but what you hope he will not do. "Attack me as I enter thekitchen! Then I must not give them time. "

Just as he drew near to the latch, a terrible thought crossed him. "Suppose they had already dealt with Gerard. Why, then, " thought he, "nought is left but to kill, and be killed;" and he strung his bow, andwalked rapidly into the kitchen. There were seven hideous faces seatedround the fire, and the landlord pouring them out neat brandy, blood'sforerunner in every age. 

"What? company!" cried Denys gaily; "one minute, my lads, and I'll bewith you;" and he snatched up a lighted candle off the table, opened thedoor that led to the staircase, and went up it hallooing. "What, Gerard!whither hast thou skulked to?" There was no answer. He hallooed louder, "Gerard, where art thou?"

After a moment, in which Denys lived an hour of agony, a peevish, half-inarticulate noise issued from the room at the head of the littlestairs. Denys burst in, and there was Gerard asleep. 

"Thank God!" he said, in a choking voice, then began to sing loud, untuneful ditties. Gerard put his fingers into his ears; but presentlyhe saw in Denys's face a horror that contrasted strangely with thissudden merriment. 

"What ails thee?" said he, sitting up and staring. 

"Hush!" said Denys, and his hand spoke even more plainly than his lips. "Listen to me. "

Denys then pointing significantly to the door, to show Gerard sharp earswere listening hard by, continued his song aloud but under cover of itthrew in short muttered syllables. 

"(Our lives are in peril. )

"(Thieves. )

"(Thy doublet. )

"(Thy sword. )

"Aid. 

"Coming. 

"Put off time. " Then aloud--

"Well, now, wilt have t'other bottle?--Say nay. "

"No, not I. "

"But I tell thee, there are half-a-dozen jolly fellows. Tired. "

"Ay, but I am too wearied, " said Gerard. "Go thou. "

"Nay, nay!" Then he went to the door and called out cheerfully"Landlord, the young milksop will not rise. Give those honest fellowst'other bottle. I will pay for't in the morning. "

He heard a brutal and fierce chuckle. 

Having thus by observation made sure the kitchen door was shut, and themiscreants were not actually listening, he examined the chamber doorclosely: then quietly shut it, but did not bolt it; and went andinspected the window. 

It was too small to get out of, and yet a thick bar of iron had beenlet in the stone to make it smaller; and just as he made this chillingdiscovery, the outer door of the house was bolted with a loud clang. 

Denys groaned. "The beasts are in the shambles. "

But would the thieves attack them while they were awake? Probably not. 

Not to throw away this their best chance, the poor souls now made aseries of desperate efforts to converse, as if discussing ordinarymatters; and by this means Gerard learned all that had passed, and thatthe girl was gone for aid. 

"Pray Heaven she may not lose heart by the way, " said Denys, sorrowfully. 

And Denys begged Gerard's forgiveness for bringing him out of his wayfor this. 

Gerard forgave him. 

"I would fear them less, Gerard, but for one they call the Abbot. I picked him out at once. Taller than you, bigger than us both puttogether. Fights with an axe. Gerard, a man to lead a herd of deer tobattle. I shall kill that man to-night, or he will kill me. I thinksomehow 'tis he will kill me. "

"Saints forbid! Shoot him at the door! What avails his strength againstyour weapon?"

"I shall pick him out; but if it comes to hand fighting, run swiftlyunder his guard, or you are a dead man. I tell thee neither of us maystand a blow of that axe: thou never sawest such a body of a man. "

Gerard was for bolting the door; but Denys with a sign showed him thathalf the door-post turned outward on a hinge, and the great bolt waslittle more than a blind. "I have forborne to bolt it, " said he, "thatthey may think us the less suspicious. "

Near an hour rolled away thus. It seemed an age. Yet it was but a littlehour, and the town was a league distant. And some of the voices in thekitchen became angry and impatient. 

"They will not wait much longer, " said Denys, "and we have no chance atall unless we surprise them. "

"I will do whate'er you bid, " said Gerard meekly. 

There was a cupboard on the same side as the door; but between it andthe window. It reached nearly to the ground, but not quite. Denys openedthe cupboard door and placed Gerard on a chair behind it. "If theyrun for the bed, strike at the napes of their necks! a sword cut therealways kills or disables. " He then arranged the bolsters and their shoesin the bed so as to deceive a person peeping from a distance, and drewthe short curtains at the head. 

Meantime Gerard was on his knees. Denys looked round and saw him. 

"Ah!" said Denys, "above all, pray them to forgive me for bringing youinto this guet-apens!"

And now they grasped hands and looked in one another's eyes oh, such alook! Denys's hand was cold, and Gerard's warm. 

They took their posts. 

Denys blew out the candle. 

"We must keep silence now. "

But in the terrible tension of their nerves and very souls they foundthey could hear a whisper fainter than any man could catch at alloutside that door. They could hear each other's hearts thump at times. 

"Good news!" breathed Denys, listening at the door. "They are castinglots. "

"Pray that it may be the Abbot. "

"Yes. Why?

"If he comes alone I can make sure of him. "

"Denys!"

"Ay!"

"I fear I shall go mad, if they do not come soon. "

"Shall I feign sleep? Shall I snore?"

"Will that-------?

"Perhaps"

"Do then and God have mercy on us!"

Denys snored at intervals. 

There was a scuffling of feet heard in the kitchen, and then all wasstill. 

Denys snored again. Then took up his position behind the door. 

But he, or they, who had drawn the lot, seemed determined to run nofoolish risks. Nothing was attempted in a hurry. 

When they were almost starved with cold, and waiting for the attack, thedoor on the stairs opened softly and closed again. Nothing more. 

There was another harrowing silence. 

Then a single light footstep on the stair; and nothing more. 

Then a light crept under the door and nothing more. 

Presently there was a gentle scratching, not half so loud as a mouse's, and the false door-post opened by degrees, and left a perpendicularspace, through which the light streamed in. The door, had it beenbolted, would now have hung by the bare tip of the bolt, which went intothe real door-post, but as it was, it swung gently open of itself. Itopened inwards, so Denys did not raise his crossbow from the ground, butmerely grasped his dagger. 

The candle was held up, and shaded from behind by a man's hand. 

He was inspecting the beds from the threshold, satisfied that hisvictims were both in bed. 

The man glided into the apartment. But at the first step something inthe position of the cupboard and chair made him uneasy. He ventured nofurther, but put the candle on the floor and stooped to peer underthe chair; but as he stooped, an iron hand grasped his shoulder, and adagger was driven so fiercely through his neck that the point cameout at his gullet. There was a terrible hiccough, but no cry; andhalf-a-dozen silent strokes followed in swift succession, each adeath-blow, and the assassin was laid noiselessly on the floor. 

Denys closed the door, bolted it gently, drew the post to, and evenwhile he was going whispered Gerard to bring a chair. It was done. 

"Help me set him up. "

"Dead?"

"Parbleu. "

"What for?"

"Frighten them! Gain time. "

Even while saying this, Denys had whipped a piece of string round thedead man's neck, and tied him to the chair, and there the ghastly figuresat fronting the door. 

"Denys, I can do better. Saints forgive me!"

"What? Be quick then, we have not many moments. "

And Denys got his crossbow ready, and tearing off his straw mattress, reared it before him and prepared to shoot the moment the door shouldopen, for he had no hope any more would come singly, when they found thefirst did not return. 

While thus employed, Gerard was busy about the seated corpse, and tohis amazement Denys saw a luminous glow spreading rapidly over the whiteface. 

Gerard blew out the candle; and on this the corpse's face shone stillmore like a glowworm's head. 

Denys shook in his shoes, and his teeth chattered. 

"What, in Heaven's name, is this?" he whispered. 

"Hush! 'tis but phosphorus, but 'twill serve. "

"Away! they will surprise thee. "

In fact, uneasy mutterings were heard below, and at last a deep voicesaid, "What makes him so long? is the drole rifling them?"

It was their comrade they suspected then, not the enemy. Soon a stepcame softly but rapidly up the stairs: the door was gently tried. 

When this resisted, which was clearly not expected, the sham post wasvery cautiously moved, and an eye no doubt peeped through the aperture:for there was a howl of dismay, and the man was heard to stumble backand burst into the kitchen, here a Babel of voices rose directly on hisreturn. 

Gerard ran to the dead thief and began to work on him again. 

"Back, madman!" whispered Denys. 

"Nay, nay. I know these ignorant brutes; they will not venture hereawhile. I can make him ten times more fearful. "

"At least close that opening! Let them not see you at your devilishwork. "

Gerard closed the sham post, and in half a minute his brush gave thedead head a sight to strike any man with dismay. He put his art to astrange use, and one unparalleled perhaps in the history of mankind. He illuminated his dead enemy's face to frighten his living foe: thestaring eyeballs he made globes of fire; the teeth he left white, forso they were more terrible by the contrast; but the palate and tonguehe tipped with fire, and made one lurid cavern of the red depths thechapfallen jaw revealed: and on the brow he wrote in burning letters"La Mort. " And, while he was doing it, the stout Denys was quaking, andfearing the vengeance of Heaven; for one mans courage is not another's;and the band of miscreants below were quarrelling and disputing loudly, and now without disguise. 

The steps that led down to the kitchen were fifteen, but they werenearly perpendicular: there was therefore in point of fact no distancebetween the besiegers and besieged, and the latter now caught almostevery word. At last one was heard to cry out, "I tell ye the devil hasgot him and branded him with hellfire. I am more like to leave thiscursed house than go again into a room that is full of fiends. "

"Art drunk? or mad? or a coward?" said another. 

"Call me a coward, I'll give thee my dagger's point, and send thee wherePierre sits o' fire for ever. 

"Come, no quarrelling when work is afoot, " roared a tremendous diapason, "or I'll brain ye both with my fist, and send ye where we shall all gosoon or late. "

"The Abbot, " whispered Denys gravely. 

He felt the voice he had just heard could belong to no man but thecolossus he had seen in passing through the kitchen. It made the placevibrate. The quarrelling continued some time, and then there was a deadsilence. 

"Look out, Gerard. "

"Ay. What will they do next?"

"We shall soon know. "

"Shall I wait for you, or cut down the first that opens the door?"

"Wait for me, lest we strike the same and waste a blow. Alas! we cannotafford that. "

Dead silence. 

Sudden came into the room a thing that made them start and their heartsquiver. 

And what was it? A moonbeam. 

Even so can this machine, the body, by the soul's action, be strungup to start and quiver. The sudden ray shot keen and pure into thatshamble. 

Its calm, cold, silvery soul traversed the apartment in a stream of nogreat volume, for the window was narrow. 

After the first tremor Gerard whispered, "Courage, Denys! God's eyeis on us even here. " And he fell upon his knees with his face turnedtowards the window. 

Ay it was like a holy eye opening suddenly on human crime and humanpassions. Many a scene of blood and crime that pure cold eye had restedon; but on few more ghastly than this, where two men, with a lightedcorpse between them, waited panting, to kill and be killed. Nor did themoonlight deaden that horrible corpse-light. If anything it added toits ghastliness: for the body sat at the edge of the moonbeam, which cutsharp across the shoulder and the ear, and seemed blue and ghastly andunnatural by the side of that lurid glow in which the face and eyes andteeth shone horribly. But Denys dared not look that way. 

The moon drew a broad stripe of light across the door, and on that hiseyes were glued. Presently he whispered, "Gerard!"

Gerard looked and raised his sword. 

Acutely as they had listened, they had heard of late no sound onthe stair. Yet therein the door-post, at the edge of the stream ofmoonlight, were the tips of the fingers of a hand. 

The nails glistened. 

Presently they began to crawl and crawl down towards the bolt, butwith infinite slowness and caution. In so doing they crept into themoonlight. The actual motion was imperceptible, but slowly, slowly, the fingers came out whiter and whiter; but the hand between the mainknuckles and the wrist remained dark. 

Denys slowly raised his crossbow. 

He levelled it. He took a long steady aim. 

Gerard palpitated. At last the crossbow twanged. The hand was instantlynailed, with a stern jar, to the quivering door-post. There was a screamof anguish. "Cut, " whispered Denys eagerly, and Gerard's uplifted sworddescended and severed the wrist with two swift blows. A body sank downmoaning outside. 

The hand remained inside, immovable, with blood trickling from it downthe wall. The fierce bolt, slightly barbed, had gone through it and deepinto the real door-post. 

"Two, " said Denys, with terrible cynicism. 

He strung his crossbow, and kneeled behind his cover again. 

"The next will be the Abbot. "

The wounded man moved, and presently crawled down to his companions onthe stairs, and the kitchen door was shut. 

There nothing was heard now but low muttering. The last incident hadrevealed the mortal character of the weapons used by the besieged. 

"I begin to think the Abbot's stomach is not so great as his body, " saidDenys. 

The words were scarcely out of his mouth when the following eventshappened all in a couple of seconds. The kitchen door was openedroughly, a heavy but active man darted up the stairs without any mannerof disguise, and a single ponderous blow sent the door not only off itshinges, but right across the room on to Denys's fortification, which itstruck so rudely as nearly to lay him flat. And in the doorway stood acolossus with a glittering axe. 

He saw the dead man with the moon's blue light on half his face, and thered light on the other half and inside his chapfallen jaws: he stared, his arms fell, his knees knocked together, and he crouched with terror. 

"LA MORT!" he cried, in tones of terror, and turned and fled. In whichact Denys started up and shot him through both jaws. He sprang with onebound into the kitchen, and there leaned on his axe, spitting blood andteeth and curses. 

Denys strung his bow and put his hand into his breast. 

He drew it out dismayed. 

"My last bolt is gone, " he groaned. 

"But we have our swords, and you have slain the giant. "

"No, Gerard, " said Denys gravely, "I have not. And the worst is I havewounded him. Fool! to shoot at a retreating lion. He had never faced thyhandiwork again, but for my meddling. "

"Ha! to your guard! I hear them open the door. "

Then Denys, depressed by the one error he had committed in all thisfearful night, felt convinced his last hour had come. He drew his sword, but like one doomed. But what is this? a red light flickers on theceiling. Gerard flew to the window and looked out. There were men withtorches, and breastplates gleaming red. "We are saved! Armed men!" Andhe dashed his sword through the window shouting, "Quick! quick! we aresore pressed. "

"Back!" yelled Denys; "they come! strike none but him!"

That very moment the Abbot and two men with naked weapons rushed intothe room. Even as they came, the outer door was hammered fiercely, andthe Abbot's comrades hearing it, and seeing the torchlight, turned andfled. Not so the terrible Abbot: wild with rage and pain, he spurned hisdead comrade, chair and all, across the room, then, as the men faced himon each side with kindling eyeballs, he waved his tremendous axe like afeather right and left, and cleared a space, then lifted it to hew themboth in pieces. 

His antagonists were inferior in strength, but not in swiftness anddaring, and above all they had settled how to attack him. The momenthe reared his axe, they flew at him like cats, and both together. If hestruck a full blow with his weapon he would most likely kill one, butthe other would certainly kill him: he saw this, and intelligent aswell as powerful, he thrust the handle fiercely in Denys's face, and, turning, jobbed with the steel at Gerard. Denys went staggering backcovered with blood. Gerard had rushed in like lightning, and, just asthe axe turned to descend on him, drove his sword so fiercely throughthe giant's body, that the very hilt sounded on his ribs like the blowof a pugilist, and Denys, staggering back to help his friend, saw asteel point come out of the Abbot behind. 

The stricken giant bellowed like a bull, dropped his axe, and clutchingGerard's throat tremendously, shook him like a child. Then Denys witha fierce snarl drove his sword into the giant's back. "Stand firm now!"and he pushed the cold steel through and through the giant and out athis breast. 

Thus horribly spitted on both sides, the Abbot gave a violent shudder, and his heels hammered the ground convulsively. His lips, fast turningblue, opened wide and deep, and he cried, "LA MORT!-LA MORT!-LA MORT!!"the first time in a roar of despair, and then twice in a horror-strickenwhisper, never to be forgotten. 

Just then the street door was forced. 

Suddenly the Abbot's arms whirled like windmills, and his huge bodywrenched wildly and carried them to the doorway, twisting their wristsand nearly throwing them off their legs. 

"He'll win clear yet, " cried Denys: "out steel! and in again!"

They tore out their smoking swords, but ere they could stab again, the Abbot leaped full five feet high, and fell with a tremendous crashagainst the door below, carrying it away with him like a sheet of paper, and through the aperture the glare of torches burst on the awe-struckfaces above, half blinding them. 

The thieves at the first alarm had made for the back door, but driventhence by a strong guard ran back to the kitchen, just in time to seethe lock forced out of the socket, and half-a-dozen mailed archers burstin upon them. On these in pure despair they drew their swords. 

But ere a blow was struck on either side, the staircase door behind themwas battered into their midst with one ponderous blow, and with it theAbbot's body came flying, hurled as they thought by no mortal hand, androlled on the floor spouting blood from back and bosom in two furiousjets, and quivered, but breathed no more. 

The thieves smitten with dismay fell on their knees directly, and thearchers bound them, while, above, the rescued ones still stood likestatues rooted to the spot, their dripping swords extended in the redtorchlight, expecting their indomitable enemy to leap back on them aswonderfully as he had gone. 

CHAPTER XXXIV

"Where be the true men?"

"Here be we. God bless you all! God bless you!"

There was a rush to the stairs, and half-a-dozen hard but friendly handswere held out and grasped them warmly. 

"Y'have saved our lives, lads, " cried Denys, "y'have saved our livesthis night. "

A wild sight met the eyes of the rescued pair. The room flaring withtorches, the glittering breastplates of the archers, their bronzedfaces, the white cheeks of the bound thieves, and the bleeding giant, whose dead body these hard men left lying there in its own gore. 

Gerard went round the archers and took them each by the hand withglistening eyes, and on this they all kissed him; and this time hekissed them in return. Then he said to one handsome archer of his ownage, "Prithee, good soldier, have an eye to me. A strange drowsinessovercomes me. Let no one cut my throat while I sleep--for pity's sake. "

The archer promised with a laugh; for he thought Gerard was jesting: andthe latter went off into a deep sleep almost immediately. 

Denys was surprised at this: but did not interfere; for it suited hisimmediate purpose. A couple of archers were inspecting the Abbot's body, turning it half over with their feet, and inquiring, "Which of the twohad flung this enormous rogue down from an upper storey like that; theywould fain have the trick of his arm. "

Denys at first pished and pshawed, but dared not play the braggart, forhe said to himself, "That young vagabond will break in and say 'twasthe finger of Heaven, and no mortal arm, or some such stuff, and make melook like a fool. " But now, seeing Gerard unconscious, he suddenly gavethis required information. 

"Well, then, you see, comrades, I had run my sword through this one upto the hilt, and one or two more of 'em came buzzing about me; so itbehoved me have my sword or die: so I just put my foot against hisstomach, gave a tug with my hand and a spring with my foot, and sent himflying to kingdom come! He died in the air, and his carrion rolledin amongst you without ceremony: made you jump, I warrant me. Butpikestaves and pillage! what avails prattling of, these trifles oncethey are gone by? buvons, camarades, buvons. "

The archers remarked that it was easy to say "buvons" where no liquorwas, but not so easy to do it. 

"Nay, I'll soon find you liquor. My nose hath a natural alacrity atscenting out the wine. You follow me: and I my nose: bring a torch!" Andthey left the room, and finding a short flight of stone steps, descendedthem and entered a large, low, damp cellar. 

It smelt close and dank: and the walls were encrusted here and therewith what seemed cobwebs; but proved to be saltpetre that had oozed outof the damp stones and crystallized. 

"Oh! the fine mouldy smell, " said Denys; "in such places still lurks thegood wine; advance thy torch. Diable! what is that in the corner? A pileof rags? No: 'tis a man. "

They gathered round with the torch, and lo! a figure crouched on a heapin the corner, pale as ashes and shivering. 

"Why, it is the landlord, " said Denys. 

"Get up, thou craven heart!" shouted one of the archers. 

"Why, man, the thieves are bound, and we are dry that bound them. Up!and show us thy wine; for no bottles see here. "

"What, be the rascals bound?" stammered the pale landlord; "good news. W-w-wine? that will I, honest sirs. "

And he rose with unsure joints and offered to lead the way to the winecellar. But Denys interposed. "You are all in the dark, comrades. He isin league with the thieves. "

"Alack, good soldier, me in league with the accursed robbers! Is thatreasonable?"

"The girl said so anyway. "

"The girl! What girl? Ah! Curse her, traitress!"

"Well, " interposed the other archer; "the girl is not here, but gone onto the bailiff. So let the burghers settle whether this craven be guiltyor no: for we caught him not in the act: and let him draw us our wine. "

"One moment, " said Denys shrewdly. "Why cursed he the girl? If he be atrue man, he should bless her as we do. "

"Alas, sir!" said the landlord, "I have but my good name to live by, andI cursed her to you, because you said she had belied me. "

"Humph! I trow thou art a thief, and where is the thief that cannot liewith a smooth face? Therefore hold him, comrades: a prisoner can drawwine an if his hands be not bound. "

The landlord offered no objection; but on the contrary said he wouldwith pleasure show them where his little stock of wine was, but hopedthey would pay for what they should drink, for his rent was due this twomonths. 

The archers smiled grimly at his simplicity, as they thought it; one ofthem laid a hand quietly but firmly on his shoulder, the other led onwith the torch. 

They had reached the threshold when Denys cried "Halt!"

"What is't?"

"Here be bottles in this corner; advance thy light. "

The torch-bearer went towards him. He had just taken off his scabbardand was probing the heap the landlord had just been crouched upon. 

"Nay, nay, " cried the landlord, "the wine is in the next cellar. Thereis nothing there. "

"Nothing is mighty hard, then, " said Denys, and drew out something withhis hand from the heap. 

It proved to be only a bone. 

Denys threw it on the floor: it rattled. 

"There is nought there but the bones of the house, " said the landlord. 

"Just now 'twas nothing. Now that we have found something 'tis nothingbut bones. Here's another. Humph? look at this one, comrade; and youcome too and look at it, and bring you smooth knave along. "

The archer with the torch, whose name was Philippe, held the bone to thelight and turned it round and round. 

"Well?" said Denys. 

"Well, if this was a field of battle, I should say 'twas the shankboneof a man; no more, no less. But 'tisn't a battlefield, nor a churchyard;'tis an inn. "

"True, mate; but yon knave's ashy face is as good a light to me as afield of battle. I read the bone by it, Bring yon face nearer, I say. When the chine is amissing, and the house dog can't look at you withouthis tail creeping between his legs, who was the thief? Good brothersmine, my mind it doth misgive me. The deeper I thrust the more there be. Mayhap if these bones could tell their tale they would make true men'sflesh creep that heard it. "

"Alas! young man, what hideous fancies are these! The bones are bonesof beeves, and sheep, and kids, and not, as you think, of men and women. Holy saints preserve us!"

"Hold thy peace! thy words are air. Thou hast not got burghers by theear, that know not a veal knuckle from their grandsire's ribs; butsoldiers-men that have gone to look for their dear comrades, and foundtheir bones picked as clean by the crows as these I doubt have been bythee and thy mates. Men and women, saidst thou? And prithee, when spakeI a word of women's bones? Wouldst make a child suspect thee. Fieldof battle, comrade! Was not this house a field of battle half an houragone? Drag him close to me, let me read his face: now then, what isthis, thou knave?" and he thrust a small object suddenly in his face. 

"Alas! I know not. "

"Well, I would not swear neither: but it is too like the thumb bone ofa man's hand; mates, my flesh it creeps. Churchyard! how know I this isnot one?"

And he now drew his sword out of the scabbard and began to rake the heapof earth and broken crockery and bones out on the floor. 

The landlord assured him he but wasted his time. "We poor innkeepers aresinners, " said he; "we give short measure and baptize the wine: we arefain to do these things; the laws are so unjust to us; but we are notassassins. How could we afford to kill our customers? May Heaven'slightning strike me dead if there be any bones there but such as havebeen used for meat. 'Tis the kitchen wench flings them here: I swear byGod's holy mother, by holy Paul, by holy Dominic, and Denys my patronsaint--ah!"

Denys held out a bone under his eye in dead silence. It was a bone noman, however ignorant, however lying, could confound with those of sheepor oxen. The sight of it shut the lying lips, and palsied the heartlessheart. 

The landlord's hair rose visibly on his head like spikes, and his kneesgave way as if his limbs had been struck from under him. But the archersdragged him fiercely up, and kept him erect under the torch, staringfascinated at the dead skull which, white as the living cheek opposed, but no whiter, glared back again at its murderer, whose pale lip nowopened and opened, but could utter no sound. 

"Ah!" said Denys solemnly, and trembling now with rage, "look on thesockets out of which thou hast picked the eyes, and let them blast thineeyes, that crows shall pick out ere this week shall end. Now, hold thouthat while I search on. Hold it, I say, or here I rob the gallows--" andhe threatened the quaking wretch with his naked sword, till with a groanhe took the skull and held it, almost fainting. 

Oh! that every murderer, and contriver of murder, could see him, sick, and staggering with terror, and with his hair on end, holding the coldskull, and feeling that his own head would soon be like it. And soonthe heap was scattered, and alas! not one nor two, but many skulls werebrought to light, the culprit moaning at each discovery. 

Suddenly Denys uttered a strange cry of distress to come from so boldand hard a man; and held up to the torch a mass of human hair. It waslong, glossy, and golden. A woman's beautiful hair. At the sight of itthe archers instinctively shook the craven wretch in their hands: and hewhined. 

"I have a little sister with hair just so fair and shining as this, "gulped Denys. "Jesu! if it should be hers! There quick, take my swordand dagger, and keep them from my hand, lest I strike him dead and wrongthe gibbet. And thou, poor innocent victim, on whose head this mostlovely hair did grow, hear me swear this, on bended knee, never toleave this man till I see him broken to pieces on the wheel even for thysake. "

He rose from his knee. "Ay, had he as many lives as here be hairs, I'dhave them all, by God, " and he put the hair into his bosom. Then in asudden fury seized the landlord fiercely by the neck, and forced him tohis knees; and foot on head ground his face savagely among the bonesof his victims, where they lay thickest; and the assassin first yelled, then whined and whimpered, just as a dog first yells, then whines, whenhis nose is so forced into some leveret or other innocent he has killed. 

"Now lend me thy bowstring, Philippe!" He passed it through the eyes ofa skull alternately, and hung the ghastly relic of mortality and crimeround the man's neck; then pulled him up and kicked him industriouslyinto the kitchen, where one of the aldermen of the burgh had arrivedwith constables, and was even now taking an archer's deposition. 

The grave burgher was much startled at sight of the landlord drivenin bleeding from a dozen scratches inflicted by the bones of his ownvictims, and carrying his horrible collar. But Denys came panting after, and in a few fiery words soon made all clear. 

"Bind him like the rest, " said the alderman sternly. "I count him theblackest of them all. "

While his hands were being bound, the poor wretch begged piteously that"the skull might be taken from him. "

"Humph!" said the alderman. "Certes I had not ordered such a thing to beput on mortal man. Yet being there, I will not lift voice nor finger todoff it. Methinks it fits thee truly, thou bloody dog. 'Tis thy ensign, and hangs well above a heart so foul as thine. "

He then inquired of Denys if he thought they had secured the whole gang, or but a part. 

"Your worship, " said Denys, "there are but seven of them, and thislandlord. One we slew upstairs, one we trundled down dead, the rest arebound before you. "

"Good! go fetch the dead one from upstairs, and lay him beside him Icaused to be removed. "

Here a voice like a guinea-fowl's broke peevishly in. "Now, now, now, where is the hand? that is what I want to see. " The speaker was a littlepettifogging clerk. 

"You will find it above, nailed to the door-post by a crossbow bolt. "

"Good!" said the clerk. He whispered his master, "What a goodly showwill the 'pieces de conviction' make!" and with this he wrote them down, enumerating them in separate squeaks as he penned them. Skulls--Bones--Awoman's hair--A thief's hands 1 axe--2 carcasses--1 crossbow bolt. This done, he itched to search the cellar himself: there might be otherinvaluable morsels of evidence, an ear, or even an earring. The aldermanassenting, he caught up a torch and was hurrying thither, when anaccident stopped him, and indeed carried him a step or two in theopposite direction. 

The constables had gone up the stair in single file. 

But the head constable no sooner saw the phosphorescent corpse seatedby the bedside, than he stood stupefied; and next he began to shake likeone in an ague, and, terror gaining on him more and more, he uttered asort of howl and recoiled swiftly. Forgetting the steps in his recoil, he tumbled over backward on his nearest companion; but he, shaken by theshout of dismay, and catching a glimpse of something horrid, was alreadystaggering back, and in no condition to sustain the head constable, who, like most head constables, was a ponderous man. The two carried away thethird, and the three the fourth, and they streamed into the kitchen, andsettled on the floor, overlapping each other like a sequence laid out ona card-table. The clerk coming hastily with his torch ran an involuntarytilt against the fourth man, who, sharing the momentum of the mass, knocked him instantly on his back, the ace of that fair quint; and therehe lay kicking and waving his torch, apparently in triumph, butreally in convulsion, sense and wind being driven out together by theconcussion. 

"What is to do now, in Heaven's name?" cried the alderman, starting upwith considerable alarm. But Denys explained, and offered to accompanyhis worship. "So be it, " said the latter. His men picked themselvesruefully up, and the alderman put himself at their head and examined thepremises above and below. As for the prisoners, their interrogatory waspostponed till they could be confronted with the servant. 

Before dawn, the thieves, alive and dead, and all the relics andevidences of crime and retribution, were swept away into the law'snet, and the inn was silent and almost deserted. There remained but oneconstable, and Denys and Gerard, the latter still sleeping heavily. 

CHAPTER XXXV

Gerard awoke, and found Denys watching him with some anxiety. 

"It is you for sleeping! Why, 'tis high noon. "

"It was a blessed sleep, " said Gerard; "methinks Heaven sent it me. Ithath put as it were a veil between me and that awful night. To thinkthat you and I sit here alive and well. How terrible a dream I seem tohave had!"

"Ay, lad, that is the wise way to look at these things when once theyare past, why, they are dreams, shadows. Break thy fast, and then thouwilt think no more on't. Moreover, I promised to bring thee on to thetown by noon, and take thee to his worship. "

Gerard then sopped some rye bread in red wine and ate it to break hisfast: then went with Denys over the scene of combat, and came backshuddering, and finally took the road with his friend, and kept peeringthrough the hedges, and expecting sudden attacks unreasonably, till theyreached the little town. Denys took him to "The White Hart". 

"No fear of cut-throats here, " said he. "I know the landlord this manya year. He is a burgess, and looks to be bailiff. 'Tis here I was makingfor yestreen. But we lost time, and night o'ertook us--and--

"And you saw a woman at the door, and would be wiser than a Jeanneton;she told us they were nought. "

"Why, what saved our lives if not a woman? Ay, and risked her own to doit. "

"That is true, Denys; and though women are nothing to me, I long tothank this poor girl, and reward her, ay, though I share every doit inmy purse with her. Do not you?"

"Parbleu. "

"Where shall we find her?"

"Mayhap the alderman will tell us. We must go to him first. "

The alderman received them with a most singular and inexplicableexpression of countenance. However, after a moment's reflection, he worea grim smile, and finally proceeded to put interrogatories to Gerard, and took down the answers. This done, he told them that they muststay in the town till the thieves were tried, and be at hand to giveevidence, on peril of fine and imprisonment. They looked very blank atthis. 

"However, " said he, "'twill not be long, the culprits having been takenred-handed. " He added, "And you know, in any case you could not leavethe place this week. "

Denys stared at this remark, and Gerard smiled at what he thought thesimplicity of the old gentleman in dreaming that a provincial town ofBurgundy had attraction to detain him from Rome and Margaret. 

He now went to that which was nearest both their hearts. 

"Your worship, " said he, "we cannot find our benefactress in the town. "

"Nay, but who is your benefactress?"

"Who? why the good girl that came to you by night and saved our lives atperil of her own. Oh sir, our hearts burn within us to thank and blessher; where is she?"

CHAPTER XXXVI

"In prison, sir; good lack, for what misdeed?"

"Well, she is a witness, and may be a necessary one. "

"Why, Messire Bailiff, " put in Denys, "you lay not all your witnesses bythe heels I trow. "

The alderman, pleased at being called bailiff, became communicative. "In a case of blood we detain all testimony that is like to give us legbail, and so defeat justice, and that is why we still keep the womenfolk. For a man at odd times hides a week in one mind, but a woman, ifshe do her duty to the realm o' Friday, she shall undo it afore Sunday, or try. Could you see yon wench now, you should find her a-blubberingat having betrayed five males to the gallows. Had they been females, we might have trusted to a subpoena. For they despise one another. And there they show some sense. But now I think on't, there were otherreasons for laying this one by the heels. Hand me those depositions, young sir. " And he put on his glasses. "Ay! she was implicated; she wasone of the band. "

A loud disclaimer burst from Denys and Gerard at once. 

"No need to deave me, " said the alderman. "Here 'tis in black and white. 'Jean Hardy (that is one of the thieves), being questioned, confessedthat--humph? Ay, here 'tis. 'And that the girl Manon was the decoy, and her sweetheart was Georges Vipont, one of the band; and hanged lastmonth: and that she had been deject ever since, and had openly blamedthe band for his death, saying if they had not been rank cowards, he hadnever been taken, and it is his opinion she did but betray them out ofvery spite, and--

"His opinion, " cried Gerard indignantly; "what signifies the opinionof a cut-throat, burning to be revenged on her who has delivered him tojustice? And an you go to that, what avails his testimony? Is a thiefnever a liar? Is he not aye a liar? and here a motive to lie? Revenge, why, 'tis the strongest of all the passions. And oh, sir, what madnessto question a detected felon and listen to him lying away an honestlife--as if he were a true man swearing in open day, with his true handon the Gospel laid!"

"Young man, " said the alderman, "restrain thy heat in presence ofauthority! I find by your tone you are a stranger. Know then that inthis land we question all the world. We are not so weak as to hope toget at the truth by shutting either our left ear or our right. "

"And so you would listen to Satan belying the saints!"

"Ta! ta! The law meddles but with men and women, and these cannotutter a story all lies, let them try ever so. Wherefore we shut not thebarn-door (as the saying is) against any man's grain. Only having takenit in, we do winnow and sift it. And who told you I had swallowed thethief's story whole like fair water? Not so. I did but credit so muchon't as was borne out by better proof. "

"Better proof?" and Gerard looked blank. "Why, who but the thieves wouldbreathe a word against her?"

"Marry, herself. "

"Herself, sir? what, did you question her too?"

"I tell you we question all the world. Here is her deposition; can youread?--Read it yourself, then. "

Gerard looked at Denys and read him Manon's deposition. 

"I am a native of Epinal. I left my native place two years ago becauseI was unfortunate: I could not like the man they bade me. So my fatherbeat me. I ran away from my father. I went to service. I left servicebecause the mistress was jealous of me. The reason that she gave forturning me off was, because I was saucy. Last year I stood in themarketplace to be hired with other girls. The landlord of 'The FairStar' hired me. I was eleven months with him. A young man courted me. Iloved him. I found out that travellers came and never went away again. I told my lover. He bade me hold my peace. He threatened me. I found mylover was one of a band of thieves. When travellers were to be robbed, the landlord went out and told the band to come. Then I wept and prayedfor the travellers' souls. I never told. A month ago my lover died. 

"The soldier put me in mind of my lover. He was bearded like him I hadlost. I cannot tell whether I should have interfered, if he had had nobeard. I am sorry I told now. "

The paper almost dropped from Gerard's hands. Now for the first time hesaw that Manon's life was in mortal danger. He knew the dogged law, andthe dogged men that executed it. He threw himself suddenly on his kneesat the alderman's feet. "Oh, sir! think of the difference between thosecruel men and this poor weak woman! Could you have the heart to send herto the same death with them; could you have the heart to condemn us tolook on and see her slaughtered, who, but that she risked her life forours, had not now been in jeopardy? Alas, sir! show me and my comradesome pity, if you have none for her, poor soul. Denys and I be true men, and you will rend our hearts if you kill that poor simple girl. Whatcan we do? What is left for us to do then but cut our throats at hergallows' foot?"

The alderman was tough, but mortal; the prayers and agitation of Gerardfirst astounded, then touched him. He showed it in a curious way. Hebecame peevish and fretful. "There, get up, do, " said he. "I doubtwhether anybody would say as many words for me. What ho, Daniel!go fetch the town clerk. " And on that functionary entering from anadjoining room, "Here is a foolish lad fretting about yon girl. Canwe stretch a point? say we admit her to bear witness, and question herfavourably. "

The town clerk was one of your "impossibility" men. 

"Nay, sir, we cannot do that: she was not concerned in this business. Had she been accessory, we might have offered her a pardon to bearwitness. "

Gerard burst in, "But she did better. Instead of being accessory, shestayed the crime; and she proffered herself as witness by running hitherwith the tale. "

"Tush, young man, 'tis a matter of law. " The alderman and the clerk thenhad a long discussion, the one maintaining, the other denying, that shestood as fair in law as if she had been accessory to the attempt onour travellers' lives. And this was lucky for Manon: for the alderman, irritated by the clerk reiterating that he could not do this, and couldnot that, and could not do t'other, said "he would show him he could doanything he chose, " And he had Manon out, and upon the landlord of "TheWhite Hart" being her bondsman, and Denys depositing five gold pieceswith him, and the girl promising, not without some coaxing from Denys, to attend as a witness, he liberated her, but eased his conscience bytelling her in his own terms his reason for this leniency. 

"The town had to buy a new rope for everybody hanged, and present itto the bourreau, or compound with him in money: and she was not in hisopinion worth this municipal expense, whereas decided characters likeher late confederates, were. " And so Denys and Gerard carried her off, Gerard dancing round her for joy, Denys keeping up her heart byassuring her of the demise of a troublesome personage, and she weepinginauspiciously. However, on the road to "The White Hart" the publicfound her out, and having heard the whole story from the archers, whonaturally told it warmly in her favour, followed her hurrahing andencouraging her, till finding herself backed by numbers she plucked upheart. The landlord too saw at a glance that her presence in the innwould draw custom, and received her politely, and assigned her an upperchamber: here she buried herself, and being alone rained tears again. 

Poor little mind, it was like a ripple, up and down, down and up, up anddown. Bidding the landlord be very kind to her, and keep her a prisonerwithout letting her feel it, the friends went out: and lo! as theystepped into the street they saw two processions coming towards themfrom opposite sides. One was a large one, attended with noise and howlsand those indescribable cries by which rude natures reveal at odd timesthat relationship to the beasts of the field and forest, which at othertimes we succeed in hiding. The other, very thinly attended by a fewnuns and friars, came slow and silent. 

The prisoners going to exposure in the market-place. The gathered bonesof the victims coming to the churchyard. 

And the two met in the narrow street nearly at the inn door, and couldnot pass each other for a long time, and the bier, that bore the relicsof mortality, got wedged against the cart that carried the men who hadmade those bones what they were, and in a few hours must die for itthemselves. The mob had not the quick intelligence to be at once struckwith this stern meeting: but at last a woman cried, "Look at your work, ye dogs!" and the crowd took it like wildfire, and there was a horribleyell, and the culprits groaned and tried to hide their heads upon theirbosoms, but could not, their hands being tied. And there they stood, images of pale hollow-eyed despair, and oh how they looked on the bier, and envied those whom they had sent before them on the dark road theywere going upon themselves! And the two men who were the cause of bothprocessions stood and looked gravely on, and even Manon, hearing thedisturbance, crept to the window, and, hiding her face, peeped tremblingthrough her fingers, as women will. 

This strange meeting parted Denys and Gerard. The former yieldedto curiosity and revenge, the latter doffed his bonnet, and piouslyfollowed the poor remains of those whose fate had so nearly been hisown. For some time he was the one lay mourner: but when they had reachedthe suburbs, a long way from the greater attraction that was filling themarket-place, more than one artisan threw down his tools, and morethan one shopman left his shop, and touched with pity or a sense of ourcommon humanity, and perhaps decided somewhat by the example of Gerard, followed the bones bareheaded, and saw them deposited with the prayersof the Church in hallowed ground. 

After the funeral rites Gerard stepped respectfully up to the cure, andoffered to buy a mass for their souls. 

Gerard, son of Catherine, always looked at two sides of a penny: and hetried to purchase this mass a trifle under the usual terms, on accountof the pitiable circumstances. But the good cure gently but adroitlyparried his ingenuity, and blandly screwed him up to the market price. 

In the course of the business they discovered a similarity ofsentiments. Piety and worldly prudence are not very rare companions:still it is unusual to carry both so far as these two men did. Theircollision in the prayer market led to mutual esteem, as when knightencountered knight worthy of his steel. Moreover the good cure loved abit of gossip, and finding his customer was one of those who had foughtthe thieves at Domfront, would have him into his parlour and hear thewhole from his own lips. And his heart warmed to Gerard, and he said"God was good to thee. I thank Him for't with all my soul. Thou arta good lad. " He added drily, "Shouldst have told me this tale in thechurchyard. I doubt, I had given thee the mass for love. However, " saidhe (the thermometer suddenly falling), "'tis ill luck to go back upon abargain. But I'll broach a bottle of my old Medoc for thee: and fewbe the guests I would do that for. " The cure went to his cupboard, andwhile he groped for the choice bottle, he muttered to himself, "At theirold tricks again!"

"Plait-il?" said Gerard. 

"I said nought. Ay, here 'tis. "

"Nay, your reverence. You surely spoke: you said, 'At their old tricksagain!'"

"Said I so in sooth?" and his reverence smiled. He then proceeded tobroach the wine, and filled a cup for each. Then he put a log of wood onthe fire, for stoves were none in Burgundy. "And so I said 'At their oldtricks!' did I? Come, sip the good wine, and, whilst it lasts, story forstory, I care not if I tell you a little tale. "

Gerard's eyes sparkled. 

"Thou lovest a story?"

"As my life. "

"Nay, but raise not thine expectations too high, neither. 'Tis but afoolish trifle compared with thine adventures. "

THE CURE'S TALE. 

"Once upon a time, then, in the kingdom of France, and in the duchyof Burgundy, and not a day's journey from the town where now we sita-sipping of old Medoc, there lived a cure. I say he lived; but barely. The parish was small, the parishioners greedy; and never gave theircure a doit more than he could compel. The nearer they brought him to adisembodied spirit by meagre diet, the holier should be his prayers intheir behalf. I know not if this was their creed, but their practicegave it colour. 

"At last he pickled a rod for them. 

"One day the richest farmer in the place had twins to baptize. The curewas had to the christening dinner as usual; but ere he would baptizethe children, he demanded, not the christening fees only, but the burialfees. 'Saints defend us, parson, cried the mother; 'talk not of burying!I did never see children liker to live. ' 'Nor I, ' said the cure, 'thepraise be to God. Natheless, they are sure to die, being sons of Adam, as well as of thee, dame. But die when they will, 'twill cost themnothing, the burial fees being paid and entered in this book. ' 'For allthat 'twill cost them something, ' quoth the miller, the greatest wagin the place, and as big a knave as any; for which was the biggest Godknoweth, but no mortal man, not even the hangman. 'Miller, I tell theenay, ' quo' the cure. 'Parson, I tell you ay, ' quo' the miller. ''Twillcost them their lives. ' At which millstone conceit was a great laugh;and in the general mirth the fees were paid and the Christians made. 

"But when the next parishioner's child, and the next after, and all, hadto pay each his burial fee, or lose his place in heaven, discontent didsecretly rankle in the parish. Well, one fine day they met insecret, and sent a churchwarden with a complaint to the bishop, and athunderbolt fell on the poor cure. Came to him at dinner-time a summonsto the episcopal palace, to bring the parish books and answer certaincharges. Then the cure guessed where the shoe pinched. He left his foodon the board, for small his appetite now, and took the parish books andwent quaking. 

"The bishop entertained him with a frown, and exposed the plaint. 'Monseigneur, ' said the cure right humbly, 'doth the parish allege manythings against me, or this one only?' 'In sooth, but this one, ' said thebishop, and softened a little. 'First, monseigneur, I acknowledge thefact. ' ''Tis well, ' quoth the bishop; 'that saves time and trouble. Nowto your excuse, if excuse there be. ' 'Monseigneur, I have been cure ofthat parish seven years, and fifty children have I baptized, and buriednot five. At first I used to say, "Heaven be praised, the air of thisvillage is main healthy;" but on searching the register book I found'twas always so, and on probing the matter, it came out that of thoseborn at Domfront, all, but here and there one, did go and get hanged atAix. But this was to defraud not their cure only, but the entire Churchof her dues, since "pendards" pay no funeral fees, being buried in air. Thereupon, knowing by sad experience their greed, and how they grudgethe Church every sou, I laid a trap to keep them from hanging; for, greed against greed, there be of them that will die in their beds liketrue men ere the Church shall gain those funeral fees for nought. 'Then the bishop laughed till the tears ran down, and questioned thechurchwarden, and he was fain to confess that too many of the parish didcome to that unlucky end at Aix. 'Then, ' said the bishop, 'I do approvethe act, for myself and my successors; and so be it ever, till theymend their manners and die in their beds. ' And the next day came theringleaders crestfallen to the cure, and said, 'Parson, ye were evengood to us, barring this untoward matter: prithee let there be no illblood anent so trivial a thing. ' And the cure said, 'My children, I wereunworthy to be your pastor could I not forgive a wrong; go in peace, andget me as many children as may be, that by the double fees the cure youlove may miss starvation. '

"And the bishop often told the story, and it kept his memory of the curealive, and at last he shifted him to a decent parish, where he can offera glass of old Medoc to such as are worthy of it. Their name it is notlegion. "

A light broke in upon Gerard, his countenance showed it. 

"Ay!" said his host, "I am that cure: so now thou canst guess why I said'At their old tricks. ' My life on't they have wheedled my successor intoremitting those funeral fees. You are well out of that parish. And so amI. "

The cure's little niece burst in, "Uncle, the weighing--la! a stranger!"And burst out. 

The cure rose directly, but would not part with Gerard. 

"Wet thy beard once more, and come with me. "

In the church porch they found the sexton with a huge pair of scales, and weights of all sizes. Several humble persons were standing by, andsoon a woman stepped forward with a sickly child and said, "Be it heavybe it light, I vow, in rye meal of the best, whate'er this child shallweigh, and the same will duly pay to Holy Church, an if he shall casthis trouble. Pray, good people, for this child, and for me his motherhither come in dole and care!"

The child was weighed, and yelled as if the scale had been the font. 

"Courage! dame, " cried Gerard. "This is a good sign. There is plenty oflife here to battle its trouble. "

"Now, blest be the tongue that tells me so, " said the poor woman. Shehushed her ponderling against her bosom, and stood aloof watching, whilst another woman brought her child to scale. 

But presently a loud, dictatorial voice was heard, "Way there, make wayfor the seigneur!"

The small folk parted on both sides like waves ploughed by a lordlygalley, and in marched in gorgeous attire, his cap adorned by a featherwith a topaz at its root, his jerkin richly furred, satin doublet, redhose, shoes like skates, diamond-hilted sword in velvet scabbard, andhawk on his wrist, "the lord of the manor. " He flung himself into thescales as if he was lord of the zodiac as well as the manor: whereat thehawk balanced and flapped; but stuck: then winked. 

While the sexton heaved in the great weights, the cure told Gerard, "Mylord had been sick unto death, and vowed his weight in bread and cheeseto the poor, the Church taking her tenth. "

"Permit me, my lord; if your lordship continues to press your lordship'sstaff on the other scale, you will disturb the balance. "

His lordship grinned and removed his staff, and leaned on it. The curepolitely but firmly objected to that too. 

"Mille diables! what am I to do with it, then?" cried the other. 

"Deign to hold it out so, my lord, wide of both scales. "

When my lord did this, and so fell into the trap he had laid forHoly Church, the good cure whispered to Gerard. "Cretensis incidit inCretensem!" which I take to mean, "Diamond cut diamond. " He then saidwith an obsequious air, "If that your lordship grudges Heaven fullweight, you might set the hawk on your lacquey, and so save a pound. "

"Gramercy for thy rede, cure, " cried the great man, reproachfully. "Shall I for one sorry pound grudge my poor fowl the benefit of HolyChurch? I'd as lieve the devil should have me and all my house as her, any day i' the year. "

"Sweet is affection, " whispered the cure. 

"Between a bird and a brute, " whispered Gerard. 

"Tush!" and the cure looked terrified. 

The seigneur's weight was booked, and Heaven I trust and believe did notweigh his gratitude in the balance of the sanctuary. For my unlearnedreader is not to suppose there was anything the least eccentric in theman, or his gratitude to the Giver of health and all good gifts. Menlook forward to death, and back upon past sickness with different eyes. Item, when men drive a bargain, they strive to get the sunny side ofit; it matters not one straw whether it is with man or Heaven they arebargaining. In this respect we are the same now, at bottom, as we werefour hundred years ago: only in those days we did it a grain or two morenaively, and that naivete shone out more palpably, because, in that rudeage, body prevailing over mind, all sentiments took material forms. Man repented with scourges, prayed by bead, bribed the saints with waxtapers, put fish into the body to sanctify the soul, sojourned in coldwater for empire over the emotions, and thanked God for returning healthin 1 cwt. 2 stone 7 lb 3 oz. 1 dwt. Of bread and cheese. 

Whilst I have been preaching, who preach so rarely and so ill, the goodcure has been soliciting the lord of the manor to step into the church, and give order what shall be done with his great-great-grandfather. 

"Ods bodikins! what, have you dug him up?"

"Nay, my lord, he never was buried. "

"What, the old dict was true after all?"

"So true that the workmen this very day found a skeleton erect in thepillar they are repairing. I had sent to my lord at once, but I knew hewould be here. "

"It is he! 'Tis he!" said his descendant, quickening his pace. "Let usgo see the old boy. This youth is a stranger, I think. "

Gerard bowed. 

"Know then that my great-great-grandfather held his head high and beingon the point of death, revolted against lying under the aisle with hisforbears for mean folk to pass over. So, as the tradition goes, he sworehis son (my great-grandfather), to bury him erect in one of the pillarsof the church" (here they entered the porch). "'For, ' quoth he, 'NO BASEMAN SHALL PASS OVER MY STOMACH. ' Peste!" and even while speaking, hislordship parried adroitly with his stick a skull that came hopping athim, bowled by a boy in the middle of the aisle, who took to his heelsyelling with fear the moment he saw what he had done. His lordshiphurled the skull furiously after him as he ran, at which the cure gave ashout of dismay and put forth his arm to hinder him, but was too late. 

The cure groaned aloud. And as if this had evoked spirits of mischief, up started a whole pack of children from some ambuscade, and unseen, butheard loud enough, clattered out of the church like a covey rising in athick wood. 

"Oh! these pernicious brats, " cried the cure. "The workmen cannot go totheir nonemete but the church is rife with them. Pray Heaven they havenot found his late lordship; nay, I mind, I hid his lordship under aworkmen's jerkin, and--saints defend us! the jerkin has been moved. "

The poor cure's worst misgivings were realized: the rising generationof the plebians had played the mischief with the haughty old noble. "Thelittle ones had jockeyed for the bones oh, " and pocketed such of them asseemed adapted for certain primitive games then in vogue amongst them. 

"I'll excommunicate them, " roared the curate, "and all their race. "

"Never heed, " said the scapegrace lord: and stroked his hawk; "there isenough of him to swear by. Put him back! put him back!"

"Surely, my lord, 'tis your will his bones be laid in hallowed earth, and masses said for his poor prideful soul?"

The noble stroked his hawk. 

"Are ye there, Master Cure?" said he. "Nay, the business is too old:he is out of purgatory by this time, up or down. I shall not drawmy purse-strings for him. Every dog his day. Adieu, Messires, adieu, ancestor;" and he sauntered off whistling to his hawk and caressing it. 

His reverence looked ruefully after him. 

"Cretensis incidit in Cretensem, " said he sorrowfully. "I thought Ihad him safe for a dozen masses. Yet I blame him not, but that youngne'er-do-weel which did trundle his ancestor's skull at us: for whocould venerate his great-great-grandsire and play football with hishead? Well it behoves us to be better Christians than he is. " So theygathered the bones reverently, and the cure locked them up, and forbadethe workmen, who now entered the church, to close up the pillar, till heshould recover by threats of the Church's wrath every atom of my lord. And he showed Gerard a famous shrine in the church. Before it were theusual gifts of tapers, etc. There was also a wax image of a falcon, mostcuriously moulded and coloured to the life, eyes and all. Gerard's eyefell at once on this, and he expressed the liveliest admiration. Thecure assented. Then Gerard asked, "Could the saint have loved hawking?"

The cure laughed at his simplicity. "Nay, 'tis but a statuary hawk. Whenthey have a bird of gentle breed they cannot train, they make his image, and send it to this shrine with a present, and pray the saint to workupon the stubborn mind of the original, and make it ductile as wax: thatis the notion, and methinks a reasonable one, too. "

Gerard assented. "But alack, reverend sir, were I a saint, methinks Ishould side with the innocent dove, rather than with the cruel hawk thatrends her. "

"By St. Denys you are right, " said the cure. "But, que voulez-vous?the saints are debonair, and have been flesh themselves, and know man'sfrailty and absurdity. 'Tis the Bishop of Avignon sent this one. "

"What! do bishops hawk in this country?"

"One and all. Every noble person hawks, and lives with hawk on wrist. Why, my lord abbot hard by, and his lordship that has just parted fromus, had a two years' feud as to where they should put their hawks downon that very altar there. Each claimed the right hand of the altar forhis bird. "

"What desecration!"

"Nay! nay! thou knowest we make them doff both glove and hawk to takethe blessed eucharist. Their jewelled gloves will they give to a servantor simple Christian to hold: but their beloved hawks they will put downon no place less than the altar. "

Gerard inquired how the battle of the hawks ended. 

"Why, the abbot he yielded, as the Church yields to laymen. He searchedancient books, and found that the left hand was the more honourable, being in truth the right hand, since the altar is east, but lookswestward. So he gave my lord the soi-disant right hand, and contentedhimself with the real right hand, and even so may the Church stilloutwit the lay nobles and their arrogance, saving your presence. "

"Nay, sir, I honour the Church. I am convent bred, and owe all I haveand am to Holy Church. "

"Ah, that accounts for my sudden liking to thee. Art a gracious youth. Come and see me whenever thou wilt. "

Gerard took this as a hint that he might go now. It jumped with his ownwish, for he was curious to hear what Denys had seen and done all thistime. He made his reverence and walked out of the church; but wasno sooner clear of it than he set off to run with all his might: andtearing round a corner, ran into a large stomach, whose owner clutchedhim, to keep himself steady under the shock; but did not release hishold on regaining his equilibrium. 

"Let go, man, " said Gerard. 

"Not so. You are my prisoner. "

"Prisoner?"

"Ay. "

"What for, in Heaven's name?"

"What for? Why, sorcery. "

"SORCERY?"

"Sorcery. "

CHAPTER XXXVII

The culprits were condemned to stand pinioned in the marketplace for twohours, that should any persons recognize them or any of them as guiltyof other crimes, they might depose to that effect at the trial. 

They stood, however, the whole period, and no one advanced anythingfresh against them. This was the less remarkable that they were nightbirds, vampires who preyed in the dark on weary travellers, mostlystrangers. 

But just as they were being taken down, a fearful scream was heard inthe crowd, and a woman pointed at one of them, with eyes almost startingfrom their sockets: but ere she could speak she fainted away. 

Then men and women crowded round her, partly to aid her, partly fromcuriosity. When she began to recover they fell to conjectures. 

"'Twas at him she pointed. "

"Nay, 'twas at this one. "

"Nay, nay, " said another, "'twas at yon hangdog with the hair hung roundhis neck. "

All further conjectures were cut short. The poor creature no soonerrecovered her senses than she flew at the landlord like a lioness. "My child! Man! man! Give me back my child. " And she seized the glossygolden hair that the officers had hung round his neck, and tore itfrom his neck, and covered it with kisses; then, her poor confused mindclearing, she saw even by this token that her lost girl was dead, andsank suddenly down shrieking and sobbing so over the poor hair, that thecrowd rushed on the assassin with one savage growl. His life had endedthen and speedily, for in those days all carried death at their girdles. But Denys drew his sword directly, and shouting "A moi, camarades!" keptthe mob at bay. "Who lays a finger on him dies. " Other archers backedhim, and with some difficulty they kept him uninjured, while Denysappealed to those who shouted for his blood. 

"What sort of vengeance is this? would you be so mad as rob the wheel, and give the vermin an easy death?"

The mob was kept passive by the archers' steel rather than by Denys'swords, and growled at intervals with flashing eyes. The municipalofficers, seeing this, collected round, and with the archers made aguard, and prudently carried the accused back to gaol. 

The mob hooted them and the prisoners indiscriminately. Denys saw thelatter safely lodged, then made for "The White Hart, " where he expectedto find Gerard. 

On the way he saw two girls working at a first-floor window. He salutedthem. They smiled. He entered into conversation. Their manners wereeasy, their complexion high. 

He invited them to a repast at "The White Hart. " They objected. Heacquiesced in their refusal. They consented. And in this charmingsociety he forgot all about poor Gerard, who meantime was carried off togaol; but on the way suddenly stopped, having now somewhat recoveredhis presence of mind, and demanded to know by whose authority he wasarrested. 

"By the vice-baillie's, " said the constable. 

"The vice-baillie? Alas! what have I, a stranger, done to offend avice-baillie? For this charge of sorcery must be a blind. No sorcerer amI; but a poor true lad far from his home. "

This vague shift disgusted the officer. "Show him the capias, Jacques, "said he. 

Jacques held out the writ in both hands about a yard and a half fromGerard's eye; and at the same moment the large constable suddenly pinnedhim; both officers were on tenterhooks lest the prisoner should grab thedocument, to which they attached a superstitious importance. 

But the poor prisoner had no such thought. Query whether he would havetouched it with the tongs. He just craned out his neck and read it, andto his infinite surprise found the vice-bailiff who had signed the writwas the friendly alderman. He took courage and assured his captor therewas some error. But finding he made no impression, demanded to be takenbefore the alderman. 

"What say you to that, Jacques?"

"Impossible. We have no orders to take him before his worship. Read thewrit!"

"Nay, but good kind fellows, what harm can it be? I will give you eachan ecu. "

"Jacques, what say you to that?"

"Humph! I say we have no orders not to take him to his worship. Read thewrit!"

"Then say we take him to prison round by his worship. "

It was agreed. They got the money; and bade Gerard observe they weredoing him a favour. He saw they wanted a little gratitude as well asmuch silver. He tried to satisfy this cupidity, but it stuck in histhroat. Feigning was not his forte. 

He entered the alderman's presence with his heart in his mouth, andbegged with faltering voice to know what he had done to offend since heleft that very room with Manon and Denys. 

"Nought that I know of, " said the alderman. 

On the writ being shown him, he told Gerard he had signed it atdaybreak. "I get old, and my memory faileth me: a discussing of the girlI quite forgot your own offence: but I remember now. All is well. Youare he I committed for sorcery. Stay! ere you go to gaol, you shall hearwhat your accuser says: run and fetch him, you. "

The man could not find the accuser all at once. So the alderman, gettingimpatient, told Gerard the main charge was that he had set a dead body aburning with diabolical fire, that flamed, but did not consume. "And if'tis true, young man, I'm sorry for thee, for thou wilt assuredly burnwith fire of good pine logs in the market-place of Neufchasteau. "

"Oh, sir, for pity's sake let me have speech with his reverence thecure. "

The alderman advised Gerard against it. "The Church was harder uponsorcerers than was the corporation. "

"But, sir, I am innocent, " said Gerard, between snarling and whining. 

"Oh, if you think you are innocent--officer, go with him to the cure;but see he 'scape you not. Innocent, quotha?"

They found the cure in his doublet repairing a wheelbarrow. Gerardtold him all, and appealed piteously to him. "Just for using a littlephosphorus in self-defence against cut-throats they are going to hang. "

It was lucky for our magician that he had already told his tale in fullto the cure, for thus that shrewd personage had hold of the stick at theright end. The corporation held it by the ferule. His reverence lookedexceedingly grave and said, "I must question you privately on thisuntoward business. " He took him into a private room and bade the officerstand outside and guard the door, and be ready to come if called. Thebig constable stood outside the door, quaking, and expecting to see theroom fly away and leave a stink of brimstone. Instantly they were alonethe cure unlocked his countenance and was himself again. 

"Show me the trick on't, " said he, all curiosity. 

"I cannot, sir, unless the room be darkened. "

The cure speedily closed out the light with a wooden shutter. "Now, then. "

"But on what shall I put it?" said Gerard. "Here is no dead face. 'Twasthat made it look so dire. " The cure groped about the room. "Good; hereis an image: 'tis my patron saint. "

"Heaven forbid! That were profanation. "

"Pshaw! 'twill rub off, will't not?"

"Ay, but it goes against me to take such liberty with a saint, " objectedthe sorcerer. 

"Fiddlestick!" said the divine. 

"To be sure by putting it on his holiness will show your reverence it isno Satanic art. "

"Mayhap 'twas for that I did propose it. " said the cure subtly. 

Thus encouraged, Gerard fired the eyes and nostrils of the image andmade the cure jump. Then lighted up the hair in patches; and set thewhole face shining like a glow-worm's. 

"By'r Lady, " shouted the cure, "'tis strange, and small my wonder thatthey took you for a magician, seeing a dead face thus fired. Now comethy ways with me!"

He put on his grey gown and great hat, and in a few minutes they foundthemselves in presence of the alderman. By his side, poisoning his mind, stood the accuser, a singular figure in red hose and red shoes, a blackgown with blue bands, and a cocked hat. 

After saluting the alderman, the cure turned to this personage and saidgood-humouredly, "So, Mangis, at thy work again, babbling away honestmen's lives! Come, your worship, this is the old tale! two of a tradecan ne'er agree. Here is Mangis, who professes sorcery, and would sellhimself to Satan to-night, but that Satan is not so weak as buy whathe can have gratis, this Mangis, who would be a sorcerer, but is onlya quacksalver, accuses of magic a true lad, who did but use inself-defence a secret of chemistry well-known to me and all churchmen. "

"But he is no churchman, to dabble in such mysteries, " objected thealderman. 

"He is more churchman than layman, being convent bred, and in the lesserorders, " said the ready cure. "Therefore, sorcerer, withdraw thy plaintwithout more words!"

"That I will not, your reverence, " replied Mangis stoutly. "A sorcerer Iam, but a white one, not a black one. I make no pact with Satan, but onthe contrary still battle him with lawful and necessary arts, I ne'erprofane the sacraments, as do the black sorcerers, nor turn myself intoa cat and go sucking infants' blood, nor e'en their breath, nor set deadmen o' fire. I but tell the peasants when their cattle and their hensare possessed, and at what time of the moon to plant rye, and what daysin each month are lucky for wooing of women and selling of bullocksand so forth: above all, it is my art and my trade to detect the blackmagicians, as I did that whole tribe of them who were burnt at Dol butlast year. "

"Ay, Mangis. And what is the upshot of that famous fire thy tongue didkindle?"

"Why, their ashes were cast to the wind. "

"Ay. But the true end of thy comedy is this. The parliament of Dijonhath since sifted the matter, and found they were no sorcerers, but goodand peaceful citizens; and but last week did order masses to be said fortheir souls, and expiatory farces and mysteries to be played for themin seven towns of Burgundy; all which will not of those cinders make menand women again. Now 'tis our custom in this land, when we have slainthe innocent by hearkening false knaves like thee, not to blame ourcredulous ears, but the false tongue that gulled them. Therefore bethinkthee that, at a word from me to my lord bishop, thou wilt smell burningpine nearer than e'er knave smelt it and lived, and wilt travel on asmoky cloud to him whose heart thou bearest (for the word devil in theLatin it meaneth 'false accuser'), and whose livery thou wearest. "

And the cure pointed at Mangis with his staff. 

"That is true i'fegs, " said the alderman, "for red and black be the foulfiendys colours. "

By this time the white sorcerer's cheek was as colourless as his dresswas fiery. Indeed the contrast amounted to pictorial. He stammered out, "I respect Holy Church and her will; he shall fire the churchyard, andall in it, for me: I do withdraw the plaint. "

"Then withdraw thyself, " said the vice-bailiff. 

The moment he was gone the cure took the conversational tone, and toldthe alderman courteously that the accused had received the chemicalsubstance from Holy Church, and had restored it her, by giving it all tohim. 

"Then 'tis in good hands, " was the reply; "young man, you are free. Letme have your reverence's prayers. "

"Doubt it not! Humph! Vice-baillie, the town owes me four silver franks, this three months and more. "

"They shall be paid, cure, ay, ere the week be out. "

On this good understanding Church and State parted. As soon as he was inthe street Gerard caught the priest's hand, and kissed it. 

"Oh, sir! Oh, your reverence. You have saved me from the fiery stake. What can I say, what do? what?"

"Nought, foolish lad. Bounty rewards itself. Natheless--Humph?--I wishI had done't without leasing. It ill becomes my function to utterfalsehoods. "

"Falsehood, sir?" Gerard was mystified. 

"Didst not hear me say thou hadst given me that same phosphorus? 'Twillcost me a fortnight's penance, that light word. " The cure sighed, andhis eye twinkled cunningly. 

"Nay, nay, " cried Gerard eagerly. "Now Heaven forbid! That was nofalsehood, father: well you knew the phosphorus was yours, is yours. "And he thrust the bottle into the cure's hand. "But alas, 'tis too poora gift: will you not take from my purse somewhat for Holy Church?" andnow he held out his purse with glistening eyes. 

"Nay, " said the other brusquely, and put his hands quickly behind him;"not a doit. Fie! fie! art pauper et exul. Come thou rather each day atnoon and take thy diet with me; for my heart warms to thee;" and he wentoff very abruptly with his hands behind him. 

They itched. 

But they itched in vain. 

Where there's a heart there's a Rubicon. 

Gerard went hastily to the inn to relieve Denys of the anxiety so longand mysterious an absence must have caused him. He found him seatedat his ease, playing dice with two young ladies whose manners wereunreserved, and complexion high. 

Gerard was hurt. "N'oubliez point la Jeanneton!" said he, colouring up. 

"What of her?" said Denys, gaily rattling the dice. 

"She said, 'Le peu que sont les femmes. '"

"Oh, did she? And what say you to that, mesdemoiselles?"

"We say that none run women down, but such as are too old, or tooill-favoured, or too witless to please them. "

"Witless, quotha? Wise men have not folly enough to please them, normadness enough to desire to please them, " said Gerard loftily; "but 'tisto my comrade I speak, not to you, you brazen toads, that make so freewith a man at first sight. "

"Preach away, comrade. Fling a byword or two at our heads. Know, girls, that he is a very Solomon for bywords. Methinks he was brought up byhand on 'em. "

"Be thy friendship a byword!" retorted Gerard. "The friendship thatmelts to nought at sight of a farthingale. "

"Malheureux!" cried Denys, "I speak but pellets, and thou answerestdaggers. "

"Would I could, " was the reply. "Adieu. "

"What a little savage!" said one of the girls. 

Gerard opened the door and put in his head. "I have thought of abyword, " said he spitefully--

 "Qui hante femmes et dez Il mourra en pauvretez. 

"There. " And having delivered this thunderbolt of antique wisdom, heslammed the door viciously ere any of them could retort. 

And now, being somewhat exhausted by his anxieties, he went to the barfor a morsel of bread and a cup of wine. The landlord would sell nothingless than a pint bottle. Well then he would have a bottle; but when hecame to compare the contents of the bottle with its size, great was thediscrepancy: on this he examined the bottle keenly, and found thatthe glass was thin where the bottle tapered, but towards the bottomunnaturally thick. He pointed this out at once. 

The landlord answered superciliously that he did not make bottles: andwas nowise accountable for their shape. 

"That we will see presently, " said Gerard. "I will take this thy pint tothe vice-bailiff. "

"Nay, nay, for Heaven's sake, " cried the landlord, changing his tone atonce. "I love to content my customers. If by chance this pint be short, we will charge it and its fellow three sous insteads of two sous each. "

"So be it. But much I admire that you, the host of so fair an inn, should practise thus. The wine, too, smacketh strongly of spring water. "

"Young sir, " said the landlord, "we cut no travellers' throats at thisinn, as they do at most. However, you know all about that, 'The WhiteHart' is no lion, nor bear. Whatever masterful robbery is done here, isdone upon the poor host. How then could he live at all if he dealt not alittle crooked with the few who pay?"

Gerard objected to this system root and branch. Honest trade was smallprofits, quick returns; and neither to cheat nor be cheated. 

The landlord sighed at this picture. "So might one keep an inn inheaven, but not in Burgundy. When foot soldiers going to the wars arequartered on me, how can I but lose by their custom? Two sous per day istheir pay, and they eat two sous' worth, and drink into the bargain. Thepardoners are my good friends, but palmers and pilgrims, what think youI gain by them? marry, a loss. Minstrels and jongleurs draw custom andso claim to pay no score, except for liquor. By the secular monks Ineither gain nor lose, but the black and grey friars have made vowof poverty, but not of famine; eat like wolves and give the poor hostnought but their prayers; and mayhap not them: how can he tell? In myfather's day we had the weddings; but now the great gentry let theirhouses and their plates, their mugs and their spoons to any honestcouple that want to wed, and thither the very mechanics go with theirbrides and bridal train. They come not to us: indeed we could not findseats and vessels for such a crowd as eat and drink and dance the weekout at the homeliest wedding now. In my father's day the great gentrysold wine by the barrel only; but now they have leave to cry it, andsell it by the galopin, in the very market-place. How can we vie withthem? They grow it. We buy it of the grower. The coroner's quests wehave still, and these would bring goodly profit, but the meat is ayegone ere the mouths be full. "

"You should make better provision, " suggested his hearer. 

"The law will not let us. We are forbidden to go into the market forthe first hour. So, when we arrive, the burghers have bought all but therefuse. Besides, the law forbids us to buy more than three bushelsof meal at a time: yet market day comes but once a week. As for thebutchers, they will not kill for us unless we bribe them. "

"Courage!" said Gerard kindly, "the shoe pinches every tradersomewhere. "

"Ay: but not as it pinches us. Our shoe is trode all o' one side as wellas pinches us lame. A savoir, if we pay not the merchants we buy meal, meat, and wine of, they can cast us into prison and keep us there tillwe pay or die. But we cannot cast into prison those who buy those veryvictuals of us. A traveller's horse we may keep for his debt; but where, in Heaven's name? In our own stable, eating his head off at our cost. Nay, we may keep the traveller himself; but where? In gaol? Nay, inour own good house, and there must we lodge and feed him gratis. And sofling good silver after bad? Merci; no: let him go with a wanion. Ourhonestest customers are the thieves. Would to Heaven there were more ofthem. They look not too close into the shape of the canakin, nor intothe host's reckoning: with them and with their purses 'tis lightly come, and lightly go. Also they spend freely, not knowing but each carouse maybe their last. But the thief-takers, instead of profiting by thisfair example, are for ever robbing the poor host. When noble or honesttravellers descend at our door, come the Provost's men pretending tosuspect them, and demanding to search them and their papers. To savewhich offence the host must bleed wine and meat. Then come the excise toexamine all your weights and measures. You must stop their mouths withmeat and wine. Town excise. Royal excise. Parliament excise. A swarmof them, and all with a wolf in their stomachs and a sponge in theirgullets. Monks, friars, pilgrims, palmers, soldiers, excisemen, provost-marshals and men, and mere bad debtors, how can 'The White Hart'butt against all these? Cutting no throats in self-defence as do your'Swans' and 'Roses' and 'Boar's Heads' and 'Red Lions' and 'Eagles, 'your 'Moons, ' 'Stars, ' and 'Moors, ' how can 'The White Hart' give a pintof wine for a pint? And everything risen so. Why, lad, not a pound ofbread I sell but cost me three good copper deniers, twelve to the sou;and each pint of wine, bought by the tun, costs me four deniers; everysack of charcoal two sous, and gone in a day. A pair of partridges fivesous. What think you of that? Heard one ever the like? five sous for twolittle beasts all bone and feather? A pair of pigeons, thirty deniers. 'Tis ruination!!! For we may not raise our pricen with the market. Oh, no, I tell thee the shoe is trode all o' one side as well as pinches thewater into our eyn. We may charge nought for mustard, pepper, salt, or firewood. Think you we get them for nought? Candle it is a sou thepound. Salt five sous the stone, pepper four sous the pound, mustardtwenty deniers the pint; and raw meat, dwindleth it on the spit with nocost to me but loss of weight? Why, what think you I pay my cook? Butyou shall never guess. A HUNDRED SOUS A YEAR AS I AM A LIVING SINNER. 

"And my waiter thirty sous, besides his perquisites. He is a hantlericher than I am. And then to be insulted as well as pillaged. LastSunday I went to church. It is a place I trouble not often. Didn't thecure lash the hotel-keepers? I grant you he hit all the trades, exceptthe one that is a byword for looseness, and pride, and sloth, to wit, the clergy. But, mind you, he stripeit the other lay estates with afeather, but us hotel-keepers with a neat's pizzle: godless for this, godless for that, and most godless of all for opening our doors duringmass. Why, the law forces us to open at all hours to travellers fromanother town, stopping, halting, or passing: those be the words. Theycan fine us before the bailiff if we refuse them, mass or no mass;and say a townsman should creep in with the true travellers, are we toblame? They all vow they are tired wayfarers; and can I ken every facein a great town like this? So if we respect the law our poor souls areto suffer, and if we respect it not, our poor lank purses must bleed attwo holes, fine and loss of custom. "

A man speaking of himself in general, is "a babbling brook;" of hiswrongs, "a shining river. "

"Labitur et labetur in omne volubilis aevum. "

So luckily for my readers, though not for all concerned, this injuredorator was arrested in mid career. Another man burst in upon his wrongswith all the advantage of a recent wrong; a wrong red hot. It was Denyscursing and swearing and crying that he was robbed. 

"Did those hussies pass this way? who are they? where do they bide? Theyhave ta'en my purse and fifteen golden pieces: raise the hue and cry!ah! traitresses! vipers! These inns are all guet-apens. "

"There now, " cried the landlord to Gerard. 

Gerard implored him to be calm, and say how it had befallen. 

"First one went out on some pretence: then after a while the other wentto fetch her back, and neither returning, I clapped hand to purse andfound it empty: the ungrateful creatures, I was letting them win it in agallop: but loaded dice were not quick enough; they must claw it all ina lump. "

Gerard was for going at once to the alderman and setting the officers tofind them. 

"Not I, " said Denys. "I hate the law. No: as it came so let it go. "

Gerard would not give it up so. 

At a hint from the landlord he forced Denys along with him to theprovost-marshal. That dignitary shook his head. "We have no clue tooccasional thieves, that work honestly at their needles, till some gullcomes and tempts them with an easy booty, and then they pluck him. 

"Come away, " cried Denys furiously. "I knew what use a bourgeois wouldbe to me at a pinch:" and he marched off in a rage. 

"They are clear of the town ere this, " said Gerard. 

"Speak no more on't if you prize my friendship. I have five pieces withthe bailiff, and ten I left with Manon, luckily; or these traitresseshad feathered their nest with my last plume. What dost gape for so? Nay, I do ill to vent my choler on thee: I'll tell thee all. Art wiser thanI. What saidst thou at the door? No matter. Well, then, I did offermarriage to that Manon. "

Gerard was dumfounded. 

"What? You offered her what?"

"Marriage. Is that such a mighty strange thing to offer a wench?"

"'Tis a strange thing to offer to a strange girl in passing. "

"Nay, I am not such a sot as you opine. I saw the corn in all thatchaff. I knew I could not get her by fair means, so I was fain to tryfoul. 'Mademoiselle, ' said I, 'marriage is not one of my habits, butstruck by your qualities I make an exception; deign to bestow this handon me. '"

"And she bestowed it on thine ear. '"

"Not so. On the contrary she--Art a disrespectful young monkey. Knowthat here, not being Holland or any other barbarous state, courtesybegets courtesy. Says she, a colouring like a rose, 'Soldier, you aretoo late. He is not a patch on you for looks; but then--he has loved mea long time. '

"'He? who?'

"'T'other. '

"'What other?'

"Why, he that was not too late. ' Oh, that is the way they all speak, theloves; the she-wolves. Their little minds go in leaps. Think you theymarshal their words in order of battle? Their tongues are in too greata hurry. Says she, 'I love him not; not to say love him; but he does me, and dearly; and for that reason I'd sooner die than cause him grief, Iwould. '"

"Now I believe she did love him. "

"Who doubts that? Why she said so, round about, as they always say thesethings, and with 'nay' for 'ay. '

"Well one thing led to another, and at last, as she could not give meher hand, she gave me a piece of advice, and that was to leave part ofmy money with the young mistress. Then, when bad company had cleaned meout, I should have some to travel back with, said she. I said I wouldbetter her advice, and leave it with her. Her face got red. Says she, 'Think what you do. Chambermaids have an ill name for honesty. ' 'Oh, thedevil is not so black as he is painted, ' said I. 'I'll risk it;' and Ileft fifteen gold pieces with her. "

Gerard sighed. "I wish you may ever see them again. It is wondrous inwhat esteem you do hold this sex, to trust so to the first comer. For mypart I know little about them; I never saw but one I could love as wellas I love thee. But the ancients must surely know; and they held womencheap. 'Levius quid femina, ' said they, which is but la Jeanneton'stune in Latin, 'Le peu que sont les femmes. ' Also do but see how thegreybeards of our own day speak of them, being no longer blinded bydesire: this alderman, to wit. "

"Oh, novice of novices, " cried Denys, "not to have seen why that oldfool rails so on the poor things! One day, out of the millions of womenhe blackens, one did prefer some other man to him: for which solitarypiece of bad taste, and ten to one 'twas good taste, he doth bespattercreation's fairer half, thereby proving what? le peu que sont leshommes. "

"I see women have a shrewd champion in thee, " said Gerard, with a smile. But the next moment inquired gravely why he had not told him all thisbefore. 

Denys grinned. "Had the girl said 'Ay, ' why then I had told theestraight. But 'tis a rule with us soldiers never to publish our defeats:'tis much if after each check we claim not a victory. "

"Now that is true, " said Gerard. "Young as I am, I have seen this; thatafter every great battle the generals on both sides go to the nearestchurch, and sing each a Te Deum for the victory; methinks a Te Martem, or Te Bellonam, or Te Mercurium, Mercury being the god of lies, weremore fitting. "

"Pas si bete, " said Denys approvingly. "Hast a good eye: canst see asteeple by daylight. So now tell me how thou hast fared in this town allday. "

"Come, " said Gerard, "'tis well thou hast asked me: for else I had nevertold thee. " He then related in full how he had been arrested, and bywhat a providential circumstance he had escaped long imprisonment orspeedy conflagration. 

His narrative produced an effect he little expected or desired. 

"I am a traitor, " cried Denys. "I left thee in a strange place to fightthine own battles, while I shook the dice with those jades. Now takethou this sword and pass it through my body forthwith. "

"What for in Heaven's name?" inquired Gerard. 

"For an example, " roared Denys. "For a warning to all false loons thatprofess friendship, and disgrace it. "

"Oh, very well, " said Gerard. "Yes. Not a bad notion. Where will youhave it?"

"Here, through my heart; that is, where other men have a heart, but Inone, or a Satanic false one. "

Gerard made a motion to run him through, and flung his arms round hisneck instead. "I know no way to thy heart but this, thou great sillything. "

Denys uttered an exclamation, then hugged him warmly--and, quiteovercome by this sudden turn of youthful affection and native grace, gulped out in a broken voice, "Railest on women--and art--likethem--with thy pretty ways. Thy mother's milk is in thee still. Satanwould love thee, or--le bon Dieu would kick him out of hell for shamingit. Give me thy hand! Give me thy hand! May" (a tremendous oath) "if Ilet thee out of my sight till Italy. "

And so the staunch friends were more than reconciled after their shorttiff. 

The next day the thieves were tried. The pieces de conviction werereduced in number, to the great chagrin of the little clerk, by theinterment of the bones. But there was still a pretty show. A thief'shand struck off flagrante delicto; a murdered woman's hair; the Abbot'saxe, and other tools of crime. The skulls, etc. , were sworn to by theconstables who had found them. Evidence was lax in that age and place. They all confessed but the landlord. And Manon was called to bring thecrime home to him. Her evidence was conclusive. He made a vain attemptto shake her credibility by drawing from her that her own sweetheart hadbeen one of the gang, and that she had held her tongue so long as hewas alive. The public prosecutor came to the aid of his witness, and elicited that a knife had been held to her throat, and her ownsweetheart sworn with solemn oaths to kill her should she betray them, and that this terrible threat, and not the mere fear of death, had gluedher lips. 

The other thieves were condemned to be hanged, and the landlord to bebroken on the wheel. He uttered a piercing cry when his sentence waspronounced. 

As for poor Manon, she became the subject of universal criticism. Nordid opinion any longer run dead in her favour; it divided into two broadcurrents. And strange to relate, the majority of her own sex took herpart, and the males were but equally divided; which hardly happens oncein a hundred years. Perhaps some lady will explain the phenomenon. Asfor me, I am a little shy of explaining things I don't understand. Ithas become so common. Meantime, had she been a lover of notoriety, shewould have been happy, for the town talked of nothing but her. The poorgirl, however, had but one wish to escape the crowd that followed her, and hide her head somewhere where she could cry over her "pendard, "whom all these proceedings brought vividly back to her affectionateremembrance. Before he was hanged he had threatened her life; but shewas not one of your fastidious girls, who love their male divinities anythe less for beating them, kicking them, or killing them, but ratherthe better, provided these attentions are interspersed with occasionalcaresses; so it would have been odd indeed had she taken offence at amere threat of that sort. He had never threatened her with a rival. Shesobbed single-mindedly. 

Meantime the inn was filled with thirsters for a sight of her, whofeasted and drank, to pass away the time till she should deign toappear. When she had been sobbing some time, there was a tap at herdoor, and the landlord entered with a proposal. "Nay, weep not, goodlass, your fortune it is made an you like. Say the word, and you arechambermaid of 'The White Hart. '"

"Nay, nay, " said Manon with a fresh burst of grief. "Never more will Ibe a servant in an inn. I'll go to my mother. "

The landlord consoled and coaxed her: and she became calmer, but nonethe less determined against his proposal. 

The landlord left her. But ere long he returned and made her anotherproposal. Would she be his wife, and landlady of "The White Hart"?

"You do ill to mock me, " said she sorrowfully. 

"Nay, sweetheart. I mock thee not. I am too old for sorry jests. Say youthe word, and you are my partner for better for worse. "

She looked at him, and saw he was in earnest: on this she suddenlyrained hard to the memory of "le pendard": the tears came in a torrent, being the last; and she gave her hand to the landlord of "The WhiteHart, " and broke a gold crown with him in sign of plighted troth. 

"We will keep it dark till the house is quiet, " said the landlord. 

"Ay, " said she; "but meantime prithee give me linen to hem, or work todo; for the time hangs on me like lead. "

Her betrothed's eye brightened at this housewifely request, and hebrought her up two dozen flagons of various sizes to clean and polish. 

She gathered complacency as she reflected that by a strange turn offortune all this bright pewter was to be hers. 

Meantime the landlord went downstairs, and falling in with our friendsdrew them aside into the bar. 

He then addressed Denys with considerable solemnity. "We are oldacquaintances, and you want not for sagacity: now advise me in a strait. My custom is somewhat declining: this girl Manon is the talk of thetown; see how full the inn is to-night. She doth refuse to be mychambermaid. I have half a mind to marry her. What think you? shall Isay the word?"

Denys in reply merely open his eyes wide with amazement. 

The landlord turned to Gerard with a half-inquiring look, "Nay, sir, " said Gerard; "I am too young to advise my seniors andbetters. "

"No matter. Let us hear your thought. "

"Well, sir, it was said of a good wife by the ancients, 'bene quaelatuit, bene vixit, ' that is, she is the best wife that is least talkedof: but here 'male quae patuit' were as near the mark. Therefore, anyou bear the lass good-will, why not club purses with Denys and me andconvey her safe home with a dowry? Then mayhap some rustical person inher own place may be brought to wife her. "

"Why so many words?" said Denys. "This old fox is not the ass he affectsto be. "

"Oh! that is your advice, is it?" said the landlord testily. "Well thenwe shall soon know who is the fool, you or me, for I have spoken to heras it happens; and what is more, she has said Ay, and she is polishingthe flagons at this moment. "

"Oho!" said Denys drily, "'twas an ambuscade. Well, in that case, myadvice is, run for the notary, tie the noose, and let us three drink thebride's health, till we see six sots a-tippling. "

"And shall. Ay, now you utter sense. "

In ten minutes a civil marriage was effected upstairs before a notaryand his clerk and our two friends. 

In ten minutes more the white hind, dead sick of seclusion, had takenher place within the bar, and was serving out liquids, and bustling, andher colour rising a little. 

In six little minutes more she soundly rated a careless servant-girl forcarrying a nipperkin of wine awry and spilling good liquor. 

During the evening she received across the bar eight offers of marriage, some of them from respectable burghers. Now the landlord and our twofriends had in perfect innocence ensconced themselves behind a screen, to drink at their ease the new couple's health. The above comedy wasthrown in for their entertainment by bounteous fate. They heard theproposals made one after another, and uninventive Manon's invariableanswer--"Serviteur; you are a day after the fair. " The landlord chuckledand looked good-natured superiority at both his late advisers, withtheir traditional notions that men shun a woman "quae patuit, " i. E. Whohas become the town talk. 

But Denys scarce noticed the spouse's triumph over him, he was sooccupied with his own over Gerard. At each municipal tender of undyingaffection, he turned almost purple with the effort it cost him notto roar with glee; and driving his elbow into the deep-meditatingand much-puzzled pupil of antiquity, whispered, "Le peu que sont leshommes. "

The next morning Gerard was eager to start, but Denys was under a vow tosee the murderers of the golden-haired girl executed. 

Gerard respected his vow, but avoided his example. 

He went to bid the cure farewell instead, and sought and received hisblessing. About noon the travellers got clear of the town. Just outsidethe south gate they passed the gallows; it had eight tenants: theskeleton of Manon's late wept, and now being fast forgotten, lover, andthe bodies of those who had so nearly taken our travellers' lives. Ahand was nailed to the beam. And hard by on a huge wheel was clawed thedead landlord, with every bone in his body broken to pieces. 

Gerard averted his head and hurried by. Denys lingered, and crowed overhis dead foes. "Times are changed, my lads, since we two sat shaking inthe cold awaiting you seven to come and cut our throats. "

"Fie, Denys! Death squares all reckonings. Prithee pass on withoutanother word, if you prize my respect a groat. "

To this earnest remonstrance Denys yielded. He even said thoughtfully, "You have been better brought up than I. "

About three in the afternoon they reached a little town with the peoplebuzzing in knots. The wolves, starved by the cold, had entered, andeaten two grown-up persons overnight, in the main street: so some wereblaming the eaten--"None but fools or knaves are about after nightfall;"others the law for not protecting the town, and others the corporationfor not enforcing what laws there were. 

"Bah! this is nothing to us, " said Denys, and was for resuming theirmarch. 

"Ay, but 'tis, " remonstrated Gerard. 

"What, are we the pair they ate?"

"No, but we may be the next pair. "

"Ay, neighbour, " said an ancient man, "'tis the town's fault for notobeying the ducal ordinance, which bids every shopkeeper light a lampo'er his door at sunset, and burn it till sunrise. "

On this Denys asked him somewhat derisively, "What made him fancy rushdips would scare away empty wolves? Why, mutton fat is all their joy. "

"'Tis not the fat, vain man, but the light. All ill things hate light;especially wolves and the imps that lurk, I ween, under their fur. Example; Paris city stands in a wood like, and the wolves do howl aroundit all night: yet of late years wolves come but little in the streets. For why, in that burgh the watchmen do thunder at each door that isdark, and make the weary wight rise and light. 'Tis my son tells me. Heis a great voyager, my son Nicholas. "

In further explanation he assured them that previously to that ordinanceno city had been worse infested with wolves than Paris; a troop hadboldly assaulted the town in 1420, and in 1438 they had eaten fourteenpersons in a single month between Montmartre and the gate St. Antoine, and that not a winter month even, but September: and as for thedead, which nightly lay in the streets slain in midnight brawls, orassassinated, the wolves had used to devour them, and to grub up thefresh graves in the churchyards and tear out the bodies. 

Here a thoughtful citizen suggested that probably the wolves had beenbridled of late in Paris, not by candle-lights, but owing to the Englishhaving been driven out of the kingdom of France. "For those English bevery wolves themselves for fierceness and greediness. What marvel thenthat under their rule our neighbours of France should be wolf-eaten?"This logic was too suited to the time and place not to be receivedwith acclamation. But the old man stood his ground. "I grant ye thoseislanders are wolves; but two-legged ones, and little apt to favourtheir four-footed cousins. One greedy thing loveth it another? I trownot. By the same token, and this too I have from my boy Nicole, Sir Wolfdare not show his nose in London city; though 'tis smaller than Paris, and thick woods hard by the north wall, and therein great store of deer, and wild boars as rife as flies at midsummer. "

"Sir, " said Gerard, "you seem conversant with wild beasts, pritheeadvise my comrade here and me: we would not waste time on the road, anif we may go forward to the next town with reasonable safety. '

"Young man, I trow 'twere an idle risk. It lacks but an hour of dusk, and you must pass nigh a wood where lurk some thousands of thesehalf-starved vermin, rank cowards single; but in great bands bold aslions. Wherefore I rede you sojourn here the night; and journey onbetimes. By the dawn the vermin will be tired out with roaring andrampaging; and mayhap will have filled their lank bellies with flesh ofmy good neighbours here, the unteachable fools. "

Gerard hoped not; and asked could he recommend them to a good inn. 

"Humph! there is the 'Tete d'Or. ' My grandaughter keeps it. She isa mijauree, but not so knavish as most hotel-keepers, and her houseindifferent clean. "

"Hey, for the 'Tete d'Or, '" struck in Denys, decided by his ineradicablefoible. 

On the way to it, Gerard inquired of his companion what a "mijauree"was?

Denys laughed at his ignorance. "Not know what a mijauree is? why allthe world knows that. It is neither more nor less than a mijauree. "

As they entered the "Tete d'Or, " they met a young lady richly dressedwith a velvet chaperon on her head, which was confined by law to thenobility. They unbonneted and louted low, and she curtsied, but fixedher eye on vacancy the while, which had a curious rather than a genialeffect. However, nobility was not so unassuming in those days as itis now. So they were little surprised. But the next minute supper wasserved, and lo! in came this princess and carved the goose. 

"Holy St. Bavon, " cried Gerard. "'Twas the landlady all the while. "

A young woman, cursed with nice white teeth and lovely hands: for thesebeauties being misallied to homely features, had turned her head. Shewas a feeble carver, carving not for the sake of others but herself, i. E. To display her hands. When not carving she was eternally eithertaking a pin out of her head or her body, or else putting a pin into herhead or her body. To display her teeth, she laughed indifferently at gayor grave and from ear to ear. And she "sat at ease" with her mouth ajar. 

Now there is an animal in creation of no great general merit; but it hasthe eye of a hawk for affectation. It is called "a boy. " And Gerard wasbut a boy still in some things; swift to see, and to loath, affectation. So Denys sat casting sheep's eyes, and Gerard daggers, at one comedian. 

Presently, in the midst of her minauderies, she gave a loud shriek andbounded out of her chair like hare from form, and ran backwards out ofthe room uttering little screams, and holding her farthingale tight downto her ankles with both hands. And as she scuttled out of the door amouse scuttled back to the wainscot in a state of equal, and perhapsmore reasonable terror. The guests, who had risen in anxiety at theprincipal yell, now stood irresolute awhile, then sat down laughing. Thetender Denys, to whom a woman's cowardice, being a sexual trait, seemedto be a lovely and pleasant thing, said he would go comfort her andbring her back. 

"Nay! nay! nay! for pity's sake let her bide, " cried Gerard earnestly. "Oh, blessed mouse! sure some saint sent thee to our aid. "

Now at his right hand sat a sturdy middle-aged burgher, whose conduct upto date had been cynical. He had never budged nor even rested his knifeat all this fracas. He now turned on Gerard and inquired haughtilywhether he really thought that "grimaciere" was afraid of a mouse. 

"Ay. She screamed hearty. "

"Where is the coquette that cannot scream to the life? These shetavern-keepers do still ape the nobles. Some princess or duchess hathlain here a night, that was honestly afeard of a mouse, having beenbrought up to it. And this ape hath seen her, and said, 'I will startat a mouse, and make a coil, ' She has no more right to start at a mousethan to wear that fur on her bosom, and that velvet on her monkey'shead. I am of the town, young man, and have known the mijauree all herlife, and I mind when she was no more afeard of a mouse than she is ofa man. " He added that she was fast emptying the inn with these"singeries. " "All the world is so sick of her hands, that her verykinsfolk will not venture themselves anigh them. " He concluded withsomething like a sigh, "The 'Tete d'Or' was a thriving hostelry under myold chum her good father; but she is digging its grave tooth and nail. '

"Tooth and nail? good! a right merry conceit and a true, " said Gerard. But the right merry conceit was an inadvertence as pure as snow, andthe stout burgher went to his grave and never knew what he had done:for just then attention was attracted by Denys returning pompously. Heinspected the apartment minutely, and with a high official air: he alsolooked solemnly under the table; and during the whole inquisition awhite hand was placed conspicuously on the edge of the open door, anda tremulous voice inquired behind it whether the horrid thing was quitegone. 

"The enemy has retreated, bag and baggage, " said Denys: and handed inthe trembling fair, who, sitting down, apologized to her guests forher foolish fears, with so much earnestness, grace, and seemingself-contempt, that, but for a sour grin on his neighbour's face, Gerardwould have been taken in as all the other strangers were. Dinner ended, the young landlady begged an Augustine friar at her right hand to saygrace. He delivered a longish one. The moment he began, she clapped herwhite hands piously together, and held them up joined for mortals toadmire; 'tis an excellent pose for taper white fingers: and cast hereyes upward towards heaven, and felt as thankful to it as a magpie doeswhile cutting off with your thimble. 

After supper the two friends went to the street-door and eyed themarket-place. The mistress joined them, and pointed out the town-hall, the borough gaol, St. Catherine's church, etc. This was courteous, tosay the least. But the true cause soon revealed itself; the fair handwas poked right under their eyes every time an object was indicated; andGerard eyed it like a basilisk, and longed for a bunch of nettles. Thesun set, and the travellers, few in number, drew round the great roaringfire, and omitting to go on the spit, were frozen behind though roastedin front. For if the German stoves were oppressively hot, the Frenchsalles manger were bitterly cold, and above all stormy. In Germany mensat bareheaded round the stove, and took off their upper clothes, but inBurgundy they kept on their hats, and put on their warmest furs to sitround the great open chimney places, at which the external air rushedfuriously from door and ill-fitting window. However, it seems theirmediaeval backs were broad enough to bear it: for they made themselvesnot only comfortable but merry, and broke harmless jests over eachother in turn. For instance, Denys's new shoes, though not in directcommunication, had this day exploded with twin-like sympathy andunanimity. "Where do you buy your shoon, soldier?" asked one. 

Denys looked askant at Gerard, and not liking the theme, shook it off. "I gather 'em off the trees by the roadside, " said he surlily. 

"Then you gathered these too ripe, " said the hostess, who was only afool externally. 

"Ay, rotten ripe, " observed another, inspecting them. 

Gerard said nothing, but pointed the circular satire by pantomime. Heslily put out both his feet, one after another, under Denys's eye, withtheir German shoes, on which a hundred leagues of travel had produced noeffect. They seemed hewn out of a rock. 

At this, "I'll twist the smooth varlet's neck that sold me mine, "shouted Denys, in huge wrath, and confirmed the threat with singularoaths peculiar to the mediaeval military. The landlady put her fingersin her ears, thereby exhibiting the hand in a fresh attitude. "Tell mewhen he has done his orisons, somebody, " said she mincingly. And afterthat they fell to telling stories. 

Gerard, when his turn came, told the adventure of Denys and Gerard atthe inn in Domfront, and so well, that the hearers were rapt into sweetoblivion of the very existence of mijauree and hands. But this made hervery uneasy, and she had recourse to her grand coup. This misdirectedgenius had for a twelvemonth past practised yawning, and could do itnow at any moment so naturally as to set all creation gaping, could allcreation have seen her. By this means she got in all her charms. Forfirst she showed her teeth, then, out of good breeding, you know, closedher mouth with three taper fingers. So the moment Gerard's story got toointeresting and absorbing, she turned to and made yawns, and "croix surla bouche. "

This was all very fine: but Gerard was an artist, and artists arechilled by gaping auditors. He bore up against the yawns a long time;but finding they came from a bottomless reservoir, lost both heart andtemper, and suddenly rising in mid narrative, said, "But I weary ourhostess, and I am tired myself: so good night!" whipped a candle off thedresser, whispered Denys, "I cannot stand her, " and marched to bed in amoment. 

The mijauree coloured and bit her lips. She had not intended her byplayfor Gerard's eye: and she saw in a moment she had been rude, and silly, and publicly rebuked. She sat with cheek on fire, and a little naturalwater in her eyes, and looked ten times comelier and more womanlyand interesting than she had done all day. The desertion of the bestnarrator broke up the party, and the unassuming Denys approached themeditative mijauree, and invited her in the most flattering terms togamble with him. She started from her reverie, looked him down into theearth's centre with chilling dignity, and consented, for she rememberedall in a moment what a show of hands gambling admitted. 

The soldier and the mijauree rattled the dice. In which sport she was sotaken up with her hands, that she forgot to cheat, and Denys won an "ecuau soleil" of her. She fumbled slowly with her purse, partly because hersex do not burn to pay debts of honour, partly to admire the play ofher little knuckles peeping between their soft white cushions. Denysproposed a compromise. 

"Three silver franks I win of you, fair hostess. Give me now threekisses of this white hand, and we'll e'en cry quits. "

"You are malapert, " said the lady, with a toss of her head; "besides, they are so dirty. See! they are like ink!" and to convince him she putthem out to him and turned them up and down. They were no dirtier thancream fresh from the cob and she knew it: she was eternally washing andscenting them. 

Denys read the objection like the observant warrior he was, seized themand mumbled them. 

Finding him so appreciative of her charm, she said timidly, "Will you dome a kindness, good soldier?"

"A thousand, fair hostess, an you will. "

"Nay, I ask but one. 'Tis to tell thy comrade I was right sorry to losehis most thrilling story, and I hope he will tell me the rest to-morrowmorning. Meantime I shall not sleep for thinking on't. Wilt tell himthat--to pleasure me?"

"Ay, I'll tell the young savage. But he is not worthy of yourcondescension, sweet hostess. He would rather be aside a man than awoman any day. "

"So would--ahem. He is right: the young women of the day are not worthyof him, 'un tas des mijaurees' He has a good, honest, and right comelyface. Any way, I would not guest of mine should think me unmannerly, notfor all the world. Wilt keep faith with me and tell him?"

"On this fair hand I swear it; and thus I seal the pledge. "

"There; no need to melt the wax, though. Now go to bed. And tell him ereyou sleep. "

The perverse toad (I thank thee, Manon, for teaching me that word) wasinclined to bestow her slight affections upon Gerard. Not that she wasinflammable: far less so than many that passed for prudes in the town. But Gerard possessed a triple attraction that has ensnared coquettes inall ages. 1. He was very handsome. 2. He did not admire her the least. 3. He had given her a good slap in the face. 

Denys woke Gerard and gave the message. Gerard was not enchanted "Dostwake a tired man to tell him that? Am I to be pestered with 'mijaurees'by night as well as day?"

"But I tell thee, novice, thou hast conquered her: trust to myexperience: her voice sank to melodious whispers; and the cunning jadedid in a manner bribe me to carry thee her challenge to Love's lists!for so I read her message. "

Denys then, assuming the senior and the man of the world, told Gerardthe time was come to show him how a soldier understood friendshipand camaraderie. Italy was now out of the question. Fate had providedbetter; and the blind jade Fortune had smiled on merit for once. "TheHead of Gold" had been a prosperous inn, would be again with a man atits head. A good general laid far-sighted plans; but was always readyto abandon them, should some brilliant advantage offer, and to reapthe full harvest of the unforeseen: 'twas chiefly by this trait greatleaders defeated little ones; for these latter could do nothing not cutand dried beforehand. 

"Sorry friendship, that would marry me to a mijauree, " interposedGerard, yawning. 

"Comrade, be reasonable; 'tis not the friskiest sheep that falls downthe cliff. All creatures must have their fling soon, or late; and whynot a woman? What more frivolous than a kitten? what graver than a cat?"

"Hast a good eye for nature, Denys, " said Gerard, "that I proclaim. 

"A better for thine interest, boy. Trust then to me; these little dovesthey are my study day and night; happy the man whose wife taketh herfling before wedlock, and who trippeth up the altar-steps instead ofdown 'em. Marriage it always changeth them for better or else for worse. Why, Gerard, she is honest when all is done; and he is no man, nor halfa man, that cannot mould any honest lass like a bit of warm wax, and sheaye aside him at bed and board. I tell thee in one month thou wilt makeof this coquette the matron the most sober in the town, and of allits wives the one most docile and submissive. Why, she is half tamedalready. Nine in ten meek and mild ones had gently hated thee likepoison all their lives, for wounding of their hidden pride. But she foran affront proffers affection. By Joshua his bugle a generous lass, andvoid of petty malice. When thou wast gone she sat a-thinking and spokenot. A sure sign of love in one of her sex: for of all things elsethey speak ere they think. Also her voice did sink exceeding low indiscoursing of thee, and murmured sweetly; another infallible sign. Thebolt hath struck and rankles in her; oh, be joyful! Art silent? Isee; 'tis settled. I shall go alone to Remiremont, alone and sad. But, pillage and poleaxes! what care I for that, since my dear comrade willstay here, landlord of the 'Tete d'Or, ' and safe from all the stormsof life? Wilt think of me, Gerard, now and then by thy warm fire, of mecamped on some windy heath, or lying in wet trenches, or wounded onthe field and far from comfort? Nay!" and this he said in a manner trulynoble, "not comfortless or cold, or wet, or bleeding, 'twill still warmmy heart to lie on my back and think that I have placed my dear friendand comrade true in the 'Tete d'Or, ' far from a soldier's ills. "

"I let you run on, dear Denys, " said Gerard softly, "because at eachword you show me the treasure of a good heart. But now bethink thee, mytroth is plighted there where my heart it clingeth. You so leal, wouldyou make me disloyal?"

"Perdition seize me, but I forgot that, " said Denys. 

"No more then, but hie thee to bed, good Denys. Next to Margaret I lovethee best on earth, and value thy 'coeur d'or' far more than a dozenof these 'Tetes d'Or. ' So prithee call me at the first blush ofrosy-fingered morn, and let's away ere the woman with the hands bestirring. "

They rose with the dawn, and broke their fast by the kitchen fire. 

Denys inquired of the girl whether the mistress was about. 

"Nay; but she hath risen from her bed: by the same token I am carryingher this to clean her withal;" and she filled a jug with boiling water, and took it upstairs. 

"Behold, " said Gerard, "the very elements must be warmed to suit herskin; what had the saints said, which still chose the coldest pool?Away, ere she come down and catch us. "

They paid the score, and left the "Tete d'Or, " while its mistress waswashing her hands. 

CHAPTER XXXVIII

Outside the town they found the snow fresh trampled by innumerablewolves every foot of the road. 

"We did well to take the old man's advice, Denys. "

"Ay did we. For now I think on't, I did hear them last night scurryingunder our window, and howling and whining for man's flesh in yonmarket-place. But no fat burgher did pity the poor vagabones, and dropout o' window. "

Gerard smiled, but with an air of abstraction. And they plodded on insilence. 

"What dost meditate so profoundly?"

"Thy goodness. "

Denys was anything but pleased at this answer. Amongst his oddities youmay have observed that he could stand a great deal of real impertinence;he was so good-humoured. But would fire up now and then where not eventhe shadow of a ground for anger existed. 

"A civil question merits a civil reply, " said he very drily. 

"Alas, I meant no other, " said Gerard. 

"Then why pretend you were thinking of my goodness, when you know I haveno goodness under my skin?"

"Had another said this, I had answered, 'Thou liest. ' But to thee I say, 'Hast no eye for men's qualities, but only for women's. ' And once more Ido defy thy unreasonable choler, and say I was thinking on thy goodnessof overnight. Wouldst have wedded me to the 'Tete d'Or' or rather to the'tete de veau doree, ' and left thyself solitary. "

"Oh, are ye there, lad?" said Denys, recovering his good humour in amoment. "Well, but to speak sooth, I meant that not for goodness; butfor friendship and true fellowship, no more. And let me tell you, myyoung master, my conscience it pricketh me even now for letting you turnyour back thus on fortune and peaceful days. A truer friend than I hadta'en and somewhat hamstrung thee. Then hadst thou been fain to liesmarting at the 'Tete d'Or' a month or so; yon skittish lass had nursedthee tenderly, and all had been well. Blade I had in hand to do't, butremembering how thou hatest pain, though it be but a scratch, my cravenheart it failed me at the pinch. " And Denys wore a look of humbleapology for his lack of virtuous resolution when the path of duty lay soclear. 

Gerard raised his eyebrows with astonishment at this monstrous butthoroughly characteristic revelation; however, this new and delicatepoint of friendship was never discussed; viz. , whether one ought inall love to cut the tendon Achilles of one's friend. For an incidentinterposed. 

"Here cometh one in our rear a-riding on his neighbour's mule, " shoutedDenys. 

Gerard turned round. "And how know ye 'tis not his own, pray?"

"Oh, blind! Because he rides it with no discretion. "

And in truth the man came galloping like a fury. But what astonished thefriends most was that on reaching them the rustic rider's eyes openedsaucer-like, and he drew the rein so suddenly and powerfully, that themule stuck out her fore-legs, and went sliding between the pedestrianslike a four-legged table on castors. 

"I trow ye are from the 'Tete d'Or?'" They assented. "Which of ye is theyounger?"

"He that was born the later, " said Denys, winking at his companion. 

"Gramercy for the news. "

"Come, divine then!"

"And shall. Thy beard is ripe, thy fellow's is green; he shall be theyounger; here, youngster. " And he held him out a paper packet. "Ye leftthis at the 'Tete d'Or, ' and our mistress sends it ye. "

"Nay, good fellow, methinks I left nought. " And Gerard felt his pouch. Etc. 

"Would ye make our burgess a liar, " said the rustic reproachfully; "andshall I have no pourboire?" (still more reproachfully); "and came ventrea terre. "

"Nay, thou shalt have pourboire, " and he gave him a small coin. 

"A la bonne heure, " cried the clown, and his features beamed withdisproportionate joy. "The Virgin go with ye; come up, Jenny!" and backhe went "stomach to earth, " as his nation is pleased to call it. 

Gerard undid the packet; it was about six inches square, and inside ithe found another packet, which contained a packet, and so on. At thefourth he hurled the whole thing into the snow. Denys took it outand rebuked his petulance. He excused himself on the ground of hatingaffectation. 

Denys attested, "'The great toe of the little daughter of Herodias'there was no affectation here, but only woman's good wit. Doubtless thewraps contained something which out of delicacy, or her sex's lovelycunning, she would not her hind should see her bestow on a young man;thy garter, to wit. "

"I wear none. "

"Her own then; or a lock of her hair. What is this? A piece of raw silkfresh from the worm. Well, of all the love tokens!"

"Now who but thee ever dreamed that she is so naught as send me lovetokens? I saw no harm in her--barring her hands. "

"Stay, here is something hard lurking in this soft nest. Come forth, Isay, little nestling! Saints and pikestaves! look at this!"

It was a gold ring with a great amethyst glowing and sparkling, fullcoloured, but pure as crystal. 

"How lovely!" said Gerard innocently. 

"And here is something writ; read it thou! I read not so glib as some, when I know not the matter beforehand. "

Gerard took the paper. "'Tis a posy, and fairly enough writ. " He readthe lines, blushing like a girl. They were very naive, and may be thusEnglished:--

 'Youth, with thee my heart is fledde, Come back to the 'golden Hedde!' Wilt not? yet this token keepe Of hir who doeth thy goeing weepe. Gyf the world prove harsh and cold, Come back to 'the Hedde of gold. '"

"The little dove!" purred Denys. 

"The great owl! To go and risk her good name thus. However, thank Heavenshe has played this prank with an honest lad that will ne'er expose herfolly. But oh, the perverseness! Could she not bestow her nauseousnesson thee?" Denys sighed and shrugged. "On thee that art as ripe for follyas herself?"

Denys confessed that his young friend had harped his very thought. 'Twaspassing strange to him that a damsel with eyes in her head should passby a man, and bestow her affections on a boy. Still he could not butrecognize in this the bounty of Nature. Boys were human beings afterall, and but for this occasional caprice of women, their lot would betoo terrible; they would be out of the sun altogether, blighted, andnever come to anything; since only the fair could make a man out ofsuch unpromising materials as a boy. Gerard interrupted this flatteringdiscourse to beg the warrior-philosopher's acceptance of the lady'sring. He refused it flatly, and insisted on Gerard going back to the"Tete d'Or" at once, ring and all, like a man, and not letting a poorgirl hold out her arms to him in vain. 

"Her hands, you mean. "

"Her hand, with the 'Tete d'Or' in it. "

Failing in this, he was for putting the ring on his friend's finger. Gerard declined. "I wear a ring already. "

"What, that sorry gimcrack? why, 'tis pewter, or tin at best: and thisvirgin gold, forbye the jewel. "

"Ay, but 'twas Margaret gave me this one; and I value it above rubies. I'll neither part with it nor give it a rival, " and he kissed the basemetal, and bade it fear nought. 

"I see the owl hath sent her ring to a goose, " said Denys sorrowfully. However, he prevailed on Gerard to fasten it inside his bonnet. To this, indeed, the lad consented very readily. For sovereign qualities wereuniversally ascribed to certain jewels; and the amethyst ranked highamong these precious talismans. 

When this was disposed of, Gerard earnestly requested his friend to letthe matter drop, since speaking of the other sex to him made him pineso for Margaret, and almost unmanned him with the thought that each stepwas taking him farther from her. "I am no general lover, Denys. There isroom in my heart for one sweetheart, and for one friend. I am far frommy dear mistress; and my friend, a few leagues more, and I must lose himtoo. Oh, let me drink thy friendship pure while I may, and not dilutewith any of these stupid females. "

"And shalt, honey-pot, and shalt, " said Denys kindly'. "But as tomy leaving thee at Remiremont, reckon thou not on that! For" (threeconsecutive oaths) "if I do. Nay, I shall propose to thee to stayforty-eight hours there, while I kiss my mother and sisters, and thefemales generally, and on go you and I together to the sea. "

"Denys! Denys!"

"Denys nor me! 'Tis settled. Gainsay me not! or I'll go with theeto Rome. Why not? his Holiness the Pope hath ever some little merrypleasant war toward, and a Burgundian soldier is still welcome in hisranks. "

On this Gerard opened his heart. "Denys, ere I fell in with thee, I usedoften to halt on the road, unable to go farther: my puny heart so pulledme back: and then, after a short prayer to the saints for aid, would Irise and drag my most unwilling body onward. But since I joined companywith thee, great is my courage. I have found the saying of theancients true, that better is a bright comrade on the weary road thana horse-litter; and, dear brother, when I do think of what we have doneand suffered together! Savedst my life from the bear, and from yetmore savage thieves; and even poor I did make shift to draw thee outof Rhine, and somehow loved thee double from that hour. How many tiestender and strong between us! Had I my will, I'd never, never, never, never part with my Denys on this side the grave. Well-a-day! God Hiswill be done. 

"No, my will shall be done this time, " shouted Denys. "Le bon Dieu hasbigger fish to fry than you or me. I'll go with thee to Rome. There ismy hand on it. "

"Think what, you say! 'Tis impossible. 'Tis too selfish of me. "

"I tell thee, 'tis settled. No power can change me. At Remiremont Iborrow ten pieces of my uncle, and on we go; 'tis fixed. "

They shook hands over it. Then Gerard said nothing, for his heart wastoo full; but he ran twice round his companion as he walked, then dancedbackwards in front of him, and finally took his hand, and so on theywent hand in hand like sweethearts, till a company of mounted soldiers, about fifty in number, rose to sight on the brow of a hill. 

"See the banner of Burgundy, " said Denys joyfully; "I shall look out fora comrade among these. "

"How gorgeous is the standard in the sun, " said Gerard "and how braveare the leaders with velvet and feathers, and steel breastplates likeglassy mirrors!"

When they came near enough to distinguish faces, Denys uttered anexclamation: "Why, 'tis the Bastard of Burgundy, as I live. Nay, then;there is fighting a-foot since he is out; a gallant leader, Gerard, rates his life no higher than a private soldier's, and a soldier's nohigher than a tomtit's; and that is the captain for me. "

"And see, Denys, the very mules with their great brass frontlets andtrappings seem proud to carry them; no wonder men itch to be soldiers;"and in the midst of this innocent admiration the troop came up withthem. 

"Halt!" cried a stentorian voice. The troop halted. The Bastard ofBurgundy bent his brow gloomily on Denys: "How now, arbalestrier, howcomes it thy face is turned southward, when every good hand and heart ishurrying northward?"

Denys replied respectfully that he was going on leave, after some yearsof service, to see his kindred at Remiremont. 

"Good. But this is not the time for't; the duchy is disturbed. Ho! bringthat dead soldier's mule to the front; and thou mount her and forwardwith us to Flanders. "

"So please your highness, " said Denys firmly, "that may not be. My homeis close at hand. I have not seen it these three years; and above all, Ihave this poor youth in charge, whom I may not, cannot leave, till I seehim shipped for Rome. 

"Dost bandy words with me?" said the chief, with amazement, turning fastto wrath. "Art weary o' thy life? Let go the youth's hand, and into thesaddle without more idle words. "

Denys made no reply; but he held Gerard's hand the tighter, and lookeddefiance. 

At this the bastard roared, "Jarnac, dismount six of thy archers, andshoot me this white-livered cur dead where he stands--for an example. "

The young Count de Jarnac, second in command, gave the order, and themen dismounted to execute it. 

"Strip him naked, " said the bastard, in the cold tone of militarybusiness, "and put his arms and accoutrements on the spare mule We'llmaybe find some clown worthier to wear them. "

Denys groaned aloud, "Am I to be shamed as well as slain?"

"Oh, nay! nay! nay!" cried Gerard, awaking from the stupor into whichthis thunderbolt of tyranny had thrown him. "He shall go with you on theinstant. I'd liever part with him for ever than see a hair of his dearhead harmed Oh, sir, oh, my lord, give a poor boy but a minute to bidhis only friend farewell! he will go with you. I swear he shall go withyou. "

The stern leader nodded a cold contemptuous assent. "Thou, Jarnac, staywith them, and bring him on alive or dead. Forward!" And he resumed hismarch, followed by all the band but the young count and six archers, oneof whom held the spare mule. 

Denys and Gerard gazed at one another haggardly. Oh, what a look!

And after this mute interchange of anguish, they spoke hurriedly, forthe moments were flying by. 

"Thou goest to Holland: thou knowest where she bides. Tell her all. Shewill be kind to thee for my sake. "

"Oh, sorry tale that I shall carry her! For God's sake, go back to the'Tete d'Or. ' I am mad!"

"Hush! Let me think: have I nought to say to thee, Denys? my head! myhead!"

"Ah! I have it. Make for the Rhine, Gerard! Strasbourg. 'Tis but a step. And down the current to Rotterdam. Margaret is there: I go thither. I'lltell her thou art coming. We shall all be together. "

"My lads, haste ye, or you will get us into trouble, " said the countfirmly, but not harshly now. 

"Oh, sir, one moment! one little moment!" panted Gerard. 

"Cursed be the land I 'was born in! cursed be the race of man! and hethat made them what they are!" screamed Denys. 

"Hush, Denys, hush! blaspheme not! Oh, God forgive him, he wots not whathe says. Be patient, Denys, be patient: though we meet no more on earth, let us meet in a better world, where no blasphemer may enter. To myheart, lost friend; for what are words now?" He held out his arms, andthey locked one another in a close embrace. They kissed one anotheragain and again, speechless, and the tears rained down their cheeks Andthe Count Jarnac looked on amazed, but the rougher soldiers, to whomcomrade was a sacred name, looked on with some pity in their hardfaces. Then at a signal from Jarnac, with kind force and words of rudeconsolation, they almost lifted Denys on to the mule; and putting himin the middle of them, spurred after their leader. And Gerard ran wildlyafter (for the lane turned), to see the very last of him; and the lastglimpse he caught, Denys was rocking to and fro on his mule, and tearinghis hair out. But at this sight something rose in Gerard's throat sohigh, so high, he could run no more nor breathe, but gasped, and leanedagainst the snow-clad hedge, seizing it, and choking piteously. 

The thorns ran into his hand. 

After a bitter struggle he got his breath again; and now began to seehis own misfortune. Yet not all at once to realize it, so sudden andnumbing was the stroke. He staggered on, but scarce feeling or caringwhither he was going; and every now and then he stopped, and his armsfell and his head sank on his chest, and he stood motionless: then hesaid to himself, "Can this thing be? this must be a dream. 'Tis scarcefive minutes since we were so happy, walking handed, faring to Rometogether, and we admired them and their gay banners and helmets ohhearts of hell!"

All nature seemed to stare now as lonely as himself. Not a creature insight. No colour but white. He, the ghost of his former self, wanderedalone among the ghosts of trees, and fields, and hedges. Desolate!desolate! desolate! All was desolate. 

He knelt and gathered a little snow. "Nay, I dream not; for this issnow: cold as the world's heart. It is bloody, too: what may thatmean? Fool! 'tis from thy hand. I mind not the wound Ay, I see: thorns. Welcome! kindly foes: I felt ye not, ye ran not into my heart. Ye arenot cruel like men. "

He had risen, and was dragging his leaden limbs along, when he heardhorses' feet and gay voices behind him. He turned with a joyful but wildhope that the soldiers had relented and were bringing Denys back. Butno, it was a gay cavalcade. A gentleman of rank and his favourites invelvet and furs and feathers; and four or five armed retainers in buffjerkins. 

They swept gaily by. 

Gerard never looked at them after they were gone by: certain gay shadowshad come and passed; that was all. He was like one in a dream. But hewas rudely wakened; suddenly a voice in front of him cried harshly, "Stand and deliver!" and there were three of the gentleman's servants infront of him. They had ridden back to rob him. 

"How, ye false knaves, " said he, quite calmly; "would ye shame yournoble master? He will hang ye to the nearest tree;" and with these wordshe drew his sword doggedly, and set his back to the hedge. 

One of the men instantly levelled his petronel at him. 

But another, less sanguinary, interposed. "Be not so hasty! And be notthou so mad! Look yonder!"

Gerard looked, and scarce a hundred yards off the nobleman and hisfriends had halted, and sat on their horses, looking at the lawlessact, too proud to do their own dirty work, but not too proud to reapthe fruit, and watch lest their agents should rob them of another man'smoney. 

The milder servant then, a good-natured fellow, showed Gerard resistancewas vain; reminded him common thieves often took the life as well as thepurse, and assured him it cost a mint to be a gentleman; his master hadlost money at play overnight, and was going to visit his leman, and somust take money where he saw it. 

"Therefore, good youth, consider that we rob not for ourselves, anddeliver us that fat purse at thy girdle without more ado, nor put us tothe pain of slitting thy throat and taking it all the same. "

"This knave is right, " said Gerard calmly aloud but to himself. "Iought not to fling away my life; Margaret would be so sorry. Take thenthe poor man's purse to the rich man's pouch; and with it this; tellhim, I pray the Holy Trinity each coin in it may burn his hand, andfreeze his heart, and blast his soul for ever. Begone and leave me to mysorrow!" He flung them the purse. 

They rode away muttering; for his words pricked them a little; a verylittle: and he staggered on, penniless now as well as friendless, tillhe came to the edge of a wood. Then, though his heart could hardly feelthis second blow, his judgment did; and he began to ask himself what wasthe use going further? He sat down on the hard road, and ran his nailsinto his hair, and tried to think for the best; a task all the moredifficult that a strange drowsiness was stealing over him. Rome he couldnever reach without money. Denys had said, "Go to Strasbourg, and downthe Rhine home. " He would obey Denys. But how to get to Strasbourgwithout money?

Then suddenly seemed to ring in his ears--

 "Gyf the world prove harsh and cold, Come back to the hedde of gold. "

"And if I do I must go as her servant; I who am Margaret's. I ama-weary, a-weary. I will sleep, and dream all is as it was. Ah me, howhappy were we an hour agone, we little knew how happy. There is a house:the owner well-to-do. What if I told him my wrong, and prayed his aidto retrieve my purse, and so to Rhine? Fool! is he not a man, like therest? He would scorn me and trample me lower. Denys cursed the race ofmen. That will I never; but oh, I begin to loathe and dread them. Nay, here will I lie till sunset: then darkling creep into this rich man'sbarn, and take by stealth a draught of milk or a handful o' grain, tokeep body and soul together. God, who hath seen the rich rob me, willperadventure forgive me. They say 'tis ill sleeping on the snow. Deathsteals on such sleepers with muffled feet and honey breath. But what canI? I am a-weary, a-weary. Shall this be the wood where lie the wolvesyon old man spoke of? I must e'en trust them: they are not men; and I amso a-weary. "

He crawled to the roadside, and stretched out his limbs on the snow, with a deep sigh. 

"Ah, tear not thine hair so! teareth my heart to see thee. "

"Margaret. Never see me more. Poor Margaret. "

And the too tender heart was still. 

And the constant lover, and friend of antique mould, lay silent on thesnow; in peril from the weather, in peril from wild beasts, in perilfrom hunger, friendless and penniless in a strange land, and not halfwayto Rome. 

CHAPTER XXXIX

Rude travel is enticing to us English. And so are its records; eventhough the adventurer be no pilgrim of love. And antique friendship hasat least the interest of a fossil. Still, as the true centre of thisstory is in Holland, it is full time to return thither, and to thoseordinary personages and incidents whereof life has been mainly composedin all ages. 

Jorian Ketel came to Peter's house to claim Margaret's promise; butMargaret was ill in bed, and Peter, on hearing his errand, affronted himand warned him off the premises, and one or two that stood by were forducking him; for both father and daughter were favourites, and thewhole story was in every mouth, and Sevenbergens in that state of hot, undiscriminating irritation which accompanies popular sympathy. 

So Jorian Ketel went off in dudgeon, and repented him of his good deed. This sort of penitence is not rare, and has the merit of being sincere. Dierich Brower, who was discovered at "The Three Kings, " making achatterbox drunk in order to worm out of him the whereabouts of MartinWittenhaagen, was actually taken and flung into a horsepond, andthreatened with worse usage, should he ever show his face in the burghagain; and finally, municipal jealousy being roused, the burgomasterof Sevenbergen sent a formal missive to the burgomaster of Tergou, reminding him he had overstepped the law, and requesting him to apply tothe authorities of Sevenbergen on any future occasion when he might havea complaint, real or imaginary, against any of its townsfolk. 

The wily Ghysbrecht, suppressing his rage at this remonstrance, sent back a civil message to say that the person he had followed toSevenbergen was a Tergovian, one Gerard, and that he had stolen the townrecords: that Gerard having escaped into foreign parts, and probablytaken the documents with him, the whole matter was at an end. 

Thus he made a virtue of necessity. But in reality his calmness was buta veil: baffled at Sevenbergen, he turned his views elsewhere he set hisemissaries to learn from the family at Tergou whither Gerard had fled, and "to his infinite surprise" they did not know. This added tohis uneasiness. It made him fear Gerard was only lurking in theneighbourhood: he would make a certain discovery, and would come backand take a terrible revenge. From this time Dierich and others that wereabout him noticed a change for the worse in Ghysbrecht Van Swieten. Hebecame a moody irritable man. A dread lay on him. His eyes cast furtiveglances, like one who expects a blow, and knows not from what quarterit is to come. Making others wretched had not made him happy. It seldomdoes. 

The little family at Tergou, which, but for his violent interference, might in time have cemented its difference without banishing spem gregisto a distant land, wore still the same outward features, but within wasno longer the simple happy family this tale opened with. Little Kateknew the share Cornelis and Sybrandt had in banishing Gerard, andthough, for fear of making more mischief still, she never told hermother, yet there were times she shuddered at the bare sight of them, and blushed at their hypocritical regrets. Catherine, with a woman'svigilance, noticed this, and with a woman's subtlety said nothing, butquietly pondered it, and went on watching for more. The black sheepthemselves, in their efforts to partake in the general gloom and sorrow, succeeded so far as to impose upon their father and Giles: but thedemure satisfaction that lay at their bottom could not escape thesefeminine eyes--

"That, noting all, seem nought to note. "

Thus mistrust and suspicion sat at the table, poor substitutes forGerard's intelligent face, that had brightened the whole circle, unobserved till it was gone. As for the old hosier his pride had beenwounded by his son's disobedience, and so he bore stiffly up, and didhis best never to mention Gerard's name; but underneath his Spartancloak, Nature might be seen tugging at his heart-strings. One anxiety henever affected to conceal. "If I but knew where the boy is, and that hislife and health are in no danger, small would be my care, " would he say;and then a deep sigh would follow. I cannot help thinking that if Gerardhad opened the door just then, and walked in, there would have been manytears and embraces for him, and few reproaches, or none. 

One thing took the old couple quite by surprise--publicity. Ere Gerardhad been gone a week, his adventures were in every mouth; and to makematters worse, the popular sympathy declared itself warmly on the sideof the lovers, and against Gerard's cruel parents, and that old busybodythe burgomaster, who must put his nose into a business that nowiseconcerned him. 

"Mother, " said Kate, "it is all over the town that Margaret is down witha fever--a burning fever; her father fears her sadly. "

"Margaret? what Margaret?" inquired Catherine, with a treacherousassumption of calmness and indifference. 

"Oh, mother! whom should I mean? Why, Gerard's Margaret. "

"Gerard's Margaret, " screamed Catherine; "how dare you say such a wordto me? And I rede you never mention that hussy's name in this house, that she has laid bare. She is the ruin of my poor boy, the flower ofall my flock. She is the cause that he is not a holy priest in the midstof us, but is roaming the world, and I a desolate broken-hearted mother. There, do not cry, my girl, I do ill to speak harsh to you. But oh, Kate! you know not what passes in a mother's heart. I bear up beforeyou all; it behoves me swallow my fears; but at night I see him in mydreams, and still some trouble or other near him: sometimes he is tornby wild beasts; other times he is in the hands of robbers, and theircruel knives uplifted to strike his poor pale face, that one shouldthink would move a stone. Oh! when I remember that, while I sit herein comfort, perhaps my poor boy lies dead in some savage place, and allalong of that girl: there, her very name is ratsbane to me. I trembleall over when I hear it. "

"I'll not say anything, nor do anything to grieve you worse, mother, "said Kate tenderly; but she sighed. 

She whose name was so fiercely interdicted in this house was much spokenof, and even pitied elsewhere. All Sevenbergen was sorry for her, andthe young men and maidens cast many a pitying glance, as they passed, atthe little window where the beauty of the village lay "dying for love. "In this familiar phrase they underrated her spirit and unselfishness. Gerard was not dead, and she was too loyal herself to doubt hisconstancy. Her father was dear to her and helpless; and but for bodilyweakness, all her love for Gerard would not have kept her from doingher duties, though she might have gone about them with drooping head andheavy heart. But physical and mental excitement had brought on an attackof fever so violent, that nothing but youth and constitution savedher. The malady left her at last, but in that terrible state of bodilyweakness in which the patient feels life a burden. 

Then it is that love and friendship by the bedside are mortal angelswith comfort in their voice, and healing in their palms. 

But this poor girl had to come back to life and vigour how she could. Many days she lay alone, and the heavy hours rolled like leaden wavesover her. In her enfeebled state existence seemed a burden, and life athing gone by. She could not try her best to get well. Gerard was gone. She had not him to get well for. Often she lay for hours quite still, with the tears welling gently out of her eyes. 

One day, waking from an uneasy slumber, she found two women in her room, One was a servant, the other by the deep fur on her collar and sleeveswas a person of consideration: a narrow band of silvery hair, beingspared by her coiffure, showed her to be past the age when women ofsense concealed their years. The looks of both were kind and friendly. Margaret tried to raise herself in the bed, but the old lady placed ahand very gently on her. 

"Lie still, sweetheart; we come not here to put you about, but tocomfort you, God willing. Now cheer up a bit, and tell us, first, whothink you we are?"

"Nay, madam, I know you, though I never saw you before: you are thedemoiselle Van Eyck, and this is Reicht Heynes. Gerard has oft spoken ofyou, and of your goodness to him. Madam, he has no friend like you nearhim now, " and at this thought she lay back, and the tears welled out ofher eyes in a moment. 

The good-natured Reicht Heynes began to cry for company; but hermistress scolded her. "Well, you are a pretty one for a sick-room, " saidshe; and she put out a world of innocent art to cheer the patient; andnot without some little success. An old woman, that has seen life andall its troubles, is a sovereign blessing by a sorrowful young woman'sside. She knows what to say, and what to avoid. She knows how to sootheher and interest her. Ere she had been there an hour, she had Margaret'shead lying on her shoulder instead of on the pillow, and Margaret's softeyes dwelling on her with gentle gratitude. 

"Ah! this is hair, " said the old lady, running her fingers through it. "Come and look at it, Reicht!"

Reicht came and handled it, and praised it unaffectedly. The poorgirl that owned it was not quite out of the reach of flattery; owingdoubtless to not being dead. 

"In sooth, madam, I did use to think it hideous; but he praised it, andever since then I have been almost vain of it, saints forgive me. Youknow how foolish those are that love. "

"They are greater fools that don't, " said the old lady, sharply. 

Margaret opened her lovely eyes, and looked at her for her meaning. 

This was only the first of many visits. In fact either Margaret Van Eyckor Reicht came nearly every day until their patient was convalescent;and she improved rapidly under their hands. Reicht attributed thisprincipally to certain nourishing dishes she prepared in Peter'skitchen; but Margaret herself thought more of the kind words and eyesthat kept telling her she had friends to live for. 

Martin Wittenhaagen went straight to Rotterdam, to take the bull by thehorns. The bull was a biped, with a crown for horns. It was Philipthe Good, duke of this, earl of that, lord of the other. Arrived atRotterdam, Martin found the court was at Ghent. To Ghent he went, andsought an audience, but was put off and baffled by lackeys and pages. Sohe threw himself in his sovereign's way out hunting, and contrary toall court precedents, commenced the conversation--by roaring lustily formercy. 

"Why, where is the peril, man?" said the duke, looking all round andlaughing. 

"Grace for an old soldier hunted down by burghers!"

Now kings differ in character like other folk; but there is one traitthey have in common; they are mightily inclined to be affable to menof very low estate. These do not vie with them in anything whatever, so jealousy cannot creep in; and they amuse them by their bluntness andnovelty, and refresh the poor things with a touch of nature--a rarity incourts. So Philip the Good reined in his horse and gave Martin almost atete-a-tete, and Martin reminded him of a certain battlefield where hehad received an arrow intended for his sovereign. The duke rememberedthe incident perfectly, and was graciously pleased to take a cheerfulview of it. He could afford to, not having been the one hit. ThenMartin told his majesty of Gerard's first capture in the church, hisimprisonment in the tower, and the manoeuvre by which they got him out, and all the details of the hunt; and whether he told it better thanI have, or the duke had not heard so many good stories as you have, certain it is that sovereign got so wrapt up in it, that, when a numberof courtiers came galloping up and interrupted Martin, he swore likea costermonger, and threatened, only half in jest, to cut off the nexthead that should come between him and a good story; and when Martin haddone, he cried out--

"St. Luke! what sport goeth on in this mine earldom, ay! in my ownwoods, and I see it not. You base fellows have all the luck. " And hewas indignant at the partiality of Fortune. "Lo you now! this was aman-hunt, " said he. "I never had the luck to be at a man-hunt. "

"My luck was none so great, " replied Martin bluntly: "I was on the wrongside of the dogs' noses. "

"Ah! so you were; I forgot that. " And royalty was more reconciled to itslot. "What would you then?"

"A free pardon, your highness, for myself and Gerard. "

"For what?"

"For prison-breaking. "

"Go to; the bird will fly from the cage. 'Tis instinct. Besides, coop ayoung man up for loving a young woman? These burgomasters must be voidof common sense. What else?"

"For striking down the burgomaster. "

"Oh, the hunted boar will turn to bay. 'Tis his right; and I hold himless than man that grudges it him. What else?"

"For killing of the bloodhounds. "

The duke's countenance fell. 

"'Twas their life or mine, " said Martin eagerly. 

"Ay! but I can't have, my bloodhounds, my beautiful bloodhounds, sacrificed to--

"No, no, no! They were not your dogs. "

"Whose dogs, then?"

"The ranger's. "

"Oh. Well, I am very sorry for him, but as I was saying I can't havemy old soldiers sacrificed to his bloodhounds. Thou shalt have thy freepardon. "

"And poor Gerard. "

"And poor Gerard too, for thy sake. And more, tell thou this burgomasterhis doings mislike me: this is to set up for a king, not a burgomaster. I'll have no kings in Holland but one. Bid him be more humble; or by St. Jude I'll hang him before his own door, as I hanged the burgomasterof what's the name, some town or other in Flanders it was; no, 'twas'somewhere in Brabant--no matter--I hanged him, I remember that much--foroppressing poor folk. "

The duke then beckoned his chancellor, a pursy old fellow that rode likea sack, and bade him write out a free pardon for Martin and one Gerard. 

This precious document was drawn up in form, and signed next day, andMartin hastened home with it. 

Margaret had left her bed some days, and was sitting pale and pensiveby the fireside, when he burst in, waving the parchment, and crying, "Afree pardon, girl, for Gerard as well as me! Send for him back when youwill; all the burgomasters on earth daren't lay a finger on him. "

She flushed all over with joy and her hands trembled with eagernessas she took the parchment and devoured it with her eyes, and kissed itagain and again, and flung her arms round Martin's neck, and kissed him. When she was calmer, she told him Heaven had raised her up a friend inthe dame Van Eyck. "And I would fain consult her on this good news; butI have not strength to walk so far. "

"What need to walk? There is my mule. "

"Your mule, Martin?"

The old soldier or professional pillager laughed, and confessed hehad got so used to her, that he forgot at times Ghysbrecht had a priorclaim. To-morrow he would turn her into the burgomaster's yard, butto-night she should carry Margaret to Tergou. 

It was nearly dusk; so Margaret ventured, and about seven in the eveningshe astonished and gladdened her new but ardent friend, by arriving ather house with unwonted roses on her cheeks, and Gerard's pardon in herbosom. 

CHAPTER XL

Some are old in heart at forty, some are young at eighty. MargaretVan Eyck's heart was an evergreen. She loved her young namesake withyouthful ardour. Nor was this new sentiment a mere caprice; she wasquick at reading character, and saw in Margaret Brandt that which inone of her own sex goes far with an intelligent woman; genuineness. But, besides her own sterling qualities, Margaret had from the first a potentally in the old artist's bosom. 

Human nature. 

Strange as it may appear to the unobservant, our hearts warm morereadily to those we have benefited than to our benefactors. Some of theGreek philosophers noticed this; but the British Homer has stamped it inimmortal lines:--

 "I heard, and thought how side by side We two had stemmed the battle's tide In many a well-debated field, Where Bertram's breast was Philip's shield. I thought on Darien's deserts pale, Where Death bestrides the evening gale, How o'er my friend my cloak I threw, And fenceless faced the deadly dew. I thought on Quariana's cliff, Where, rescued from our foundering skiff, Through the white breakers' wrath I bore Exhausted Bertram to the shore: And when his side an arrow found, I sucked the Indian's venom'd wound. These thoughts like torrents rushed along To sweep away my purpose strong. "

Observe! this assassin's hand is stayed by memory, not of benefitsreceived, but benefits conferred. 

Now Margaret Van Eyck had been wonderfully kind to Margaret Brandt; hadbroken through her own habits to go and see her; had nursed her, andsoothed her, and petted her, and cured her more than all the medicine inthe world. So her heart opened to the recipient of her goodness, and sheloved her now far more tenderly than she had ever loved Gerard, though, in truth, it was purely out of regard for Gerard she had visited her inthe first instance. 

When, therefore, she saw the roses on Margaret's cheek, and read thebit of parchment that had brought them there, she gave up her own viewswithout a murmur. 

"Sweetheart, " said she, "I did desire he should stay in Italy fiveor six years, and come back rich, and above all, an artist. But yourhappiness is before all, and I see you cannot live without him, so wemust have him home as fast as may be. "

"Ah, madam! you see my very thoughts. " And the young woman hung her heada moment and blushed. "But how to let him know, madam? That passes myskill. He is gone to Italy; but what part I know not. Stay! he named thecities he should visit. Florence was one, and Rome. " But then--Finally, being a sensible girl, she divined that a letter, addressed, "MyGerard--Italy, " might chance to miscarry, and she looked imploringly ather friend for counsel. 

"You are come to the right place, and at the right time, " said the oldlady. "Here was this Hans Memling with me to-day; he is going to Italy, girl, no later than next week, 'to improve his hand, ' he says. Notbefore 'twas needed, I do assure you. "

"But how is he to find my Gerard?"

"Why, he knows your Gerard, child. They have supped here more thanonce, and were like hand and glove. Now, as his business is the same asGerard's, he will visit the same places as Gerard, and soon or late hemust fall in with him. Wherefore, get you a long letter written, andcopy out this pardon into it, and I'll answer for the messenger. In sixmonths at farthest Gerard shall get it; and when he shall get it, thenwill he kiss it, and put it in his bosom, and come flying home. What areyou smiling at? And now what makes your cheeks so red? And what youare smothering me for, I cannot think. Yes! happy days are coming to mylittle pearl. "

Meantime, Martin sat in the kitchen, with the black-jack before him andReicht Heynes spinning beside him: and, wow! but she pumped him thatnight. 

This Hans Memling was an old pupil of Jan Van Eyck and his sister. Hewas a painter notwithstanding Margaret's sneer, and a good soul enough, with one fault. He loved the "nipperkin, canakin, and the brown bowl"more than they deserve. This singular penchant kept him from amassingfortune, and was the cause that he often came to Margaret Van Eyck fora meal, and sometimes for a groat. But this gave her a claim on him, andshe knew he would not trifle with any commission she should entrust tohim. 

The letter was duly written and left with Margaret Van Eyck; and thefollowing week, sure enough, Hans Memling returned from Flanders, Margaret Van Eyck gave him the letter, and a piece of gold towards histravelling expenses. He seemed in a hurry to be off. 

"All the better, " said the old artist; "he will be the sooner in Italy. "

But as there are horses who burn and rage to start, and after the firstyard or two want the whip, so all this hurry cooled into inaction whenHans got as far as the principal hostelry of Tergou, and saw two ofhis boon companions sitting in the bay window. He went in for a partingglass with them; but when he offered to pay, they would not hear of it, No; he was going a long journey; they would treat him; everybody musttreat him, the landlord and all. 

It resulted from this treatment that his tongue got as loose as if thewine had been oil; and he confided to the convivial crew that he wasgoing to show the Italians how to paint: next he sang his exploitsin battle, for he had handled a pike; and his amorous successes withfemales, not present to oppose their version of the incidents. In short, "plenus rimarum erat: huc illuc diffluebat;" and among the miscellaneousmatters that oozed out, he must blab that he was entrusted with a letterto a townsman of theirs, one Gerard, a good fellow: he added "you areall good fellows:" and to impress his eulogy, slapped Sybrandt on theback so heartily, as to drive the breath out of his body. 

Sybrandt got round the table to avoid this muscular approval; butlistened to every word, and learned for the first time that Gerard wasgone to Italy. However, to make sure, he affected to doubt it. 

"My brother Gerard is never in Italy. "

"Ye lie, ye cur, " roared Hans, taking instantly the irascible turn, andnot being clear enough to see that he, who now sat opposite him, was thesame he had praised, and hit, when beside him. "If he is ten timesyour brother, he is in Italy. What call ye this? There, read me thatsuperscription!" and he flung down a letter on the table. 

Sybrandt took it up, and examined it gravely; but eventually laid itdown, with the remark, that he could not read. However, one of thecompany, by some immense fortuity, could read; and proud of so rare anaccomplishment, took it, and read it out:

"To Gerard Eliassoen, of Tergou. These by the hand of the trusty HansMemling, with all speed. "

"'Tis excellently well writ, " said the reader, examining every letter. 

"Ay!" said Hans bombastically, "and small wonder: 'tis writ by a famoushand; by Margaret, sister of Jan Van Eyck. Blessed and honoured be hismemory! She is an old friend of mine, is Margaret Van Eyck. "

Miscellaneous Hans then diverged into forty topics. 

Sybrandt stole out of the company, and went in search of Cornelis. 

They put their heads together over the news: Italy was an immensedistance off. If they could only keep him there?

"Keep him there? Nothing would keep him long from his Margaret. "

"Curse her!" said Sybrandt. "Why didn't she die when she was about it?"

"She die? She would outlive the pest to vex us. " And Cornelis was wrothat her selfishness in not dying, to oblige. 

These two black sheep kept putting their heads together, and taintingeach other worse and worse, till at last their corrupt hearts conceiveda plan for keeping Gerard in Italy all his life, and so securing hisshare of their father's substance. 

But when they had planned it they were no nearer the execution: for thatrequired talent: so iniquity came to a standstill. But presently, as ifSatan had come between the two heads, and whispered into the right earof one and the left of the other simultaneously, they both burst out--

"THE BURGOMASTER!"

They went to Ghysbrecht Van Swieten, and he received them at once:for the man who is under the torture of suspense catches eagerly atknowledge. Certainty is often painful, but seldom, like suspense, intolerable. 

"You have news of Gerard?" said he eagerly. 

Then they told about the letter and Hans Memling. He listened withrestless eye. "Who writ the letter?"

"Margaret Van Eyck, " was the reply; for they naturally thought thecontents were by the same hand as the superscription. 

"Are ye sure?" And he went to a drawer and drew out a paper written byMargaret Van Eyck while treating with the burgh for her house. "Was itwrit like this?"

"Yes. 'Tis the same writing, " said Sybrandt boldly. 

"Good. And now what would ye of me?" said Ghysbrecht, with beatingheart, but a carelessness so well feigned that it staggered them. Theyfumbled with their bonnets, and stammered and spoke a word or two, thenhesitated and beat about the bush, and let out by degrees that theywanted a letter written, to say something that might keep Gerard inItaly; and this letter they proposed to substitute in Hans Memling'swallet for the one he carried. While these fumbled with their bonnetsand their iniquity, and vacillated between respect for a burgomaster, and suspicion that this one was as great a rogue as themselves, andsomehow or other, on their side against Gerard, pros and cons werecoursing one another to and fro in the keen old man's spirit. Vengeancesaid let Gerard come back and feel the weight of the law. Prudence saidkeep him a thousand miles off. But then Prudence said also, why do dirtywork on a doubtful chance? Why put it in the power of these two roguesto tarnish your name? Finally, his strong persuasion that Gerard wasin possession of a secret by means of which he could wound him to thequick, coupled with his caution, found words thus: "It is my duty toaid the citizens that cannot write. But for their matter I will not beresponsible. Tell me, then, what I shall write. "

"Something about this Margaret. "

"Ay, ay! that she is false, that she is married to another, I'll gobail. "

"Nay, burgomaster, nay! not for all the world!" cried Sybrandt; "Gerardwould not believe it, or but half, and then he would come back to see. No; say that she is dead. "

"Dead! what, at her age, will he credit that?"

"Sooner than the other. Why she was nearly dead: so it is not to say adownright lie, after all. "

"Humph! And you think that will keep him in Italy?"

"We are sure of it, are we not, Cornelis?"

"Ay, " said Cornelis, "our Gerard will never leave Italy now he isthere. It was always his dream to get there. He would come back forhis Margaret, but not for us. What cares he for us? He despises his ownfamily; always did. "

"This would be a bitter pill to him, " said the old hypocrite. 

"It will be for his good in the end, " replied the young one. 

"What avails Famine wedding Thirst?" said Cornelis. 

"And the grief you are preparing for him so coolly?" Ghysbrecht spokesarcastically, but tasted his own vengeance all the time. 

"Oh, a lie is not like a blow with a curtal axe. It hacks no flesh, andbreaks no bones. "

"A curtal axe?" said Sybrandt; "no, nor even like a stroke with acudgel. " And he shot a sly envenomed glance at the burgomaster's brokennose. 

Ghysbrecht's face darkened with ire when this adder's tongue struck hiswound. But it told, as intended: the old man bristled with hate. 

"Well, " said he, "tell me what to write for you, and I must write it;but take notice, you bear the blame if aught turns amiss. Not the handwhich writes, but the tongue which dictates, doth the deed. "

The brothers assented warmly, sneering within. Ghysbrecht then drewhis inkhorn towards him, and laid the specimen of Margaret Van Eyck'swriting before him, and made some inquiries as to the size and shapeof the letter, when an unlooked-for interruption occurred; Jorian Ketelburst hastily into the room, and looked vexed at not finding him alone. 

"Thou seest I have matter on hand, good fellow. "

"Ay; but this is grave. I bring good news; but 'tis not for every ear. "

The burgomaster rose, and drew Jorian aside into the embrasure of hisdeep window, and then the brothers heard them converse in low but eagertones. It ended by Ghysbrecht sending Jorian out to saddle his mule. Hethen addressed the black sheep with a sudden coldness that amazed them--

"I prize the peace of households; but this is not a thing to be done ina hurry: we will see about it, we will see. "

"But, burgomaster, the man will be gone. It will be too late. "

"Where is he?"

"At the hostelry, drinking. "

"Well, keep him drinking! We will see, we will see. " And he sent themoff discomfited. 

To explain all this we must retrograde a step. This very morning then, Margaret Brandt had met Jorian Ketel near her own door. He passed herwith a scowl. This struck her, and she remembered him. 

"Stay, " said she. "Yes! it is the good man who saved him. Oh! whyhave you not been near me since? And why have you not come for theparchments? Was it not true about the hundred crowns?"

Jorian gave a snort; but, seeing her face that looked so candid, beganto think there might be some mistake. He told her he had come, and howhe had been received. 

"Alas!" said she, "I knew nought of this. I lay at Death's door. Shethen invited him to follow her, and took him into the garden and showedhim the spot where the parchments were buried. Martin was for takingthem up, but I would not let him. He put them there; and I said noneshould move them but you, who had earned them so well of him and me. "

"Give me a spade!" cried Jorian eagerly. "But stay! No; he is asuspicious man. You are sure they are there still?"

"I will openly take the blame if human hand hath touched them. "

"Then keep them but two hours more, I prithee, good Margaret, " saidJorian, and ran off to the Stadthouse of Tergou a joyful man. 

The burgomaster jogged along towards Sevenbergen, with Jorian stridingbeside him, giving him assurance that in an hour's time the missingparchments would be in his hand. 

"Ah, master!" said he, "lucky for us it wasn't a thief that took them. "

"Not a thief? not a thief? what call you him, then?"

"Well, saving your presence, I call him a jackdaw. This is jackdaw'swork, if ever there was; 'take the thing you are least in need of, andhide it'--that's a jackdaw. I should know, " added Jorian oracularly, "for I was brought up along with a chough. He and I were born the sameyear, but he cut his teeth long before me, and wow! but my life was aburden for years all along of him. If you had but a hole in your hose nobigger than a groat, in went his beak like a gimlet; and, for stealing, Gerard all over. What he wanted least, and any poor Christian in thehouse wanted most, that went first. Mother was a notable woman, soif she did but look round, away flew her thimble. Father lived bycordwaining, so about sunrise Jack went diligently off with his awl, hiswax, and his twine. After that, make your bread how you could! One dayI heard my mother tell him to his face he was enough to corrupthalf-a-dozen other children; and he only cocked his eye at her, and nextminute away with the nurseling's shoe off his very foot. Now this Gerardis tarred with the same stick. The parchments are no more use to himthan a thimble or an awl to Jack. He took 'em out of pure mischief andhid them, and you would never have found them but for me. "

"I believe you are right, " said Ghysbrecht, "and I have vexed myselfmore than need. "

When they came to Peter's gate he felt uneasy. 

"I wish it had been anywhere but here. "

Jorian reassured him. 

"The girl is honest and friendly, " said he. "She had nothing to do withtaking them, I'll be sworn;" and he led him into the garden. "There, master, if a face is to be believed, here they lie; and see, the mouldis loose. "

He ran for a spade which was stuck up in the ground at some distance, and soon went to work and uncovered a parchment. Ghysbrecht saw it, andthrust him aside and went down on his knees and tore it out of the hole. His hands trembled and his face shone. He threw out parchment afterparchment, and Jorian dusted them and cleared them and shook them. Now, when Ghysbrecht had thrown out a great many, his face began to darkenand lengthen, and when he came to the last, he put his hands to histemples and seemed to be all amazed. 

"What mystery lies here?" he gasped. "Are fiends mocking me? Dig deeper!There must be another. "

Jorian drove the spade in and threw out quantities of hard mould. Invain. And even while he dug, his master's mood had changed. 

"Treason! treachery!" he cried. "You knew of this. "

"Knew what, master, in Heaven's name?"

"Caitiff, you knew there was another one worth all these twice told. '

"'Tis false, " cried Jorian, made suspicious by the other's suspicion. "'Tis a trick to rob me of my hundred crowns. Oh! I know you, burgomaster. " And Jorian was ready to whimper. 

A mellow voice fell on them both like oil upon the waves. 

"No, good man, it is not false, nor yet is it quite true: there wasanother parchment. "

"There, there, there! Where is it?"

"But, " continued Margaret calmly, "it was not a town record (so you havegained your hundred crowns, good man): it was but a private deed betweenthe burgomaster here and my grandfather Flor--"

"Hush, hush!"

"--is Brandt. "

"Where is it, girl? that is all we want to know. "

"Have patience, and I shall tell you. Gerard read the title of it, andhe said, 'This is as much yours as the burgomaster's, ' and he put itapart, to read it with me at his leisure. "

"It is in the house, then?" said the burgomaster, recovering hiscalmness. 

"No, sir, " said Margaret gravely, "it is not. " Then, in a voicethat faltered suddenly, "You hunted--my poor Gerard--so hard--and soclose-that you gave him--no time-to think of aught--but his life--andhis grief. The parchment was in his bosom, and he hath ta'en it withhim. "

"Whither, whither?"

"Ask me no more, sir. What right is yours to question me thus? It wasfor your sake, good man, I put force upon my heart, and came out here, and bore to speak at all to this hard old man. For, when I think of themisery he has brought on him and me, the sight of him is more than I canbear;" and she gave an involuntary shudder, and went slowly in, with herhand to her head, crying bitterly. 

Remorse for the past, and dread of the future--the slow, but, as he nowfelt, the inevitable future--avarice, and fear, all tugged in one shortmoment at Ghysbrecht's tough heart. He hung his head, and his arms felllistless by his sides. A coarse chuckle made him start round, and therestood Martin Wittenhaagen leaning on his bow, and sneering from earto ear. At sight of the man and his grinning face, Ghysbrecht's worstpassions awoke. 

"Ho! attach him, seize him, traitor and thief!" cried he. "Dog, thoushalt pay for all. "

Martin, without a word, calmly thrust the duke's pardon underGhysbrecht's nose. He looked, and had not a word to say. Martin followedup his advantage. 

"The duke and I are soldiers. He won't let you greasy burghers trampleon an old comrade. He bade me carry you a message too. "

"The duke send a message to me?"

"Ay! I told him of your masterful doings, of your imprisoning Gerardfor loving a girl; and says he, 'Tell him this is to be a king, nota burgomaster. I'll have no kings in Holland but one. Bid him be morehumble, or I'll hang him at his own door, '"

(Ghysbrecht trembled: he thought the duke capable of the deed)

"'as I hanged the burgomaster of Thingembob. ' The duke could not mindwhich of you he had hung, or in what part; such trifles stick not in asoldier's memory; but he was sure he had hanged one of you for grindingpoor folk, 'and I'm the man to hang another, ' quoth the good duke. "

These repeated insults from so mean a man, coupled with hisinvulnerability, shielded as he was by the duke, drove the choleric oldman into a fit of impotent fury: he shook his fist at the soldier, and tried to threaten him, but could not speak for the rage andmortification that choked him: then he gave a sort of screech, andcoiled himself up in eye and form like a rattlesnake about to strike;and spat furiously upon Martin's doublet. 

The thick-skinned soldier treated this ebullition with genuine contempt. "Here's a venomous old toad! he knows a kick from his foot would sendhim to his last home; and he wants me to cheat the gallows. But I haveslain too many men in fair fight to lift limb against anything less thana man; and this I count no man. What is it, in Heaven's name? an oldgoat's-skin bag full o' rotten bones. "

"My mule! my mule!" screamed Ghysbrecht. 

Jorian helped the old man up trembling in every joint. Once in thesaddle, he seemed to gather in a moment unnatural vigour; and the figurethat went flying to Tergou was truly weird-like and terrible: so old andwizened the face; so white and reverend the streaming hair; so balefulthe eye; so fierce the fury which shook the bent frame that wentspurring like mad; while the quavering voice yelled, "I'll make theirhearts ache. I'll make their hearts ache. I'll make their hearts ache. I'll make their hearts ache. All of them. All!--all!--all!"

The black sheep sat disconsolate amidst the convivial crew, and eyedHans Memling's wallet. For more ease he had taken it off, and flung iton the table. How readily they could have slipped out that letter andput in another. For the first time in their lives they were sorry theyhad not learned to write, like their brother. 

And now Hans began to talk of going, and the brothers agreed in awhisper to abandon their project for the time. They had scarcelyresolved this, when Dierich Brower stood suddenly in the doorway, andgave them a wink. 

They went out to him. "Come to the burgomaster with all speed, " said he, They found Ghysbrecht seated at a table, pale and agitated. Before himlay Margaret Van Eyck's handwriting. "I have written what you desired, "said he. "Now for the superscription. What were the words? did ye see?"

"We cannot read, " said Cornelis. 

"Then is all this labour lost, " cried Ghysbrecht angrily. "Dolts!"

"Nay, but, " said Sybrandt, "I heard the words read, and I have not lostthem. They were, 'To Gerard Eliassoen, these by the hand of the trustyHans Memling, with all speed. '"

"'Tis well. Now, how was the letter folded? how big was it?"

"Longer than that one, and not so long as this. "

"'Tis well. Where is he?"

"At the hostelry. "

"Come, then, take you this groat, and treat him. Then ask to see theletter, and put this in place of it. Come to me with the other letter. "

The brothers assented, took the letter, and went to the hostelry. 

They had not been gone a minute, when Dierich Brower issued from theStadthouse, and followed them. He had his orders not to let them outof his sight till the true letter was in his master's hands. He watchedoutside the hostelry. 

He had not long to wait. They came out almost immediately, with downcastlooks. Dierich made up to them. 

"Too late!" they cried; "too late! He is gone. "

"Gone? How long?"

"Scarce five minutes. Cursed chance!"

"You must go back to the burgomaster at once, " said Dierich Brower. 

"To what end?"

"No matter; come!" and he hurried them to the Stadthouse. 

Ghysbrecht Van Swieten was not the man to accept a defeat. 

"Well, " said he, on hearing the ill news, "suppose he is gone. Is hemounted?"

"No. "

"Then what hinders you to come up with him?"

"But what avails coming up with him! There are no hostelries on the roadhe is gone. "

"Fools!" said Ghysbrecht, "is there no way of emptying a man's pocketsbut liquor and sleight of hand?"

A meaning look, that passed between Ghysbrecht and Dierich, aided thebrothers' comprehension. They changed colour, and lost all zeal for thebusiness. 

"No! no! we don't hate our brother. We won't get ourselves hanged tospite him, " said Sybrandt; "that would be a fool's trick. "

"Hanged!" cried Ghysbrecht. "Am I not the burgomaster? How can ye behanged? I see how 'tis ye fear to tackle one man, being two: heartsof hare, that ye are! Oh! why cannot I be young again? I'd do itsingle-handed. "

The old man now threw off all disguise, and showed them his heart was inthis deed. He then flattered and besought, and jeered them alternately, but he found no eloquence could move them to an action, howeverdishonourable, which was attended with danger. At last he opened adrawer, and showed them a pile of silver coins. 

"Change but those letters for me, " he said, "and each of you shallthrust one hand into this drawer, and take away as many of them as youcan hold. "

The effect was magical. Their eyes glittered with desire. Their wholebodies seemed to swell, and rise into male energy. 

"Swear it, then, " said Sybrandt. 

"I swear it. "

"No; on the crucifix. "

Ghysbrecht swore upon the crucifix. 

The next minute the brothers were on the road, in pursuit of HansMemling. They came in sight of him about two leagues from Tergou, butthough they knew he had no weapon but his staff, they were too prudentto venture on him in daylight; so they fell back. 

But being now three leagues and more from the town, and on a grassyroad--sun down, moon not yet up--honest Hans suddenly found himselfattacked before and behind at once by men with uplifted knives, whocried in loud though somewhat shaky voices, "Stand and deliver!"

The attack was so sudden, and so well planned, that Hans was dismayed. "Slay me not, good fellows, " he cried; "I am but a poor man, and yeshall have my all. "

"So be it then. Live! but empty thy wallet. "

"There is nought in my wallet, good friend, but one letter. "

"That we shall see, " said Sybrandt, who was the one in front. 

"Well, it is a letter. "

"Take it not from me, I pray you. 'Tis worth nought, and the good damewould fret that writ it. "

"There, " said Sybrandt, "take back thy letter; and now empty thy pouch. Come I tarry not!"

But by this time Hans had recovered his confusion; and from a certainflutter in Sybrandt, and hard breathing of Cornelis, aided by anindescribable consciousness, felt sure the pair he had to deal with wereno heroes. He pretended to fumble for his money: then suddenly thrusthis staff fiercely into Sybrandt's face, and drove him staggering, andlent Cornelis a back-handed slash on the ear that sent him twirling likea weathercock in March; then whirled his weapon over his head and dancedabout the road like a figure on springs, shouting:

"Come on, ye thieving loons! Come on!"

It was a plain invitation; yet they misunderstood it so utterly as totake to their heels, with Hans after them, he shouting "Stop thieves!"and they howling with fear and pain as they ran. 

CHAPTER XLI

Denys, placed in the middle of his companions, lest he should be so madas attempt escape was carried off in an agony of grief and remorse. Forhis sake Gerard had abandoned the German route to Rome; and what was hisreward? left all alone in the centre of Burgundy. This was the thoughtwhich maddened Denys most, and made him now rave at heaven and earth, now fall into a gloomy silence so savage and sinister that it was deemedprudent to disarm him. They caught up their leader just outside thetown, and the whole cavalcade drew up and baited at the "Tete d'Or. "

The young landlady, though much occupied with the count, and stillmore with the bastard, caught sight of Denys, and asked him somewhatanxiously what had become of his young companion?

Denys, with a burst of grief, told her all, and prayed her to send afterGerard. "Now he is parted from me, he will maybe listen to my rede, "said he; "poor wretch, he loves not solitude. "

The landlady gave a toss of her head. "I trow I have been somewhatover-kind already, " said she, and turned rather red. 

"You will not?"

"Not I. "

"Then, "--and he poured a volley of curses and abuse upon her. 

She turned her back upon him, and went off whimpering, and Saying shewas not used to be cursed at; and ordered her hind to saddle two mules. 

Denys went north with his troop, mute and drooping over his saddle, and quite unknown to him, that veracious young lady made an equestriantoilet in only forty minutes, she being really in a hurry, and spurredaway with her servant in the opposite direction. 

At dark, after a long march, the bastard and his men reached "The WhiteHart;" their arrival caused a prodigious bustle, and it was some timebefore Manon discovered her old friend among so many. When she did, sheshowed it only by heightened colour. She did not claim the acquaintance. The poor soul was already beginning to scorn. 

"The base degrees by which she did ascend. "

Denys saw but could not smile. The inn reminded him too much of Gerard. 

Ere the night closed the wind changed. She looked into the room andbeckoned him with her finger. He rose sulkily, and his guards with him. 

"Nay, I would speak a word to thee in private. "

She drew him to a corner of the room, and there asked him under herbreath would he do her a kindness. 

He answered out loud, "No, he would not; he was not in the vein to dokindnesses to man or woman. If he did a kindness it should be to a dog;and not that if he could help it. "

"Alas, good archer, I did you one eftsoons, you and your prettycomrade, " said Manon humbly. 

"You did, dame, you did; well then, for his sake--what is't to do?"

"Thou knowest my story. I had been unfortunate. Now I am worshipful. Buta woman did cast him in my teeth this day. And so 'twill be ever whilehe hangs there. I would have him ta'en down; well-a-day!"

"With all my heart. "

"And none dare I ask but thee. Wilt do't?"

"Not I, even were I not a prisoner. "

On this stern refusal the tender Manon sighed, and clasped her palmstogether despondently. Denys told her she need not fret. There weresoldiers of a lower stamp who would not make two bites of such a cherry. It was a mere matter of money; if she could find two angels, he wouldfind two soldiers to do the dirty work of "The White Hart. "

This was not very palatable. However, reflecting that soldiers werebirds of passage, drinking here to-night, knocked on the head thereto-morrow, she said softly, "Send them out to me. But prithee, tell themthat 'tis for one that is my friend; let them not think 'tis for me; Ishould sink into the earth; times are changed. "

Denys found warriors glad to win an angel apiece so easily. He sent themout, and instantly dismissing the subject with contempt, sat brooding onhis lost friend. 

Manon and the warriors soon came to a general understanding. But whatwere they to do with the body when taken down? She murmured, "The riveris nigh the--the place. "

"Fling him in, eh?"

"Nay, nay; be not so cruel! Could ye not put him--gently--and--withsomewhat weighty?"

She must have been thinking on the subject in detail; for she was notone to whom ideas came quickly. 

All was speedily agreed, except the time of payment. The mail-claditched for it, and sought it in advance. Manon demurred to that. 

What, did she doubt their word? then let her come along with them, orwatch them at a distance. 

"Me?" said Manon with horror. "I would liever die than see it done. "

"Which yet you would have done. "

"Ay, for sore is my need. Times are changed. "

She had already forgotten her precept to Denys. 

An hour later the disagreeable relic of caterpillar existence ceasedto canker the worshipful matron's public life, and the grim eyes of thepast to cast malignant glances down into a white hind's clover field. 

Total. She made the landlord an average wife, and a prime house-dog, andoutlived everybody. 

Her troops, when they returned from executing with mediaeval naivetethe precept, "Off wi' the auld love, " received a shock. They foundthe market-place black with groups; it had been empty an hour ago. Conscience smote them. This came of meddling with the dead. However, thebolder of the two, encouraged by the darkness, stole forward alone, andslily mingled with a group: he soon returned to his companion, saying, in a tone of reproach not strictly reasonable, "Ye born fool, it is only a miracle. "

CHAPTER XLII

Letters of fire on the church wall had just inquired, with an appearanceof genuine curiosity, why there was no mass for the duke in this time oftrouble. The supernatural expostulation had been seen by many, and hadgradually faded, leaving the spectators glued there gaping. The upshotwas, that the corporation, not choosing to be behind the angelic powersin loyalty to a temporal sovereign, invested freely in masses. By thisan old friend of ours, the cure, profited in hard cash; for which he hada very pretty taste. But for this I would not of course have detainedyou over so trite an occurrence as a miracle. 

Denys begged for his arms. "Why disgrace him as well as break hisheart?"

"Then swear on the cross of thy sword not to leave the bastard's serviceuntil the sedition shall be put down. " He yielded to necessity, anddelivered three volleys of oaths, and recovered his arms and liberty. 

The troops halted at "The Three Fish, " and Marion at sight of him criedout, "I'm out of luck; who would have thought to see you again?" Thenseeing he was sad, and rather hurt than amused at this blunt jest, sheasked him what was amiss? He told her. She took a bright view of thecase. Gerard was too handsome and well-behaved to come to harm. Thewomen too would always be on his side. Moreover, it was clear thatthings must either go well or ill with him. In the former case he wouldstrike in with some good company going to Rome; in the latter he wouldreturn home, perhaps be there before his friend; "for you have a trifleof fighting to do in Flanders by all accounts. " She then brought himhis gold pieces, and steadily refused to accept one, though he urged heragain and again. Denys was somewhat convinced by her argument, becauseshe concurred with his own wishes, and was also cheered a little byfinding her so honest. It made him think a little better of that worldin which his poor little friend was walking alone. 

Foot soldiers in small bodies down to twos and threes were already onthe road, making lazily towards Flanders, many of them penniless, butpassed from town to town by the bailiffs, with orders for food andlodging on the innkeepers. 

Anthony of Burgundy overtook numbers of these, and gathered them underhis standard, so that he entered Flanders at the head of six hundredmen. On crossing the frontier he was met by his brother Baldwyn, withmen, arms, and provisions; he organized his whole force and marched onin battle array through several towns, not only without impediment, but with great acclamations. This loyalty called forth comments notaltogether gracious. 

"This rebellion of ours is a bite, " growled a soldier called Simon, whohad elected himself Denys's comrade. 

Denys said nothing, but made a little vow to St. Mars to shoot thisAnthony of Burgundy dead, should the rebellion, that had cost himGerard, prove no rebellion. 

That afternoon they came in sight of a strongly fortified town; and awhisper went through the little army that this was a disaffected place. 

But when they came in sight, the great gate stood open, and the towersthat flanked it on each side were manned with a single sentinelapiece. So the advancing force somewhat broke their array and marchedcarelessly. 

When they were within a furlong, the drawbridge across the moat roseslowly and creaking till it stood vertical against the fort and thevery moment it settled into this warlike attitude, down rattled theportcullis at the gate, and the towers and curtains bristled with lancesand crossbows. 

A stern hum ran through the bastard's front rank and spread to the rear. 

"Halt!" cried he. The word went down the line, and they halted. "Heraldto the gate!" A pursuivant spurred out of the ranks, and halting twentyyards from the gate, raised his bugle with his herald's flag hangingdown round it, and blew a summons. A tall figure in brazen armourappeared over the gate. A few fiery words passed between him and theherald, which were not audible, but their import clear, for the heraldblew a single keen and threatening note at the walls, and came gallopingback with war in his face. The bastard moved out of the line to meethim, and their heads had not been together two seconds ere he turned inhis saddle and shouted, "Pioneers, to the van!" and in a moment hedgeswere levelled, and the force took the field and encamped just out ofshot from the walls; and away went mounted officers flying south, east, and west, to the friendly towns, for catapults, palisades, mantelets, raw hides, tar-barrels, carpenters, provisions, and all the materialsfor a siege. 

The bright perspective mightily cheered one drooping soldier. Atthe first clang of the portcullis his eyes brightened and his templeflushed; and when the herald came back with battle in his eye he saw itin a moment, and for the first time this many days cried, "Courage, toutle monde, le diable est mort. "

If that great warrior heard, how he must have grinned!

The besiegers encamped a furlong from the walls, and made roads; kepttheir pikemen in camp ready for an assault when practicable; and sentforward their sappers, pioneers, catapultiers, and crossbowmen. Theseopened a siege by filling the moat, and mining, or breaching the wall, etc. And as much of their work had to be done under close fire ofarrows, quarels, bolts, stones, and little rocks, the above artists "hadneed of a hundred eyes, " and acted in concert with a vigilance, and anamount of individual intelligence, daring, and skill, that made a siegevery interesting, and even amusing: to lookers on. 

The first thing they did was to advance their carpenters behind rollingmantelets, to erect a stockade high and strong on the very edge of themoat. Some lives were lost at this, but not many; for a strong force ofcrossbowmen, including Denys, rolled their mantelets up and shot overthe workmen's heads at every besieged who showed his nose, and at everyloophole, arrow-slit, or other aperture, which commanded the particularspot the carpenters happened to be upon. Covered by their condensedfire, these soon raised a high palisade between them and the ordinarymissiles from the pierced masonry. 

But the besieged expected this, and ran out at night their boards orwooden penthouses on the top of the curtains. The curtains were builtwith square holes near the top to receive the beams that supported thesestructures, the true defence of mediaeval forts, from which the besiegeddelivered their missiles with far more freedom and variety of rangethan they could shoot through the oblique but immovable loopholes of thecurtain, or even through the sloping crenelets of the higher towers. On this the besiegers brought up mangonels, and set them hurlinghuge stones at these woodworks and battering them to pieces. Contemporaneously they built a triangular wooden tower as high as thecurtain, and kept it ready for use, and just out of shot. 

This was a terrible sight to the besieged. These wooden towers had takenmany a town. They began to mine underneath that part of the moat thetower stood frowning at; and made other preparations to give it a warmreception. The besiegers also mined, but at another part, their objectbeing to get under the square barbican and throw it down. All this timeDenys was behind his mantelet with another arbalestrier, protecting theworkmen and making some excellent shots. These ended by earning himthe esteem of an unseen archer, who every now and then sent a wingedcompliment quivering into his mantelet. One came and struck within aninch of the narrow slit through which Denys was squinting at the moment. "Peste, " cried he, "you shoot well, my friend. Come forth and receive mycongratulations! Shall merit such as thine hide its head? Comrade, itis one of those cursed Englishmen, with his half ell shaft. I'll not dietill I've had a shot at London wall. "

On the side of the besieged was a figure that soon attracted greatnotice by promenading under fire. It was a tall knight, clad in completebrass, and carrying a light but prodigiously long lance, with which hedirected the movements of the besieged. And when any disaster befell thebesiegers, this tall knight and his long lance were pretty sure to beconcerned in it. 

My young reader will say, "Why did not Denys shoot him?" Denys did shoothim; every day of his life; other arbalestriers shot him; archers shothim. Everybody shot him. He was there to be shot, apparently. But theabomination was, he did not mind being shot. Nay, worse, he got at lastso demoralised as not to seem to know when he was shot. He walked hisbattlements under fire, as some stout skipper paces his deck in asuit of Flushing, calmly oblivious of the April drops that fall on hiswoollen armour. At last the besiegers got spiteful, and would not wasteany more good steel on him; but cursed him and his impervious coat ofmail. 

He took those missiles like the rest. 

Gunpowder has spoiled war. War was always detrimental to the solidinterests of mankind. But in old times it was good for something: itpainted well, sang divinely, furnished Iliads. But invisible butchery, under a pall of smoke a furlong thick, who is any the better for that?Poet with his note-book may repeat, "Suave etiam belli certamina magnatueri;" but the sentiment is hollow and savours of cuckoo. You can'ttueri anything but a horrid row. He didn't say, "Suave etiam ingentemcaliginem tueri per campos instructam. "

They managed better in the Middle Ages. 

This siege was a small affair; but, such as it was, a writer or minstrelcould see it, and turn an honest penny by singing it; so far then thesport was reasonable, and served an end. 

It was a bright day, clear, but not quite frosty. The efforts of thebesieging force were concentrated against a space of about two hundredand fifty yards, containing two curtains and two towers, one of whichwas the square barbican, the other had a pointed roof that was builtto overlap, resting on a stone machicolade, and by this means a row ofdangerous crenelets between the roof and the masonry grinned down at thenearer assailants, and looked not very unlike the grinders of a modernfrigate with each port nearly closed. The curtains were overlapped withpenthouses somewhat shattered by the mangonels, trebuchets, and otherslinging engines of the besiegers. On the besiegers' edge of the moatwas what seemed at first sight a gigantic arsenal, longer than it wasbroad, peopled by human ants, and full of busy, honest industry, and displaying all the various mechanical science of the age in fulloperation. Here the lever at work, there the winch and pulley, here thebalance, there the capstan. Everywhere heaps of stones, and piles offascines, mantelets, and rows of fire-barrels. Mantelets rolling, thehammer tapping all day, horses and carts in endless succession rattlingup with materials. Only, on looking closer into the hive of industry, you might observe that arrows were constantly flying to and fro, thatthe cranes did not tenderly deposit their masses of stone, but flungthem with an indifference to property, though on scientific principles, and that among the tubs full of arrows, and the tar-barrels and thebeams, the fagots, and other utensils, here and there a workman or asoldier lay flatter than is usual in limited naps, and something moreor less feathered stuck in them, and blood, and other essentials, oozedout. 

At the edge of the moat opposite the wooden tower, a strong penthouse, which they called "a cat, " might be seen stealing towards the curtain, and gradually filling up the moat with fascines and rubbish, which theworkmen flung out at its mouth. It was advanced by two sets of ropespassing round pulleys, and each worked by a windlass at some distancefrom the cat. The knight burnt the first cat by flinging blazingtar-barrels on it. So the besiegers made the roof of this one verysteep, and covered it with raw hides, and the tar-barrels could not harmit. Then the knight made signs with his spear, and a little trebuchetbehind the walls began dropping stones just clear of the wall into themoat, and at last they got the range, and a stone went clean through theroof of the cat, and made an ugly hole. 

Baldwyn of Burgundy saw this, and losing his temper, ordered the greatcatapult that was battering the wood-work of the curtain opposite it tobe turned and levelled slantwise at this invulnerable knight. Denys andhis Englishman went to dinner. These two worthies being eternally onthe watch for one another had made a sort of distant acquaintance, andconversed by signs, especially on a topic that in peace or war maintainsthe same importance. Sometimes Denys would put a piece of bread on thetop of his mantelet, and then the archer would hang something of thekind out by a string; or the order of invitation would be reversed. Anyway, they always managed to dine together. 

And now the engineers proceeded to the unusual step of slingingfifty-pound stones at an individual. 

This catapult was a scientific, simple, and beautiful engine, and veryeffective in vertical fire at the short ranges of the period. 

Imagine a fir-tree cut down, and set to turn round a horizontal axis onlofty uprights, but not in equilibrio; three-fourths of the tree beingon the hither side. At the shorter and thicker end of the tree wasfastened a weight of half a ton. This butt end just before the dischargepointed towards the enemy. By means of a powerful winch the longtapering portion of the tree was forced down to the very ground, andfastened by a bolt; and the stone placed in a sling attached to thetree's nose. But this process of course raised the butt end with itshuge weight high in the air, and kept it there struggling in vainto come down. The bolt was now drawn; Gravity, an institution whichflourished even then, resumed its sway, the short end swung furiouslydown, the long end went as furiously round up, and at its highestelevation flung the huge stone out of the sling with a tremendous jerk. In this case the huge mass so flung missed the knight; but came downnear him on the penthouse, and went through it like paper, making anawful gap in roof and floor. Through the latter fell out two inanimateobjects, the stone itself and the mangled body of a besieger it hadstruck. They fell down the high curtain side, down, down, and struckalmost together the sullen waters of the moat, which closed bubblingon them, and kept both the stone and the bone two hundred years, tillcannon mocked those oft perturbed waters, and civilization dried them. 

"Aha! a good shot, " cried Baldwyn of Burgundy. 

The tall knight retired. The besiegers hooted him. 

He reappeared on the platform of the barbican, his helmet being justvisible above the parapet. He seemed very busy, and soon an enormousTurkish catapult made its appearance on the platform and aided by theelevation at which it was planted, flung a twentypound stone some twohundred and forty yards in the air; it bounded after that, and knockedsome dirt into the Lord Anthony's eye, and made him swear. The nextstone struck a horse that was bringing up a sheaf of arrows in a cart, bowled the horse over dead like a rabbit, and spilt the cart. It wasthen turned at the besiegers' wooden tower, supposed to be out of shot. Sir Turk slung stones cut with sharp edges on purpose, and struck itrepeatedly, and broke it in several places. The besiegers turned twoof their slinging engines on this monster, and kept constantly slingingsmaller stones on to the platform of the barbican, and killed two ofthe engineers. But the Turk disdained to retort. He flung a forty-poundstone on to the besiegers' great catapult, and hitting it in theneighbourhood of the axis, knocked the whole structure to pieces, andsent the engineers skipping and yelling. 

In the afternoon, as Simon was running back to his mantelet from apalisade where he had been shooting at the besieged, Denys, peepingthrough his slit, saw the poor fellow suddenly stare and hold out hisarms, then roll on his face, and a feathered arrow protruded from hisback. The archer showed himself a moment to enjoy his skill. It was theEnglishman. Denys, already prepared, shot his bolt, and the murderousarcher staggered away wounded. But poor Simon never moved. His wars wereover. 

"I am unlucky in my comrades, " said Denys. 

The next morning an unwelcome sight greeted the besieged. The cat wascovered with mattresses and raw hides, and fast filling up the moat. Theknight stoned it, but in vain; flung burning tar-barrels on it, but invain. Then with his own hands he let down by a rope a bag of burningsulphur and pitch, and stunk them out. But Baldwyn, armed like alobster, ran, and bounding on the roof, cut the string, and the workwent on. Then the knight sent fresh engineers into the mine, andundermined the place and underpinned it with beams, and covered thebeams thickly with grease and tar. 

At break of day the moat was filled, and the wooden tower began to moveon its wheels towards a part of the curtain on which two catapultswere already playing to breach the hoards, and clear the way. There wassomething awful and magical in its approach without visible agency, forit was driven by internal rollers worked by leverage. On the top was aplatform, where stood the first assailing party protected in front bythe drawbridge of the turret, which stood vertical till lowered on tothe wall; but better protected by full suits of armour. The beseigedslung at the tower, and struck it often, but in vain. It was welldefended with mattresses and hides, and presently was at the edge of themoat. The knight bade fire the mine underneath it. 

Then the Turkish engine flung a stone of half a hundredweight rightamongst the knights, and carried two away with it off the tower on tothe plain. One lay and writhed: the other neither moved nor spake. 

And now the besieging catapults flung blazing tar-barrels, and fired thehoards on both sides, and the assailants ran up the ladders behind thetower, and lowered the drawbridge on to the battered curtain, while thecatapults in concert flung tar-barrels and fired the adjoining worksto dislodge the defenders. The armed men on the platform sprang on thebridge, led by Baldwyn. The invulnerable knight and his men-at-arms metthem, and a fearful combat ensued, in which many a figure was seento fall headlong down off the narrow bridge. But fresh besiegers keptswarming up behind the tower, and the besieged were driven off thebridge. 

Another minute, and the town was taken; but so well had the firing ofthe mine been timed, that just at this instant the underpinners gaveway, and the tower suddenly sank away from the walls, tearing thedrawbridge clear and pouring the soldiers off it against the masonry, and on to the dry moat. The besieged uttered a fierce shout, and in amoment surrounded Baldwyn and his fellows; but strange to say, offeredthem quarter. While a party disarmed and disposed of these, others firedthe turret in fifty places with a sort of hand grenades. At this workwho so busy as the tall knight. He put the fire-bags on his long spear, and thrust them into the doomed structure late so terrible. To do thishe was obliged to stand on a projecting beam of the shattered hoard, holding on by the hand of a pikeman to steady himself. This provokedDenys; he ran out from his mantelet, hoping to escape notice in theconfusion, and levelling his crossbow missed the knight clean, but senthis bolt into the brain of the pikeman, and the tall knight fell heavilyfrom the wall, lance and all. Denys gazed wonder-struck; and in thatunlucky moment, suddenly he felt his arm hot, then cold, and there wasan English arrow skewering it. 

This episode was unnoticed in a much greater matter. The knight, hisarmour glittering in the morning sun, fell headlong, but turning as heneared the water, struck it with a slap that sounded a mile off. 

None ever thought to see him again. But he fell at the edge of thefascines on which the turret stood all cocked on one side, and his spearstuck into them under water, and by a mighty effort he got to the side, but could not get out. Anthony sent a dozen knights with a white flag totake him prisoner. He submitted like a lamb, but said nothing. 

He was taken to Anthony's tent. 

That worthy laughed at first at the sight of his muddy armour, butpresently, frowning, said, "I marvel, sir, that so good a knight asyou should know his devoir so ill as turn rebel, and give us all thistrouble. "

"I am nun-nun-nun-nun-nun-no knight. "

"What then?"

"A hosier. "

"A what? Then thy armour shall be stripped off, and thou shalt be tiedto a stake in front of the works, and riddled with arrows for a warningto traitors. "

"N-n-n-n-no! duda-duda-duda-duda-don't do that. "

"Why not?"

"Tuta-tuta-tuta-townsfolk will-h-h-h-hang t'otherbuba-buba-buba-buba-bastard. "

"What, whom?"

"Your bub-bub-bub-brother Baldwyn. "

"What, have you knaves ta'en him?"

The warlike hosier nodded. 

"Hang the fool!" said Anthony, peevishly. 

The warlike hosier watched his eye, and doffing his helmet, took out ofthe lining an intercepted letter from the duke, bidding the said Anthonycome to court immediately, as he was to represent the court of Burgundyat the court of England; was to go over and receive the English king'ssister, and conduct her to her bridegroom, the Earl of Charolois. Themission was one very soothing to Anthony's pride, and also to his loveof pleasure. For Edward the Fourth held the gayest and most luxuriouscourt in Europe. The sly hosier saw he longed to be off, and said, "We'll gega-gega-gega-gega-give ye a thousand angels to raise thesiege. "

"And Baldwyn?"

"I'll gega-gega-gega-gega-go and send him with the money. "

It was now dinner-time; and a flag of truce being hoisted on both sides, the sham knight and the true one dined together and came to a friendlyunderstanding. 

"But what is your grievance, my good friend?"

"Tuta-tuta-tuta-tuta-too much taxes. "

Denys, on finding the arrow in his right arm, turned his back, which wasprotected by a long shield, and walked sulkily into camp. He was met bythe Comte de Jarnac, who had seen his brilliant shot, and finding himwounded into the bargain, gave him a handful of broad pieces. 

"Hast got the better of thy grief, arbalestrier, methinks. "

"My grief, yes; but not my love. As soon as ever I have put down thisrebellion, I go to Holland, and there I shall meet with him. "

This event was nearer than Denys thought. He was relieved from servicenext day, and though his wound was no trifle, set out with a stout heartto rejoin his friend in Holland. 

CHAPTER XLIII

A change came over Margaret Brandt. She went about her household dutieslike one in a dream. If Peter did but speak a little quickly to her, shestarted and fixed two terrified eyes on him. She went less often to herfriend Margaret Van Eyck, and was ill at her ease when there. Instead ofmeeting her warm old friend's caresses, she used to receive them passiveand trembling, and sometimes almost shrink from them. But the mostextraordinary thing was, she never would go outside her own house indaylight. When she went to Tergou it was after dusk, and she returnedbefore daybreak. She would not even go to matins. At last Peter, unobservant as he was, noticed it, and asked her the reason. 

"Methinks the folk all look at me. "

One day, Margaret Van Eyck asked her what was the matter. 

A scared look and a flood of tears were all the reply; the old ladyexpostulated gently. "What, sweetheart, afraid to confide your sorrowsto me?"

"I have no sorrows, madam, but of my own making. I am kinder treatedthan I deserve; especially in this house. "

"Then why not come oftener, my dear?"

"I come oftener than I deserve;" and she sighed deeply. 

"There, Reicht is bawling for you, " said Margaret Van Eyck; "go, child!--what on earth can it be?"

Turning possibilities over in her mind, she thought Margaret must bemortified at the contempt with which she was treated by Gerard's family. "I will take them to task for it, at least such of them as are women;"and the very next day she put on her hood and cloak and followed byReicht, went to the hosier's house. Catherine received her with muchrespect, and thanked her with tears for her kindness to Gerard. Butwhen, encouraged by this, her visitor diverged to Margaret Brandt, Catherine's eyes dried, and her lips turned to half the size, and shelooked as only obstinate, ignorant women can look. When they put onthis cast of features, you might as well attempt to soften or convince abrick wall. Margaret Van Eyck tried, but all in vain. So then, not beingherself used to be thwarted, she got provoked, and at last went outhastily with an abrupt and mutilated curtsey, which Catherine, returnedwith an air rather of defiance than obeisance. Outside the door MargaretVan Eyck found Reicht conversing with a pale girl on crutches. MargaretVan Eyck was pushing by them with heightened colour, and a scornfultoss intended for the whole family, when suddenly a little delicate handglided timidly into hers, and looking round she saw two dove-like eyes, with the water in them, that sought hers gratefully and at the same timeimploringly. The old lady read this wonderful look, complex as it was, and down went her choler. She stopped and kissed Kate's brow. "I see, "said she. "Mind, then, I leave it to you. " Returned home, she said--"Ihave been to a house to-day, where I have seen a very common thing anda very uncommon thing; I have seen a stupid, obstinate woman, and I haveseen an angel in the flesh, with a face-if I had it here I'd take downmy brushes once more and try and paint it. "

Little Kate did not belie the good opinion so hastily formed of her. Shewaited a better opportunity, and told her mother what she had learnedfrom Reicht Heynes, that Margaret had shed her very blood for Gerard inthe wood. 

"See, mother, how she loves him. "

"Who would not love him?"

"Oh, mother, think of it! Poor thing. "

"Ay, wench. She has her own trouble, no doubt, as well as we ours. Ican't abide the sight of blood, let alone my own. "

This was a point gained; but when Kate tried to follow it up she wasstopped short. 

About a month after this a soldier of the Dalgetty tribe, returning fromservice in Burgundy, brought a letter one evening to the hosier's house. He was away on business; but the rest of the family sat at Supper. Thesoldier laid the letter on the table by Catherine, and refusing allguerdon for bringing it, went off to Sevenbergen. 

The letter was unfolded and spread out; and curiously enough, though notone of them could read, they could all tell it was Gerard's handwriting. 

"And your father must be away, " cried Catherine. "Are ye not ashamed ofyourselves? not one that can read your brother's letter. "

But although the words were to them what hieroglyphics are to us, therewas something in the letter they could read. There is an art can speakwithout words; unfettered by the penman's limits, it can steal throughthe eye into the heart and brain, alike of the learned and unlearned;and it can cross a frontier or a sea, yet lose nothing. It is at themercy of no translator; for it writes an universal language. 

When, therefore, they saw this, [a picture of two hands clasped together]

which Gerard had drawn with his pencil between the two short paragraphs, of which his letter consisted, they read it, and it went straight totheir hearts. 

Gerard was bidding them farewell. 

As they gazed on that simple sketch, in every turn and line of whichthey recognized his manner, Gerard seemed present, and bidding themfarewell. 

The women wept over it till they could see it no longer. 

Giles said, "Poor Gerard!" in a lower voice than seemed to belong tohim. 

Even Cornelis and Sybrandt felt a momentary remorse, and sat silent andgloomy. 

But how to get the words read to them. They were loth to show theirignorance and their emotion to a stranger. 

"The Dame Van Eyck?" said Kate timidly. 

"And so I will, Kate. She has a good heart. She loves Gerard, too. Shewill be glad to hear of him. I was short with her when she came here;but I will make my submission, and then she will tell me what my poorchild says to me. "

She was soon at Margaret Van Eyck's house. Reicht took her into a room, and said, "Bide a minute; she is at her orisons. "

There was a young woman in the room seated pensively by the stove; butshe rose and courteously made way for the visitor. 

"Thank you, young lady; the winter nights are cold, and your stove is atreat. " Catherine then, while warming her hands, inspected her companionfurtively from head to foot, inclusive. The young person wore anordinary wimple, but her gown was trimmed with fur, which was, in thosedays, almost a sign of superior rank or wealth. But what most struckCatherine was the candour and modesty of the face. She felt sure ofsympathy from so good a countenance, and began to gossip. 

"Now, what think you brings me here, young lady? It is a letter! aletter from my poor boy that is far away in some savage part or other. And I take shame to say that none of us can read it. I wonder whetheryou can read?"

"Yes. "

"Can ye, now? It is much to your credit, my dear. I dare say she won'tbe long; but every minute is an hour to a poor longing mother. "

"I will read it to you. "

"Bless you, my dear; bless you!"

In her unfeigned eagerness she never noticed the suppressed eagernesswith which the hand was slowly put out to take the letter. She did notsee the tremor with which the fingers closed on it. 

"Come, then, read it to me, prithee. I am wearying for it. "

"The first words are, 'To my honoured parents. '"

"Ay! and he always did honour us, poor soul. "

"'God and the saints have you in His holy keeping, and bless you bynight and by day. Your one harsh deed is forgotten; your years of loveremembered. '"

Catherine laid her hand on her bosom, and sank back in her chair withone long sob. 

"Then comes this, madam. It doth speak for itself; 'a long farewell. '"

"Ay, go on; bless you, girl you give me sorry comfort. Still 'tiscomfort. "

"'To my brothers Cornelis and Sybrandt--Be content; you will see me nomore!'"

"What does that mean? Ah!"

"'To my sister Kate. Little angel of my father's house. Be kind toher--' Ah!"

"That is Margaret Brandt, my dear--his sweetheart, poor soul. I've notbeen kind to her, my dear. Forgive me, Gerard!"

"'--for poor Gerard's sake: since grief to her is death to me--Ah!"And nature, resenting the poor girl's struggle for unnatural composure, suddenly gave way, and she sank from her chair and lay insensible, withthe letter in her hand and her head on Catherine's knees. 

CHAPTER XLIV

Experienced women are not frightened when a woman faints, or do theyhastily attribute it to anything but physical causes, which they haveoften seen produce it. Catherine bustled about; laid the girl down withher head on the floor quite flat, opened the window, and unloosed herdress as she lay. Not till she had done all this did she step to thedoor and say, rather loudly:

"Come here, if you please. "

Margaret Van Eyck and Reicht came, and found Margaret lying quite flat, and Catherine beating her hands. 

"Oh, my poor girl! What have you done to her?"

"Me?" said Catherine angrily. 

"What has happened, then?"

"Nothing, madam; nothing more than is natural in her situation. "

Margaret Van Eyck coloured with ire. 

"You do well to speak so coolly, " said she, "you that are the cause ofher situation. "

"That I am not, " said Catherine bluntly; "nor any woman born. "

"What! was it not you and your husband that kept them apart? and now hehas gone to Italy all alone. Situation indeed! You have broken her heartamongst you. "

"Why, madam? Who is it then? in Heaven's name! To hear you, one wouldthink this was my Gerard's lass. But that can't be. This fur never costless than five crowns the ell; besides, this young gentlewoman is awife; or ought to be. "

"Of course she ought. And who is the cause she is none? Who came beforethem at the very altar?"

"God forgive them, whoever it was, " said Catherine gravely; "me it wasnot, nor my man. "

"Well, " said the other, a little softened, "now you have seen her, perhaps you will not be quite so bitter against her madam. She is comingto, thank Heaven. "

"Me bitter against her?" said Catherine; "no, that is all over. Poorsoul! trouble behind her and trouble afore her; and to think of mysetting her, of all living women, to read Gerard's letter to me. Ay, andthat was what made her go off, I'll be sworn. She is coming to. What, sweetheart! be not afeard, none are here but friends. "

They seated her in an easy chair. As the colour was creeping back to herface and lips. Catherine drew Margaret Van Eyck aside. 

"Is she staying with you, if you please?"

"No, madam. "

"I wouldn't let her go back to Sevenbergen to-night, then. "

"That is as she pleases. She still refuses to bide the night. "

"Ay, but you are older than she is; you can make her. There, she isbeginning to notice. "

Catherine then put her mouth to Margaret Van Eyck's ear for half amoment; it did not seem time enough to whisper a word, far less asentence. But on some topics females can flash communication to femalelike lightning, or thought itself. 

The old lady started, and whispered back--

"It's false! it is a calumny! it is monstrous! look at her face. It isblasphemy to accuse such a face. "

"Tut! tut! tut!" said the other; "you might as well say this is not myhand. I ought to know; and I tell ye it is so. "

Then, much to Margaret Van Eyck's surprise, she went up to the girl, andtaking her round the neck, kissed her warmly. 

"I suffered for Gerard, and you shed your blood for him I do hear; hisown words show me that I have been to blame, the very words you haveread to me. Ay, Gerard, my child, I have held aloof from her; but I'llmake it up to her once I begin. You are my daughter from this hour. "

Another warm embrace sealed this hasty compact, and the woman of impulsewas gone. 

Margaret lay back in her chair, and a feeble smile stole over her face. Gerard's mother had kissed her and called her daughter; but the nextmoment she saw her old friend looking at her with a vexed air. 

"I wonder you let that woman kiss you. "

"His mother!" murmured Margaret, half reproachfully. 

"Mother, or no mother, you would not let her touch you if you knew whatshe whispered in my ear about you. "

"About me?" said Margaret faintly. 

"Ay, about you, whom she never saw till to-night. " The old lady wasproceeding, with some hesitation and choice of language, to makeMargaret share her indignation, when an unlooked-for interruption closedher lips. 

The young woman slid from her chair to her knees, and began to praypiteously to her for pardon. From the words and the manner of herpenitence a bystander would have gathered she had inflicted some cruelwrong, some intolerable insult, upon her venerable friend. 

CHAPTER XLV

The little party at the hosier's house sat at table discussing therecent event, when their mother returned, and casting a piercing glanceall round the little circle, laid the letter flat on the table. Sherepeated every word of it by memory, following the lines with herfinger, to cheat herself and bearers into the notion that she could readthe words, or nearly. Then, suddenly lifting her head, she cast anotherkeen look on Cornelis and Sybrandt: their eyes fell. 

On this the storm that had long been brewing burst on their heads. 

Catherine seemed to swell like an angry hen ruffling her feathers, andout of her mouth came a Rhone and Saone of wisdom and twaddle, of greatand mean invective, such as no male that ever was born could utter inone current; and not many women. 

The following is a fair though a small sample of her words: only theywere uttered all in one breath. 

"I have long had my doubts that you blew the flame betwixt Gerard andyour father, and set that old rogue, Ghysbrecht, on. And now, here areGerard's own written words to prove it. You have driven your own fleshand blood into a far land, and robbed the mother that bore you of herdarling, the pride of her eye, the joy of her heart. But you are all ofa piece from end to end. When you were all boys together, my others werea comfort; but you were a curse: mischievous and sly; and took a womanhalf a day to keep your clothes whole: for why? work wears cloth, butplay cuts it. With the beard comes prudence; but none came to you:still the last to go to bed, and the last to leave it; and why? becausehonesty goes to bed early, and industry rises betimes; where there aretwo lie-a-beds in a house there are a pair of ne'er-do-weels. Often I'vesat and looked at your ways, and wondered where ye came from: ye don'ttake after your father, and ye are no more like me than a wasp is to anant; sure ye were changed in the cradle, or the cuckoo dropped ye on myfloor: for ye have not our hands, nor our hearts: of all my blood, nonebut you ever jeered them that God afflicted; but often when my back wasturned I've heard you mock at Giles, because he is not as big as some;and at my lily Kate, because she is not so strong as a Flanders mare. After that rob a church an you will! for you can be no worse in His eyesthat made both Kate and Giles, and in mine that suffered for them, poordarlings, as I did for you, you paltry, unfeeling, treasonable curs!No, I will not hush, my daughter, they have filled the cup too full. Ittakes a deal to turn a mother's heart against the sons she has nursedupon her knees; and many is the time I have winked and wouldn't see toomuch, and bitten my tongue, lest their father should know them as I do;he would have put them to the door that moment. But now they have filledthe cup too full. And where got ye all this money? For this last monthyou have been rolling in it. You never wrought for it. I wish I maynever hear from other mouths how ye got it. It is since that night youwere out so late, and your head came back so swelled, Cornelis. Slothand greed are ill-mated, my masters. Lovers of money must sweat orsteal. Well, if you robbed any poor soul of it, it was some woman, I'llgo bail; for a man would drive you with his naked hand. No matter, it isgood for one thing. It has shown me how you will guide our gear if everit comes to be yourn. I have watched you, my lads, this while. You havespent a groat to-day between you. And I spend scarce a groat a week, andkeep you all, good and bad. No I give up waiting for the shoes that willmaybe walk behind your coffin; for this shop and this house shall neverbe yourn. Gerard is our heir; poor Gerard, whom you have banished anddone your best to kill; after that never call me mother again! But youhave made him tenfold dearer to me. My poor lost boy! I shall soon seehim again shall hold him in my arms, and set him on my knees. Ay, youmay stare! You are too crafty, and yet not crafty enow. You cut thestalk away; but you left the seed--the seed that shall outgrow you, andoutlive you. Margaret Brandt is quick, and it is Gerard's, and what isGerard's is mine; and I have prayed the saints it may be a boy; and itwill--it must. Kate, when I found it was so, my bowels yearned over herchild unborn as if it had been my own. He is our heir. He will outliveus. You will not; for a bad heart in a carcass is like the worm in thenut, soon brings the body to dust. So, Kate, take down Gerard's bib andtucker that are in the drawer you wot of, and one of these days we willcarry them to Sevenbergen. We will borrow Peter Buyskens' cart, andgo comfort Gerard's wife under her burden. She is his wife. Who isGhysbrecht Van Swieten? Can he come between a couple and the altar, andsunder those that God and the priest make one? She is my daughter, andI am as proud of her as I am of you, Kate, almost; and as for you, keepout of my way awhile, for you are like the black dog in my eyes. "

Cornelis and Sybrandt took the hint and slunk out, aching with remorse, and impenitence, and hate. They avoided her eye as much as everthey could; and for many days she never spoke a word, good, bad, orindifferent, to either of them. Liberaverat animum suum. 

CHAPTER XLVI

Catherine was a good housewife who seldom left home for a day, and thenone thing or another always went amiss. She was keenly conscious ofthis, and watching for a slack tide in things domestic, put off hervisit to Sevenbergen from day to day, and one afternoon that it reallycould have been managed, Peter Buyskens' mule was out of the way. 

At last, one day Eli asked her before all the family, whether it wastrue she had thought of visiting Margaret Brandt. 

"Ay, my man. "

"Then I do forbid you. "

"Oh, do you?"

"I do. "

"Then there is no more to be said, I suppose, " said she, colouring. 

"Not a word, " replied Eli sternly. 

When she was alone with her daughter she was very severe, not upon Eli, but upon herself. 

"Behoved me rather go thither like a cat at a robin. But this was me allover. I am like a silly hen that can lay no egg without cackling, andconvening all the house to rob her on't. Next time you and I are afteraught the least amiss, let's do't in Heaven's name then and there, andnot take time to think about it, far less talk; so then, if they take usto task we can say, alack we knew nought; we thought no ill; now, who'dever? and so forth. For two pins I'd go thither in all their teeth. "

Defiance so wild and picturesque staggered Kate. "Nay, mother, withpatience father will come round. "

"And so will Michaelmas; but when? and I was so bent on you seeing thegirl. Then we could have put our heads together about her. Say what theywill, there is no judging body or beast but by the eye. And were I tohave fifty more sons I'd ne'er thwart one of them's fancy, till suchtime as I had clapped my eyes upon her and seen Quicksands; say you, I should have thought of that before condemning Gerard his fancy; butthere, life is a school, and the lesson ne'er done; we put down onefault and take up t'other, and so go blundering here, and blunderingthere, till we blunder into our graves, and there's an end of us. "

"Mother, " said Kate timidly. 

"Well, what is a-coming now? no good news though, by the look of you. What on earth can make the poor wretch so scared?"

"An avowal she hath to make, " faltered Kate faintly. 

"Now, there is a noble word for ye, " said Catherine proudly. "Our Gerardtaught thee that, I'll go bail. Come then, out with thy vowel. "

"Well then, sooth to say, I have seen her. "

"And?"

"And spoken with her to boot. "

"And never told me? After this marvels are dirt. "

"Mother, you were so hot against her. I waited till I could tell youwithout angering you worse. "

"Ay, " said Catherine, half sadly, half bitterly, "like mother, likedaughter; cowardice it is our bane. The others I whiles buffet, or howwould the house fare? but did you, Kate, ever have harsh word or lookfrom your poor mother, that you--Nay, I will not have ye cry, girl; tento one ye had your reason; so rise up, brave heart, and tell me all, better late than ne'er; and first and foremost when ever, and how ever, wend you to Sevenbergen wi' your poor crutches, and I not know?"

"I never was there in my life; and, mammy dear, to say that I ne'erwished to see her that I will not, but I ne'er went nor sought to seeher. "

"There now, " said Catherine disputatively, "said I not 'twas all unlikemy girl to seek her unbeknown to me? Come now, for I'm all agog. 

"Then thus 'twas. It came to my ears, no matter how, and prithee, goodmother, on my knees ne'er ask me how, that Gerard was a prisoner in theStadthouse tower. "

"Ah"

"By father's behest as 'twas pretended. "

Catherine uttered a sigh that was almost a moan. "Blacker than Ithought, " she muttered faintly. 

"Giles and I went out at night to bid him be of good cheer. And there atthe tower foot was a brave lass, quite strange to me I vow, on the sameerrand. "

"Lookee there now, Kate. "

"At first we did properly frighten one another, through the place hisbad name, and our poor heads being so full o' divels, and we whitened abit in moonshine. But next moment, quo' I, 'You are Margaret. ' 'And youare Kate, ' quo' she. Think on't!"

"Did one ever? 'Twas Gerard! He will have been talking backards andforrards of thee to her, and her to thee. "

In return for this, Kate bestowed on Catherine one of the prettiestpresents in nature--the composite kiss, i. E. , she imprinted on her cheeka single kiss, which said--

 1. Quite correct. 2. Good, clever mother, for guessing so right and quick. 3. How sweet for us twain to be' of one mind again after never having been otherwise. 4. Etc. 

"Now then, speak thy mind, child, Gerard is not here. Alas, what am Isaying? would to Heaven he were. "

"Well then, mother, she is comely, and wrongs her picture but little. "

"Eh, dear; hark to young folk! I am for good acts, not good looks. Lovesshe my boy as he did ought to be loved?"

"Sevenbergen is farther from the Stadthouse than we are, " said Katethoughtfully; "yet she was there afore me. "

Catherine nodded intelligence. 

"Nay, more, she had got him out ere I came. Ay, down from the captive'stower. "

Catherine shook her head incredulously. "The highest tower for miles! Itis not feasible. "

"'Tis sooth though. She and an old man she brought found means and witto send him up a rope. There 'twas dangling from his prison, and ourGiles went up it. When first I saw it hang, I said, 'This is glamour. 'But when the frank lass's arms came round me, and her bosom' did beaton mine, and her cheeks wet, then said I, ''Tis not glamour: 'tis love. 'For she is not like me, but lusty and able; and, dear heart, even I, poor frail creature, do feel sometimes as I could move the world forthem I love: I love you, mother. And she loves Gerard. "

"God bless her for't! God bless her!"

"But

"But what, lamb?"

"Her love, is it for very certain honest? 'Tis most strange; but thatvery thing, which hath warmed your heart, hath somewhat cooled minetowards her; poor soul. She is no wife, you know, mother, when all isdone. "

"Humph! They have stood at the altar together. "

"Ay, but they went as they came, maid and bachelor. "

"The parson, saith he so?"

"Nay, for that I know not. "

"Then I'll take no man's word but his in such a tangled skein. "After some reflection she added, "Natheless art right, girl; I'll toSevenbergen alone. A wife I am but not a slave. We are all in the darkhere. And she holds the clue. I must question her, and no one by; leastof all you. I'll not take any lily to a house Wi' a spot, no, not to apalace o' gold and silver. "

The more Catherine pondered this conversation, the more she felt drawntowards Margaret, and moreover "she was all agog" with curiosity, apotent passion with us all, and nearly omnipotent with those who likeCatherine, do not slake it with reading. At last, one fine day, afterdinner, she whispered to Kate, "Keep the house from going to pieces, anye can;" and donned her best kirtle and hood, and her scarlet clockedhose and her new shoes, and trudged briskly off to Sevenbergen, troubling no man's mule. 

When she got there she inquired where Margaret Brandt lived. The firstperson she asked shook his head, and said--"The name is strange to me. "She went a little farther and asked a girl of about fifteen who wasstanding at a door. "Father, " said the girl, speaking into the house, "here is another after that magician's daughter. " The man came out andtold Catherine Peter Brandt's cottage was just outside the town on theeast side. "You may see the chimney hence;" and he pointed it out toher. "But you will not find them there, neither father nor daughter;they have left the town this week, bless you. "

"Say not so, good man, and me walken all the way from Tergou. "

"From Tergou? then you must ha' met the soldier. "

"What soldier? ay, I did meet a soldier. "

"Well, then, yon soldier was here seeking that self-same Margaret. "

"Ay, and warn't a mad with us because she was gone?" put in the girl. "His long beard and her cheek are no strangers, I warrant. "

"Say no more than ye know, " said Catherine sharply. "You are young totake to slandering your elders. Stay! tell we more about this soldier, good man. 

"Nay, I know no more than that he came hither seeking Margaret Brandt, and I told him she and her father had made a moonlight flit on't thisday sennight, and that some thought the devil had flown away with them, being magicians. 'And, ' says he, 'the devil fly away with thee for thyill news;' that was my thanks. 'But I doubt 'tis a lie, ' said he. 'Anyou think so, ' said I, 'go and see. ' 'I will, ' said he, and burst outwi' a hantle o' gibberish: my wife thinks 'twas curses; and hied him tothe cottage. Presently back a comes, and sings t'other tune. 'You wereright and I was wrong, ' says he, and shoves a silver coin in my hand. Show it the wife, some of ye; then she'll believe me; I have been calleda liar once to-day. "

"It needs not, " said Catherine, inspecting the coin all the same. 

"And he seemed quiet and sad like, didn't he now, wench?"

"That a did, " said the young woman warmly; "and, dame, he was just aspretty a man as ever I clapped eyes on. Cheeks like a rose, and shiningbeard, and eyes in his head like sloes. "

"I saw he was well bearded, " said Catherine; "but, for the rest, at myage I scan them not as when I was young and foolish. But he seemed rightcivil: doffed his bonnet to me as I had been a queen, and I did drop himmy best reverence, for manners beget manners. But little I wist he hadbeen her light o' love, and most likely the--Who bakes for this town?"

The man, not being acquainted with her, opened his eyes at thistransition, swift and smooth. 

"Well, dame, there be two; John Bush and Eric Donaldson, they both bidein this street. "

"Then, God be with you, good people, " said she, and proceeded; but hersprightly foot came flat on the ground now, and no longer struck it withlittle jerks and cocking heel. She asked the bakers whether PeterBrandt had gone away in their debt. Bush said they were not customers. Donaldson said, "Not a stiver: his daughter had come round and paidhim the very night they went. Didn't believe they owed a copper in thetown. " So Catherine got all the information of that kind she wanted withvery little trouble. 

"Can you tell me what sort this Margaret was?" said she, as she turnedto go. 

"Well, somewhat too reserved for my taste. I like a chattycustomer--when I'm not too busy. But she bore a high character for beinga good daughter. "

"'Tis no small praise. A well-looking lass, I am told?"

"Why, whence come you, wyfe?"

"From Tergou. "

"Oh, ay. Well you shall judge: the lads clept her 'the beauty ofSevenbergen;' the lasses did scout it merrily, and terribly pulled herto pieces, and found so many faults no two could agree where the faultlay. "

"That is enough, " said Catherine. "I see, the bakers are no fools inSevenbergen, and the young women no shallower than in other burghs. "

She bought a manchet of bread, partly out of sympathy and justice (shekept a shop), partly to show her household how much better bread shegave them daily; and returned to Tergou dejected. 

Kate met her outside the town with beaming eyes. 

"Well, Kate, lass, it is a happy thing I went; I am heartbroken. Gerardhas been sore abused. The child is none of ourn, nor the mother fromthis hour. "

"Alas, mother, I fathom not your meaning. "

"Ask me no more, girl, but never mention her name to me again. That isall. "

Kate acquiesced with a humble sigh, and they went home together. 

They found a soldier seated tranquilly by their fire. The moment theyentered the door he rose, and saluted them civilly. They stood andlooked at him; Kate with some little surprise, but Catherine with agreat deal, and with rising indignation. 

"What makes you here?" was Catherine's greeting. 

"I came to seek after Margaret. "

"Well, we know no such person. "

"Say not so, dame; sure you know her by name, Margaret Brandt. "

"We have heard of her for that matter--to our cost. "

"Comes, dame, prithee tell me at least where she bides. "

"I know not where she bides, and care not. "

Denys felt sure this was a deliberate untruth. He bit his lip. "Well, Ilooked to find myself in an enemy's country at this Tergou; but maybe ifye knew all ye would not be so dour. "

"I do know all, " replied Catherine bitterly. "This morn I knew nought. "Then suddenly setting her arms akimbo she told him with a raised voiceand flashing eyes she wondered at his cheek sitting down by that hearthof all hearths in the world. 

"May Satan fly away with your hearth to the lake of fire and brimstone, "shouted Denys, who could speak Flemish fluently. "Your own servant bademe sit there till you came, else I had ne'er troubled your hearth. Mymalison on it, and on the churlish roof-tree that greets an unoffendingstranger this way, " and he strode scowling to the door. 

"Oh! oh!" ejaculated Catherine, frightened, and also a littleconscience-stricken; and the virago sat suddenly down and burst intotears. Her daughter followed suit quietly, but without loss of time. 

A shrewd writer, now unhappily lost to us, has somewhere the followingdialogue:

She. "I feel all a woman's weakness. "

He. "Then you are invincible. "

Denys, by anticipation, confirmed that valuable statement; he stood atthe door looking ruefully at the havoc his thunderbolt of eloquence hadmade. 

"Nay, wife, " said he, "weep not neither for a soldier's hasty word. Imean not all I said. Why, your house is your own, and what right in ithave I? There now, I'll go. "

"What is to do?" said a grave manly voice. 

It was Eli; he had come in from the shop. 

"Here is a ruffian been a-scolding of your women folk and making themcry, " explained Denys. 

"Little Kate, what is't? for ruffians do not use to call themselvesruffians, " said Eli the sensible. 

Ere she could explain, "Hold your tongue, girl, " said Catherine; "Murielbade him sat down, and I knew not that, and wyted on him; and he wasgoing and leaving his malison on us, root and branch. I was never sobecursed in all my days, oh! oh! oh!"

"You were both somewhat to blame; both you and he, " said Eli calmly. "However, what the servant says the master should still stand to. Wekeep not open house, but yet we are not poor enough to grudge a seat atour hearth in a cold day to a wayfarer with an honest face, and, as Ithink, a wounded man. So, end all malice, and sit ye down!"

"Wounded?" cried mother and daughter in a breath. 

"Think you a soldier slings his arm for sport?"

"Nay, 'tis but an arrow, " said Denys cheerfully. 

"But an arrow?" said Kate, with concentrated horror. "Where were oureyes, mother?"

"Nay, in good sooth, a trifle. Which, however, I will pray mesdames toaccept as an excuse for my vivacity. 'Tis these little foolish triflingwounds that fret a man, worthy sir. Why, look ye now, sweeter temperthan our Gerard never breathed, yet, when the bear did but strike apiece no bigger than a crown out of his calf, he turned so hot andcholeric y'had said he was no son of yours, but got by the good knightSir John Pepper on his wife dame Mustard; who is this? a dwarf? yourservant, Master Giles. "

"Your servant, soldier, " roared the newcomer. Denys started. He had notcounted on exchanging greetings with a petard. 

Denys's words had surprised his hosts, but hardly more than theirdeportment now did him. They all three came creeping up to where he sat, and looked down into him with their lips parted, as if he had been somestrange phenomenon. 

And growing agitation succeeded to amazement. 

"Now hush!" said Eli, "let none speak but I. Young man, " said hesolemnly, "in God's name who are you, that know us though we know younot, and that shake our hearts speaking to us of--the absent-our poorrebellious son: whom Heaven forgive and bless?"

"What, master, " said Denys, lowering his voice, "hath he not writ toyou? hath he not told you of me, Denys of Burgundy?"

"He hath writ, but three lines, and named not Denys of Burgundy, nor anystranger. "

"Ay, I mind the long letter was to his sweetheart, this Margaret, andshe has decamped, plague take her, and how I am to find her Heavenknows. "

"What, she is not your sweetheart then?"

"Who, dame? an't please you. "

"Why, Margaret Brandt. "

"How can my comrade's sweetheart be mine? I know her not from Noah'sniece; how should I? I never saw her. "

"Whist with this idle chat, Kate, " said Eli impatiently, "and let theyoung man answer me. How came you to know Gerard, our son? Prithee nowthink on a parent's cares, and answer me straightforward, like a soldieras thou art. "

"And shall. I was paid off at Flushing, and started for Burgundy. Onthe German frontier I lay at the same inn with Gerard. I fancied him. Isaid, 'Be my comrade. ' He was loth at first; consented presently. Many aweary league we trode together. Never were truer comrades: never will bewhile earth shall last. First I left my route a bit to be with him: thenhe his to be with me. We talked of Sevenbergen and Tergou a thousandtimes; and of all in this house. We had our troubles on the road; butbattling them together made them light. I saved his life from a bear; hemine in the Rhine: for he swims like a duck and I like a hod o' bricksand one another's lives at an inn in Burgundy, where we two held a roomfor a good hour against seven cut-throats, and crippled one and slewtwo; and your son did his devoir like a man, and met the stoutestchampion I ever countered, and spitted him like a sucking-pig. Else Ihad not been here. But just when all was fair, and I was to see him safeaboard ship for Rome, if not to Rome itself, met us that son of a--theLord Anthony of Burgundy, and his men, making for Flanders, then ininsurrection, tore us by force apart, took me where I got some broadpieces in hand, and a broad arrow in my shoulder, and left my poorGerard lonesome. At that sad parting, soldier though I be, these eyesdid rain salt scalding tears, and so did his, poor soul. His last wordto me was, 'Go, comfort Margaret!' so here I be. Mine to him was, 'Thinkno more of Rome. Make for Rhine, and down stream home. ' Now say, for youknow best, did I advise him well or ill?"

"Soldier, take my hand, " said Eli. "God bless thee! God bless thee!"and his lip quivered. It was all his reply, but more eloquent than manywords. 

Catherine did not answer at all, but she darted from the room and badeMuriel bring the best that was in the house, and returned with wood inboth arms, and heaped the fire, and took out a snow-white cloth fromthe press, and was going in a great hurry to lay it for Gerard's friend, when suddenly she sat down and all the power ebbed rapidly out of herbody. 

"Father!" cried Kate, whose eye was as quick as her affection. 

Denys started up; but Eli waved him back and flung a little watersharply in his wife's face. This did her instant good. She gasped, "Sosudden. My poor boy!" Eli whispered Denys, "Take no notice! she thinksof him night and day. " They pretended not to observe her, and she shookit off, and hustled and laid the cloth with her own hands; but as shesmoothed it, her hands trembled and a tear or two stole down her cheeks. 

They could not make enough of Denys. They stuffed him, and crammed him;and then gathered round him and kept filling his glass in turn, while bythat genial blaze of fire and ruby wine and eager eyes he told all thatI have related, and a vast number of minor details, which an artist, however minute, omits. 

But how different the effect on my readers and on this small circle! Tothem the interest was already made before the first word came from hislips. It was all about Gerard, and he who sat there telling it them, waswarm from Gerard and an actor with him in all these scenes. 

The flesh and blood around that fire quivered for their severed member, hearing its struggles and perils. 

I shall ask my readers to recall to memory all they can of Gerard'sjourney with Denys, and in their mind's eye to see those very matterstold by his comrade to an exile's father, all stoic outside, all fatherwithin, and to two poor women, an exile's mother and a sister, who wereall love and pity and tender anxiety both outside and in. Now would youmind closing this book for a minute and making an effort to realize allthis? It will save us so much repetition. 

Then you will not be surprised when I tell you that after a while Gilescame softly and curled himself up before the fire, and lay gazing at thespeaker with a reverence almost canine; and that, when the rough soldierhad unconsciously but thoroughly betrayed his better qualities, andabove all his rare affection for Gerard, Kate, though timorous as abird, stole her little hand into the warrior's huge brown palm, whereit lay an instant like a tea-spoonful of cream spilt on a platter, thennipped the ball of his thumb and served for a Kardiometer. In otherwords, Fate is just even to rival storytellers, and balances matters. Denys had to pay a tax to his audience which I have not. Whenever Gerardwas in too much danger, the female faces became so white, and their poorlittle throats gurgled so, he was obliged in common humanity tospoil his recital. Suspense is the soul of narrative, and thus dealtRough-and-Tender of Burgundy with his best suspenses. "Now, dame, takenot on till ye hear the end; ma'amselle, let not your cheek blanch so;courage! it looks ugly; but you shall hear how we won through. Had hemiscarried, and I at hand, would I be alive?"

And meantime Kate's little Kardiometer, or heart-measurer, graduatedemotion, and pinched by scale. At its best it was by no means ahigh-pressure engine. But all is relative. Denys soon learned the tendergamut; and when to water the suspense, and extract the thrill as far aspossible. On one occasion only he cannily indemnified his narrative forthis drawback. Falling personally into the Rhine, and sinking, he gotpinched, he Denys, to his surprise and satisfaction. "Oho!" thought he, and on the principle of the anatomists, "experimentum in corpore vili, "kept himself a quarter of an hour under water; under pressure all thetime. And even when Gerard had got hold of him, he was loth to leave theriver, so, less conscientious than I was, swam with Gerard to the eastbank first, and was about to land, but detected the officers and theirintent, chaffed them a little space, treading water, then turned andswam wearily all across, and at last was obliged to get out, for veryshame, or else acknowledge himself a pike; so permitted himself to land, exhausted: and the pressure relaxed. 

It was eleven o'clock, an unheard-of hour, but they took no note of timethis night; and Denys had still much to tell them, when the door wasopened quietly, and in stole Cornelis and Sybrandt looking hang-dog. They had this night been drinking the very last drop of their mysteriousfunds. 

Catherine feared her husband would rebuke them before Denys; but he onlylooked sadly at them, and motioned them to sit down quietly. 

Denys it was who seemed discomposed. He knitted his brows and eyed themthoughtfully and rather gloomily. Then turned to Catherine. "What sayyou, dame? the rest to-morrow; for I am somewhat weary, and it waxeslate. "

"So be it, " said Eli. But when Denys rose to go to his inn, he wasinstantly stopped by Catherine. "And think you to lie from this house?Gerard's room has been got ready for you hours agone; the sheets I'llnot say much for, seeing I spun the flax and wove the web. "

"Then would I lie in them blindfold, " was the gallant reply. "Ah, dame, our poor Gerard was the one for fine linen. He could hardly forgive thehonest Germans their coarse flax, and whene'er my traitors of countrymendid amiss, a would excuse them, saying, 'Well, well; bonnes toiles sonten Bourgogne:' that means, there be good lenten cloths in Burgundy. ' Butindeed he beat all for bywords and cleanliness. 

"Oh, Eli! Eli! doth not our son come back to us at each word?"

"Ay. Buss me, my poor Kate. You and I know all that passeth in eachother's hearts this night. None other can, but God. "

CHAPTER XLVII

Denys took an opportunity next day and told mother and daughter therest, excusing himself characteristically for not letting Cornelis andSybrandt hear of it. "It is not for me to blacken them; they come ofa good stock. But Gerard looks on them as no friends of his in thismatter; and I'm Gerard's comrade and it is a rule with us soldiers notto tell the enemy aught--but lies. "

Catherine sighed, but made no answer. 

The adventures he related cost them a tumult of agitation and grief, andsore they wept at the parting of the friends, which even now Denys couldnot tell without faltering. But at last all merged in the joyful hopeand expectation of Gerard's speedy return. In this Denys confidentlyshared; but reminded them that was no reason why he should neglect hisfriend's wishes and last words. In fact, should Gerard return next week, and no Margaret to be found, what sort of figure should he cut?

Catherine had never felt so kindly towards the truant Margaret as now;and she was fully as anxious to find her, and be kind to her beforeGerard's return, as Denys was; but she could not agree with him thatanything was to be gained by leaving this neighbourhood to search forher. "She must have told somebody whither she was going. It is notas though they were dishonest folk flying the country; they owe not astiver in Sevenbergen; and dear heart, Denys, you can't hunt all Hollandfor her. "

"Can I not?" said Denys grimly. "That we shall see. " He added, aftersome reflection, that they must divide their forces; she stay here witheyes and ears wide open, and he ransack every town in Holland for her, if need be. "But she will not be many leagues from here. They be three. Three fly not so fast, nor far, as one. "

"That is sense, " said Catherine. But she insisted on his going first tothe demoiselle Van Eyck. "She and our Margaret were bosom friends. Sheknows where the girl is gone, if she will but tell us. " Denys was forgoing to her that instant, so Catherine, in a turn of the hand, madeherself one shade neater, and took him with her. 

She was received graciously by the old lady sitting in a richlyfurnished room; and opened her business. The tapestry dropped out ofMargaret Van Eyck's hands. "Gone? Gone from Sevenbergen and not told me;the thankless girl. "

This turn greatly surprised the visitors. "What, you know not? when wasshe here last?"

"Maybe ten days agone. I had ta'en out my brushes, after so many years, to paint her portrait. I did not do it, though; for reasons. "

Catherine remarked it was "a most strange thing she should go away bagand baggage like this, without with your leave or by your leave, why, orwherefore. Was ever aught so untoward; just when all our hearts are warmto her; and here is Gerard's mate come from the ends of the earth withcomfort for her from Gerard, and can't find her, and Gerard himselfexpected. What to do I know not. But sure she is not parted like thiswithout a reason. Can ye not give us the clue, my good demoiselle?Prithee now. 

"I have it not to give, " said the elder lady, rather peevishly. 

"Then I can, " said Reicht Heynes, showing herself in the doorway, withcolour somewhat heightened. 

"So you have been hearkening all the time, eh?"

"What are my ears for, mistress?"

"True. Well, throw us the light of thy wisdom on this dark matter. "

"There is no darkness that I see, " said Reicht. "And the clue, why, anye call't a two-plye twine, and the ends on't in this room e'en now, ye'll not be far out. Oh, mistress, I wonder at you sitting therepretending. "

"Marry, come up. " and the mistress's cheek was now nearly as red as theservant's. "So 'twas I drove the foolish girl away. "

"You did your share, mistress. What sort of greeting gave you herlast time she came? Think you she could miss to notice it, and she allfriendless? And you said, 'I have altered my mind about painting ofyou, ' says you, a turning up your nose at her. "

"I did not turn up my nose. It is not shaped like yours for lookingheavenward. "

"Oh, all our nosen can follow our heartys bent, for that matter. Poorsoul. She did come into the kitchen to me. 'I am not to be painted now, 'said she, and the tears in her eyes. She said no more. But I knew wellwhat she did mean. I had seen ye. "

"Well, " said Margaret Van Eyck, "I do confess so much, and I make youthe judge, madam. Know that these young girls can do nothing of theirown heads, but are most apt at mimicking aught their sweethearts do. Nowyour Gerard is reasonably handy at many things, and among the rest atthe illuminator's craft. And Margaret she is his pupil, and a patientone: what marvel? having a woman's eye for colour, and eke a lover toape. 'Tis a trick I despise at heart: for by it the great art of colour, which should be royal, aspiring, and free, becomes a poor slave to thepetty crafts of writing and printing, and is fettered, imprisoned, andmade little, body and soul, to match the littleness of books, and go tochurch in a rich fool's pocket. Natheless affection rules us all, andwhen the poor wench would bring me her thorn leaves, and lilies, andivy, and dewberries, and ladybirds, and butterfly grubs, and all thescum of Nature-stuck fast in gold-leaf like wasps in a honey-pot, andwithal her diurnal book, showing she had pored an hundred, or an hundredand fifty, or two hundred hours over each singular page, certes I waswroth that an immortal soul, and many hours of labour, and much manualskill, should be flung away on Nature's trash, leaves, insects, grubs, and on barren letters; but, having bowels, I did perforce restrain, andas it were, dam my better feelings, and looked kindly at the work tosee how it might be bettered; and said I, 'Sith Heaven for our sinshath doomed us to spend time, and soul, and colour on great letters andlittle beetles, omitting such small fry as saints and heroes, theiracts and passions, why not present the scum naturally?' I told her 'thegrapes I saw, walking abroad, did hang i' the air, not stick in a wall;and even these insects, ' quo' I, 'and Nature her slime in general, passnot their noxious lives wedged miserably in metal prisons like fliesin honey-pots and glue-pots, but do crawl or hover at large, infestingair. ' 'Ah my dear friend, ' says she, 'I see now whither you drive; butthis ground is gold; whereon we may not shade. ' 'Who said so?' quothI. 'All teachers of this craft, ' says she; and (to make an end o' me atonce, I trow) 'Gerard himself!' 'That for Gerard himself, ' quoth I, 'andall the gang; gi'e me a brush!'

"Then chose I, to shade her fruit and reptiles, a colour false innature, but true relatively to that monstrous ground of glaring gold;and in five minutes out came a bunch of raspberries, stalk and all, anda'most flew in your mouth; likewise a butterfly grub she had so trulypresented as might turn the stoutest stomach. My lady she flings herarms round my neck, and says she, 'Oh!'"

"Did she now?"

"The little love!" observed Denys, succeeding at last in wedging in aword. 

Margaret Van Eyck stared at him; and then smiled. She went on to tellthem how from step to step she had been led on to promise to resume theart she had laid aside with a sigh when her brothers died, and to paintthe Madonna once more--with Margaret for model. Incidentally she evenrevealed how girls are turned into saints. "Thy hair is adorable, " saidI. "Why, 'tis red, " quo' she. "Ay, " quoth I, "but what a red! how brown!how glossy! most hair is not worth a straw to us painters; thine theartist's very hue. But thy violet eyes, which smack of earth, being nowlanguid for lack of one Gerard, now full of fire in hopes of the sameGerard, these will I lift to heaven in fixed and holy meditation, andthy nose, which doth already somewhat aspire that way (though not sopiously as Reicht's), will I debase a trifle, and somewhat enfeeble thychin. "

"Enfeeble her chin? Alack! what may that mean? Ye go beyond me, mistress. "

"'Tis a resolute chin. Not a jot too resolute for this wicked world; butwhen ye come to a Madonna? No thank you. "

"Well I never. A resolute chin. "

Denys. "The darling!"

"And now comes the rub. When you told me she was--the way she is, itgave me a shock; I dropped my brushes. Was I going to turn a girl, thatcouldn't keep her lover at a distance, into the Virgin Mary, at my timeof life? I love the poor ninny still. But I adore our blessed Lady. Say you, 'a painter must not be peevish in such matters'? Well, mostpainters are men; and men are fine fellows. They can do aught. Theirsaints and virgins are neither more nor less than their lemans, savingyour presence. But know that for this very reason half their craftis lost on me, which find beneath their angels' white wings the verytrollops I have seen flaunting it on the streets, bejewelled like Paynimidols, and put on like the queens in a pack o' cards. And I am not afine fellow, but only a woman, and my painting is but one half craft, and t'other half devotion. So now you may read me. 'Twas foolish, maybe, but I could not help it; yet am I sorry. " And the old lady endeddespondently a discourse which she had commenced in a'mighty defianttone. 

"Well, you know, dame, " observed Catherine, "you must think it would goto the poor girl's heart, and she so fond of ye?"

Margaret Van Eyck only sighed. 

The Frisian girl, after biting her lips impatiently a little while, turned upon Catherine. "Why, dame, think you 'twas for that aloneMargaret and Peter hath left Sevenbergen? Nay. "

"For what else, then?"

"What else? Why, because Gerard's people slight her so cruel. Who wouldbide among hard-hearted folk that ha' driven her lad t' Italy, and nowhe is gone, relent not, but face it out, and ne'er come anigh her thatis left?"

"Reicht, I was going. "

"Oh, ay, going, and going, and going. Ye should ha' said less or elsedone more. But with your words you did uplift her heart and let it downwi' your deeds. 'They have never been, ' said the poor thing to me, withsuch a sigh. Ay, here is one can feel for her: for I too am far from myfriends, and often, when first I came to Holland, I did used to take ahearty cry all to myself. But ten times liever would I be Reicht Heyneswith nought but the leagues atw'een me and all my kith, than be as sheis i' the midst of them that ought to warm to her, and yet to fare aslonesome as I. "

"Alack, Reicht, I did go but yestreen, and had gone before, but oneplaguy thing or t'other did still come and hinder me. "

"Mistress, did aught hinder ye to eat your dinner any one of those days?I trow not. And had your heart been as good towards your own flesh andblood, as 'twas towards your flesher's meat, nought had prevailed tokeep you from her that sat lonely, a watching the road for you andcomfort, wi' your child's child a beating 'neath her bosom. "

Here this rude young woman was interrupted by an incident not uncommonin a domestic's bright existence. The Van Eyck had been nettled by theattack on her, but with due tact had gone into ambush. She now sprangout of it. "Since you disrespect my guests, seek another place!"

"With all my heart, " said Reicht stoutly. 

"Nay, mistress, " put in the good-natured Catherine. "True folk willstill speak out. Her tongue is a stinger. " Here the water came intothe speaker's eyes by way of confirmation. "But better she said it thanthought it. So now 't won't rankle in her. And part with her for me, that shall ye not. Beshrew the wench, she wots she is a good servant, and takes advantage. We poor wretches which keep house must still pay'em tax for value. I had a good servant once, when I was a youngwoman. Eh dear, how she did grind me down into the dust. In the end, by Heaven's mercy, she married the baker, and I was my own woman again. 'So, ' said I, 'no more good servants shall come hither, a hectoring o'me. ' I just get a fool and learn her; and whenever she knoweth her righthand from her left, she sauceth me: then out I bundle her neck andcrop, and take another dunce in her place. Dear heart, 'tis wearisome, teaching a string of fools by ones; but there--I am mistress:" here sheforgot that she was defending Reicht, and turning rather spitefully uponher, added, "and you be mistress here, I trow. "

"No more than that stool, " said the Van Eyck loftily. "She is neithermistress nor servant; but Gone. She is dismissed the house, and there'san end of her. What, did ye not hear me turn the saucy baggage off?"

"Ay, ay. We all heard ye, " said Reicht, with vast indifference. 

"Then hear me!" said Denys solemnly. 

They all went round like things on wheels, and fastened their eyes onhim. 

"Ay, let us hear what the man says, " urged the hostess. "Men are finefellows, with their great hoarse voices. "

"Mistress Reicht, " said Denys, with great dignity and ceremony, indeedso great as to verge on the absurd, "you are turned off. If on a slightacquaintance I might advise, I'd say, since you are a servant no more, be a mistress, a queen. "

"Easier said than done, " replied Reicht bluntly. 

"Not a jot. You see here one who is a man, though but half anarbalestrier, owing to that devilish Englishman's arrow, in whosecarcass I have, however, left a like token, which is a comfort. I havetwenty gold pieces" (he showed them) "and a stout arm. In anotherweek or so I shall have twain. Marriage is not a habit of mine; butI capitulate to so many virtues. You are beautiful, good-hearted, andoutspoken, and above all, you take the part of my she-comrade. Be thenan arbalestriesse!"

"And what the dickens is that?" inquired Reicht. 

"I mean, be the wife, mistress, and queen of Denys of Burgundy herepresent. "

A dead silence fell on all. 

It did not last long, though; and was followed by a burst ofunreasonable indignation. 

Catherine. "Well, did you ever?"

Margaret. "Never in all my born days. "

Catherine. "Before our very faces. "

Margaret. "Of all the absurdity, and insolence of this ridiculous sex--"

Then Denys observed somewhat drily, that the female to whom he hadaddressed himself was mute; and the others, on whose eloquence there wasno immediate demand, were fluent: on this the voices stopped, and theeyes turned pivot-like upon Reicht. 

She took a sly glance from under her lashes at her military assailant, and said, "I mean to take a good look at any man ere I leap into hisarms. "

Denys drew himself up majestically. "Then look your fill, and leapaway. "

This proposal led to a new and most unexpected result. A long whitefinger was extended by the Van Eyck in a line with the speaker's eye, and an agitated voice bade him stand, in the name of all the saints. "You are beautiful, so, " cried she. "You are inspired--with folly. Whatmatters that? you are inspired. I must take off your head. " And in amoment she was at work with her pencil. "Come out, hussy, " she screamedto Reicht, "more in front of him, and keep the fool inspired andbeautiful. Oh, why had I not this maniac for my good centurion? Theywent and brought me a brute with a low forehead and a shapeless beard. "

Catherine stood and looked with utter amazement at this pantomime, and secretly resolved that her venerable hostess had been a disguisedlunatic all this time, and was now busy throwing off the mask. Asfor Reicht, she was unhappy and cross. She had left her caldron in aprecarious state, and made no scruple to say so, and that duties sograve as hers left her no "time to waste a playing the statee and thefool all at one time. " Her mistress in reply reminded her that it waspossible to be rude and rebellious to one's poor, old, affectionate, desolate mistress, without being utterly heartless and savage; and atrampler on arts. 

On this Reicht stopped, and pouted, and looked like a little basiliskat the inspired model who caused her woe. He retorted with unshakenadmiration. The situation was at last dissolved by the artist's wristbecoming cramped from disuse; this was not, however, until she had madea rough but noble sketch. "I can work no more at present, " said shesorrowfully. 

"Then, now, mistress, I may go and mind my pot?"

"Ay, ay, go to your pot! And get into it, do; you will find your soul init: so then you will all be together. "

"Well, but, Reicht, " said Catherine, laughing, "she turned you off. "

"Boo, boo, boo!" said Reicht contemptuously. "When she wants to get ridof me, let her turn herself off and die. I am sure she is old enoughfor't. But take your time, mistress; if you are in no hurry, no more amI. When that day doth come, 'twill take a man to dry my eyes; and if youshould be in the same mind then, soldier, you can say so; and if you arenot, why, 'twill be all one to Reicht Heynes. "

And the plain speaker went her way. But her words did not fall to theground. Neither of her female hearers could disguise from herself thatthis blunt girl, solitary herself, had probably read Margaret Brandtaright, and that she had gone away from Sevenbergen broken-hearted. 

Catherine and Denys bade the Van Eyck adieu, and that same afternoonDenys set out on a wild goose chase. His plan, like all great things, was simple. He should go to a hundred towns and villages, and ask ineach after an old physician with a fair daughter, and an old long-bowsoldier. He should inquire of the burgomasters about all new-comers, andshould go to the fountains and watch the women and girls as they camewith their pitchers for water. 

And away he went, and was months and months on the tramp, and could notfind her. 

Happily, this chivalrous feat of friendship was in some degree its ownreward. 

Those who sit at home blindfolded by self-conceit, and think camelor man out of the depths of their inner consciousness, alias theirignorance, will tell you that in the intervals of war and danger, peaceand tranquil life acquire their true value and satisfy the heroic mind. But those who look before they babble or scribble will see and saythat men who risk their lives habitually thirst for exciting pleasuresbetween the acts of danger, are not for innocent tranquility. 

To this Denys was no exception. His whole military life had beenhalf sparta, half Capua. And he was too good a soldier and too good alibertine to have ever mixed either habit with the other. But now forthe first time he found himself mixed; at peace and yet on duty; forhe took this latter view of his wild goose chase, luckily. So all thesemonths he was a demi-Spartan; sober, prudent, vigilant, indomitable; andhappy, though constantly disappointed, as might have been expected. Heflirted gigantically on the road; but wasted no time about it. Nor inthese his wanderings did he tell a single female that "marriage was notone of his habits, etc. "

And so we leave him on the tramp, "Pilgrim of Friendship, " as his poorcomrade was of Love. 

CHAPTER XLVIII

Catherine was in dismay when she reflected that Gerard must reach homein another month at farthest, more likely in a week; and how should shetell him she had not even kept an eye upon his betrothed? Then there wasthe uncertainty as to the girl's fate; and this uncertainty sometimestook a sickening form. 

"Oh, Kate, " she groaned, "if she should have gone and made herselfaway!"

"Mother, she would never be so wicked. "

"Ah, my lass, you know not what hasty fools young lasses be, that haveno mothers to keep 'em straight. They will fling themselves into thewater for a man that the next man they meet would ha' cured 'em of in aweek. I have known 'em to jump in like brass one moment and scream forhelp in the next. Couldn't know their own minds ye see even about sucha trifle as yon. And then there's times when their bodies ail like noother living creatures ever I could hear of, and that strings up theirfeelings so, the patience, that belongs to them at other times beyondall living souls barring an ass, seems all to jump out of 'em atone turn, and into the water they go. Therefore, I say that men aremonsters. "

"Mother!"

"Monsters, and no less, to go making such heaps o' canals just to temptthe poor women in. They know we shall not cut our throats, hating thesight of blood and rating our skins a hantle higher nor our lives; andas for hanging, while she is a fixing of the nail and a making of thenoose she has time t' alter her mind. But a jump into a canal is no morethan into bed; and the water it does all the lave, will ye, nill ye. Why, look at me, the mother o' nine, wasn't I agog to make a hole in ourcanal for the nonce?"

"Nay, mother, I'll never believe it of you. "

"Ye may, though. 'Twas in the first year of our keeping house together. Eli hadn't found out my weak stitches then, nor I his; so we made arent, pulling contrariwise; had a quarrel. So then I ran crying, to tellsome gabbling fool like myself what I had no business to tell out o'doors except to the saints, and there was one of our precious canals inthe way; do they take us for teal? Oh, how tempting it did look! Says Ito myself, 'Sith he has let me go out of his door quarrelled, he shallsee me drowned next, and then he will change his key. He will blubbera good one, and I shall look down from heaven' (I forgot I should be int'other part), 'and see him take on, and oh, but that will be sweet!'and I was all a tiptoe and going in, only just then I thought Iwouldn't. I had got a new gown a making, for one thing, and hard uponfinished. So I went home instead, and what was Eli's first word, 'Letyon flea stick i' the wall, my lass, ' says he. 'Not a word of all I saidt' anger thee was sooth, but this, "I love thee. "' These were his verywords; I minded 'em, being the first quarrel. So I flung my arms abouthis neck and sobbed a bit, and thought o' the canal; and he was nocolder to me than I to him, being a man and a young one; and so thenthat was better than lying in the water; and spoiling my wedding kirtleand my fine new shoon, old John Bush made 'em, that was uncle to himkeeps the shop now. And what was my grief to hers?"

Little Kate hoped that Margaret loved her father too much to think ofleaving him so at his age. "He is father and mother and all to her, youknow. "

"Nay, Kate, they do forget all these things in a moment o' despair whenthe very sky seems black above them. I place more faith in him thatis unborn, than on him that is ripe for the grave, to keep her out o'mischief. For certes it do go sore against us to die when there's alittle innocent a pulling at our hearts to let 'un live, and feeding atour very veins. "

"Well, then, keep up a good heart, mother. " She added, that very likelyall these fears were exaggerated. She ended by solemnly entreating hermother at all events not to persist in naming the sex of Margaret'sinfant. It was so unlucky, all the gossips told her; "dear heart, as ifthere were not as many girls born as boys. "

This reflection, though not unreasonable, was met with clamour. 

"Have you the cruelty to threaten me with a girl!!? I want no moregirls, while I have you. What use would a lass be to me? Can I set heron my knee and see my Gerard again as I can a boy? I tell thee 'tis allsettled. 

"How may that be?"

"In my mind. And if I am to be disappointed i' the end, 'tisn't for youto disappoint me beforehand, telling me it is not to be a child, butonly a girl. "

CHAPTER XLIX

MARGARET BRANDT had always held herself apart from Sevenbergen; and herreserve had passed for pride; this had come to her ears, and she knewmany hearts were swelling with jealousy and malevolence. How would theytriumph over her when her condition could no longer be concealed! Thisthought gnawed her night and day. For some time it had made her buryherself in the house, and shun daylight even on those rare occasionswhen she went abroad. 

Not that in her secret heart and conscience she mistook her moralsituation, as my unlearned readers have done perhaps. Though notacquainted with the nice distinctions of the contemporary law, she knewthat betrothal was a marriage contract, and could no more be legallybroken on either side than any other compact written and witnessed; andthat marriage with another party than the betrothed had been formerlyannulled both by Church and State and that betrothed couples oftencame together without any further ceremony, and their children werelegitimate. 

But what weighed down her simple mediaeval mind was this: that verycontract of betrothal was not forthcoming. Instead of her keeping it, Gerard had got it, and Gerard was far, far away. She hated and despisedherself for the miserable oversight which had placed her at the mercy offalse opinion. 

For though she had never heard Horace's famous couplet, Segniusirritant, etc. , she was Horatian by the plain, hard, positiveintelligence, which, strange to say, characterizes the judgment of hersex, when feeling happens not to blind it altogether. She gauged theunderstanding of the world to a T. Her marriage lines being outof sight, and in Italy, would never prevail to balance her visiblepregnancy, and the sight of her child when born. What sort of a tale wasthis to stop slanderous tongues? "I have got my marriage lines, but Icannot show them you. " What woman would believe her? or even pretend tobelieve her? And as she was in reality one of the most modest girls inHolland, it was women's good opinion she wanted, not men's. 

Even barefaced slander attacks her sex at a great advantage; but herewas slander with a face of truth. "The strong-minded woman" had not yetbeen invented; and Margaret, though by nature and by having been earlymade mistress of a family, she was resolute in some respects, was weakas water in others, and weakest of all in this. Like all the eliteof her sex, she was a poor little leaf, trembling at each gust of theworld's opinion, true or false. Much misery may be contained in fewwords. I doubt if pages of description from any man's pen could makeany human creature, except virtuous women (and these need no such aid), realize the anguish of a virtuous woman foreseeing herself paraded as afrail one. Had she been frail at heart, she might have brazened it out. But she had not that advantage. She was really pure as snow, and saw thepitch coming nearer her and nearer. The poor girl sat listless hours ata time, and moaned with inner anguish. And often, when her father wastalking to her, and she giving mechanical replies, suddenly her cheekwould burn like fire, and the old man would wonder what he had said todiscompose her. Nothing. His words were less than air to her. It was theever-present dread sent the colour of shame into her burning cheek, nomatter what she seemed to be talking and thinking about. But both shameand fear rose to a climax when she came back that night from MargaretVan Eyck's. Her condition was discovered, and by persons of her ownsex. The old artist, secluded like herself, might not betray her;but Catherine, a gossip in the centre of a family, and a thickneighbourhood? One spark of hope remained. Catherine had spoken kindly, even lovingly. The situation admitted no half course. Gerard's motherthus roused must either be her best friend or worst enemy. She waitedthen in racking anxiety to hear more. No word came. She gave up hope. Catherine was not going to be her friend. Then she would expose her, since she had no strong and kindly feeling to balance the natural loveof babbling. 

Then it was the wish to fly from this neighbourhood began to grow andgnaw upon her, till it became a wild and passionate desire. But howpersuade her father to this? Old people cling to places. He was very oldand infirm to change his abode. There was no course but to make him herconfidant; better so than to run away from him; and she felt that wouldbe the alternative. And now between her uncontrollable desire to flyand hide, and her invincible aversion to speak out to a man, even to herfather, she vibrated in a suspense full of lively torture. And presentlybetwixt these two came in one day the fatal thought, "end all!" Thingsfoolishly worded are not always foolish; one of poor Catherine'sbugbears, these numerous canals, did sorely tempt this poor fluctuatinggirl. She stood on the bank one afternoon, and eyed the calm deep water. It seemed an image of repose, and she was so harassed. No more trouble. No more fear of shame. If Gerard had not loved her, I doubt she hadended there. 

As it was, she kneeled by the water side, and prayed fervently to God tokeep such wicked thoughts from her. "Oh! selfish wretch, " said she, "toleave thy father. Oh, wicked wretch, to kill thy child, and make thypoor Gerard lose all his pain and peril undertaken for thy sight. I willtell father all, ay, ere this sun shall set. " And she went home witheager haste, lest her good resolution should ooze out ere she got there. 

Now, in matters domestic the learned Peter was simple as a child, andMargaret, from the age of sixteen, had governed the house gentlybut absolutely. It was therefore a strange thing in this house, thefaltering, irresolute way in which its young but despotic mistressaddressed that person, who in a domestic sense was less importantthan Martin Wittenhaagen, or even than the little girl who came in themorning and for a pittance washed the vessels, etc. , and went home atnight. 

"Father, I would speak to thee. "

"Speak on, girl. "

"Wilt listen to me? And--and--not--and try to excuse my faults?"

"We have all our faults, Margaret, thou no more than the rest of us; butfewer, unless parental feeling blinds me. "

"Alas, no, father: I am a poor foolish girl, that would fain do well, but have done ill, most ill, most unwisely; and now must bear the shame. But, father, I love you, with all my faults, and will not you forgive myfolly, and still love your motherless girl?"

"That ye may count on, " said Peter cheerfully. 

"Oh, well, smile not. For then how can I speak and make you sad?"

"Why, what is the matter?"

"Father, disgrace is coming on this house: it is at the door. And Ithe culprit. Oh, father, turn your head away. I--I--father, I have letGerard take away my marriage lines. "

"Is that all? 'Twas an oversight. "

"'Twas the deed of a mad woman. But woe is me! that is not the worst. "

Peter interrupted her. "The youth is honest, and loves you dear. You areyoung. What is a year or two to you? Gerard will assuredly come back andkeep troth. "

"And meantime know you what is coming?"

"Not I, except that I shall be gone first for one. "

"Worse than that. There is worse pain than death. Nay, for pity's saketurn away your head, father. "

"Foolish wench!" muttered Peter, but turned his head. 

She trembled violently, and with her cheeks on fire began to falter out, "I did look on Gerard as my husband--we being betrothed-and he was in sosore danger, and I thought I had killed him, and I-oh, if you were butmy mother I might find courage: you would question me. But you say not aword. "

"Why, Margaret, what is all this coil about? and why are thy cheekscrimson, speaking to no stranger', but to thy old father?"

"Why are my cheeks on fire? Because--because--father kill me; send meto heaven! bid Martin shoot me with his arrow! And then the gossips willcome and tell you why I blush so this day. And then, when I am dead, Ihope you will love your girl again for her mother's sake. "

"Give me thy hand, mistress, " said Peter, a little sternly. 

She put it out to him trembling. He took it gently and began with someanxiety in his face to feel her pulse. 

"Alas, nay, " said she. "'Tis my soul that burns, not my body, withfever. I cannot, will not, bide in Sevenbergen. " And she wrung her handsimpatiently. 

"Be calm now, " said the old man soothingly, "nor torment thyself fornought. Not bide in Sevenbergen? What need to bide a day, as it vexesthee, and puts thee in a fever: for fevered thou art, deny it not. "

"What!" cried Margaret, "would you yield to go hence, and--and ask noreason but my longing to be gone?" and suddenly throwing herself on herknees beside him, in a fervour of supplication she clutched his sleeve, and then his arm, and then his shoulder, while imploring him to quitthis place, and not ask her why. "Alas! what needs it? You will soon seeit. And I could never say it. I would liever die. "

"Foolish child, who seeks thy girlish secrets? Is it I, whose life hathbeen spent in searching Nature's? And for leaving Sevenbergen, what isthere to keep me in it, thee unwilling? Is there respect for me here, orgratitude? Am I not yclept quacksalver by those that come not near me, and wizard by those I heal? And give they not the guerdon and the honourthey deny me to the empirics that slaughter them? Besides, what is't tome where we sojourn? Choose thou that, as did thy mother before thee. "

Margaret embraced him tenderly, and wept upon his shoulder. 

She was respited. 

Yet as she wept, respited, she almost wished she had had the courage totell him. 

After a while nothing would content him but her taking a medicament hewent and brought her. She took it submissively, to please him. Itwas the least she could do. It was a composing draught, and thoughadministered under an error, and a common one, did her more good thanharm: she awoke calmed by a long sleep, and that very day began herpreparations. 

Next week they went to Rotterdam, bag and baggage, and lodged above atailor's shop in the Brede-Kirk Straet. 

Only one person in Tergou knew whither they were gone. 

The Burgomaster. 

He locked the information in his own breast. 

The use he made of it ere long, my reader will not easily divine: for hedid not divine it himself. 

But time will show. 

CHAPTER L

Among strangers Margaret Brandt was comparatively happy. And soon a newand unexpected cause of content arose. A civic dignitary being ill, andfanciful in proportion, went from doctor to doctor; and having arrivedat death's door, sent for Peter. Peter found him bled and purged tonothing. He flung a battalion of bottles out of window, and left itopen; beat up yolks of eggs in neat Schiedam, and administered it insmall doses; followed this up by meat stewed in red wine and water, shredding into both mild febrifugal herbs, that did no harm. Finally, his patient got about again, looking something between a man and apillow-case, and being a voluble dignitary, spread Peter's fame in everystreet; and that artist, who had long merited a reputation in vain, made one rapidly by luck. Things looked bright. The old man's pride wascheered at last, and his purse began to fill. He spent much of his gain, however, in sovereign herbs and choice drugs, and would have so investedthem all, but Margaret white-mailed a part. The victory came too late. Its happy excitement was fatal. 

One evening, in bidding her good-night, his voice seemed ratherinarticulate. 

The next morning he was found speechless, and only just sensible. 

Margaret, who had been for years her father's attentive pupil, saw atonce that he had had a paralytic stroke. But not trusting to herself, she ran for a doctor. One of those who, obstructed by Peter, had notkilled the civic dignitary, came, and cheerfully confirmed her views. He was for bleeding the patient. She declined. "He was always againstblooding, " said she, "especially the old. " Peter lived, but was neverthe same man again. His memory became much affected, and of course hewas not to be trusted to prescribe; and several patients had come, and one or two, that were bent on being cured by the new doctor and noother, awaited his convalescence. Misery stared her in the face. Sheresolved to go for advice and comfort to her cousin William Johnson, from whom she had hitherto kept aloof out of pride and poverty. Shefound him and his servant sitting in the same room, and neither of themthe better for liquor. Mastering all signs of surprise, she gave hergreetings, and presently told him she had come to talk on a familymatter, and with this glanced quietly at the servant by way of hint. Thewoman took it, but not as expected. 

"Oh, you can speak before me, can she not, my old man?"

At this familiarity Margaret turned very red, and said--

"I cry you mercy, mistress. I knew not my cousin had fallen into thecustom of this town. Well, I must take a fitter opportunity;" and sherose to go. 

"I wot not what ye mean by custom o' the town, " said the woman, bouncingup. "But this I know; 'tis the part of a faithful servant to keep hermaster from being preyed on by his beggarly kin. "

Margaret retorted: "Ye are too modest, mistress. Ye are no servant. Yourspeech betrays you. 'Tis not till the ape hath mounted the tree thatshe, shows her tail so plain. Nay, there sits the servant; God help him!And while so it is, fear not thou his kin will ever be so poor in spiritas come where the likes of you can flout their dole. " And casting onelook of mute reproach at her cousin for being so little of a man as tosit passive and silent all this time, she turned and went haughtily out;nor would she shed a single tear till she got home and thought of it. And now here were two men to be lodged and fed by one pregnant girl; andanother mouth coming into the world. 

But this last, though the most helpless of all, was their best friend. 

Nature was strong in Margaret Brandt; that same nature which makes thebrutes, the birds, and the insects, so cunning at providing food andshelter for their progeny yet to come. 

Stimulated by nature she sat and brooded, and brooded, and thought, andthought, how to be beforehand with destitution. Ay, though she had stillfive gold pieces left, she saw starvation coming with inevitable foot. 

Her sex, when, deviating from custom, it thinks with male intensity, thinks just as much to the purpose as we do. She rose, bade Martin movePeter to another room, made her own very neat and clean, polished theglass globe, and suspended it from the ceiling, dusted the crocodile andnailed him to the outside wall; and after duly instructing Martin, sethim to play the lounging sentinel about the street door, and tell thecrocodile-bitten that a great, and aged, and learned alchymist abodethere, who in his moments of recreation would sometimes amuse himself bycuring mortal diseases. 

Patients soon came, and were received by Margaret, and demanded to seethe leech. "That might not be. He was deep in his studies, searching forthe grand elixir, and not princes could have speech of him. They musttell her their symptoms, and return in two hours. " And oh! mysteriouspowers! when they did return, the drug or draught was always ready forthem. Sometimes, when it was a worshipful patient, she would carefullyscan his face, and feeling both pulse and skin, as well as hearing hisstory, would go softly with it to Peter's room; and there think andask herself how her father, whose system she had long quietly observed, would have treated the case. Then she would write an illegible scrawlwith a cabalistic letter, and bring it down reverently, and show it thepatient, and "Could he read that?" Then it would be either, "I am noreader, " or, with admiration, "Nay, mistress, nought can I make on't. "

"Ay, but I can. 'Tis sovereign. Look on thyself as cured!" If she hadthe materials by her, and she was too good an economist not to favoursomewhat those medicines she had in her own stock, she would sometimeslet the patient see her compound it, often and anxiously consulting thesacred prescription lest great Science should suffer in her hands. Andso she would send them away relieved of cash, but with their pocketsfull of medicine, and minds full of faith, and humbugged to theirhearts' content. Populus vult decipi. And when they were gone, she wouldtake down two little boxes Gerard had made her; and on one of theseshe had written To-day, and on the other To-morrow, and put the smallercoins into "To-day, " and the larger into "To-morrow, " along with suchof her gold pieces as had survived the journey from Sevenbergen, andthe expenses of housekeeping in a strange place, and so she met currentexpenses, and laid by for the rainy day she saw coming, and mixed drugswith simples, and vice with virtue. On this last score her consciencepricked her sore, and after each day's comedy, she knelt down and prayedGod to forgive her "for the sake of her child. " But lo and behold, cureand cure was reported to her; so then her conscience began to harden. Martin Wittenhaagen had of late been a dead weight on her hands. Likemost men who had endured great hardships, he had stiffened rathersuddenly. But though less supple, he was as strong as ever, and at hisown pace could have carried the doctor herself round Rotterdam city. Hecarried her slops instead. 

In this new business he showed the qualities of a soldier: unreasoningobedience, punctuality, accuracy, despatch, and drunkenness. 

He fell among "good fellows;" the blackguards plied him with Schiedam;he babbled, he bragged. 

Doctor Margaret had risen very high in his estimation. All thisbrandishing of a crocodile for a standard, and setting a dotard inambush, and getting rid of slops, and taking good money in exchange, struck him not as Science but something far superior, Strategy. And heboasted in his cups and before a mixed company how "me and my General weare a biting of the burghers. "

When this revelation had had time to leaven the city, his General, Doctor Margaret, received a call from the constables; they took her, trembling and begging subordinate machines to forgive her, before theburgomaster; and by his side stood real physicians, a terrible row, inlong robes and square caps, accusing her of practising unlawfully on thebodies of the duke's lieges. At first she was too frightened to saya word. Novice like, the very name of "Law" paralyzed her. But beingquestioned closely, but not so harshly as if she had been ugly, she toldthe truth; she had long been her father's pupil, and had but followedhis system, and she had cured many; "and it is not for myself in verydeed, sirs, but I have two poor helpless honest men at home upon myhands, and how else can I keep them? Ah, good sirs, let a poor girl makeher bread honestly; ye hinder them not to make it idly and shamefully;and oh, sirs, ye are husbands, ye are fathers; ye cannot but see I havereason to work and provide as best I may;" and ere this woman's appealhad left her lips, she would have given the world to recall it, andstood with one hand upon her heart and one before her face, hiding it, but not the tears that trickled underneath it. All which went to thewrong address. Perhaps a female bailiff might have yielded to sucharguments, and bade her practise medicine, and break law, till such timeas her child should be weaned, and no longer. 

"What have we to do with that, " said the burgomaster, "save and exceptthat if thou wilt pledge thyself to break the law no more, I will remitthe imprisonment, and exact but the fine?"

On this Doctor Margaret clasped her hands together, and vowed mostpenitently never, never, never to cure body or beast again; and beingdismissed with the constables to pay the fine, she turned at thedoor, and curtsied, poor soul, and thanked the gentlemen for theirforbearance. 

And to pay the fine the "To-morrow box" must be opened on the instant;and with excess of caution she had gone and nailed it up, that no slighttemptation might prevail to open it. And now she could not draw thenails, and the constables grew impatient, and doubted its contents, andsaid, "Let us break it for you. " But she would not let them. "Ye willbreak it worse than I shall. " And she took a hammer, and struck toofaintly, and lost all strength for a minute, and wept hysterically; andat last she broke it, and a little cry bubbled from her when it broke;and she paid the fine, and it took all her unlawful gains and two goldpieces to boot; and when the men were gone, she drew the broken piecesof the box, and what little money they had left her, all together on thetable, and her arms went round them, and her rich hair escaped, and felldown all loose, and she bowed her forehead on the wreck, and sobbed, "My love's box it is broken, and my heart withal;" and so remained. AndMartin Wittenhaagen came in, and she could not lift her head, but sighedout to him what had befallen her, ending, "My love his box is broken, and so mine heart is broken. "

And Martin was not so sad as wroth. Some traitor had betrayed him. Whatstony heart had told and brought her to this pass? Whoever it was shouldfeel his arrow's point. The curious attitude in which he must deliverthe shaft never occurred to him. 

"Idle chat! idle chat!" moaned Margaret, without lifting her brow fromthe table. "When you have slain all the gossips in this town, can we eatthem? Tell me how to keep you all, or prithee hold thy peace, and letthe saints get leave to whisper me. " Martin held his tongue, and castuneasy glances at his defeated General. 

Towards evening she rose, and washed her face and did up her hair, and doggedly bade Martin take down the crocodile, and put out a basketinstead. 

"I can get up linen better than they seem to do it in this street, " saidshe, "and you must carry it in the basket. "

"That will I for thy sake, " said the soldier. 

"Good Martin! forgive me that I spake shrewishly to thee. "

Even while they were talking came a male for advice. Margaret told itthe mayor had interfered and forbidden her to sell drugs. "But, " saidshe, "I will gladly iron and starch your linen for you, and I will comeand fetch it from your house. "

"Are ye mad, young woman?" said the male. "I come for a leech, and yeproffer me a washerwoman;" and it went out in dudgeon. 

"There is a stupid creature, " said Margaret sadly. 

Presently came a female to tell the symptoms of her sick child. Margaretstopped it. 

"We are forbidden by the bailiff to sell drugs. But I will gladly wash, iron, and starch your linen for you-and-I will come and fetch it fromyour house. "

"Oh, ay, " said the female. "Well, I have some smocks and ruffs foul. Come for them; and when you are there, you can look at the boy;" and ittold her where it lived, and when its husband would be out; yet it wasrather fond of its husband than not. 

An introduction is an introduction. And two or three patients out ofall those who came and were denied medicine made Doctor Margaret theirwasherwoman. 

"Now, Martin, you must help. I'll no more cats than can slay mice. "

"Mistress, the stomach is not awanting for't, but the headpiece, worstluck. "

"Oh! I mean not the starching and ironing; that takes a woman and ahandy one. But the bare washing; a man can surely contrive that. Why, amule has wit enough in's head to do't with his hoofs, an' ye could drivehim into the tub. Come, off doublet, and try. "

"I am your man, " said the brave old soldier, stripping for the unwontedtoil. "I'll risk my arm in soapsuds, an you will risk your glory. "

"My what?"

"Your glory and honour as a--washerwoman. "

"Gramercy! if you are man enough to bring me half-washed linen t' iron, I am woman enough to fling't back i' the suds. "

And so the brave girl and the brave soldier worked with a will, and keptthe wolf from the door. More they could not do. Margaret had repairedthe "To-morrow box, " and as she leaned over the glue, her tears mixedwith it, and she cemented her exiled lover's box with them, at which asmile is allowable, but an intelligent smile tipped with pity, please, and not the empty guffaw of the nineteenth-century-jackass, burlesquingBibles, and making fun of all things except fun. But when mendedit stood unreplenished. They kept the weekly rent paid, and the potboiling, but no more. 

And now came a concatenation. Recommended from one to another, Margaretwashed for the mayor. And bringing home the clean linen one day sheheard in the kitchen that his worship's only daughter was strickenwith disease, and not like to live, Poor Margaret could not helpcross-questioning, and a female servant gave her such of the symptoms asshe had observed. But they were too general. However, one gossip wouldadd one fact, and another another. And Margaret pondered them all. 

At last one day she met the mayor himself. He recognized her directly. "Why, you are the unlicensed doctor. " "I was, " said she, "but now I'myour worship's washerwoman. " The dignitary coloured, and said that wasrather a come down. "Nay, I bear no malice; for your worship might havebeen harder. Rather would I do you a good turn. Sir, you have a sickdaughter. Let me see her. "

The mayor shook his head. "That cannot be. The law I do enforce onothers I may not break myself. " Margaret opened her eyes. "Alack, sir, Iseek no guerdon now for curing folk; why, I am a washerwoman. I trow onemay heal all the world, an if one will but let the world starve one inreturn. " "That is no more than just, " said the mayor: he added, "an' yemake no trade on't, there is no offence. " "Then let me see her. "

"What avails it? The learnedest leeches in Rotterdam have all seen her, and bettered her nought. Her ill is inscrutable. One skilled wight saithspleen; another, liver; another, blood; another, stomach; and another, that she is possessed; and in very truth, she seems to have a demon;shunneth all company; pineth alone; eateth no more victuals than mightdiet a sparrow. Speaketh seldom, nor hearkens them that speak, andweareth thinner and paler and nearer and nearer the grave, well-a-day. ""Sir, " said Margaret, "an if you take your velvet doublet tohalf-a-dozen of shops in Rotterdam, and speer is this fine or sorryvelvet, and worth how much the ell, those six traders will eye it andfeel it, and all be in one story to a letter. And why? Because they knowtheir trade. And your leeches are all in different stories. Why? Becausethey know not their trade. I have heard my father say each is enamouredof some one evil, and seeth it with his bat's eye in every patient. Hadthey stayed at home, and never seen your daughter, they had answered allthe same, spleen, blood, stomach, lungs, liver, lunacy, or as they callit possession. Let me see her. We are of a sex, and that is much. " Andwhen he still hesitated, "Saints of heaven!" cried she, giving way tothe irritability of a breeding woman, "is this how men love their ownflesh and blood? Her mother had ta'en me in her arms ere this, andcarried me to the sick room. " And two violet eyes flashed fire. 

"Come with me, " said the mayor hastily. 

"Mistress, I have brought thee a new doctor. "

The person addressed, a pale young girl of eighteen, gave a contemptuouswrench of her shoulder, and turned more decidedly to the fire she wassitting over. 

Margaret came softly and sat beside her. "But 'tis one that will nottorment you. 

"A woman!" exclaimed the young lady, with surprise and some contempt. 

"Tell her your symptoms. "

"What for? you will be no wiser. "

"You will be none the worse. "

"Well, I have no stomach for food, and no heart for any thing. Now cureme, and go. "

"Patience awhile! Your food, is it tasteless like in your mouth?"

"Ay. How knew you that?"

"Nay, I knew it not till you did tell me. I trow you would be better fora little good company. "

"I trow not. What is their silly chat to me?"

Here Margaret requested the father to leave them alone; and in hisabsence put some practical questions. Then she reflected. 

"When you wake i' the morning you find yourself quiver, as one may say?"

"Nay. Ay. How knew you that?"

"Shall I dose you, or shall I but tease you a bit with my silly chat?"

"Which you will. "

"Then I will tell you a story. 'Tis about two true lovers. "

"I hate to hear of lovers, " said the girl; "nevertheless canst tell me, 'twill be less nauseous than your physic--maybe. "

Margaret then told her a love story. The maiden was a girl called Ursel, and the youth one Conrad; she an old physician's daughter, he the son ofa hosier at Tergou. She told their adventures, their troubles, their sadcondition. She told it from the female point of view, and in a sweet andwinning and earnest voice, that by degrees soon laid hold of this sullenheart, and held it breathless; and when she broke it off her patient wasmuch disappointed. 

"Nay, nay, I must hear the end. I will hear it. "

"Ye cannot, for I know it not; none knoweth that but God. "

"Ah, your Ursel was a jewel of worth, " said the girl earnestly. "Wouldshe were here. "

"Instead of her that is here?"

"I say not that;" and she blushed a little. 

"You do but think it. "

"Thought is free. Whether or no, an she were here, I'd give her a buss, poor thing. "

"Then give it me, for I am she. "

"Nay, nay, that I'll be sworn y' are not. "

"Say not so; in very truth I am she. And prithee, sweet mistress, gonot from your word, but give me the buss ye promised me, and with a goodheart, for oh, my own heart lies heavy: heavy as thine, sweet mistress. "

The young gentlewoman rose and put her arms round Margaret's neck andkissed her. "I am woe for you, " she sighed. "You are a good soul; youhave done me good--a little. " (A gulp came in her throat. ) "Come again!come again!"

Margaret did come again, and talked with her, and gently, but keenlywatched what topics interested her, and found there was but one. Then she said to the mayor, "I know your daughter's trouble, and 'tiscurable. "

"What is't? the blood?"

"Nay. "

"The stomach?"

"Nay. "

"The liver?"

"Nay. "

"The foul fiend?"

"Nay. "

"What then?"

"Love. "

"Love? stuff, impossible! She is but a child; she never stirs abroadunguarded. She never hath from a child. "

"All the better; then we shall not have far to look for him. "

"I vow not. I shall but command her to tell me the caitiff's name, thathath by magic arts ensnared her young affections. "

"Oh, how foolish be the wise!" said Margaret; "what, would ye go and puther on her guard? Nay, let us work by art first; and if that fails, then'twill still be time for violence and folly. "

Margaret then with some difficulty prevailed on the mayor to takeadvantage of its being Saturday, and pay all his people their salariesin his daughter's presence and hers. 

It was done: some fifteen people entered the room, and received theirpay with a kind word from their employer. Then Margaret, who had satclose to the patient all the time, rose and went out. The mayor followedher. 

"Sir, how call you yon black-haired lad?"

"That is Ulrich, my clerk. "

"Well then, 'tis he. "

"Now Heaven forbid a lad I took out of the streets. "

"Well, but your worship is an understanding man. You took him not upwithout some merit of his?"

"Merit? not a jot! I liked the looks of the brat, that was all. "

"Was that no merit? He pleased the father's eye. And now who had pleasedthe daughter's. That has oft been seen since Adam. "

"How know ye 'tis he?"

"I held her hand, and with my finger did lightly touch her wrist; andwhen the others came and went, 'twas as if dogs and cats had fared inand out. But at this Ulrich's coming her pulse did leap, and her eyeshine; and when he went, she did sink back and sigh; and 'twas to beseen the sun had gone out of the room for her. Nay, burgomaster, looknot on me so scared: no witch or magician I, but a poor girl that hathbeen docile, and so bettered herself by a great neglected leech's artand learning. I tell ye all this hath been done before, thousands ofyears ere we were born. Now bide thou there till I come to thee, andprithee, prithee, spoil not good work wi' meddling. " She then went backand asked her patient for a lock of her hair. 

"Take it, " said she, more listlessly than ever. 

"Why, 'tis a lass of marble. How long do you count to be like that, mistress?"

"Till I am in my grave, sweet Peggy. "

"Who knows? maybe in ten minutes you will be altogether as hot. "

She ran into the shop, but speedily returned to the mayor and said, "Good news! He fancies her and more than a little. Now how is't to be?Will you marry your child, or bury her, for there is no third way, forshame and love they do rend her virgin heart to death. "

The dignitary decided for the more cheerful rite, but not without astruggle; and with its marks on his face he accompanied Margaret to hisdaughter. But as men are seldom in a hurry to drink their wormwood, hestood silent. So Doctor Margaret said cheerfully, "Mistress, your lockis gone; I have sold it. "

"And who was so mad as to buy such a thing?" inquired the young ladyscornfully. 

"Oh, a black-haired laddie wi' white teeth. They call him Ulrich. "

The pale face reddened directly, brow and all. 

"Says he, 'Oh, sweet mistress, give it me. ' I had told them all whose'twas. 'Nay, ' said I, 'selling is my livelihood, not giving. ' So heoffered me this, he offered me that, but nought less would I take thanhis next quarter's wages. 

"Cruel, " murmured the girl, scarce audibly. 

"Why, you are in one tale with your father. Says he to me when I toldhim, 'Oh, an he loves her hair so well, 'tis odd but he loves the restof her. Well, ' quoth he, ''tis an honest lad, and a shall have her, gienshe will but leave her sulks and consent. ' So, what say ye, mistress, will you be married to Ulrich, or buried i' the kirkyard?"

"Father! father!"

"'Tis so, girl, speak thy mind. "

"I will obey my father--in all things, " stammered the poor girl, tryinghard to maintain the advantageous position in which Margaret had placedher. But nature, and the joy and surprise, were too strong even for avirgin's bashful cunning. She cast an eloquent look on them both, andsank at her father's knees, and begged his pardon, with many sobs forhaving doubted his tenderness. 

He raised her in his arms, and took her, radiant through her tears withjoy, and returning life, and filial love, to his breast; and the pairpassed a truly sacred moment, and the dignitary was as happy as hethought to be miserable; so hard is it for mortals to foresee. And theylooked round for Margaret, but she had stolen away softly. 

The young girl searched the house for her. 

"Where is she hid? Where on earth is she?"

Where was she? why, in her own house, dressing meat for her two oldchildren, and crying bitterly the while at the living picture ofhappiness she had just created. 

"Well-a-day, the odds between her lot and mine; well-a-day!"

Next time she met the dignitary he hemm'd and hawed, and remarked whata pity it was the law forbade him to pay her who had cured his daughter. "However, when all is done, 'twas not art, 'twas but woman's wit. "

"Nought but that, burgomaster, " said Margaret bitterly. "Pay the men ofart for not curing her: all the guerdon I seek, that cured her, is this:go not and give your foul linen away from me by way of thanks. "

"Why should I?" inquired he. 

"Marry, because there be fools about ye will tell ye she that hath witto cure dark diseases, cannot have wit to take dirt out o' rags; sopledge me your faith. "

The dignitary promised pompously, and felt all the patron. 

Something must be done to fill "To-morrow's" box. She hawked her initialletters and her illuminated vellums all about the town. Printing had bythis time dealt caligraphy in black and white a terrible blow inHolland and Germany. But some copies of the printed books were usuallyilluminated and fettered. The printers offered Margaret prices for workin these two kinds. 

"I'll think on't, " said she. 

She took down her diurnal book, and calculated that the price of anhour's work on those arts would be about one-fifth what she got for anhour at the tub and mangle. "I'll starve first, " said she; "what, pay acraft and a mystery five times less than a handicraft!"

Martin, carrying the dry clothes-basket, got treated, and drunk. Thistime he babbled her whole story. The girls got hold of it and gibed herat the fountain. 

All she had gone through was light to her, compared with the pins andbodkins her own sex drove into her heart, whenever she came near themerry crew with her pitcher, and that was every day. Each sex has itsform of cruelty; man's is more brutal and terrible; but shallow women, that have neither read nor suffered, have an unmuscular barbarity oftheir own (where no feeling of sex steps in to overpower it). Thisdefect, intellectual perhaps rather than moral, has been mitigated inour day by books, especially by able works of fiction; for there aretwo roads to the highest effort of intelligence, Pity; Experience ofsorrows, and Imagination, by which alone we realize the grief wenever felt. In the fifteenth century girls with pitchers had but one;Experience; and at sixteen years of age or so, that road had scarce beentrodden. These girls persisted that Margaret was deserted by her lover. And to be deserted was a crime (They had not been deserted yet. ) Not aword against the Gerard they had created out of their own heads. For theimaginary crime they fell foul of the supposed victim. Sometimes theyaffronted her to her face. Oftener they talked at her backwards andforwards with a subtle skill, and a perseverance which, "oh, that theyhad bestowed on the arts, " as poor Aguecheek says. 

Now Margaret was brave, and a coward; brave to battle difficulties andill fortune; brave to shed her own blood for those she loved. Fortitudeshe had. But she had no true fighting courage. She was a powerful youngwoman, rather tall, full, and symmetrical; yet had one of those slipsof girls slapped her face, the poor fool's hands would have droppedpowerless, or gone to her own eyes instead of her adversary's. Nor wasshe even a match for so many tongues; and besides, what could she say?She knew nothing of these girls, except that somehow they had found outher sorrows, and hated her; only she thought to herself they must bevery happy, or they would not be so hard on her. 

So she took their taunts in silence; and all her struggle was not to letthem see their power to make her writhe within. 

Here came in her fortitude; and she received their blows withwell-feigned, icy hauteur. They slapped a statue. 

But one day, when her spirits were weak, as happens at times to femalesin her condition, a dozen assailants followed suit so admirably, thather whole sex seemed to the dispirited one to be against her, and shelost heart, and the tears began to run silently at each fresh stab. 

On this their triumph knew no bounds, and they followed her half wayhome casting barbed speeches. 

After that exposure of weakness the statue could be assumed no more. Sothen she would stand timidly aloof out of tongue-shot, till her youngtyrants' pitchers were all filled, and they gone; and then creep up withhers. And one day she waited so long that the fount had ceased to flow. So the next day she was obliged to face the phalanx, or her house godry. She drew near slowly, but with the less tremor, that she saw aman at the well talking to them. He would distract their attention, andbesides, they would keep their foul tongues quiet if only to blindthe male to their real character. This conjecture, though shrewd, waserroneous. They could not all flirt with that one man; so the outsidersindemnified themselves by talking at her the very moment she came up. 

"Any news from foreign parts, Jacqueline?"

"None for me, Martha. My lad goes no farther from me than the townwall. "

"I can't say as much, " says a third. 

"But if he goes t' Italy I have got another ready to take the fool'splace. "

"He'll not go thither, lass. They go not so far till they are sick of usthat bide in Holland. "

Surprise and indignation, and the presence of a man, gave Margaret amoment's fighting courage. 

"Oh, flout me not, and show your ill nature before the very soldier. InHeaven's name, what ill did I ever to ye? what harsh word cast back, forall you have flung on me, a desolate stranger in your cruel town, that ye flout me for my bereavement and my poor lad's most unwillingbanishment? Hearts of flesh would surely pity us both, for that ye castin my teeth these many days, ye brows of brass, ye bosoms of stone. "

They stared at this novelty, resistance; and ere they could recover andmake mincement of her, she put her pitcher quietly down, and threw hercoarse apron over her head, and stood there grieving, her short-livedspirit oozing fast. "Hallo!" cried the soldier, "why, what is your ill?"She made no reply. But a little girl, who had long secretly hated thebig ones, squeaked out, "They did flout her, they are aye flouting her;she may not come nigh the fountain for fear o' them, and 'tis a blackshame. "

"Who spoke to her! Not I for one. "

"Nor I. I would not bemean myself so far. "

The man laughed heartily at this display of dignity. "Come, wife, " saidhe, "never lower thy flag to such light skirmishers as these. Hast atongue i' thy head as well as they. "

"Alack, good soldier, I was not bred to bandy foul terms. "

"Well, but hast a better arm than these. Why not take 'em by twos acrossthy knee, and skelp 'em till they cry Meculpee?"

"Nay, I would not hurt their bodies for all their cruel hearts. "

"Then ye must e'en laugh at them, wife. What! a woman grown, and notsee why mesdames give tongue? You are a buxom wife; they are a bundle ofthread-papers. You are fair and fresh; they have all the Dutch rim undertheir bright eyes, that comes of dwelling in eternal swamps. There liesyour crime. Come, gie me thy pitcher, and if they flout me, shalt seeme scrub 'em all wi' my beard till they squeak holy mother. " Thepitcher was soon filled, and the soldier put it in Margaret's hand. Shemurmured, "Thank you kindly, brave soldier. "

He patted her on the shoulder. "Come, courage, brave wife; the divellis dead!" She let the heavy pitcher fall on his foot directly. He cursedhorribly, and hopped in a circle, saying, "No, the Thief's alive and hasbroken my great toe. "

The apron came down, and there was a lovely face all flushed with'emotion, and two beaming eyes in front of him, and two hands held outclasped. 

"Nay, nay, 'tis nought, " said he good-humouredly, mistaking. 

"Denys?"

"Well?--But--Hallo! How know you my name is--"

"Denys of Burgundy!"

"Why, ods bodikins! I know you not, and you know me. "

"By Gerard's letter. Crossbow! beard! handsome! The divell is dead. "

"Sword of Goliah! this must be she. Red hair, violet eyes, lovely face. But I took ye for a married wife, seeing ye---"

"Tell me my name, " said she quickly. 

"Margaret Brandt. "

"Gerard? Where is he? Is he in life? Is he well? Is he coming? Is hecome? Why is he not here? Where have ye left him? Oh tell me! prithee, prithee, prithee, tell me!"

"Ay, ay, but not here. Oh, ye are all curiosity now, mesdames, eh? Lass, I have been three months a-foot travelling all Holland to find ye, and here you are. Oh, be joyful!" and he flung his cap in the air, andseizing both her hands kissed them ardently. "Ah, my pretty she-comrade, I have found thee at last. I knew I should. Shall be flouted no more. I'll twist your necks at the first word, ye little trollops. And I havegot fifteen gold angels left for thee, and our Gerard will soon be here. Shalt wet thy purple eyes no more. "

But the fair eyes were wet even now, looking kindly and gratefully atthe friend that had dropped among her foes as if from heaven; Gerard'scomrade. "Prithee come home with me good, kind Denys. I cannot speak ofhim before these. " They went off together, followed by a chorus. "Shehas gotten a man. She has gotten a man at last. Boo! boo! boo!"

Margaret quickened her steps; but Denys took down his crossbow andpretended to shoot them all dead: they fled quadrivious, shrieking. 

CHAPTER LI

The reader already knows how much these two had to tell one another. It was a sweet yet bitter day for Margaret, since it brought her a truefriend, and ill news; for now first she learned that Gerard was allalone in that strange land. She could not think with Denys that he wouldcome home; indeed he would have arrived before this. 

Denys was a balm. He called her his she-comrade, and was always cheeringher up with his formula and hilarities, and she petted him and mademuch of him, and feebly hectored it over him as well as over Martin, andwould not let him eat a single meal out of her house, and forbade him touse naughty words. "It spoils you, Denys. Good lack, to hear such uglywords come forth so comely a head: forbear, or I shall be angry: so becivil. " Whereupon Denys was upon his good behaviour, and ludicrous thestruggle between his native politeness and his acquired ruffianism. Andas it never rains but it pours, other persons now solicited Margaret'sfriendship. She had written to Margaret Van Eyck a humble letter tellingher she knew she was no longer the favourite she had been, and wouldkeep her distance; but could not forget her benefactress's pastkindness. She then told her briefly how many ways she had battled for aliving, and in conclusion, begged earnestly that her residence might notbe betrayed, "least of all to his people. I do hate them, they drovehim from me. And even when he was gone, their hearts turned not to me asthey would an if they had repented their cruelty to him. "

The Van Eyck was perplexed. At last she made a confidante of Reicht. Thesecret ran through Reicht, as through a cylinder, to Catherine. 

"Ay, and is she turned that bitter against us?" said that good woman. "She stole our son from us, and now she hates us for not running intoher arms. Natheless it is a blessing she is alive and no farther awaythan Rotterdam. "

The English princess, now Countess Charolois, made a statelyprogress through the northern states of the duchy, accompanied by herstepdaughter the young heiress of Burgundy, Marie de Bourgogne. Then theold duke, the most magnificent prince in Europe, put out his splendour. Troops of dazzling knights, and bevies of fair ladies gorgeouslyattired, attended the two princesses; and minstrels, jongleurs, orstory-tellers, bards, musicians, actors, tumblers followed in the train;and there was fencing, dancing, and joy in every town they shone on. Richart invited all his people to meet him at Rotterdam and view thepageant. 

They had been in Rotterdam some days, when Denys met Catherineaccidentally in the street, and after a warm greeting on both sides, bade her rejoice, for he had found the she-comrade, and crowed; butCatherine cooled him by showing him how much earlier he would have foundher by staying quietly at Tergou, than by vagabondizing it all overHolland. "And being found, what the better are we? her heart is set deadagainst us now. "

"Oh, let that flea stick; come you with me to her house. "

No, she would not go where she was sure of an ill welcome. "Them thatcome unbidden sit unseated. " No, let Denys be mediator, and bring theparties to a good understanding. He undertook the office at once, andwith great pomp and confidence. He trotted off to Margaret and said, "She-comrade, I met this day a friend of thine. "

"Thou didst look into the Rotter then, and see thyself. "

"Nay, 'twas a female, and one that seeks thy regard; 'twas Catherine, Gerard's mother. "

"Oh, was it?" said Margaret; "then you may tell her she comes too late. There was a time I longed and longed for her; but she held aloof in myhour of most need, so now we will be as we ha' been. "

Denys tried to shake this resolution. He coaxed her, but she was bitterand sullen, and not to be coaxed. Then he scolded her well; then, atthat she went into hysterics. 

He was frightened at this result of his eloquence, and being off hisguard, allowed himself to be entrapped into a solemn promise never torecur to the subject. He went back to Catherine crestfallen, andtold her. She fired up and told the family how his overtures had beenreceived. Then they fired up; it became a feud and burned fiercer everyday. Little Kate alone made some excuses for Margaret. 

The very next day another visitor came to Margaret, and found themilitary enslaved and degraded, Martin up to his elbows in soapsuds, and Denys ironing very clumsily, and Margaret plaiting ruffs, but witha mistress's eye on her raw levies. To these there entered an old man, venerable at first sight, but on nearer view keen and wizened. 

"Ah, " cried Margaret. Then swiftly turned her back on him and hid herface with invincible repugnance. "Oh, that man! that man!"

"Nay, fear me not, " said Ghysbrecht; "I come on a friend's errand. Ibring ye a letter from foreign parts. "

"Mock me not, old man, " and she turned slowly round. 

"Nay, see;" and he held out an enormous letter. 

Margaret darted on it, and held it with trembling hands and glisteningeyes. It was Gerard's handwriting. 

"Oh, thank you, sir, bless you for this, I forgive you all the ill youever wrought me. "

And she pressed the letter to her bosom with one hand, and glidedswiftly from the room with it. 

As she did not come back, Ghysbrecht went away, but not without a scowlat Martha. Margaret was hours alone with her letter. 

CHAPTER LI

When she came down again she was a changed woman. Her eyes were wet, butcalm, and all her bitterness and excitement charmed away. 

"Denys, " said she softly, "I have got my orders. I am to read my lover'sletter to his folk. "

"Ye will never do that?"

"Ay will I. "

"I see there is something in the letter has softened ye towards them. "

"Not a jot, Denys, not a jot. But an I hated them like poison I wouldnot disobey my love. Denys, 'tis so sweet to obey, and sweetest of allto obey one who is far, far away, and cannot enforce my duty, but musttrust my love for my obedience. Ah, Gerard, my darling, at hand I mighthave slighted thy commands, misliking thy folk as I have cause to do;but now, didst bid me go into the raging sea and read thy sweet letterto the sharks, there I'd go. Therefore, Denys, tell his mother I havegot a letter, and if she and hers would hear it, I am their servant; letthem say their hour, and I'll seat them as best I can, and welcome themas best I may. "

Denys went off to Catherine with this good news. He found the family atdinner, and told them there was a long letter from Gerard. Then in themidst of the joy this caused, he said, "And her heart is softened, andshe will read it to you herself; you are to choose your own time. "

"What does she think there are none can read but her?" asked Catherine. "Let her send the letter and we will read it. "

"Nay, but, mother, " objected little Kate; "mayhap she cannot bear topart it from her hand; she loves him dearly. "

"What, thinks she we shall steal it?"

Cornelis suggested that she would fain wedge herself into the family bymeans of this letter. 

Denys cast a look of scorn on the speaker. "There spoke a bad heart, "said he. "La camarade hates you all like poison. Oh, mistake me not, dame; I defend her not, but so 'tis; yet maugre her spleen at a wordfrom Gerard she proffers to read you his letter with her own prettymouth, and hath a voice like honey--sure 'tis a fair proffer. "

"'Tis so, mine honest soldier, " said the father of the family, "andmerits a civil reply, therefore hold your whisht ye that be women, andI shall answer her. Tell her I, his father, setting aside all pastgrudges, do for this grace thank her, and would she have double thanks, let her send my son's letter by thy faithful hand, the which will Iread to his flesh and blood, and will then to her so surely and faithfulreturn, as I am Eli a Dierich a William a Luke, free burgher of Tergou, like my forbears, and like them, a man of my word. "

"Ay, and a man who is better than his word, " cried Catherine; "the onlyone I ever did foregather. "

"Hold thy peace, wife. "

"Art a man of sense, Eli, a dirk, a chose, a chose(1), "' shouted Denys. "The she-comrade will be right glad to obey Gerard and yet not face youall, whom she hates as wormwood, saving your presence. Bless ye, theworld hath changed, she is all submission to-day: 'obedience is honey, 'quoth she; and in sooth 'tis a sweetmeat she cannot but savour, eatingso little on't, for what with her fair face, and her mellow tongue; andwhat wi' flying in fits and terrifying us that be soldiers to death, anwe thwart her; and what wi' chiding us one while, and petting us likelambs t' other, she hath made two of the crawlingest slaves ever yousaw out of two honest swashbucklers. I be the ironing ruffian, t' otherwashes. "

"What next?

"What next? why, whenever the brat is in the world I shall rock cradle, and t' other knave will wash tucker and bib. So, then, I'll go fetchthe letter on the instant. Ye will let me bide and hear it read, will yenot?"

"Else our hearts were black as coal, " said Catherine. 

So Denys went for the letter. He came back crestfallen. "She will notlet it out of her hand neither to me nor you, nor any he or she thatlives. "

"I knew she would not, " said Cornelis. 

"Whisht! whisht!" said Eli, "and let Denys tell his story. "

"'Nay, ' said I, 'but be ruled by me. ' 'Not I, ' quoth she. 'Well, but, 'quoth I, 'that same honey Obedience ye spake of. ' 'You are a fool, ' saysshe; 'obedience to Gerard is sweet, but obedience to any other body, whoever said that was sweet?'

"At last she seemed to soften a bit, and did give me a written paper foryou, mademoiselle. Here 'tis. "

"For me?" said little Kate, colouring. 

"Give that here!" said Eli, and he scanned the writing, and said almostin a whisper, "These be words from the letter Hearken!

"'And, sweetheart, an if these lines should travel safe to thee, makethou trial of my people's hearts withal. Maybe they are somewhat turnedtowards me, being far away. If 'tis so they will show it to thee, sincenow to me they may not. Read, then, this letter! But I do strictlyforbid thee to let it from thy hand; and if they still hold aloof fromthee, why, then say nought, but let them think me dead. Obey me inthis; for, if thou dost disrespect my judgment and my will in this, thoulovest me not. '"

There was a silence, and Gerard's words copied by Margaret here handedround and inspected. 

"Well, " said Catherine, "that is another matter. But methinks 'tis forher to come to us, not we to her. "

"Alas, mother! what odds does that make?"

"Much, " said Eli. "Tell her we are over many to come to her, and bid herhither, the sooner the better. "

When Denys was gone, Eli owned it was a bitter pill to him. 

"When that lass shall cross my threshold, all the mischief and miseryshe hath made here will seem to come in adoors in one heap. But whatcould I do, wife? We must hear the news of Gerard. I saw that in thineeyes, and felt it in my own heart. And she is backed by our undutifulbut still beloved son, and so is she stronger than we, and brings ournoses down to the grindstone, the sly, cruel jade. But never heed. We will hear the letter; and then let her go unblessed as she cameunwelcome. "

"Make your mind easy, " said Catherine. "She will not come at all. " And atone of regret was visible. 

Shortly after Richart, who had been hourly expected, arrived fromAmsterdam grave and dignified in his burgher's robe and gold chain, ruff, and furred cap, and was received not with affection only, butrespect; for he had risen a step higher than his parents, and such stepswere marked in mediaeval society almost as visibly as those in theirstaircases. 

Admitted in due course to the family council, he showed plainly, thoughnot discourteously, that his pride was deeply wounded by their havingdeigned to treat with Margaret Brandt. "I see the temptation, " said he. "But which of us hath not at times to wish one way and do another?" Thisthrew a considerable chill over the old people. So little Kate put in aword. "Vex not thyself, dear Richart. Mother says she will not come. 

"All the better, sweetheart. I fear me, if she do, I shall hie me backto Amsterdam. "

Here Denys popped his head in at the door, and said--

"She will be here at three on the great dial. "

They all looked at one another in silence. 

 (1) Anglice, a Thing-em-bob. 

CHAPTER LIII

"Nay, Richart, " said Catherine at last, "for Heaven's sake let not thisone sorry wench set us all by the ears: hath she not made ill bloodenough already?"

"In very deed she hath. Fear me not, good mother. Let her come and readthe letter of the poor boy she hath by devilish arts bewitched and thenlet her go. Give me your words to show her no countenance beyond decentand constrained civility: less we may not, being in our own house; andI will say no more. " On this understanding they waited the foe. She, forher part, prepared for the interview in a spirit little less hostile. When Denys brought word they would not come to her, but would receiveher, her lip curled, and she bade him observe how in them every feeling, however small, was larger than the love for Gerard. "Well, " said she, "Ihave not that excuse; so why mimic the pretty burgher's pride, the prideof all unlettered folk? I will go to them for Gerard's sake. Oh, how Iloathe them!"

Thus poor good-natured Denys was bringing into one house the materialsof an explosion. 

Margaret made her toilet in the same spirit that a knight of her daydressed for battle--he to parry blows, and she to parry glances--glancesof contempt at her poverty, or of irony at her extravagance. Her kirtlewas of English cloth, dark blue, and her farthingale and hose of thesame material, but a glossy roan, or claret colour. Not an inch ofpretentious fur about her, but plain snowy linen wristbands, andcuriously plaited linen from the bosom of the kirtle up to thecommencement of the throat; it did not encircle her throat, but framedit, being square, not round. Her front hair still peeped in two wavesmuch after the fashion which Mary Queen of Scots revived a centurylater; but instead of the silver net, which would have ill become herpresent condition, the rest of her head was covered with a very smalltight-fitting hood of dark blue cloth, hemmed with silver. Her shoeswere red; but the roan petticoat and hose prepared the spectator's mindfor the shock, and they set off the arched instep and shapely foot. 

Beauty knew its business then as now. 

And with all this she kept her enemies waiting, though it was three bythe dial. 

At last she started, attended by her he-comrade. And when they werehalfway, she stopped and said thoughtfully, "Denys!"

"Well, she-general?"

"I must go home" (piteously). 

"What, have ye left somewhat behind?"

"What?"

"My courage. Oh! oh! oh!"

"Nay, nay, be brave, she-general. I shall be with you. "

"Ay, but wilt keep close to me when I be there?"

Denys promised, and she resumed her march, but gingerly. 

Meantime they were all assembled, and waiting for her with a strangemixture of feelings. 

Mortification, curiosity, panting affection, aversion to her who came togratify those feelings, yet another curiosity to see what she was like, and what there was in her to bewitch Gerard and make so much mischief. 

At last Denys came alone, and whispered, "The she-comrade is without. "

"Fetch her in, " said Eli. "Now whisht, all of ye. None speak to her butI. "

They all turned their eyes to the door in dead silence. 

A little muttering was heard outside; Denys's rough organ and a woman'ssoft and mellow voice. 

Presently that stopped; and then the door opened slowly, and MargaretBrandt, dressed as I have described, and somewhat pale, but calm andlovely, stood on the threshold, looking straight before her. 

They all rose but Kate, and remained mute and staring. 

"Be seated, mistress, " said Eli gravely, and motioned to a seat that hadbeen set apart for her. 

She inclined her head, and crossed the apartment; and in so doing hercondition was very visible, not only in her shape, but in her languor. 

Cornelis and Sybrandt hated her for it. Richart thought it spoiled herbeauty. 

It softened the women somewhat. 

She took her letter out of her bosom, and kissed it as if she had beenalone; then disposed herself to read it, with the air of one who knewshe was there for that single purpose. 

But as she began, she noticed they had seated her all by herself like aleper. She looked at Denys, and putting her hand down by her side, madehim a swift furtive motion to come by her. 

He went with an obedient start as if she had cried "March!" and stoodat her shoulder like a sentinel; but this zealous manner of doing itrevealed to the company that he had been ordered thither; and at thatshe coloured. And now she began to read her Gerard, their Gerard, totheir eager ears, in a mellow, clear voice, so soft, so earnest, sothrilling, her very soul seemed to cling about each precious sound. Itwas a voice as of a woman's bosom set speaking by Heaven itself. 

"I do nothing doubt, my Margaret, that long ere this shall meet thybeloved eyes, Denys, my most dear friend, will have sought thee out, and told thee the manner of our unlooked for and most tearful parting. Therefore I will e'en begin at that most doleful day. What befell himafter, poor faithful soul, fain, fain would I hear, but may not. But Ipray for him day and night next after thee, dearest. Friend more stanchand loving had not David in Jonathan, than I in him. Be good to him, forpoor Gerard's sake. "

At these words, which came quite unexpectedly to him, Denys leaned hishead on Margaret's high chair, and groaned aloud. 

She turned quickly as she sat, and found his hand, and pressed it. 

And so the sweetheart and the friend held hands while the sweetheartread. 

"I went forward all dizzied, like one in an ill dream; and presently agentleman came up with his servants, all on horseback, and had liked tohave rid o'er me. And he drew rein at the brow of the hill, and senthis armed men back to rob me. They robbed me civilly enough and took mypurse and the last copper, and rid gaily away. I wandered stupid on, afriendless pauper. "

There was a general sigh, followed by an oath from Denys. 

"Presently a strange dimness came o'er me; I lay down to sleep on thesnow. 'Twas ill done, and with store of wolves hard by. Had I loved theeas thou dost deserve, I had shown more manhood. But oh, sweet love, thedrowsiness that did crawl o'er me desolate, and benumb me, was more thannature. And so I slept; and but that God was better to us, than I tothee or to myself, from that sleep I ne'er had waked; so all do say. I had slept an hour or two, as I suppose, but no more, when a hand didshake me rudely. I awoke to my troubles. And there stood a servant girlin her holiday suit. 'Are ye mad, ' quoth she, in seeming choler, 'tosleep in snow, and under wolves' nosen? Art weary o' life, and not longweaned? Come, now, said she, more kindly, 'get up like a good lad;' soI did rise up. 'Are ye rich, or are ye poor?' But I stared at her as oneamazed. 'Why, 'tis easy of reply, ' quoth she. 'Are ye rich, or are yepoor?' Then I gave a great, loud cry; that she did start back. 'Am Irich, or am I poor? Had ye asked me an hour agone, I had said I am rich. But now I am so poor as sure earth beareth on her bosom none poorer. An hour agone I was rich in a friend, rich in money, rich in hope andspirits of youth; but now the Bastard of Burgundy hath taken my friend, and another gentleman my purse; and I can neither go forward to Rome norback to her I left in Holland. I am poorest of the poor. ' 'Alack!' saidthe wench. 'Natheless, an ye had been rich ye might ha' lain down againin the snow for any use I had for ye; and then I trow ye had soon faredout o' this world as bare as ye came into it. But, being poor, you areour man: so come wi' me. ' Then I went because she bade me, and because Irecked not now whither I went. And she took me to a fine house hard by, and into a noble dining-hall hung with black; and there was set a tablewith many dishes, and but one plate and one chair. 'Fall to!' said she, in a whisper. 'What, alone?' said I. 'Alone? And which of us, think ye, would eat out of the same dish with ye? Are we robbers o' the dead?'Then she speered where I was born. 'At Tergou, ' said I. Says she, 'Andwhen a gentleman dies in that country, serve they not the dead man'sdinner up as usual, till he be in the ground, and set some poor man toit?' I told her, 'nay. ' She blushed for us then. Here they were betterChristians. ' So I behoved to sit down. But small was my heart for meat. Then this kind lass sat by me and poured me out wine; and tasting it, it cut me to the heart Denys was not there to drink with me. He doth solove good wine, and women good, bad, or indifferent. The rich, strongwine curled round my sick heart; and that day first I did seem toglimpse why folk in trouble run to drink so. She made me eat of everydish. ''Twas unlucky to pass one. Nought was here but her master's dailydinner. ' 'He had a good stomach, then, ' said I. 'Ay, lad, and a goodheart. Leastways, so we all say now he is dead; but, being alive, noword on't e'er heard I. ' So I did eat as a bird, nibbling of every dish. And she hearing me sigh, and seeing me like to choke at the food, tookpity and bade me be of good cheer. I should sup and lie there thatnight. And she went to the hind, and he gave me a right good bed; and Itold him all, and asked him would the law give me back my purse. 'Law!'quoth he; 'law there was none for the poor in Burgundy. Why, 'twas thecousin of the Lady of the Manor, he that had robbed me. He knew thewild spark. The matter must be judged before the lady; and she was quiteyoung, and far more like to hang me for slandering her cousin, and agentleman, and a handsome man, than to make him give me back my own. Inside the liberties of a town a poor man might now and then see theface of justice; but out among the grand seigneurs and dames--never. 'So I said, 'I'll sit down robbed rather than seek justice and findgallows. ' They were all most kind to me next day; and the girl profferedme money from her small wage to help me towards Rhine. "

"Oh, then, he is coming home! he is coming home!" shouted Denys, interrupting the reader. She shook her head gently at him, by way ofreproof. 

"I beg pardon, all the company, " said he stiffly. 

"'Twas a sore temptation; but being a servant, my stomach rose againstit. 'Nay, nay, ' said I. She told me I was wrong. ''Twas pride out o'place; poor folk should help one another; or who on earth would?' I saidif I could do aught in return 'twere well; but for a free gift, nay: Iwas overmuch beholden already. Should I write a letter for her? 'Nay, heis in the house at present, ' said she. 'Should I draw her picture, andso earn my money?' 'What, can ye?' said she. I told her I could try; andher habit would well become a picture. So she was agog to be limned, andgive it her lad. And I set her to stand in a good light, and soon madesketches two, whereof I send thee one, coloured at odd hours. The otherI did most hastily, and with little conscience daub, for which mayHeaven forgive me; but time was short. They, poor things, knew nobetter, and were most proud and joyous; and both kissing me after theircountry fashion, 'twas the hind that was her sweetheart, they did bid meGod-speed; and I towards Rhine. "

Margaret paused here, and gave Denys the coloured drawing to hand round. It was eagerly examined by the females on account of the costume, whichdiffered in some respects from that of the Dutch domestic: the hair wasin a tight linen bag, a yellow half kerchief crossed her head from earto ear, but threw out a rectangular point that descended the centre ofher forehead, and it met in two more points over her bosom. She wore ared kirtle with long sleeves, kilted very high in front, and showing agreen farthingale and a great red leather purse hanging down over it;red stockings, yellow leathern shoes, ahead of her age; for they werelow-quartered and square-toed, secured by a strap buckling over theinstep, which was not uncommon, and was perhaps the rude germ of thediamond buckle to come. 

Margaret continued:--

"But oh! how I missed my Denys at every step! often I sat down on theroad and groaned. And in the afternoon it chanced that I did so set medown where two roads met, and with heavy head in hand, and heavy heart, did think of thee, my poor sweetheart, and of my lost friend, and of thelittle house at Tergou, where they all loved me once; though now it isturned to hate. "

Catherine. "Alas! that he will think so. "

Eli. "Whisht, wife!"

"And I did sigh loud, and often. And me sighing so, one came carollinglike a bird adown t' other road. 'Ay, chirp and chirp, ' cried Ibitterly. 'Thou has not lost sweetheart, and friend, thy father'shearth, thy mother's smile, and every penny in the world. ' And at lasthe did so carol, and carol, I jumped up in ire to get away from his mostjarring mirth. But ere I lied from it, I looked down the path to seewhat could make a man so lighthearted in this weary world; and lo! thesongster was a humpbacked cripple, with a bloody bandage o'er his eye, and both legs gone at the knee. "

"He! he! he! he! he!" went Sybrandt, laughing and cackling. 

Margaret's eyes flashed: she began to fold the letter up. 

"Nay, lass, " said Eli, "heed him not! Thou unmannerly cur, offer't butagain and I put thee to the door. "

"Why, what was there to gibe at, Sybrandt?" remonstrated Catherine moremildly. "Is not our Kate afflicted? and is she not the most content ofus all, and singeth like a merle at times between her pains? But I amas bad as thou; prithee read on, lass, and stop our gabble wi' somewhatworth the hearkening. "

"'Then, ' said I, 'may this thing be?' And I took myself to task. 'Gerard, son of Eli, dost thou well to bemoan thy lot, thou hast youthand health; and here comes the wreck of nature on crutches, praisingGod's goodness with singing like a mavis?'"

Catherine. "There you see. "

Eli. "Whisht, dame, whisht!"

"And whenever he saw me, he left carolling and presently hobbled up andchanted, 'Charity, for love of Heaven, sweet master, charity, ' witha whine as piteous as wind at keyhole. 'Alack, poor soul, ' said I, 'charity is in my heart, but not my purse; I am poor as thou. ' Then hebelieved me none, and to melt me undid his sleeve, and showed a sorewound on his arm, and said he, 'Poor cripple though I be, I am like tolose this eye to boot, look else. ' I saw and groaned for him, and toexcuse myself let him wot how I had been robbed of my last copper. Thereat he left whining all in a moment, and said, in a big manly voice, 'Then I'll e'en take a rest. Here, youngster, pull thou this strap: nay, fear not!' I pulled, and down came a stout pair of legs out of his back;and half his hump had melted away, and the wound in his eye no deeperthan the bandage. 

"Oh!" ejaculated Margaret's hearers in a body. 

"Whereat, seeing me astounded, he laughed in my face, and told me Iwas not worth gulling, and offered me his protection. 'My face wasprophetic, ' he said. 'Of what?' said I. 'Marry, ' said he, 'that itsowner will starve in this thievish land. ' Travel teaches e'en the youngwisdom. Time was I had turned and fled this impostor as a pestilence;but now I listened patiently to pick up crumbs of counsel. And well Idid: for nature and his adventurous life had crammed the poor knave withshrewdness and knowledge of the homelier sort--a child was I beside him. When he had turned me inside out, said he, 'Didst well to leave Franceand make for Germany; but think not of Holland again. Nay, on toAugsburg and Nurnberg, the Paradise of craftsmen: thence to Venice, anthou wilt. But thou wilt never bide in Italy nor any other land, havingonce tasted the great German cities. Why, there is but one honestcountry in Europe, and that is Germany; and since thou art honest, andsince I am a vagabone, Germany was made for us twain. ' I bade him makethat good: how might one country fit true men and knaves! 'Why, thounovice, ' said he, 'because in an honest land are fewer knaves to bitethe honest man, and many honest men for the knave to bite. I was inluck, being honest, to have fallen in with a friendly sharp. Be my pal, 'said he; 'I go to Nurnberg; we will reach it with full pouches. I'lllearn ye the cul de bois, and the cul de jatte, and how to maund, andchaunt, and patter, and to raise swellings, and paint sores and ulcerson thy body would take in the divell. ' I told him shivering, I'd lieverdie than shame myself and my folk so. "

Eli. "Good lad! good lad!"

"Why, what shame was it for such as I to turn beggar? Beggary was anancient and most honourable mystery. What did holy monks, and bishops, and kings, when they would win Heaven's smile? why, wash the feet ofbeggars, those favourites of the saints. 'The saints were no fools, ' hetold me. Then he did put out his foot. 'Look at that, that was washed bythe greatest king alive, Louis, of France, the last Holy Thursday thatwas. And the next day, Friday, clapped in the stocks by the warden ofa petty hamlet. ' So I told him my foot should walk between such highhonour and such low disgrace, on the same path of honesty, pleaseGod. Well then, since I had not spirit to beg, he would indulge myperversity. I should work under him, he be the head, I the fingers. And with that he set himself up like a judge, on a heap of dust by theroad's side, and questioned me strictly what I could do. I began to sayI was strong and willing. 'Ba!' said he, 'so is an ox. Say, what canstdo that Sir Ox cannot?' I could write; I had won a prize for it. 'Canstwrite as fast as the printers?' quo' he, jeering. 'What else?' I couldpaint. 'That was better. ' I was like to tear my hair to hear him say so, and me going to Rome to write. I could twang the psaltery a bit. 'Thatwas well. Could I tell stories?' Ay, by the score. 'Then, ' said he, 'Ihire you from this moment. ' 'What to do?' said I. 'Nought crooked, SirCandour, ' says he. 'I will feed thee all the way and find thee work; andtake half thine earnings, no more. ' 'Agreed, ' said I, and gave my handon it, 'Now, servant, ' said he, 'we will dine. But ye need not standbehind my chair, for two reasons--first I ha' got no chair; and next, good fellowship likes me better than state. ' And out of his wallet hebrought flesh, fowl, and pastry, a good dozen of spices lapped in flaxpaper, and wine fit for a king. Ne'er feasted I better than out of thisbeggar's wallet, now my master. When we had well eaten I was for goingon. 'But, ' said he, 'servants should not drive their masters too hard, especially after feeding, for then the body is for repose, and the mindturns to contemplation;' and he lay on his back gazing calmly at thesky, and presently wondered whether there were any beggars up there. I told him I knew but of one, called Lazarus. 'Could he do the cul dejatte better than I?' said he, and looked quite jealous like. I told himnay; Lazarus was honest, though a beggar, and fed daily of the crumbsfal'n from a rich man's table, and the dogs licked his sores. 'Servant, 'quo' he, 'I spy a foul fault in thee. Thou liest without discretion: nowthe end of lying being to gull, this is no better than fumbling with thedivell's tail. I pray Heaven thou mayest prove to paint better than thoucuttest whids, or I am done out of a dinner. No beggar eats crumbs, butonly the fat of the land; and dogs lick not a beggar's sores, being madewith spearwort, or ratsbane, or biting acids, from all which dogs, andeven pigs, abhor. My sores are made after my proper receipt; but no dogwould lick e'en them twice. I have made a scurvy bargain: art a cozeningknave, I doubt, as well as a nincompoop. ' I deigned no reply to thisbundle of lies, which did accuse heavenly truth of falsehood for notbeing in a tale with him. He rose and we took the road; and presentlywe came to a place where were two little wayside inns, scarce a furlongapart. 'Halt, ' said my master. 'Their armories are sore faded--all thebetter. Go thou in; shun the master; board the wife; and flatter her innsky high, all but the armories, and offer to colour them dirt cheap. 'So I went in and told the wife I was a painter, and would revive herarmories cheap; but she sent me away with a rebuff. I to my master. Hegroaned. 'Ye are all fingers and no tongue, ' said he; 'I have made ascurvy bargain. Come and hear me patter and flatter. ' Between the twoinns was a high hedge. He goes behind it a minute and comes out a decenttradesman. We went on to the other inn, and then I heard him praise itso fulsome as the very wife did blush. 'But, ' says he, 'there is onelittle, little fault; your armories are dull and faded. Say but theword, and for a silver franc my apprentice here, the cunningest e'erI had, shall make them bright as ever. Whilst she hesitated, the roguetold her he had done it to a little inn hard by, and now the inn's facewas like the starry firmament. 'D'ye hear that, my man?' cries she, '"The Three Frogs" have been and painted up their armories; shall "TheFour Hedgehogs" be outshone by them?' So I painted, and my master stoodby like a lord, advising me how to do, and winking to me to heed himnone, and I got a silver franc. And he took me back to 'The ThreeFrogs, ' and on the way put me on a beard and disguised me, andflattered 'The Three Frogs, ' and told them how he had adorned 'The FourHedgehogs, ' and into the net jumped the three poor simple frogs, and Iearned another silver franc. Then we went on and he found his crutches, and sent me forward, and showed his "cicatrices d'emprunt, " as he calledthem, and all his infirmities, at 'The Four Hedgehogs, ' and got bothfood and money. 'Come, share and share, ' quoth he: so I gave him onefranc. 'I have made a good bargain, ' said he. 'Art a master limner, buttakest too much time. ' So I let him know that in matters of honest craftthings could not be done quick and well. 'Then do them quick, ' quoth he. And he told me my name was Bon Bec; and I might call him Cul de Jatte, because that was his lay at our first meeting. And at the next town mymaster, Cul de Jatte, bought me a psaltery, and set himself up againby the roadside in state like him that erst judged Marsyas and Apollo, piping for vain glory. So I played a strain. 'Indifferent well, harmonious Bon Bec, ' said he haughtily. 'Now tune thy pipes. ' So I didsing a sweet strain the good monks taught me; and singing it remindedpoor Bon Bec, Gerard erst, of his young days and home, and brought thewater to my een. But looking up, my master's visage was as the face ofa little boy whipt soundly, or sipping foulest medicine. 'Zounds, stopthat bellyache blether, ' quoth he, 'that will ne'er wile a stiver outo' peasants' purses; 'twill but sour the nurses' milk, and gar the kinejump into rivers to be out of earshot on't. What, false knave, did I buythee a fine new psaltery to be minded o' my latter end withal? Hearken!these be the songs that glad the heart, and fill the minstrel's purse. 'And he sung so blasphemous a stave, and eke so obscene, as I drew awayfrom him a space that the lightning might not spoil the new psaltery. However, none came, being winter, and then I said, 'Master, the Lordis debonair. Held I the thunder, yon ribaldry had been thy last, thoufoul-mouthed wretch. '

"'Why, Bon Bec, what is to do?' quoth he. 'I have made an ill bargain. Oh, perverse heart, that turneth from doctrine. ' So I bade him keephis breath to cool his broth, ne'er would I shame my folk with singingribald songs. 'Then, ' says he sulkily, 'the first fire we light by thewayside, clap thou on the music box! so 'twill make our pot boil for thenonce; but with your, Good people, let us peak and pine, Cut tristful mugs, and miaul and whine Thorough our nosen chaunts divine, never, never, never. Ye might as well go through Lorraine crying, Mulleygrubs, Mulleygrubs, who'll buy my Mulleygrubs!' So we fared on, bad friends. But I took a thought, and prayed him hum me one of hisnaughty ditties again. Then he brightened, and broke forth into ribaldrylike a nightingale. Finger in ears stuffed I. 'No words; naught but thebare melody. ' For oh, Margaret, note the sly malice of the Evil One!Still to the scurviest matter he wedded the tunablest ditties. "

Catherine. "That is true as Holy Writ. "

Sybrandt. "How know you that, mother?"

Cornelis. "He! he! he!"

Eli. "Whisht, ye uneasy wights, and let me hear the boy. He is wiserthan ye; wiser than his years. "

"'What tomfoolery is this, ' said he; yet he yielded to me, and soon Igarnered three of his melodies; but I would not let Cul de Jatte wot thething I meditated. 'Show not fools nor bairns unfinished work, ' saiththe byword. And by this time 'twas night, and a little town at hand, where we went each to his inn; for my master would not yield to putoff his rags and other sores till morning; nor I to enter an inn witha tatterdemalion. So we were to meet on the road at peep of day, andindeed, we still lodged apart, meeting at morn and parting at eveoutside each town we lay at. And waking at midnight and cogitating, goodthoughts came down to me, and sudden my heart was enlightened. I calledto mind that my Margaret had withstood the taking of the burgomaster'spurse. ''Tis theft, ' said you; 'disguise it how ye will. ' But I mustbe wiser than my betters; and now that which I had as good as stolen, others had stolen from me. As it came so it was gone. Then I said, 'Heaven is not cruel, but just;' and I vowed a vow, to repay ourburgomaster every shilling an' I could. And I went forth in the morningsad, but hopeful. I felt lighter for the purse being gone. My master wasat the gate becrutched. I told him I'd liever have seen him in anotherdisguise. 'Beggars must not be choosers, ' said he. However, soon he bademe untruss him, for he felt sadly. His head swam. I told him forcefullyto deform nature thus could scarce be wholesome. He answered none; butlooked scared, and hand on head. By-and-by he gave a groan, and rolledon the ground like a ball, and writhed sore. I was scared, and wistnot what to do, but went to lift him; but his trouble rose higher andhigher, he gnashed his teeth fearfully, and the foam did fly from hislips; and presently his body bended itself like a bow, and jerked andbounded many times into the air. I exorcised him; it but made himworse. There was water in a ditch hard by, not very clear; but the poorcreature struggling between life and death, I filled my hat withal, andcame flying to souse him. Then my lord laughed in my face. 'Come, BonBec, by thy white gills, I have not forgotten my trade. ' I stood withwatery hat in hand, glaring. 'Could this be feigning?' 'What else?' saidhe. 'Why, a real fit is the sorriest thing; but a stroke with a feathercompared with mine. Art still betters nature. ' 'But look, e'en now bloodtrickleth from your nose, ' said I. 'Ay, ay, pricked my nostrils with astraw. ' 'But ye foamed at the lips. ' 'Oh, a little soap makes a micklefoam. ' And he drew out a morsel like a bean from his mouth. 'Thank thystars, Bon Bec, ' says he, 'for leading thee to a worthy master. Each dayhis lesson. To-morrow we will study the cul de bois and other branches. To-day, own me prince of demoniacs, and indeed of all good fellows. 'Then, being puffed up, he forgot yesterday's grudge, and discoursedme freely of beggars; and gave me, who eftsoons thought a beggar was abeggar, and there an end, the names and qualities of full thirty sortsof masterful and crafty mendicants in France and Germany and England;his three provinces; for so the poor, proud knave yclept those kingdomsthree; wherein his throne it was the stocks I ween. And outside the nextvillage one had gone to dinner, and left his wheelbarrow. So says he, 'I'll tie myself in a knot, and shalt wheel me through; and what withmy crippledom and thy piety, a-wheeling of thy poor old dad, we'll bleedthe bumpkins of a dacha-saltee. ' I did refuse. I would work for him; butno hand would have in begging. 'And wheeling an "asker" in a barrow, isnot that work?' said he; 'then fling yon muckle stone in to boot: stay, I'll soil it a bit, and swear it is a chip of the holy sepulchre; andyou wheeled us both from Jerusalem. ' Said I, 'Wheeling a pair o' lies, one stony, one fleshy, may be work, and hard work, but honest work 'tisnot. 'Tis fumbling with his tail you wot of. And, ' said I, 'master, nexttime you go to tempt me to knavery, speak not to me of my poor old dad. 'Said I, 'You have minded me of my real father's face, the truest man inHolland. He and I are ill friends now, worse luck. But though I offendhim shame him I never will. ' Dear Margaret, with this knave' saying, 'your poor old dad, ' it had gone to my heart like a knife. ''Tis well, 'said my master gloomily; 'I have made a bad bargain. ' Presently hehalts, and eyes a tree by the wayside. 'Go spell me what is writ onyon tree. ' So I went, and there was nought but a long square drawn inoutline. I told him so. 'So much for thy monkish lore, ' quoth he. Alittle farther, and he sent me to read a wall. There was nought but acircle scratched on the stone with a point of nail or knife, and in thecircle two dots. I said so Then said he, 'Bon Bec, that square was awarning. Some good Truand left it, that came through this village faringwest; that means "dangerous. " The circle with the two dots was writ byanother of our brotherhood; and it signifies as how the writer, soitRollin Trapu, soit Triboulet, soit Catin Cul de Bois, or what not, wasbecked for asking here, and lay two months in Starabin. ' Then he brokeforth. 'Talk: of your little snivelling books that go in pouch. Threebooks have I, France, England, and Germany; and they are writ all overin one tongue, that my brethren of all countries understand; and thatis what I call learning. So sith here they whip sores, and imprisoninfirmities, I to my tiring room. ' And he popped behind the hedge, andcame back worshipful. We passed through the village, and I sat me downon the stocks, and even the barber's apprentice whets his razor on ablock, so did I flesh my psaltery on this village, fearing great cities. I tuned it, and coursed up and down the wires nimbly with my two woodenstrikers; and then chanted loud and clear, as I had heard the minstrelsof the country, 'Qui veut ouir qui veut Savoir, '

some trash, I mind not what. And soon the villagers, male and female, thronged about me; thereat I left singing, and recited them to thepsaltery a short but right merry tale out of 'the lives of the saints, 'which it is my handbook of pleasant figments and this ended, instantlystruck up and whistled one of Cul de Jatte's devil's ditties, and playedit on the psaltery to boot. Thou knowest Heaven hath bestowed on me arare whistle, both for compass and tune. And with me whistling brightand full this sprightly air, and making the wires slow when the tune didgallop, and tripping when the tune did amble, or I did stop and shake onone note like a lark i' the air, they were like to eat me; but lookinground, lo! my master had given way to his itch, and there was his haton the ground, and copper pouring in. I deemed it cruel to whistle thebread out of poverty's pouch; so broke off and away; yet could not getclear so swift, but both men and women did slobber me sore, and smelledall of garlic. 'There, master, ' said I, 'I call that cleaving the divellin twain and keeping his white half. ' Said he, 'Bon Bec, I have madea good bargain. ' Then he bade me stay where I was while he went to theHoly Land. I stayed, and he leaped the churchyard dike, and the sextonwas digging a grave, and my master chaffered with him, and came backwith a knuckle bone. But why he clept a churchyard Holy Land, that Ilearned not then, but after dinner. I was colouring the armories of alittle inn; and he sat by me most peaceable, a cutting, and filing, andpolishing bones, sedately; so I speered was not honest work sweet? 'Asrain water, ' said he, mocking. 'What was he a making?' 'A pair of bonesto play on with thee; and with the refuse a St. Anthony's thumb anda St. Martin's little finger, for the devout. ' The vagabone! And now, sweet Margaret, thou seest our manner of life faring Rhineward. I withthe two arts I had least prized or counted on for bread was welcomeeverywhere; too poor now to fear robbers, yet able to keep both masterand man on the road. For at night I often made a portraiture of theinnkeeper or his dame, and so went richer from an inn; the which it isthe lot of few. But my master despised this even way of life. 'I loveups and downs, ' said he. And certes he lacked them not. One day he wouldgather more than I in three; another, to hear his tale, it had rainedkicks all day in lieu of 'saltees, ' and that is pennies. Yet even thenat heart he despised me for a poor mechanical soul, and scorned my arts, extolling his own, the art of feigning. 

"Natheless, at odd times was he ill at his ease. Going through the townof Aix, we came upon a beggar walking, fast by one hand to a cart-tail, and the hangman a lashing his bare bloody back. He, stout knave, sowhipt, did not a jot relent; but I did wince at every stroke; and mymaster hung his head. 

"'Soon or late, Bon Bec, ' quoth he. 'Soon or late. ' I, seeing hishaggard face, knew what he meaned. And at a town whose name hath slippedme, but 'twas on a fair river, as we came to the foot of the bridge hehalted, and shuddered. 'Why what is the coil?' said I. 'Oh, blind, ' saidhe, 'they are justifying there. ' So nought would serve him but take aboat, and cross the river by water. But 'twas out of the frying-pan, asthe word goeth. For the boatman had scarce told us the matter, and thatit was a man and a woman for stealing glazed windows out of housen, andthat the man was hanged at daybreak, and the quean to be drowned, whenlo! they did fling her off the bridge, and fell in the water not farfrom us. And oh! Margaret, the deadly splash! It ringeth in mine earseven now. But worse was coming; for, though tied, she came up and cried'Help! help!' and I, forgetting all, and hearing a woman's voice cry'Help!' was for leaping in to save her; and had surely done it, but theboatman and Cul de Jatte clung round me, and in a moment the bourreau'sman, that waited in a boat, came and entangled his hooked pole in herlong hair, and so thrust her down and ended her. Oh! if the saintsanswered so our cries for help! And poor Cul de Jatte groaned; and Isat sobbing, and beat my breast, and cried, 'Of what hath God made men'shearts?'"

The reader stopped, and the tears trickled down her cheeks. Gerardcrying in Lorraine, made her cry at Rotterdam. The leagues were no moreto her heart than the breadth of a room. 

Eli, softened by many touches in the letter, and by the reader's womanlygraces, said kindly enough, "Take thy time, lass. And methinks some ofye might find her a creepie to rest her foot, and she so near her owntrouble. "

"I'd do more for her than that an I durst, " said Catherine. "Here, Cornelis, " and she held out her little wooden stool, and that worthy, who hated Margaret worse than ever, had to take the creepie and put itcarefully under her foot. 

"You are very kind, dame, " she faltered. "I will read on; 'tis all I cando for you in turn. 

"Thus seeing my master ashy and sore shaken, I deemed this horribletragic act came timeously to warn him, so I strove sore to turn him fromhis ill ways, discoursing of sinners and their lethal end. 'Too late!'said he, 'too late!' and gnashed his teeth. Then I told him 'too late'was the divell's favourite whisper in repentant ears. Said I--

 'The Lord is debonair, Let sinners nought despair. '

'Too late!' said he, and gnashed his teeth, and writhed his face, asthough vipers were biting his inward parts. But, dear heart, his was amind like running water. Ere we cleared the town he was carolling, andoutside the gate hung the other culprit, from the bough of a littletree, and scarce a yard above the ground. And that stayed my vagabone'smusic. But ere we had gone another furlong, he feigned to have droppedhis, rosary, and ran back, with no good intent, as you shall hear. I strolled on very slowly, and often halting, and presently he camestumping up on one leg, and that bandaged. I asked him how he couldcontrive that, for 'twas masterly done. 'Oh, that was his mystery. WouldI know that, I must join the brotherhood. ' And presently we did passa narrow lane, and at the mouth on't espied a written stone, tellingbeggars by a word like a wee pitchfork to go that way. ''Tis yonfarmhouse, ' said he: 'bide thou at hand. ' And he went to the house, andcame back with money, food, and wine. 'This lad did the business, ' saidhe, slapping his one leg proudly. Then he undid the bandage, and withprideful face showed me a hole in his calf you could have put your neefin. Had I been strange to his tricks, here was a leg had drawn my lastpenny. Presently another farmhouse by the road. He made for it. I stood, and asked myself, should I run away and leave him, not to be shamed inmy own despite by him? But while I doubted, there was a great noise, and my master well cudgelled by the farmer and his men, came towards mehobbling and holloaing, for the peasants had laid on heartily. But moretrouble was at his heels. Some mischievous wight loosed a dog as big asa jackass colt, and came roaring after him, and downed him momently. I, deeming the poor rogue's death certain, and him least fit to die, drewmy sword and ran shouting. But ere I could come near, the muckle dog hadtorn away his bad leg, and ran growling to his lair with it; and Cul deJatte slipped his knot, and came running like a lapwing, with his hairon end, and so striking with both crutches before and behind at unrealdogs as 'twas like a windmill crazed. He fled adown the road. I followedleisurely, and found him at dinner. 'Curse the quiens, ' said he. And nota word all dinner time but 'Curse the quiens!'

"I said, I must know who' they were, before I would curse them. 

"'Quiens? why, that was dogs. And I knew not even that much? He had madea bad bargain. Well, well, ' said he, 'to-morrow we shall be in Germany. There the folk are music bitten, and they molest not beggars, unlessthey fake to boot, and then they drown us out of hand that moment, curse'em!' We came to Strasbourg. And I looked down Rhine with longing heart. The stream how swift! It seemed running to clip Sevenbergen to its softbosom. With but a piece of timber and an oar I might drift at my ease tothee, sleeping yet gliding still. 'Twas a sore temptation. But the fearof an ill welcome from my folk, and of the neighbours' sneers, and thehope of coming back to thee victorious, not, as now I must, defeated andshamed, and thee with me, it did withhold me; and so, with many sighs, and often turning of the head to look on beloved Rhine, I turnedsorrowful face and heavy heart towards Augsburg. "

"Alas, dame, alas! Good master Eli, forgive me! But I ne'er can win overthis part all at one time. It taketh my breath away. Welladay! Why didhe not listen to his heart? Had he not gone through peril enow, sorrowenow? Well-a-day! well-a-day!"

The letter dropped from her hand, and she drooped like a wounded lily. 

Then there was a clatter on the floor, and it was little Kate going onher crutches, with flushed face, and eyes full of pity, to console her. "Water, mother, " she cried. "I am afeared she shall swoon. "

"Nay, nay, fear me not, " said Margaret feebly. "I will not be sotroublesome. Thy good-will it maketh me stouter hearted, sweet mistressKate. For, if thou carest how I fare, sure Heaven is not against me. "

Catherine. "D'ye hear that, my man!"

Eli. "Ay, wife, I hear; and mark to boot. "

Little Kate went back to her place, and Margaret read on. 

"The Germans are fonder of armorials than the French. So I found workevery day. And whiles I wrought, my master would leave me, and doff hisraiment and don his rags, and other infirmities, and cozen the world, which he did clepe it 'plucking of the goose:' this done, would meet meand demand half my earnings; and with restless piercing eye ask me wouldI be so base as cheat my poor master by making three parts in lieu oftwo, till I threatened to lend him a cuff to boot in requital of hissuspicion; and thenceforth took his due, with feigned confidence in mygood faith, the which his dancing eye belied. Early in Germany we hada quarrel. I had seen him buy a skull of a jailer's wife, and mightyzealous a polishing it. Thought I, 'How can he carry yon memento, and not repent, seeing where ends his way?' Presently I did catch himselling it to a woman for the head of St. Barnabas, with a tale hadcozened an Ebrew. So I snatched it out of their hands, and trundled itinto the ditch. 'How, thou impious knave, ' said I, 'wouldst sell fora saint the skull of some dead thief, thy brother?' He slunk away. Butshallow she did crawl after the skull, and with apron reverently dustit for Barnabas, and it Barabbas; and so home with it. Said I, 'Non vultanser velli, sed populus vult decipi. '"

Catherine. "Oh, the goodly Latin!"

Eli. "What meaneth it?"

Catherine. "Nay, I know not; but 'tis Latin; is not that enow? He wasthe flower of the flock. "

"Then I to him, 'Take now thy psaltery, and part we here, for art awalking prison, a walking hell. ' But lo! my master fell on his knees, and begged me for pity's sake not turn him off. 'What would become ofhim? He did so love honesty. ' 'Thou love honesty?' said I. 'Ay, ' saidhe, 'not to enact it; the saints forbid. But to look on. 'Tis so faira thing to look on. Alas, good Bon Bec, ' said he; 'hadst starvedperadventure but for me. Kick not down thy ladder! Call ye that just?Nay, calm thy choler! Have pity on me! I must have a pal; and how couldI bear one like myself after one so simple as thou? He might cut mythroat for the money that is hid in my belt. 'Tis not much; 'tis notmuch. With thee I walk at mine ease; with a sharp I dare not go beforein a narrow way. Alas! forgive me. Now I know where in thy bonnet lurksthe bee, I will ware his sting; I will but pluck the secular goose. 'Sobe it, ' said I. 'And example was contagious: he should be a true man bythen we reached Nurnberg. 'Twas a long way to Nurnberg. ' Seeing him sohumble, I said, 'well, doff rags, and make thyself decent; 'twillhelp me forget what thou art. ' And he did so; and we sat down to ournonemete. Presently came by a reverend palmer with hat stuck round withcockle shells from Holy Land, and great rosary of beads like eggs ofteal, and sandals for shoes. And he leaned a-weary on his long staff, and offered us a shell apiece. My master would none. But I, to set hima better example, took one, and for it gave the poor pilgrim two batzen, and had his blessing. And he was scarce gone, when we heard savagecries, and came a sorry sight, one leading a wild woman in a chain, allrags and howling like a wolf. And when they came nigh us, she fell totearing her rags to threads. The man sought an alms of us, and told ushis hard case. 'Twas his wife stark raving mad; and he could not work inthe fields, and leave her in his house to fire it, nor cure her couldbe without the Saintys' help, and had vowed six pounds of wax to St. Anthony to heal her, and so was fain beg of charitable folk for themoney. And now she espied us, and flew at me with her long nails, andI was cold with fear, so devilish showed, her face and rolling eyes andnails like birdys talons. But he with the chain checked her sudden, and with his whip did cruelly lash her for it, that I cried, 'Forbear!forbear! She knoweth not what she doth;' and gave him a batz. And beinggone, said I, 'Master, of those twain I know not which is the morepitiable. ' And he laughed in my face, 'Behold thy justice, Bon Bec, 'said he. 'Thou railest on thy poor, good, within an ace of honestmaster, and bestowest alms on a "vopper. "' 'Vopper, ' said I, 'what isa vopper?' 'why, a trull that feigns madness. That was one of us, thatsham maniac, and wow but she did it clumsily. I blushed for her andthee. Also gavest two batzen for a shell from Holy Land, that cameno farther than Normandy. I have culled them myself on that coast byscores, and sold them to pilgrims true and pilgrims false, to gull flatslike thee withal. ' 'What!' said I; 'that reverend man?' 'One of us!'cried Cul de Jatte; 'one of us! In France we call them "Coquillarts, "but here "Calmierers. " Railest on me for selling a false relic now andthen, and wastest thy earnings on such as sell nought else. I tell thee, Bon Bec, ' said he, 'there is not one true relic on earth's face. TheSaints died a thousand years agone, and their bones mixed with thedust; but the trade in relics, it is of yesterday; and there are fortythousand tramps in Europe live by it; selling relics of forty or fiftybodies; oh, threadbare lie! And of the true Cross enow to build CologneMinster. Why, then, may not poor Cul de Jatte turn his penny with thecrowd? Art but a scurvy tyrannical servant to let thy poor master fromhis share of the swag with your whoreson pilgrims, palmers and friars, black, grey, and crutched; for all these are of our brotherhood, and ofour art, only masters they, and we but poor apprentices, in guild. ' Forhis tongue was an ell and a half. 

"'A truce to thy irreverend sophistries, ' said I, 'and say what companyis this a coming. ' 'Bohemians, ' cried he, 'Ay, ay, this shall be therest of the band. ' With that came along so motley a crew as never youreyes beheld, dear Margaret. Marched at their head one with a banner ona steel-pointed lance, and girded with a great long sword, and in velvetdoublet and leathern jerkin, the which stuffs ne'er saw I wedded aforeon mortal flesh, and a gay feather in his lordly cap, and a couple ofdead fowls at his back, the which, an the spark had come by honestly, Iam much mistook. Him followed wives and babes on two lean horses, whoseflanks still rattled like parchment drum, being beaten by kettles andcaldrons. Next an armed man a-riding of a horse, which drew a cart fullof females and children; and in it, sitting backwards, a lustylazy knave, lance in hand, with his luxurious feet raised on a holywater-pail, that lay along, and therein a cat, new kittened, sat glowingo'er her brood, and sparks for eyes. And the cart-horse cavalier had onhis shoulders a round bundle, and thereon did perch a cock and crowedwith zeal, poor ruffler, proud of his brave feathers as the rest, andhaply with more reason, being his own. And on an ass another wife andnew-born child; and one poor quean a-foot scarce dragged herself along, so near her time was she, yet held two little ones by the hand, andhelplessly helped them on the road. And the little folk were just afarce; some rode sticks, with horses' heads, between their legs, whichpranced and caracoled, and soon wearied the riders so sore, they stoodstock still and wept, which cavaliers were presently taken into cart andcuffed. And one, more grave, lost in a man's hat and feather, walked inEgyptian darkness, handed by a girl; another had the great saucepan onhis back, and a tremendous three-footed clay-pot sat on his headand shoulders, swallowing him so as he too went darkling led by hissweetheart three foot high. When they were gone by, and we had bothlaughed lustily, said I, 'Natheless, master, my bowels they yearn forone of that tawdry band, even for the poor wife so near the downlying, scarce able to drag herself, yet still, poor soul, helping the weaker onthe way. '

Catherine. "Nay, nay, Margaret. Why, wench, pluck up heart. Certes thouart no Bohemian. "

Kate. "Nay, mother, 'tis not that, I trow, but her father. And, dearheart, why take notice to put her to the blush?"

Richart. "So I say. "

"And he derided me. 'Why, that is a "biltreger, "' said he, 'and youwaste your bowels on a pillow, or so forth. ' I told him he lied. 'Timewould show, ' said he, 'wait till they camp. ' And rising after meat andmeditation, and travelling forward, we found them camped between twogreat trees on a common by the wayside; and they had lighted a greatfire, and on it was their caldron; and one of the trees slanting o'erthe fire, a kid hung down by a chain from the tree-fork to the fire, and in the fork was wedged an urchin turning still the chain to keep themeat from burning, and a gay spark with a feather in his cap cut upa sheep; and another had spitted a leg of it on a wooden stake; and awoman ended chanticleer's pride with wringing of his neck. And underthe other tree four rufflers played at cards and quarrelled, and no wordsans oath; and of these lewd gamblers one had cockles in his hat and wasmy reverend pilgrim. And a female, young and comely, and dressed like abutterfly, sat and mended a heap of dirty rags. And Cul de Jatte said, 'Yon is the "vopper, "' and I looked incredulous and looked again, and itwas so, and at her feet sat he that had so late lashed her; but I weenhe had wist where to strike, or woe betide him; and she did now oppresshim sore, and made him thread her very needle, the which he did withall humility; so was their comedy turned seamy side without; and Cul deJatte told me 'twas still so with 'voppers' and their men in camp; theywould don their bravery though but for an hour, and with their tinsel, empire, and the man durst not the least gainsay the 'vopper, ' or shewould turn him off at these times, as I my master, and take anothertyrant more submissive. And my master chuckled over me. Natheless wesoon espied a wife set with her back against the tree, and her hairdown, and her face white, and by her side a wench held up to her eye anewborn babe, with words of cheer, and the rough fellow, her husband, did bring her hot wine in a cup, and bade her take courage. And justo'er the place she sat, they had pinned from bough to bough of thoseneighbouring trees two shawls, and blankets two, together, to keep thedrizzle off her. And so had another poor little rogue come into theworld; and by her own particular folk tended gipsywise, but of theroasters, and boilers, and voppers, and gamblers, no more noticed, no, not for a single moment, than sheep which droppeth her lamb in a field, by travellers upon the way. Then said I, 'What of thy foul suspicions, master? over-knavery blinds the eye as well as over-simplicity. ' And helaughed and said, 'Triumph, Bon Bec, triumph. The chances were nine inten against thee. ' Then I did pity her, to be in a crowd at such atime; but he rebuked me. 'I should pity rather your queens and royalduchesses, which by law are condemned to groan in a crowd of nobles andcourtiers, and do writhe with shame as, well as sorrow, being come ofdecent mothers, whereas these gipsy women have no more shame under theirskins than a wolf ruth, or a hare valour. And, Bon Bec, ' quoth he, 'Iespy in thee a lamentable fault. Wastest thy bowels, wilt have none leftfor thy poor good master which doeth thy will by night and day. ' Thenwe came forward; and he talked with the men in some strange Hebrew cantwhereof no word knew I; and the poor knaves bade us welcome and deniedus nought. With them, and all they had, 'twas lightly come and lightlygo; and when we left them, my master said to me 'This is thy firstlesson, but to-night we shall lie at Hansburgh. Come with me to the"rotboss" there, and I'll show thee all our folk and their lays, and especially "the lossners, " "the dutzers, " "the schleppers, " "thegickisses, " "the schwanfelders, whom in England we call "shiveringJemmies, " "the suntvegers, " "the schwiegers, " "the joners, " "thesesseldegers, " "the gensscherers, " in France "marcandiers or rifodes, ""the veranerins, " "the stabulers, " with a few foreigners like ourselves, such as "pietres, " "francmitoux, " "polissons" "malingreux, " "traters, ""rufflers, " "whipjalks, " "dommerars, " "glymmerars, " "jarkmen, ""patricos, " "swadders, " "autem morts, " "walking morts" 'Enow, ' cried I, stopping him, 'art as gleesome as the Evil One a counting of his imps. I'll jot down in my tablet all these caitiffs and their accursed names:for knowledge is knowledge. But go among them, alive or dead, that willI not with my good will. Moreover, ' said I, 'what need? since I have acompanion in thee who is all the knaves on earth in one?' and thought toabash him but his face shone with pride, and hand on breast he did bowlow to me. 'If thy wit be scant, good Bon Bec, thy manners are a charm. I have made a good bargain. ' So he to the 'rotboss, ' and I to a decentinn, and sketched the landlord's daughter by candle-light, and startedat morn batzen three the richer, but could not find my master, soloitered slowly on, and presently met him coming west for me, andcursing the quiens. Why so? Because he could blind the culls but notthe quiens. At last I prevailed on him to leave cursing and canting, and tell me his adventure. Said he, 'I sat outside the gate of yonmonastery, full of sores, which I sho'ed the passers-by. Oh, Bon Bec, beautifuller sores you never saw; and it rained coppers in my hat. Presently the monks came home from some procession, and the convent dogsran out to meet them, curse the quiens!' 'What, did they fall on theeand bite thee, poor soul?' 'Worse, worse, dear Bon Bec. Had theybitten me I had earned silver. But the great idiots, being, as I think, puppies, or little better, fell on me where I sat, downed me, and fella licking my sores among them. As thou, false knave, didst swear thewhelps in heaven licked the sores of Lazybones, a beggar of old. ' 'Nay, nay, ' said I, 'I said no such thing. But tell me, since they bit theenot, but sportfully licked thee, what harm?' 'What harm, noodle; why, the sores came off. ' 'How could that be?' 'How could aught else be? andthem just fresh put on. Did I think he was so weak as bite holes in hisflesh with ratsbane? Nay, he was an artist, a painter, like his servant, and had put on sores made of pig's blood, rye meal, and glue. So whenthe folk saw my sores go on tongues of puppies, they laughed, and Isaw cord or sack before me. So up I jumped, and shouted, "A miracle amiracle! The very dogs of this holy convent be holy, and have cured me. Good fathers, " cried I, "whose day is this?" "St. Isidore's, " said one. "St. Isidore, " cried I, in a sort of rapture. "Why, St. Isidore ismy patron saint: so that accounts. " And the simple folk swallowed mymiracle as those accursed quiens my wounds. But the monks took me insideand shut the gate, and put their heads together; but I have a quick ear, and one did say, "Caret miraculo monasterium, " which is Greek patter, leastways it is no beggar's cant. Finally they bade the lay brethrengive me a hiding, and take me out a back way and put me on the road, andthreatened me did I come back to the town to hand me to the magistrateand have me drowned for a plain impostor. "Profit now by the Church'sgrace, " said they, "and mend thy ways. " So forward, Bon Bec, for my lifeis not sure nigh hand this town. ' As we went he worked his shoulders, 'Wow but the brethren laid on. And what means yon piece of monk's cant, I wonder?' So I told him the words meant 'the monastery is in want of amiracle, ' but the application thereof was dark to me. 'Dark, ' criedhe, 'dark as noon. Why, it means they are going to work the miracle, my miracle, and gather all the grain I sowed. Therefore these blows ontheir benefactor's shoulders; therefore is he that wrought their scurrymiracle driven forth with stripes and threats. Oh, cozening knaves!'Said I, 'Becomes you to complain of guile. ' 'Alas, Bon Bec, ' said he, 'Ibut outwit the simple, but these monks would pluck Lucifer of hiswing feathers. ' And went a league bemoaning himself that he was notconvent-bred like his servant 'He would put it to more profit;' andrailing on quiens. 'And as for those monks, there was one Above. ''Certes, ' said I, 'there is one Above. What then?' 'Who will call thoseshavelings to compt, one day, ' quoth he. 'And all deceitful men' saidI. At one that afternoon I got armories to paint: so my master took theyellow jaundice and went begging through the town, and with his oilytongue, and saffron-water face, did fill his hat. Now in all the townsare certain licensed beggars, and one of these was an old favouritewith the townsfolk: had his station at St. Martin's porch, the greatestchurch: a blind man: they called him blind Hans. He saw my masterdrawing coppers on the other side the street, and knew him by his tricksfor an impostor, so sent and warned the constables, and I met my masterin the constables' hands, and going to his trial in the town hall. Ifollowed and many more; and he was none abashed, neither by the pompof justice, nor memory of his misdeeds, but demanded his accuser like atrumpet. And blind Hans's boy came forward, but was sifted narrowly bymy master, and stammered and faltered, and owned he had seen nothing, but only carried blind Hans's tale to the chief constable. 'This is buthearsay, ' said my master. 'Lo ye now, here standeth Misfortune backbitby Envy. But stand thou forth, blind Envy, and vent thine own lie. ' Andblind Hans behoved to stand forth, sore against his will. Him did mymaster so press with questions, and so pinch and torture, asking himagain and again, how, being blind, he could see all that befell, andsome that befell not, across a way; and why, an he could not see, hecame there holding up his perjured hand, and maligning the misfortunate, that at last he groaned aloud and would utter no word more. And analderman said, 'In sooth, Hans, ye are to blame; hast cast more dirt ofsuspicion on thyself than on him. ' But the burgomaster, a wondrous fatman, and methinks of his fat some had gotten into his head, checked him, and said, 'Nay, Hans we know this many years, and be he blind or not, he hath passed for blind so long, 'tis all one. Back to thy porch, goodHans, and let the strange varlet leave the town incontinent on pain ofwhipping. ' Then my master winked to me; but there rose a civic officerin his gown of state and golden chain, a Dignity with us lightly prized, and even shunned of some, but in Germany and France much courted, saveby condemned malefactors, to wit the hangman; and says he, 'Ant pleaseyou, first let us see why he weareth his hair so thick and low. ' And hisman went and lifted Cul de Jatte's hair, and lo, the upper gristle ofboth ears was gone. 'How is this knave? quoth the burgomaster. Mymaster said carelessly, he minded not precisely: his had been a life ofmisfortunes and losses. When a poor soul has lost the use of his leg, noble sirs, these more trivial woes rest lightly in his memory. ' Whenhe found this would not serve his turn, he named two famous battles, in each of which he had lost half an ear, a fighting like a true managainst traitors and rebels. But the hangman showed them the two cutswere made at one time, and by measurement. ''Tis no bungling soldiers'work, my masters, ' said he, ''tis ourn. ' Then the burgomaster gavejudgment: 'The present charge is not proven against thee; but, an thoubeest not guilty now, thou hast been at other times, witness thine ears. Wherefore I send thee to prison for one month, and to give a florintowards the new hall of the guilds now a building, and to be whiptout of the town, and pay the hangman's fee for the same. ' And all thealdermen approved, and my master was haled to prison with one look ofanguish. It did strike my bosom. I tried to get speech of him, but thejailer denied me. But lingering near the jail I heard a whistle, andthere was Cul de Jatte at a narrow window twenty feet from earth. I wentunder, and he asked me what made I there? I told him I was loath to goforward and not bid him farewell. He seemed quite amazed; but soon hissuspicious soul got the better. That was not all mine errand. I told himnot all: the psaltery: 'Well, what of that?' 'Twas not mine, but his; Iwould pay him the price of it. 'Then throw me a rix dollar, ' said he. I counted out my coins, and they came to a rix dollar and two batzen. I threw him up his money in three throws, and when he had got it allhe said, softly, 'Bon Bec. ' 'Master, ' said I. Then the poor rogue wasgreatly moved. 'I thought ye had been mocking me, ' said he; 'oh, BonBec, Bon Bec, if I had found the world like thee at starting I had putmy wit to better use, and I had not lain here. ' Then he whimpered out, 'I gave not quite a rix dollar for the jingler;' and threw me back thathe had gone to cheat me of; honest for once, and over late; and so, withmany sighs, bade me Godspeed. Thus did my master, after often bafflingmen's justice, fall by their injustice; for his lost ears proved not hisguilt only, but of that guilt the bitter punishment: so the account waseven; yet they for his chastisement did chastise him. Natheless he was aparlous rogue. Yet he holp to make a man of me. Thanks to his good witI went forward richer far with my psaltery and brush, than with yon asgood as stolen purse; for that must have run dry in time, like a bigtrough, but these a little fountain. "

Richart. "How pregnant his reflections be; and but a curly pated ladwhen last I saw him. Asking your pardon, mistress. Prithee read on. "

"One day I walked alone, and sooth to say, lighthearted, for mine honestDenys sweetened the air on the way; but poor Cul de Jatte poisonedit. The next day passing a grand house, out came on prancing steedsa gentleman in brave attire and two servants; they overtook me. Thegentleman bade me halt. I laughed in my sleeve; for a few batzen wereall my store. He bade me doff my doublet and jerkin. Then I chuckledno more. 'Bethink you, my lord, ' said I, ''tis winter. How may a poorfellow go bare and live? So he told me I shot mine arrow wide of histhought, and off with his own gay jerkin, richly furred, and doublet tomatch, and held them forth to me. Then a servant let me know it was apenance. 'His lordship had had the ill luck to slay his cousin in theircups. ' Down to my shoes he changed with me; and set me on his horse likea popinjay, and fared by my side in my worn weeds, with my psaltery onhis back. And said he, 'Now, good youth, thou art Cousin Detstein; andI, late count, thy Servant. Play the part well, and help me save mybloodstained soul! Be haughty and choleric, as any noble; and I will beas humble as I may. ' I said I would do my best to play the noble. Butwhat should I call him? He bade me call him nought but Servant. Thatwould mortify him most, he wist. We rode on a long way in silence; forI was meditating this strange chance, that from a beggar's servant hadmade me master to a count, and also cudgelling my brains how best Imight play the master, without being run through the body all at onetime like his cousin. For I mistrusted sore my spark's humility; yourGerman nobles being, to my knowledge, proud as Lucifer, and cholericas fire. As for the servants, they did slily grin to one another to seetheir master so humbled. "

"What is that?"

A lump, as of lead, had just bounced against the door, and the latch wasfumbled with unsuccessfully. Another bounce, and the door swung inwardswith Giles arrayed in cloth of gold sticking to it like a wasp. Helanded on the floor, and was embraced; but on learning what was goingon, trumpeted that he would much liever hear of Gerard than gossip. 

Sybrandt pointed to a diminutive chair. 

Giles showed his sense of this civility by tearing the said Sybrandtout of a very big one, and there ensconced himself gorgeous and glowing. Sybrandt had to wedge himself into the one, which was too small for themagnificent dwarf's soul, and Margaret resumed. But as this part of theletter was occupied with notices of places, all which my reader probablyknows, and if not, can find handled at large in a dozen well-knownbooks, from Munster to Murray, I skip the topography, and hasten to thatpart where it occurred to him to throw his letter into a journal. Thepersonal narrative that intervened may be thus condensed. 

He spoke but little at first to his new companions, but listened to pickup their characters. Neither his noble Servant nor his servants couldread or write; and as he often made entries in his tablets, he impressedthem with some awe. One of his entries was, "Le peu que sont leshommes. " For he found the surly innkeepers licked the very groundbefore him now; nor did a soul suspect the hosier's son in the count'sfeathers, nor the count in the minstrel's weeds. 

This seems to have surprised him; for he enlarged on it with the naiveteand pomposity of youth. At one place, being humbly requested to presentthe inn with his armorial bearings, he consented loftily; but paintedthem himself, to mine host's wonder, who thought he lowered himselfby handling brush. The true count stood grinning by, and held thepaint-pot, while the sham count painted the shield with threered herrings rampant under a sort of Maltese cross made with twoell-measures. At first his plebeian servants were insolent. But thiscoming to the notice of his noble one, he forgot what he was doingpenance for, and drew his sword to cut off their ears, heads included. But Gerard interposed and saved them, and rebuked the count severely. And finally they all understood one another, and the superior mindobtained its natural influence. He played the barbarous noble of thatday vilely. For his heart would not let him be either tyrannical orcold. Here were three human beings. He tried to make them all happierthan he was; held them ravished with stories and songs, and set HerrPenitent and Co. Dancing with his whistle and psaltery. For his ownconvenience he made them ride and tie, and thus pushed rapidly throughthe country, travelling generally fifteen leagues a day. 

DIARY. 

"This first day of January I observed a young man of the country to meeta strange maiden, and kissed his hand, and then held it out to her. Shetook it with a smile, and lo! acquaintance made; and babbled like oldfriends. Greeting so pretty and delicate I ne'er did see. Yet were theyboth of the baser sort. So the next lass I saw a coming, I said to myservant lord, 'For further penance bow thy pride; go meet yon base-borngirl; kiss thy homicidal hand, and give it her, and hold her indiscourse as best ye may. ' And my noble Servant said humbly, 'I shallobey my lord. ' And we drew rein and watched while he went forward, kissed his hand and held it out to her. Forthwith she took it smiling, and was most affable with him, and he with her. Presently came up a bandof her companions. So this time I bade him doff his bonnet to them, asthough they were empresses; and he did so. And lo! the lasses drew up asstiff as hedgestakes, and moved not nor spake. "

Denys. "Aie! aie! aie Pardon, the company. "

"This surprised me none; for so they did discountenance poor Denys. Andthat whole day I wore in experimenting these German lasses; and 'twasstill the same. An ye doff bonnet to them they stiffen into statues;distance for distance. But accost them with honest freedom, and withthat customary, and though rustical, most gracious proffer, of thekissed hand, and they withhold neither their hands in turn nor theiracquaintance in an honest way. Seeing which I vexed myself that Denyswas not with us to prattle with them; he is so fond of women. " ("Are youfond of women, Denys?") And the reader opened two great violet eyes uponhim with gentle surprise. 

Denys. "Ahem! he says so, she-comrade. By Hannibal's helmet, 'tis theirfault, not mine. They will have such soft voices, and white skins, andsunny hair, and dark blue eyes, and--"

Margaret. (Reading suddenly. ) "Which their affability I put to profitthus. I asked them how they made shift to grow roses in yule? For know, dear Margaret, that throughout Germany, the baser sort of lasses wearfor head-dress nought but a 'crantz, ' or wreath of roses, encirclingtheir bare hair, as laurel Caesar's; and though of the worshipful, scorned, yet is braver, I wist, to your eye and mine which painters be, though sorry ones, than the gorgeous, uncouth, mechanical head-gear ofthe time, and adorns, not hides her hair, that goodly ornament fittedto her head by craft divine. So the good lasses, being questioned close, did let me know, the rosebuds are cut in summer and laid then in greatclay-pots, thus ordered:--first bay salt, then a row of buds, and overthat row bay salt sprinkled; then, another row of buds placed crosswise;for they say it is death to the buds to touch one another; and so on, buds and salt in layers. Then each pot is covered and soldered tight, and kept in cool cellar. And on Saturday night the master of the house, or mistress, if master be none, opens a pot, and doles the rosebuds outto every female in the house, high or low, withouten grudge; thensolders it up again. And such as of these buds would full-blown rosesmake, put them in warm water a little space, or else in the stove, andthen with tiny brush and soft, wetted in Rhenish wine, do coax them tillthey ope their folds. And some perfume them with rose-water. For, alack, their smell it is fled with the summer; and only their fair bodyes liewithouten soul, in tomb of clay, awaiting resurrection. 

"And some with the roses and buds mix nutmegs gilded, but not by my goodwill; for gold, brave in itself, cheek by jowl with roses, is but yellowearth. And it does the eye's heart good to see these fair heads of haircome, blooming with roses, over snowy roads, and by snow-capt hedges, setting winter's beauty by the side of summer's glory. For what sofair as winter's lilies, snow yclept, and what so brave as roses? Andshouldst have had a picture here, but for their superstition. Leaned alass in Sunday garb, cross ankled, against her cottage corner, whoselow roof was snow-clad, and with her crantz did seem a summer flowersprouting from winter's bosom. I drew rein, and out pencil and brush tolimn her for thee. But the simpleton, fearing the evil eye, or glamour, claps both hands to her face and flies panic-stricken. But indeed, theyare not more superstitious than the Sevenbergen folk, which take thyfather for a magician. Yet softly, sith at this moment I profit bythis darkness of their minds; for, at first, sitting down to write thisdiary, I could frame nor thought nor word, so harried and deaved was Iwith noise of mechanical persons, and hoarse laughter at dull jests ofone of these particoloured 'fools, ' which are so rife in Germany. Butoh, sorry wit, that is driven to the poor resource of pointed ear-caps, and a green and yellow body. True wit, methinks, is of the mind. Wemet in Burgundy an honest wench, though over free for my palate, achambermaid, had made havoc of all these zanies, droll by brute force. Oh, Digressor! Well then, I to be rid of roaring rusticalls, andmindless jests, put my finger in a glass and drew on the table a greatwatery circle; whereat the rusticalls did look askant, like venison ata cat; and in that circle a smaller circle. The rusticalls held theirpeace; and besides these circles cabalistical, I laid down on the tablesolemnly yon parchment deed I had out of your house. The rusticalls heldtheir breath. Then did I look as glum as might be, and mutteredslowly thus 'Videamus--quam diu tu fictus morio--vosque veristulti--audebitis--in hac aula morari, strepitantes ita--et olentes: utdulcissimae nequeam miser scribere. ' They shook like aspens, and stoleaway on tiptoe one by one at first, then in a rush and jostling, andleft me alone; and most scared of all was the fool: never earned jesterfairer his ass's ears. So rubbed I their foible, who first rubbed mine;for of all a traveller's foes I dread those giants twain, Sir Noise, andeke Sir Stench. The saints and martyrs forgive my peevishness. Thus Iwrite to thee in balmy peace, and tell thee trivial things scarce worthyink, also how I love thee, which there was no need to tell, for wellthou knowest it. And oh, dear Margaret, looking on their roses, whichgrew in summer, but blow in winter, I see the picture of our trueaffection; born it was in smiles and bliss, but soon adversity besetus sore with many a bitter blast. Yet our love hath lost no leaf, thankGod, but blossoms full and fair as ever, proof against frowns, andjibes, and prison, and banishment, as those sweet German flowers ablooming in winter's snow. 

"January 2. --My servant, the count, finding me curious, took me to thestables of the prince that rules this part. In the first court was ahorse-bath, adorned with twenty-two pillars, graven with the prince'sarms; and also the horse-leech's shop, so furnished as a rich apothecarymight envy. The stable is a fair quadrangle, whereof three sides filledwith horses of all nations. Before each horse's nose was a glazedwindow, with a green curtain to be drawn at pleasure, and at his tail athick wooden pillar with a brazen shield, whence by turning of a pipe heis watered, and serves too for a cupboard to keep his comb and rubbingclothes. Each rack was iron, and each manger shining copper, and eachnag covered with a scarlet mantle, and above him his bridle and saddlehung, ready to gallop forth in a minute; and not less than two hundredhorses, whereof twelve score of foreign breed. And we returned to ourinn full of admiration, and the two varlets said sorrowfully, 'Why werewe born with two legs?' And one of the grooms that was civil and had ofme trinkgeld, stood now at his cottage-door and asked us in. There wefound his wife and children of all ages, from five to eighteen, and hadbut one room to bide and sleep in, a thing pestiferous and most uncivil. Then I asked my Servant, knew he this prince? Ay, did he, and had oftendrunk with him in a marble chamber above the stable, where, for table, was a curious and artificial rock, and the drinking vessels hang on itspinnacles, and at the hottest of the engagement a statue of a horsemanin bronze came forth bearing a bowl of liquor, and he that sat nearestbehoved to drain it. ''Tis well, ' said I: 'now for thy penance, whisperthou in yon prince's ear, that God hath given him his people freely, andnot sought a price for them as for horses. And pray him look inside thehuts at his horse-palace door, and bethink himself is it well to househis horses, and stable his folk. ' Said he, ''Twill give sore offence. ''But, ' said I, 'ye must do it discreetly and choose your time. ' So hepromised. And riding on we heard plaintive cries. 'Alas, ' said I, 'somesore mischance hath befallen some poor soul: what may it be?' And werode up, and lo! it was a wedding feast, and the guests were plying thebusiness of drinking sad and silent, but ever and anon cried loud anddolefully, 'Seyte frolich! Be merry. '

"January 3. --Yesterday between Nurnberg and Augsburg we parted company. I gave my lord, late Servant, back his brave clothes for mine, but hishorse he made me keep, and five gold pieces, and said he was still mydebtor, his penance it had been slight along of me, but profitable. Buthis best word was this: 'I see 'tis more noble to be loved than feared. 'And then he did so praise me as I blushed to put on paper; yet, poorfool, would fain thou couldst hear his words, but from some other penthan mine. And the servants did heartily grasp my hand, and wish me goodluck. And riding apace, yet could I not reach Augsburg till thegates were closed; but it mattered little, for this Augsburg it isan enchanted city. For a small coin one took me a long way round toa famous postern called der Einlasse. Here stood two guardians, likestatues. To them I gave my name and business. They nodded me leave toknock; I knocked; and the iron gate opened with a great noise and hollowrattling of a chain, but no hand seen nor chain; and he who drew thehidden chain sits a butt's length from the gate; and I rode in, and thegate closed with a clang after me. I found myself in a great buildingwith a bridge at my feet. This I rode over and presently came to aporter's lodge, where one asked me again my name and business, then ranga bell, and a great portcullis that barred the way began to rise, drawnby a wheel overhead, and no hand seen. Behind the portcullis was a thickoaken door studded with steel. It opened without hand, and I rode into ahall as dark as pitch. Trembling there a while, a door opened and showedme a smaller hall lighted. I rode into it: a tin goblet came down fromthe ceiling by a little chain: I put two batzen into it, and it wentup again. Being gone, another thick door creaked and opened, and Irid through. It closed on me with a tremendous clang, and behold me inAugsburg city. I lay at an inn called 'The Three Moors, ' over an hundredyears old; and this morning, according to my way of viewing towns tolearn their compass and shape, I mounted the highest tower I couldfind, and setting my dial at my foot surveyed the beautiful city: wholestreets of palaces and churches tiled with copper burnished like gold;and the house fronts gaily painted and all glazed, and the glass soclean and burnished as 'tis most resplendent and rare; and I, now firstseeing a great city, did crow with delight, and like cock on his ladder, and at the tower foot was taken into custody for a spy; for whilst Iwatched the city the watchman had watched me. The burgomaster receivedme courteously and heard my story; then rebuked he the officers. 'Couldye not question him yourselves, or read in his face? This is to make ourcity stink in strangers' report. ' Then he told me my curiosity was of acommendable sort; and seeing I was a craftsman and inquisitive, badehis clerk take me among the guilds. God bless the city where the veryburgomaster is cut of Soloman's cloth!

"January 5. --Dear Margaret, it is a noble city, and a kind mother toarts. Here they cut in wood and ivory, that 'tis like spider's work, andpaint on glass, and sing angelical harmonies. Writing of books is quitegone by; here be six printers. Yet was I offered a bountiful wage towrite fairly a merchant's accounts, one Fugger, a grand and wealthytrader, and hath store of ships, yet his father was but a poor weaver. But here in commerce, her very garden, men swell like mushrooms. And hebought my horse of me, and abated me not a jot, which way of dealing isnot known in Holland. But oh, Margaret, the workmen of all the guildsare so kind and brotherly to one another, and to me. Here, methinks, I have found the true German mind, loyal, frank, and kindly, somewhatcholeric withal, but nought revengeful. Each mechanic wears a sword. Thevery weavers at the loom sit girded with their weapons, and all Germanson too slight occasion draw them and fight; but no treachery: challengefirst, then draw, and with the edge only, mostly the face, not with SirPoint; for if in these combats one thrust at his adversary and hurt him, 'tis called ein schelemstucke, a heinous act, both men and women turntheir backs on him; and even the judges punish thrusts bitterly, butpass over cuts. Hence in Germany be good store of scarred faces, threein five at least, and in France scarce more than one in three. 

"But in arts mechanical no citizens may compare with these. Fountainsin every street that play to heaven, and in the gardens seeming trees, which being approached, one standing afar touches a spring, andevery twig shoots water, and souses the guests to their host's muchdelectation. Big culverins of war they cast with no more ado than ourfolk horse-shoes, and have done this fourscore years. All stuffs theyweave, and linen fine as ours at home, or nearly, which elsewherein Europe vainly shall ye seek. Sir Printing Press--sore foe to poorGerard, but to other humans beneficial--plieth by night and day, andcasteth goodly words like sower afield; while I, poor fool, can but sowthem as I saw women in France sow rye, dribbling it in the furrow grainby grain. And of their strange mechanical skill take two examples. Forending of exemplary rogues they have a figure like a woman, seven feethigh, and called Jung Frau; but lo, a spring is touched, she seizeth thepoor wretch with iron arms, and opening herself, hales him insideher, and there pierces him through and through with two score lances. Secondly, in all great houses the spit is turned not by a scrubby boy, but by smoke. Ay, mayst well admire, and judge me a lying knave. Thesecunning Germans do set in the chimney a little windmill, and the smokestruggling to wend past, turns it, and from the mill a wire runs throughthe wall and turns the spit on wheels; beholding which I doffed mybonnet to the men of Augsburg, for who but these had ere devised to bindye so dark and subtle a knave as Sir Smoke, and set him to roast DamePullet?

"This day, January 8, with three craftsmen of the town, I painted a packof cards. They were for a senator, in a hurry. I the diamonds. My queencame forth with eyes like spring violets, hair a golden brown, andwitching smile. My fellow-craftsmen saw her, and put their arms roundmy neck and hailed me master. Oh, noble Germans! No jealousy of abrother-workman: no sour looks at a stranger; and would have me spendSunday with them after matins; and the merchant paid me so richly as Iwas ashamed to take the guerdon; and I to my inn, and tried to paintthe queen of diamonds for poor Gerard; but no, she would not come likeagain. Luck will not be bespoke. Oh, happy rich man that hath got her!Fie! fie! Happy Gerard that shall have herself one day, and keep housewith her at Augsburg. 

"January 8. --With my fellows, and one Veit Stoss, a wood-carver, andone Hafnagel, of the goldsmiths' guild, and their wives and lasses, to Hafnagel's cousin, a senator of this free city, and his stupendouswine-vessel. It is ribbed like a ship, and hath been eighteen months inhand, and finished but now, and holds a hundred and fifty hogsheads, andstandeth not, but lieth; yet even so ye get not on his back, withoutenladders two, of thirty steps. And we sat about the miraculous mass, anddrank Rhenish from it, drawn by a little artificial pump, and the lassespinned their crantzes to it, and we danced round it, and the senatordanced on its back, but with drinking of so many garausses, lost hisfooting and fell off, glass in hand, and broke an arm and a leg in themidst of us. So scurvily ended our drinking bout for this time. 

"January 10. --This day started for Venice with a company of merchants, and among them him who had desired me for his scrivener; and so we arenow agreed, I to write at night the letters he shall dict, and othermatters, he to feed and lodge me on the road. We be many and armed, andsoldiers with us to boot, so fear not the thieves which men say lie onthe borders of Italy. But an if I find the printing press at Venice, Itrow I shall not go unto Rome, for man may not vie with iron. 

"Imprimit una dies quantum non scribitur anno. And, dearest, somethingtells me you and I shall end our days at Augsburg, whence going, I shallleave it all I can--my blessing. 

"January 12. --My master affecteth me much, and now maketh me sit withhim in his horse-litter. A grave good man, of all respected, but sadfor loss of a dear daughter, and loveth my psaltery: not giddy-facedditties, but holy harmonies such as Cul de Jatte made wry mouths at. Somany men, so many minds. But cooped in horse-litter and at night writinghis letters, my journal halteth. 

"January 14. --When not attending on my good merchant, I consort withsuch of our company as are Italians, for 'tis to Italy I wend, and Iam ill seen in Italian tongue. A courteous and a subtle people, at meatdelicate feeders and cleanly: love not to put their left hand in thedish. They say Venice is the garden of Lombardy, Lombardy the garden ofItaly, Italy of the world. 

"January 16. -Strong ways and steep, and the mountain girls so girded up, as from their armpits to their waist is but a handful. Of all the garbsI yet have seen, the most unlovely. 

"January 18. -In the midst of life we are in death. Oh! dear Margaret, I thought I had lost thee. Here I lie in pain and dole, and shallwrite thee that, which read you it in a romance ye should cry, 'Mostimprobable!' And so still wondering that I am alive to write it, andthanking for it God and the saints, this is what befell thy Gerard. Yestreen I wearied of being shut up in litter, and of the mule's slowpace, and so went forward; and being, I know not why, strangely fullof spirit and hope, as I have heard befall some men when on trouble'sbrink, seemed to tread on air, and soon distanced them all. Presently Icame to two roads, and took the larger; I should have taken the smaller. After travelling a good half-hour, I found my error, and returned; anddeeming my company had long passed by, pushed bravely on, but I couldnot overtake them; and small wonder, as you shall hear. Then I wasanxious, and ran, but bare was the road of those I sought; and nightcame down, and the wild beasts a-foot, and I bemoaned my folly; also Iwas hungered. The moon rose clear and bright exceedingly, and presentlya little way off the road I saw a tall windmill. 'Come, ' said I, 'mayhapthe miller will take ruth on me. ' Near the mill was a haystack, andscattered about were store of little barrels; but lo they were notflour-barrels, but tar-barrels, one or two, and the rest of spirits, Brant vein and Schiedam; I knew them momently, having seen the like inHolland. I knocked at the mill-door, but none answered. I lifted thelatch, and the door opened inwards. I went in, and gladly, for the nightwas fine but cold, and a rime on the trees, which were a kind of loftysycamores. There was a stove, but black; I lighted it with some of thehay and wood, for there was a great pile of wood outside, and I knownot how, I went to sleep. Not long had I slept, I trow, when hearing anoise, I awoke; and there were a dozen men around me, with wild faces, and long black hair, and black sparkling eyes. "

Catherine. "Oh, my poor boy! those black-haired ones do still scare meto look on. "

"I made my excuses in such Italian as I knew, and eking out bysigns. They grinned. 'I had lost my company. ' They grinned. 'I was anhungered. ' Still they grinned, and spoke to one another in a tongue Iknew not. At last one gave me a piece of bread and a tin mug of wine, as I thought, but it was spirits neat. I made a wry face and asked forwater: then these wild men laughed a horrible laugh. I thought to fly, but looking towards the door it was bolted with two enormous bolts ofiron, and now first, as I ate my bread, I saw it was all guarded too, and ribbed with iron. My blood curdled within me, and yet I couldnot tell thee why; but hadst thou seen the faces, wild, stupid, andruthless. I mumbled my bread, not to let them see I feared them; but oh, it cost me to swallow it and keep it in me. Then it whirled in my brain, was there no way to escape? Said I, 'They will not let me forth bythe door; these be smugglers or robbers. ' So I feigned drowsiness, andtaking out two batzen said, 'Good men, for our Lady's grace let me lieon a bed and sleep, for I am faint with travel. ' They nodded and grinnedtheir horrible grin, and bade one light a lanthorn and lead me. He tookme up a winding staircase, up, up, and I saw no windows, but the woodenwalls were pierced like a barbican tower, and methinks for the samepurpose, and through these slits I got glimpses of the sky, and thought, 'Shall I e'er see thee again?' He took me to the very top of the mill, and there was a room with a heap of straw in one corner and many emptybarrels, and by the wall a truckle bed. He pointed to it, and wentdownstairs heavily, taking the light, for in this room was a greatwindow, and the moon came in bright. I looked out to see, and lo, itwas so high that even the mill sails at their highest came not up to mywindow by some feet, but turned very slow and stately underneath, forwind there was scarce a breath; and the trees seemed silver filagreemade by angel craftsmen. My hope of flight was gone. 

"But now, those wild faces being out of sight, I smiled at my fears:what an if they were ill men, would it profit them to hurt me?Natheless, for caution against surprise, I would put the bed against thedoor. I went to move it, but could not. It was free at the head, but atthe foot fast clamped with iron to the floor. So I flung my psaltery onthe bed, but for myself made a layer of straw at the door, so as nonecould open on me unawares. And I laid my sword ready to my hand. Andsaid my prayers for thee and me, and turned to sleep. 

"Below they drank and made merry. And hearing this gave me confidence. Said I, 'Out of sight, out of mind. Another hour and the good Schiedamwill make them forget that I am here. ' And so I composed myself tosleep. And for some time could not for the boisterous mirth below. At last I dropped off. How long I slept I knew not; but I woke with astart: the noise had ceased below, and the sudden silence woke me. Andscarce was I awake, when sudden the truckle bed was gone with a loudclang all but the feet, and the floor yawned, and I heard my psalteryfall and break to atoms, deep, deep, below the very floor of the mill. It had fallen into a well. And so had I done, lying where it lay. "

Margaret shuddered and put her face in her hands. But speedily resumed. 

"I lay stupefied at first. Then horror fell on me, and I rose, but stoodrooted there, shaking from head to foot. At last I found myself lookingdown into that fearsome gap, and my very hair did bristle as I peered. And then, I remember, I turned quite calm, and made up my mind to diesword in hand. For I saw no man must know this their bloody secret andlive. And I said, 'Poor Margaret!' And I took out of my bosom, wherethey lie ever, our marriage lines, and kissed them again and again. AndI pinned them to my shirt again, that they might lie in one grave withme, if die I must. And I thought, 'All our love and hopes to end thus!'"

Eli. "Whisht all! Their marriage lines? Give her time! But no word. Ican bear no chat. My poor lad!"

During the long pause that ensued Catherine leaned forward and passedsomething adroitly from her own lap under her daughter's apron who satnext her. 

"Presently thinking, all in a whirl, of all that ever passed between us, and taking leave of all those pleasant hours, I called to mind how oneday at Sevenbergen thou taughtest me to make a rope of straw. Mindestthou? The moment memory brought that happy day back to me, I cried outvery loud: 'Margaret gives me a chance for life even here. ' I woke frommy lethargy. I seized on the straw and twisted it eagerly, as thou didstteach me, but my fingers trembled and delayed the task. Whiles I wroughtI heard a door open below. That was a terrible moment. Even as I twistedmy rope I got to the window and looked down at the great arms of themill coming slowly up, then passing, then turning less slowly down, asit seemed; and I thought, 'They go not as when there is wind: yet, slowor fast, what man rid ever on such steed as these, and lived. Yet, ' saidI, 'better trust to them and God than to ill men. ' And I prayed to Himwhom even the wind obeyeth. 

"Dear Margaret, I fastened my rope, and let myself gently down, andfixed my eye on that huge arm of the mill, which then was creeping upto me, and went to spring on to it. But my heart failed me at the pinch. And methought it was not near enow. And it passed calm and awful by. Iwatched for another; they were three. And after a little while one creptup slower than the rest methought. And I with my foot thrust myself ingood time somewhat out from the wall, and crying aloud 'Margaret!' didgrip with all my soul the wood-work of the sail, and that moment wasswimming in the air. "

Giles. "WELL DONE! WELL DONE!"

"Motion I felt little; but the stars seemed to go round the sky, and thenthe grass came up to me nearer and nearer, and when the hoary grass wasquite close I was sent rolling along it as if hurled from a catapult, and got up breathless, and every point and tie about me broken. I rose, but fell down again in agony. I had but one leg I could stand on. "

Catherine. "Eh! dear! his leg is broke, my boy's leg is broke. "

"And e'en as I lay groaning, I heard a sound like thunder. It was theassassins running up the stairs. The crazy old mill shook under them. They must have found that I had not fallen into their bloody trap, andwere running to despatch me. Margaret, I felt no fear, for I had nowno hope. I could neither run nor hide; so wild the place, so bright themoon. I struggled up all agony and revenge, more like some wounded wildbeast than your Gerard. Leaning on my sword hilt I hobbled round; andswift as lighting, or vengeance, I heaped a great pile of their hayand wood at the mill door; then drove my dagger into a barrel of theirsmuggled spirits, and flung it on; then out with my tinder and lightedthe pile. 'This will bring true men round my dead body, ' said I. 'Aha!' I cried, 'think you I'll die alone, cowards, assassins! recklessfiends!' and at each word on went a barrel pierced. But oh, Margaret!the fire fed by the spirits surprised me: it shot up and singed myvery hair, it went roaring up the side of the mill, swift as fallsthe lightning; and I yelled and laughed in my torture and despair, andpierced more barrels and the very tar-barrels, and flung them on. Thefire roared like a lion for its prey, and voices answered it inside fromthe top of the mill, and the feet came thundering down, and I stoodas near that awful fire as I could, with uplifted sword to slay andbe slain. The bolt was drawn. A tar-barrel caught fire. The door wasopened. What followed? Not the men came out, but the fire rushed inat them like a living death, and the first I thought to fight with wasblackened and crumpled on the floor like a leaf. One fearsome yell, anddumb for ever. The feet ran up again, but fewer. I heard them hack withtheir swords a little way up at the mill's wooden sides; but they hadno time to hew their way out: the fire and reek were at their heels, andthe smoke burst out at every loophole, and oozed blue in the moonlightthrough each crevice. I hobbled back, racked with pain and fury. Therewere white faces up at my window. They saw me. They cursed me. I cursedthem back and shook my naked sword: 'Come down the road I came, ' Icried. 'But ye must come one by one, and as ye come, ye die upon thissteel. ' Some cursed at that, but others wailed. For I had them all atdeadly vantage. And doubtless, with my smoke-grimed face and fiendishrage, I looked a demon. And now there was a steady roar inside the mill. The flame was going up it as furnace up its chimney. The mill caughtfire. Fire glimmered through it. Tongues of flame darted through eachloophole and shot sparks and fiery flakes into the night. One of theassassins leaped on to the sail, as I had done. In his hurry he missedhis grasp and fell at my feet, and bounded from the hard ground likea ball, and never spoke, nor moved again. And the rest screamed likewomen, and with their despair came back to me both ruth for them andhope of life for myself. And the fire gnawed through the mill in placen, and shot forth showers of great flat sparks like flakes of fiery snow;and the sails caught fire one after another; and I became a man againand staggered away terror-stricken, leaning on my sword, from the sightof my revenge, and with great bodily pain crawled back to the road. And, dear Margaret, the rimy trees were now all like pyramids ofgolden filagree, and lace, cobweb fine, in the red firelight. Oh! mostbeautiful! And a poor wretch got entangled in the burning sails, andwhirled round screaming, and lost hold at the wrong time, and hurledlike stone from mangonel high into the air; then a dull thump; it washis carcass striking the earth. The next moment there was a loud crash. The mill fell in on its destroyer, and a million great sparks flew up, and the sails fell over the burning wreck, and at that a million moresparks flew up, and the ground was strewn with burning wood and men. Iprayed God forgive me, and kneeling with my back to that fiery shambles, I saw lights on the road; a welcome sight. It was a company comingtowards me, and scarce two furlongs off. I hobbled towards them. Ere Ihad gone far I heard a swift step behind me. I turned. One had escaped;how escaped, who can divine? His sword shone in the moonlight. I fearedhim. Methought the ghosts of all those dead sat on that glitteringglaive. I put my other foot to the ground, maugre the anguish, and fledtowards the torches, moaning with pain, and shouting for aid. But whatcould I do He gained on me. Behooved me turn and fight. Denys had taughtme sword play in sport. I wheeled, our swords clashed. His clothesthey smelled all singed. I cut swiftly upward with supple hand, and hisdangled bleeding at the wrist, and his sword fell; it tinkled on theground. I raised my sword to hew him should he stoop for't. He stoodand cursed me. He drew his dagger with his left; I opposed my point anddared him with my eye to close. A great shout arose behind me from truemen's throats. He started. He spat at me in his rage, then gnashed histeeth and fled blaspheming. I turned and saw torches close at hand. Lo, they fell to dancing up and down methought, and thenext-moment-all-was-dark. I had--ah!"

Catherine. "Here, help! water! Stand aloof, you that be men!"

Margaret had fainted away. 

CHAPTER LIV

When she recovered, her head was on Catherine's arm, and the honest halfof the family she had invaded like a foe stood round her uttering roughhomely words of encouragement, especially Giles, who roared at her thatshe was not to take on like that. "Gerard was alive and well, or hecould not have writ this letter, the biggest mankind had seen as yet, and, " as he thought, "the beautifullest, and most moving, and smallestwrit. "

"Ay, good Master Giles, " sighed Margaret feebly, "he was alive. But howknow I what hath since befallen him? Oh, why left he Holland to go amongstrangers fierce as lions? And why did I not drive him from me soonerthan part him from his own flesh and blood? Forgive me, you that are hismother!"

And she gently removed Catherine's arm, and made a feeble attempt toslide off the chair on to her knees, which, after a brief struggle withsuperior force, ended in her finding herself on Catherine's bosom. ThenMargaret held out the letter to Eli, and said faintly but sweetly, "Iwill trust it from my hand now. In sooth, I am little fit to read anymore-and-and--loth to leave my comfort;" and she wreathed her other armround Catherine's neck. 

"Read thou, Richart, " said Eli: "thine eyes be younger than mine. "

Richart took the letter. "Well, " said he, "such writing saw I never. Awriteth with a needle's point; and clear to boot. Why is he not in mycounting-house at Amsterdam instead of vagabonding it out yonder!"

"When I came to myself I was seated in the litter, and my good merchantholding of my hand. I babbled I know not what, and then shuddered awhilein silence. He put a horn of wine to my lips. "

Catherine. "Bless him! bless him!"

Eli. "Whisht!"

"And I told him what had befallen. He would see my leg. It was sprainedsore, and swelled at the ankle; and all my points were broken, as Icould scarce keep up my hose, and I said, 'Sir, I shall be but a burdento you, I doubt, and can make you no harmony now; my poor psaltery itis broken;' and I did grieve over my broken music, companion of so manyweary leagues. But he patted me on the cheek, and bade me not fret; alsohe did put up my leg on a pillow, and tended me like a kind father. 

"January 19. --I sit all day in the litter, for we are pushing forwardwith haste, and at night the good, kind merchant sendeth me to bed, andwill not let me work. Strange! whene'er I fall in with men like fiends, then the next moment God still sendeth me some good man or woman, lest Ishould turn away from human kind. Oh, Margaret! how strangely mixed theybe, and how old I am by what I was three months agone. And lo! if goodMaster Fugger hath not been and bought me a psaltery. "

Catherine. "Eli, my man, an yon merchant comes our way let us buy ahundred ells of cloth of him, and not higgle. "

Eli. "That will I, take your oath on't!"

While Richart prepared to read, Kate looked at her mother, and with afaint blush drew out the piece of work from under her apron, and sewedwith head depressed a little more than necessary. On this her motherdrew a piece of work out of her pocket, and sewed too, while Richartread. Both the specimens these sweet surreptitious creatures now firstexposed to observation were babies' caps, and more than half finished, which told a tale. Horror! they were like little monks' cowls in shapeand delicacy. 

"January 20. --Laid up in the litter, and as good as blind, but haltingto bait, Lombardy plains burst on me. Oh, Margaret! a land flowingwith milk and honey; all sloping plains, goodly rivers, jocund meadows, delectable orchards, and blooming gardens; and though winter, lookswarmer than poor beloved Holland at midsummer, and makes the wanderer'sface to shine, and his heart to leap for joy to see earth so kind andsmiling. Here be vines, cedars, olives, and cattle plenty, but threegoats to a sheep. The draught oxen wear white linen on their necks, andstanding by dark green olive-trees each one is a picture; and the folk, especially women, wear delicate strawen hats with flowers and leavesfairly imitated in silk, with silver mixed. This day we crossed a riverprettily in a chained ferry-boat. On either bank was a windlass, and asingle man by turning of it drew our whole company to his shore, whereatI did admire, being a stranger. Passed over with us some country folk. And an old woman looking at a young wench, she did hide her face withher hand, and held her crucifix out like knight his sword in tourneydreading the evil eye. 

"January 25. --Safe at Venice. A place whose strange and passing beautyis well known to thee by report of our mariners. Dost mind too how Peterwould oft fill our ears withal, we handed beneath the table, and hestill discoursing of this sea-enthroned and peerless city, in shape abow, and its great canal and palaces on piles, and its watery ways pliedby scores of gilded boats; and that market-place of nations, orbis, non urbis, forum, St. Mark, his place? And his statue with the peerlessjewels in his eyes, and the lion at his gate? But I, lying at my windowin pain, may see none of these beauties as yet, but only a street, fairly paved, which is dull, and houses with oiled paper and linen, in lieu of glass, which is rude; and the passers-by, their habits andtheir gestures, wherein they are superfluous. Therefore, not to miss mydaily comfort of whispering to thee, I will e'en turn mine eyes inward, and bind my sheaves of wisdom reaped by travel. For I love thee so, thatno treasure pleases me not shared with thee; and what treasure so goodand enduring as knowledge? This then have I, Sir Footsore, learned, thateach nation hath its proper wisdom, and its proper folly; and methinks, could a great king, or duke, tramp like me, and see with his own eyes, he might pick the flowers, and eschew the weeds of nations, and go homeand set his own folk on Wisdom's hill. The Germans in the north werechurlish, but frank and honest; in the south, kindly and honest too. Their general blot is drunkenness, the which they carry even to mislikeand contempt of sober men. They say commonly, 'Kanstu niecht sauffen undfressen so kanstu kienem hern wol dienen. ' In England, the vulgar sortdrink as deep, but the worshipful hold excess in this a reproach, anddrink a health or two for courtesy, not gluttony, and still sugar thewine. In their cups the Germans use little mirth or discourse, but plythe business sadly, crying 'Seyte frolich!' The best of their drunkensport is 'Kurlemurlehuff, ' a way of drinking with touching deftly of theglass, the beard, the table, in due turn, intermixed with whistlingsand snappings of the finger so curiously ordered as 'tis a labour ofHercules, but to the beholder right pleasant and mirthful. Their topers, by advice of German leeches, sleep with pebbles in their mouths. For, as of a boiling pot the lid must be set ajar, so with these fleshywine-pots, to vent the heat of their inward parts: spite of which manydie suddenly from drink; but 'tis a matter of religion to slur it, andgloze it, and charge some innocent disease therewith. Yet 'tis more acustom than very nature, for their women come among the tipplers, anddo but stand a moment, and as it were, kiss the wine-cup; and are indeedmost temperate in eating and drinking, and of all women, modest andvirtuous, and true spouses and friends to their mates; far before ourHolland lasses, that being maids, put the question to the men, and beingwived, do lord it over them. Why, there is a wife in Tergou, not farfrom our door. One came to the house and sought her man. Says she, 'You'll not find him: he asked my leave to go abroad this afternoon, andI did give it him. '"

Catherine. "'Tis sooth! 'tis sooth! 'Twas Beck Hulse, Jonah's wife. Thiscomes of a woman wedding a boy. "

"In the south where wine is, the gentry drink themselves bare; but notin the north: for with beer a noble shall sooner burst his body thanmelt his lands. They are quarrelsome, but 'tis the liquor, not the mind;for they are none revengeful. And when they have made a bad bargaindrunk, they stand to it sober. They keep their windows bright; andjudge a man by his clothes. Whatever fruit or grain or herb grows by theroadside, gather and eat. The owner seeing you shall say, 'Art welcome, honest man. ' But an ye pluck a wayside grape, your very life is injeopardy. 'Tis eating of that Heaven gave to be drunken. The French aremuch fairer spoken, and not nigh so true-hearted. Sweet words cost themnought. They call it payer en blanche. "

Denys. "Les coquins! ha! ha!"

"Natheless, courtesy is in their hearts, ay, in their very blood. Theysay commonly, 'Give yourself the trouble of sitting down. ' And suchstraws of speech show how blows the wind. Also at a public show, if youwould leave your seat, yet not lose it, tie but your napkin round thebench, and no French man or woman will sit here; but rather keep theplace for you. "

Catherine. "Gramercy! that is manners. France for me!"

Denys rose and placed his hand gracefully to his breastplate. 

"Natheless, they say things in sport which are not courteous, butshocking. 'Le diable t'emporte!' 'Allez au diable!' and so forth. ButI trow they mean not such dreadful wishes: custom belike. Moderate indrinking, and mix water with their wine, and sing and dance over theircups, and are then enchanting company. They are curious not to drinkin another man's cup. In war the English gain the better of them in thefield; but the French are their masters in attack and defence of cities;witness Orleans, where they besieged their besiegers and hashed themsore with their double and treble culverines; and many other sieges inthis our century. More than all nations they flatter their women, anddespise them. No. She may be their sovereign ruler. Also they often hangtheir female malefactors, instead of drowning them decently, as othernations use. The furniture in their inns is walnut, in Germany onlydeal. French windows are ill. The lower half is of wood, and opens; theupper half is of glass, but fixed; so that the servant cannot come atit to clean it. The German windows are all glass, and movable, and shinefar and near like diamonds. In France many mean houses are not glazedat all. Once I saw a Frenchman pass a church without unbonneting. ThisI ne'er witnessed in Holland, Germany, or Italy. At many inns they showthe traveller his sheets, to give him assurance they are clean, and warmthem at the fire before him; a laudable custom. They receive him kindlyand like a guest; they mostly cheat him, and whiles cut his throat. They plead in excuse hard and tyrannous laws. And true it is their lawthrusteth its nose into every platter, and its finger into every pie. In France worshipful men wear their hats and their furs indoors, andgo abroad lighter clad. In Germany they don hat and furred cloak to goabroad; but sit bareheaded and light clad round the stove. 

"The French intermix not the men and women folk in assemblies, as weHollanders use. Round their preachers the women sit on their heels inrows, and the men stand behind them. Their harvests are rye, and flax, and wine. Three mules shall you see to one horse, and whole flocks ofsheep as black as coal. 

"In Germany the snails be red. I lie not. The French buy minstrelsy, but breed jests, and make their own mirth. The Germans foster their setfools, with ear-caps, which move them to laughter by simulating madness;a calamity that asks pity, not laughter. In this particular I deem thatlighter nation wiser than the graver German. What sayest thou? Alas!canst not answer me now. 

"In Germany the petty laws are wondrous wise and just. Those againstcriminals, bloody. In France bloodier still; and executed a trifle morecruelly there. Here the wheel is common, and the fiery stake; and underthis king they drown men by the score in Paris river, Seine yclept. Butthe English are as peremptory in hanging and drowning for a light fault;so travellers report. Finally, a true-hearted Frenchman, when ye chanceon one, is a man as near perfect as earth affords; and such a man is myDenys, spite of his foul mouth. "

Denys. "My foul mouth! Is that so writ, Master Richart?"

Richart. "Ay, in sooth; see else. "

Denys (inspecting the letter gravely). "I read not the letter so. "

Richart. "How then?"

Denys. "Humph! ahem why just the contrary. " He added: "'Tis kittle workperusing of these black scratches men are agreed to take for words. AndI trow 'tis still by guess you clerks do go, worthy sir. My foul mouth!This is the first time e'er I heard on't. Eh, mesdames?"

But the females did not seize the opportunity he gave them, and burstinto a loud and general disclaimer. Margaret blushed and said nothing;the other two bent silently over their work with something very like asly smile. Denys inspected their countenances long and carefully. Andthe perusal was so satisfactory, that he turned with a tone of injured, but patient innocence, and bade Richart read on. 

"The Italians are a polished and subtle people. They judge a man, not byhis habits, but his speech and gesture. Here Sir Chough may by nomeans pass for falcon gentle, as did I in Germany, pranked in my nobleservant's feathers. Wisest of all nations in their singular temperanceof food and drink. Most foolish of all to search strangers coming intotheir borders, and stay them from bringing much money in. They shouldrather invite it, and like other nations, let the traveller from takingof it out. Also here in Venice the dames turn their black hair yellow bythe sun and art, to be wiser than Him who made them. Ye enter no Italiantown without a bill of health, though now is no plague in Europe. Thispeevishness is for extortion's sake. The innkeepers cringe and fawn, andcheat, and in country places murder you. Yet will they give you cleansheets by paying therefor. Delicate in eating, and abhor from puttingtheir hand in the plate; sooner they will apply a crust or what not. They do even tell of a cardinal at Rome, which armeth his guest's lefthand with a little bifurcal dagger to hold the meat, while his knifecutteth it. But methinks this, too, is to be wiser than Him, who madethe hand so supple and prehensile. "

Eli. "I am of your mind, my lad. "

"They are sore troubled with the itch. And ointment for it, unguento perla rogna, is cried at every corner of Venice. From this my window I sawan urchin sell it to three several dames in silken trains, and to twovelvet knights. "

Catherine. "Italy, my lass, I rede ye wash your body i' the tubo' Sundays; and then ye can put your hand i' the plate o' Thursdaywithouten offence. "

"Their bread is lovely white. Their meats they spoil with sprinklingcheese over them; O, perversity! Their salt is black; without a lie. Incommerce these Venetians are masters of the earth and sea; and governtheir territories wisely. Only one flaw I find; the same I once hearda learned friar cast up against Plato his republic: to wit, that herewomen are encouraged to venal frailty, and do pay a tax to the State, which, not content with silk and spice, and other rich and honestfreights, good store, must trade in sin. Twenty thousand of theseJezebels there be in Venice and Candia, and about, pampered and honouredfor bringing strangers to the city, and many live in princely palaces oftheir own. But herein methinks the politic signors of Venice forget whatKing David saith, 'Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman wakethbut in vain. ' Also, in religion, they hang their cloth according to thewind, siding now with the Pope, now with the Turk; but aye with the godof traders, mammon hight. Shall flower so cankered bloom to the world'send? But since I speak of flowers, this none may deny them, that theyare most cunning in making roses and gilliflowers to blow unseasonably. In summer they nip certain of the budding roses and water them not. Thenin winter they dig round these discouraged plants, and put in cloves;and so with great art rear sweet-scented roses, and bring them to marketin January. And did first learn this art of a cow. Buds she grazed insummer, and they sprouted at yule. Women have sat in the doctors' chairsat their colleges. But she that sat in St. Peter's was a German. Italytoo, for artful fountains and figures that move by water and enact life. And next for fountains is Augsburg, where they harness the foul knaveSmoke to good Sir Spit, and he turneth stout Master Roast. But lest anyone place should vaunt, two towns there be in Europe, which, scorninggiddy fountains, bring water tame in pipes to every burgher's door, andhe filleth his vessels with but turning of a cock. One is London, so watered this many a year by pipes of a league from Paddington, aneighbouring city; and the other is the fair town of Lubeck. Also thefierce English are reported to me wise in that they will not share theirland and flocks with wolves; but have fairly driven those marauders intotheir mountains. But neither in France, nor Germany, nor Italy, is awayfarer's life safe from the vagabones after sundown. I can hear of noglazed house in all Venice; but only oiled linen and paper; and behindthese barbarian eyelets, a wooden jalosy. Their name for a cowardlyassassin is 'a brave man, ' and for an harlot, 'a courteous person, 'which is as much as to say that a woman's worst vice, and a man's worstvice, are virtues. But I pray God for little Holland that there anassassin may be yclept an assassin, and an harlot an harlot, tilldomesday; and then gloze foul faults with silken names who can!"

Eli (with a sigh). "He should have been a priest, saving your presence, my poor lass. "

"January 26. --Sweetheart, I must be brief, and tell thee but a part ofthat I have seen, for this day my journal ends. To-night it sails forthee, and I, unhappy, not with it, but to-morrow, in another ship, toRome. 

"Dear Margaret, I took a hand litter, and was carried to St. Mark hischurch. Outside it, towards the market-place, is a noble gallery, andabove it four famous horses, cut in brass by the ancient Romans, andseem all moving, and at the very next step must needs leap down on thebeholder. About the church are six hundred pillars of marble, porphyry, and ophites. Inside is a treasure greater than either, at St. Denys, or Loretto, or Toledo. Here a jewelled pitcher given the seigniory by aPersian king, also the ducal cap blazing with jewels, and on its crowna diamond and a chrysolite, each as big as an almond; two golden crownsand twelve golden stomachers studded with jewels, from Constantinople;item, a monstrous sapphire; item, a great diamond given by a Frenchking; item, a prodigious carbuncle; item, three unicorns' horns. Butwhat are these compared with the sacred relics?

"Dear Margaret, I stood and saw the brazen chest that holds the body ofSt. Mark the Evangelist. I saw with these eyes and handled his ring, andhis gospel written with his own hand, and all my travels seemed light;for who am I that I should see such things? Dear Margaret, his sacredbody was first brought from Alexandria, by merchants in 810, and thennot prized as now; for between 829, when this church was builded, and1094, the very place where it lay was forgotten. Then holy priestsfasted and prayed many days seeking for light, and lo! the Evangelist'sbody brake at midnight through the marble and stood before them. Theyfell to the earth; but in the morning found the crevice the sacred bodyhad burst through, and peering through it saw him lie. Then they tookand laid him in his chest beneath the altar, and carefully put back thestone with its miraculous crevice, which crevice I saw, and shall gapefor a monument while the world lasts. After that they showed me theVirgin's chair, it is of stone; also her picture, painted by St. Luke, very dark, and the features now scarce visible. This picture, in time ofdrought, they carry in procession, and brings the rain. I wish I hadnot seen it. Item, two pieces of marble spotted with John the Baptist'sblood; item, a piece of the true cross, and of the pillar to whichChrist was tied; item, the rock struck by Moses, and wet to this hour;also a stone Christ sat on, preaching at Tyre; but some say it is theone the patriarch Jacob laid his head on, and I hold with them, byreason our Lord never preached at Tyre. Going hence, they showed methe state nursery for the children of those aphrodisian dames, theirfavourites. Here in the outer wall was a broad niche, and if they bringthem so little as they can squeeze them through it alive, the bairnfalls into a net inside, and the state takes charge of it, but if toobig, their mothers must even take them home again, with whom abiding'tis like to be mali corvi mali ovum. Coming out of the church we metthem carrying in a corpse, with the feet and face bare. This I thenfirst learned is Venetian custom, and sure no other town will ever robthem of it, nor of this that follows. On a great porphyry slab in thepiazza were three ghastly heads rotting and tainting the air, and intheir hot summers like to take vengeance with breeding of a plague. These were traitors to the state, and a heavy price--two thousandducats--being put on each head, their friends had slain them and broughtall three to the slab, and so sold blood of others and their own faith. No state buys heads so many, nor pays half so high a price for thatsorry merchandise. But what I most admired was to see over against theDuke's palace a fair gallows in alabaster, reared express to bring him, and no other, for the least treason to the state; and there it stands inhis eye whispering him memento mori. I pondered, and owned these signorsmy masters, who will let no man, not even their sovereign, be above thecommon weal. Hard by, on a wall, the workmen were just finishing, byorder of the seigniory, the stone effigy of a tragical and enormous actenacted last year, yet on the wall looks innocent. Here two gentle folkswhisper together, and there other twain, their swords by their side. Four brethren were they, which did on either side conspire to poison theother two, and so halve their land in lieu of quartering it; and at amutual banquet these twain drugged the wine, and those twain envenomed amarchpane, to such good purpose that the same afternoon lay four 'bravemen' around one table grovelling in mortal agony, and cursing of oneanother and themselves, and so concluded miserably, and the land, forwhich they had lost their immortal souls, went into another family. Andwhy not? it could not go into a worse. 

"But O, sovereign wisdom of bywords! how true they put the finger oneach nation's, or particular's, fault. 

 "Quand Italie sera sans poison Et France sans trahison Et l'Angleterre sans guerre, Lors sera le monde sans terre. "

Richart explained this to Catherine, then proceeded: "And after thisthey took me to the quay, and presently I espied among the masts onegarlanded with amaranth flowers. 'Take me thither, ' said I, and I letmy guide know the custom of our Dutch skippers to hoist flowers tothe masthead when they are courting a maid. Oft had I scoffed at thissaying, 'So then his wooing is the earth's concern. But now, so far fromthe Rotter, that bunch at a masthead made my heart leap with assuranceof a countryman. They carried me, and oh, Margaret! on the stern of thatDutch boy, was written in muckle letters, RICHART ELIASSOEN, AMSTERDAM. 

'Put me down, ' I said; 'for our Lady's sake put me down. ' I sat on thebank and looked, scarce believing my eyes, and looked, and presentlyfell to crying, till I could see the words no more. Ah me, how they wentto my heart, those bare letters in a foreign land. Dear Richart! good, kind brother Richart! often I have sat on his knee and rid on his back. Kisses many he has given me, unkind word from him had I never. And therewas his name on his own ship, and his face and all his grave, but goodand gentle ways, came back to me, and I sobbed vehemently, and criedaloud, 'Why, why is not brother Richart here, and not his name only?' Ispake in Dutch, for my heart was too full to hold their foreign tongues, and

Eli. "Well, Richart, go on, lad, prithee go on. Is this a place to haltat?"

Richart. "Father, with my duty to you, it is easy to say go on, butthink ye I am not flesh and blood? The poor boy's--simple grief andbrotherly love coming--so sudden-on me, they go through my heart and--Icannot go on; sink me if I can even see the words, 'tis writ so fine. "

Denys. "Courage, good Master Richart! Take your time. Here are more eynewet than yours. Ah, little comrade! would God thou wert here, and I atVenice for thee. "

Richart. "Poor little curly-headed lad, what had he done that we havedriven him so far?"

"That is what I would fain know, " said Catherine drily, then fell toweeping and rocking herself, with her apron over her head. 

"Kind dame, good friends, " said Margaret trembling, "let me tell youhow the letter ends. The skipper hearing our Gerard speak his grief inDutch, accosted him, and spake comfortably to him; and after a whileour Gerard found breath to say he was worthy Master Richart's brother. Thereat was the good skipper all agog to serve him. "

Richart. "So! so! skipper! Master Richart aforesaid will be at thywedding and bring's purse to boot. "

Margaret. "Sir, he told Gerard of his consort that was to sail thatvery night for Rotterdam; and dear Gerard had to go home and finish hisletter and bring it to the ship. And the rest, it is but his poor dearwords of love to me, the which, an't please you, I think shame to hearthem read aloud, and ends with the lines I sent to Mistress Kate, andthey would sound so harsh now and ungrateful. "

The pleading tone, as much as the words, prevailed, and Richart said hewould read no more aloud, but run his eye over it for his own brotherlysatisfaction. She blushed and looked uneasy, but made no reply. 

"Eli, " said Catherine, still sobbing a little, "tell me, for our Lady'ssake, how our poor boy is to live at that nasty Rome. He is gone thereto write, but here he his own words to prove writing avails nought: ahad died o' hunger by the way but for paint-brush and psaltery. Wella-day!"

"Well, " said Eli, "he has got brush and music still. Besides, so manymen so many minds. Writing, though it had no sale in other parts, may bemerchandise at Rome. "

"Father, " said little Kate, "have I your good leave to put in my word'twixt mother and you?"

"And welcome, little heart. "

"Then, seems to me, painting and music, close at hand, be stronger thanwriting, but being distant, nought to compare; for see what glamourwritten paper hath done here but now. Our Gerard, writing at Venice, hath verily put his hand into this room at Rotterdam, and turned allour hearts. Ay, dear dear Gerard, methinks thy spirit hath rid hither onthese thy paper wings; and oh! dear father, why not do as we should dowere he here in the body?"

"Kate, " said Eli, "fear not; Richart and I will give him glamour forglamour. We will write him a letter, and send it to Rome by a sure handwith money, and bid him home on the instant. "

Cornelis and Sybrandt exchanged a gloomy look. 

"Ah, good father! And meantime?"

"Well, meantime?"

"Dear father, dear mother, what can we do to pleasure the absent, but bekind to his poor lass; and her own trouble afore her?"

"'Tis well!" said Eli; "but I am older than thou. " Then he turnedgravely to Margaret: "Wilt answer me a question, my pretty mistress?"

"If I may, sir, " faltered Margaret. 

"What are these marriage lines Gerard speaks of in the letter?"

"Our marriage lines, sir. His and mine. Know you not that we arebetrothed?"

"Before witnesses?"

"Ay, sure. My poor father and Martin Wittenhaagen. "

"This is the first I ever heard of it. How came they in his hands? Theyshould be in yours. "

"Alas, sir, the more is my grief; but I ne'er doubted him; and he saidit was a comfort to him to have them in his bosom. "

"Y'are a very foolish lass. "

"Indeed I was, sir. But trouble teaches the simple. "

"'Tis a good answer. Well, foolish or no, y'are honest. I had shown yemore respect at first, but I thought y'had been his leman, and that isthe truth. "

"God forbid, sir! Denys, methinks 'tis time for us to go. Give me myletter, sir!"

"Bide ye! bide ye! be not so hot for a word! Natheless, wife, methinksher red cheek becomes her. "

"Better than it did you to give it her, my man. "

"Softly, wife, softly. I am not counted an unjust man though I besomewhat slow. "

Here Richart broke in. "Why, mistress, did ye shed your blood for ourGerard?"

"Not I, sir. But maybe I would. "

"Nay, nay. But he says you did. Speak sooth now!"

"Alas! I know not what ye mean. I rede ye believe not all that my poorlad says of me. Love makes him blind. "

"Traitress!" cried Denys. "Let not her throw dust in thine eyes, Master Richart. Old Martin tells me ye need not make signals to me, she-comrade; I am as blind as love--Martin tells me she cut her arm, andlet her blood flow, and smeared her heels when Gerard was hunted by thebloodhounds, to turn the scent from her lad. "

"Well, and if I did, 'twas my own, and spilled for the good of my own, "said Margaret defiantly. But Catherine suddenly clasping her, she beganto cry at having found a bosom to cry on, of one who would have alsoshed her blood for Gerard in danger. 

Eli rose from his chair. "Wife, " said he solemnly, "you will set anotherchair at our table for every meal: also another plate and knife. Theywill be for Margaret and Peter. She will come when she likes, and stayaway when she pleases. None may take her place at my left hand. Such ascan welcome her are welcome to me. Such as cannot, I force them not toabide with me. The world is wide and free. Within my walls I am master, and my son's betrothed is welcome. "

Catherine bustled out to prepare supper. Eli and Richart sat down andconcocted a letter to bring Gerard home. Richart promised it should goby sea to Rome that very week. Sybrandt and Cornelis exchanged a gloomywink, and stole out. Margaret, seeing Giles deep in meditation, for thedwarf's intelligence had taken giant strides, asked him to bring her theletter. "You have heard but half, good master Giles, " said she. "Shall Iread you the rest?"

"I shall be much beholden to you, " shouted the sonorous atom. 

She gave him her stool: curiosity bowed his pride to sit on it; andMargaret murmured the first part of the letter into his ear very low, not to disturb Eli and Richart. And to do this, she leaned forward andput her lovely face cheek by jowl with Giles's hideous one: a strangecontrast, and worth a painter's while to try and represent. And in thisattitude Catherine found her, and all the mother warmed towards her, andshe exchanged an eloquent glance with little Kate. 

The latter smiled, and sewed, with drooping lashes. 

"Get him home on the instant, " roared Giles. "I'll make a man of him. "

"Hear the boy!" said Catherine, half comically, half proudly. 

"We hear him, " said Richart; "a mostly makes himself heard when a dospeak. "

Sybrandt. "Which will get to him first?"

Cornelis (gloomily). "Who can tell?"

CHAPTER LV

About two months before this scene in Eli's home, the natives of alittle' maritime place between Naples and Rome might be seen flocking tothe sea beach, with eyes cast seaward at a ship, that laboured against astiff gale blowing dead on the shore. 

At times she seemed likely to weather the danger, and then thespectators congratulated her aloud: at others the wind and sea droveher visibly nearer, and the lookers-on were not without a secretsatisfaction they would not have owned even to themselves. 

 Non quia vexari quemquam est jucunda voluptas Sed quibus ipse malis careas quia cernere suave est. 

And the poor ship, though not scientifically built for sailing, wasadmirably constructed for going ashore, with her extravagant poop thatcaught the wind, and her lines like a cocked hat reversed. To thoseon the beach that battered labouring frame of wood seemed alive, andstruggling against death with a panting heart. But could they have beentransferred to her deck they would have seen she had not one beatingheart but many, and not one nature but a score were coming out clear inthat fearful hour. 

The mariners stumbled wildly about the deck, handling the ropes as eachthought fit, and cursing and praying alternately. 

The passengers were huddled together round the mast, some sitting, somekneeling, some lying prostrate, and grasping the bulwarks as the vesselrolled and pitched in the mighty waves. One comely young man, whose ashycheek, but compressed lips, showed how hard terror was battling in himwith self-respect, stood a little apart, holding tight by a shroud, andwincing at each sea. It was the ill-fated Gerard. Meantime prayers andvows rose from the trembling throng amid-ships, and to hear them, it seemed there were almost as many gods about as men and women. Thesailors, indeed, relied on a single goddess. They varied her titlesonly, calling on her as "Queen of Heaven, " "Star of the Sea, " "Mistressof the World, " "Haven of Safety. " But among the landsmen Polytheismraged. Even those who by some strange chance hit on the same divinitydid not hit on the same edition of that divinity. An English merchantvowed a heap of gold to our lady of Walsingham. But a Genoese merchantvowed a silver collar of four pounds to our lady of Loretto; and aTuscan noble promised ten pounds of wax lights to our lady of Ravenna;and with a similar rage for diversity they pledged themselves, not onthe true Cross, but on the true Cross in this, that, or the other moderncity. 

Suddenly a more powerful gust than usual catching the sail at adisadvantage, the rotten shrouds gave way, and the sail was torn outwith a loud crack, and went down the wind smaller and smaller, blackerand blacker, and fluttered into the sea, half a mile off, like a sheetof paper, and ere the helmsman could put the ship's head before thewind, a wave caught her on the quarter and drenched the poor wretches tothe bone, and gave them a foretaste of chill death. Then one vowed aloudto turn Carthusian monk, if St. Thomas would save him. Another wouldgo a pilgrim to Compostella, bareheaded, barefooted, with nothing buta coat of mail on his naked skin, if St. James would save him. Othersinvoked Thomas, Dominic, Denys, and above all, Catherine of Sienna. 

Two petty Neapolitan traders stood shivering. 

One shouted at the top of his voice, "I vow to St. Christopher at Parisa waxen image of his own weight, if I win safe to land. "

On this the other nudged him, and said, "Brother, brother, take heedwhat you vow. Why, if you sell all you have in the world by publicauction, 'twill not buy his weight in wax. "

"Hold your tongue, you fool, " said the vociferator. Then in a whisper:

"Think ye I am in earnest? Let me but win safe to land, I'll not givehim a rush dip. "

Others lay flat and prayed to the sea. 

"Oh, most merciful sea! oh, sea most generous! oh! bountiful sea! oh, beautiful sea! be gentle, be kind, preserve us in this hour of peril. "

And others wailed and moaned in mere animal terror each time theill-fated ship rolled or pitched more terribly than usual; and she wasnow a mere plaything in the arms of the tremendous waves. 

A Roman woman of the humbler class sat with her child at her half-baredbreast, silent amid that wailing throng: her cheek ashy pale; her eyecalm; and her lips moved at times in silent prayer, but she neitherwept, nor lamented, nor bargained with the gods. Whenever the shipseemed really gone under their feet, and bearded men squeaked, shekissed her child; but that was all. And so she sat patient, and suckledhim in death's jaws; for why should he lose any joy she could give him;moribundo? Ay, there I do believe, sat Antiquity among those mediaevals. Sixteen hundred years had not tainted the old Roman blood in her veins;and the instinct of a race she had perhaps scarce heard of taught her todie with decent dignity. 

A gigantic friar stood on the poop with feet apart, like the Colossus ofRhodes, not so much defying, as ignoring, the peril that surrounded him. He recited verses from the Canticles with a loud unwavering voice; andinvited the passengers to confess to him. Some did so on their knees, and he heard them and laid his hands on them, and absolved them as ifhe had been in a snug sacristy, instead of a perishing ship. Gerard gotnearer and nearer to him, by the instinct that takes the wavering tothe side of the impregnable. And in truth, the courage of heroes facingfleshly odds might have paled by the side of that gigantic friar, andhis still more gigantic composure. Thus, even here, two were found whomaintained the dignity of our race: a woman, tender, yet heroic, and amonk steeled by religion against mortal fears. 

And now, the sail being gone, the sailors cut down the useless mast afoot above the board, and it fell with its remaining hamper over theship's side. This seemed to relieve her a little. 

But now the hull, no longer impelled by canvas, could not keep ahead ofthe sea. It struck her again and again on the poop, and the tremendousblows seemed given by a rocky mountain, not by a liquid. 

The captain left the helm and came amidships pale as death. "Lightenher, " he cried. "Fling all overboard, or we shall founder ere we strike, and lose the one little chance we have of life. " While the sailors wereexecuting this order, the captain, pale himself, and surrounded by palefaces that demanded to know their fate, was talking as unlike an Englishskipper in like peril as can well be imagined. "Friends, " said he, "lastnight when all was fair, too fair, alas! there came a globe of fireclose to the ship. When a pair of them come it is good luck, and noughtcan drown her that voyage. We mariners call these fiery globes Castorand Pollux. But if Castor come without Pollux, or Pollux without Castor, she is doomed. Therefore, like good Christians, prepare to die. "

These words were received with a loud wail. 

To a trembling inquiry how long they had to prepare, the captainreplied, "She may, or may not, last half an hour; over that, impossible;she leaks like a sieve; bustle, men, lighten her. "

The poor passengers seized on everything that was on deck and flungit overboard. Presently they laid hold of a heavy sack; an old man waslying on it, sea sick. They lugged it from under him. It rattled. Twoof them drew it to the side; up started the owner, and with an unearthlyshriek, pounced on it. "Holy Moses! what would you do? 'Tis my all;'tis the whole fruits of my journey; silver candlesticks, silver plates, brooches, hanaps--"

"Let go, thou hoary villain, " cried the others; "shall all our lives belost for thy ill-gotten gear?" "Fling him in with it, " cried one; "'tisthis Ebrew we Christian men are drowned for. " Numbers soon wrenched itfrom him, and heaved it over the side. It splashed into the waves. Thenits owner uttered one cry of anguish, and stood glaring, his white hairstreaming in the wind, and was going to leap after it, and would, hadit floated. But it sank, and was gone for ever; and he staggered to andfro, tearing his hair, and cursed them and the ship, and the sea, andall the powers of heaven and hell alike. 

And now the captain cried out: "See, there is a church in sight. Steerfor that church, mate, and you, friends, pray to the saint, whoe'er hebe. "

So they steered for the church and prayed to the unknown god it wasnamed after. A tremendous sea pooped them, broke the rudder, and jammedit immovable, and flooded the deck. 

Then wild with superstitious terror some of them came round Gerard. "Here is the cause of all, " they cried. "He has never invoked a singlesaint. He is a heathen; here is a pagan aboard. "

"Alas, good friends, say not so, " said Gerard, his teeth chattering withcold and fear. "Rather call these heathens, that lie a praying tothe sea. Friends, I do honour the saints--but I dare not pray to themnow--there is no time--(oh!) what avail me Dominic, and Thomas, andCatherine? Nearer God's throne than these St. Peter sitteth; and if Ipray to him, it's odd, but I shall be drowned ere he has time to pleadmy cause with God. Oh! oh! oh! I must need go straight to Him that madethe sea, and the saints, and me. Our Father which art in heaven, savethese poor souls and me that cry for the bare life! Oh, sweet Jesus, pitiful Jesus, that didst walk Genezaret when Peter sank, and wept forLazarus dead when the apostles' eyes were dry, oh, save poor Gerard--fordear Margaret's sake!"

At this moment the sailors were seen preparing to desert the sinkingship in the little boat, which even at that epoch every ship carried;then there was a rush of egotists; and thirty souls crowded into it. Remained behind three who were bewildered, and two who were paralyzed, with terror. The paralyzed sat like heaps of wet rags, the bewilderedones ran to and fro, and saw the thirty egotists put off, but made noattempt to join them: only kept running to and fro, and wringing theirhands. Besides these there was one on his knees, praying over the woodenstatue of the Virgin Mary, as large as life, which the sailors hadreverently detached from the mast. It washed about the deck, as thewater came slushing in from the sea, and pouring out at the scuppers;and this poor soul kept following it on his knees, with his handsclasped at it, and the water playing with it. And there was the Jewpalsied, but not by fear. He was no longer capable of so petty apassion. He sat cross-legged, bemoaning his bag, and whenever thespray lashed him, shook his fist at where it came from, and cursed theNazarenes, and their gods, and their devils, and their ships, and theirwaters, to all eternity. 

And the gigantic Dominican, having shriven the whole ship, stood calmlycommuning with his own spirit. And the Roman woman sat pale and patient, only drawing her child closer to her bosom as death came nearer. 

Gerard saw this, and it awakened his manhood. 

"See! see!" he said, "they have ta'en the boat and left the poor womanand her child to perish. "

His heart soon set his wit working. 

"Wife, I'll save thee yet, please God. " And he ran to find a cask or aplank to float her. There was none. 

Then his eye fell on the wooden image of the Virgin. He caught it up inhis arms, and heedless of a wail that issued from its worshipper like achild robbed of its toy, ran aft with it. "Come, wife, " he cried. "I'll lash thee and the child to this. 'Tis sore worm eaten, but 'twillserve. "

She turned her great dark eye on him and said a single word:

"Thyself?!"

But with wonderful magnanimity and tenderness. 

"I am a man, and have no child to take care of. "

"Ah!" said she, and his words seemed to animate her face with a desireto live. He lashed the image to her side. Then with the hope of life shelost something of her heroic calm; not much: her body trembled a little, but not her eye. 

The ship was now so low in the water that by using an oar as a lever hecould slide her into the waves. 

"Come, " said he, "while yet there is time. "

She turned her great Roman eyes, wet now, upon him. "Poor youth!--Godforgive me!--My child!" And he launched her on the surge, and with hisoar kept her from being battered against the ship. 

A heavy hand fell on him; a deep sonorous voice sounded in his ear:"'Tis well. Now come with me. "

It was the gigantic friar. 

Gerard turned, and the friar took two strides, and laid hold of thebroken mast. Gerard did the same, obeying him instinctively. Betweenthem, after a prodigious effort, they hoisted up the remainder of themast, and carried it off. "Fling it in, " said the friar, "and followit. " They flung it in; but one of the bewildered passengers had runafter them, and jumped first and got on one end. Gerard seized theother, the friar the middle. 

It was a terrible situation. The mast rose and plunged with each wavelike a kicking horse, and the spray flogged their faces mercilessly, andblinded them: to help knock them off. 

Presently was heard a long grating noise ahead. The ship had struck, andsoon after, she being stationary now, they were hurled against her withtremendous force. Their companion's head struck against the upper partof the broken rudder with a horrible crack, and was smashed like acocoa-nut by a sledge-hammer. He sunk directly, leaving no trace buta red stain on the water, and a white clot on the jagged rudder, and adeath cry ringing in their ears, as they drifted clear under the lee ofthe black hull. The friar uttered a short Latin prayer for the safety ofhis soul, and took his place composedly. They rolled along; one momentthey saw nothing, and seemed down in a mere basin of watery hills: thenext they caught glimpses of the shore speckled bright with people, who kept throwing up their arms with wild Italian gestures to encouragethem, and the black boat driving bottom upwards, and between it andthem the woman rising and falling like themselves. She had come across apaddle, and was holding her child tight with her left arm, and paddlinggallantly with her right. 

When they had tumbled along thus a long time, suddenly the friar saidquietly--

"I touched the ground. "

"Impossible, father, " said Gerard; "we are more than a hundred yardsfrom shore. Prithee, prithee, leave not our faithful mast. "

"My son, " said the friar, "you speak prudently. But know that I havebusiness of Holy Church on hand, and may not waste time floating whenI can walk, in her service. There I felt it with my toes again; see thebenefit of wearing sandals, and not shoon. Again; and sandy. Thystature is less than mine: keep to the mast! I walk. " He left the mastaccordingly and extending his powerful arms, rushed through the water. Gerard soon followed him. At each overpowering wave the monk stood likea tower, and closing his mouth, threw his head back to encounter it, andwas entirely lost under it awhile: then emerged and ploughed lustily on. At last they came close to the shore; but the suction outward baffledall their attempts to land. Then the natives sent stout fishermen intothe sea, holding by long spears in a triple chain; and so dragged themashore. 

The friar shook himself, bestowed a short paternal benediction on thenatives, and went on to Rome, with eyes bent on earth according to hisrule, and without pausing. He did not even cast a glance back upon thatsea, which had so nearly engulfed him, but had no power to harm him, without his Master's leave. 

While he stalks on alone to Rome without looking back, I who am not inthe service of Holy Church, stop a moment to say that the reader andI were within six inches of this giant once before; but we escaped himthat time. Now I fear we are in for him. Gerard grasped every hand uponthe beach. They brought him to an enormous fire, and with a delicacyhe would hardly have encountered in the north, left him to dry himselfalone: on this he took out of his bosom a parchment, and a paper, anddried them carefully. When this was done to his mind, and not till then, he consented to put on a fisherman's dress and leave his own by thefire, and went down to the beach. What he saw may be briefly related. 

The captain stuck by the ship, not so much from gallantry, as from aconviction that it was idle to resist Castor or Pollux, whichever it wasthat had come for him in a ball of fire. 

Nevertheless the sea broke up the ship and swept the poop, captain andall, clear of the rest, and took him safe ashore. Gerard had a principalhand in pulling him out of the water. The disconsolate Hebrew landed onanother fragment, and on touching earth, offered a reward for his bag, which excited little sympathy, but some amusement. Two more were savedon pieces of the wreck. The thirty egotists came ashore, but one ata time, and dead; one breathed still. Him the natives, with excellentintentions, took to a hot fire. So then he too retired from thisshifting scene. 

As Gerard stood by the sea, watching, with horror and curiosity mixed, his late companions washed ashore, a hand was laid lightly on hisshoulder. He turned. It was the Roman matron, burning with womanlygratitude. She took his hand gently, and raising it slowly to her lips, kissed it; but so nobly, she seemed to be conferring an honour on onedeserving hand. Then with face all beaming and moist eyes, she held herchild up and made him kiss his preserver. 

Gerard kissed the child more than once. He was fond of children. But hesaid nothing. He was much moved; for she did not speak at all, exceptwith her eyes, and glowing cheeks, and noble antique gesture, so largeand stately. Perhaps she was right. Gratitude is not a thing of words. It was an ancient Roman matron thanking a modern from her heart ofhearts. 

Next day towards afternoon, Gerard--twice as old as last year, thriceas learned in human ways, a boy no more, but a man who had shed blood inself-defence, and grazed the grave by land and sea--reached the EternalCity; post tot naufragia tutus. 

CHAPTER LVI

Gerard took a modest lodging on the west bank of the Tiber, and everyday went forth in search of work, taking a specimen round to every shophe could hear of that executed such commissions. 

They received him coldly. "We make our letter somewhat thinner thanthis, " said one. "How dark your ink is, " said another. But the main crywas, "What avails this? Scant is the Latin writ here now. Can ye notwrite Greek?"

"Ay, but not nigh so well as Latin. "

"Then you shall never make your bread at Rome. "

Gerard borrowed a beautiful Greek manuscript at a high price, and wenthome with a sad hole in his purse, but none in his courage. 

In a fortnight he had made vast progress with the Greek character;so then, to lose no time, he used to work at it till noon, and huntcustomers the rest of the day. 

When he carried round a better Greek specimen than any they possessed, the traders informed him that Greek and Latin were alike unsaleable; thecity was thronged with works from all Europe. He should have come lastyear. 

Gerard bought a psaltery. His landlady, pleased with his looks andmanners, used often to speak a kind word in passing. One day she madehim dine with her, and somewhat to his surprise asked him what haddashed his spirits. He told her. She gave him her reading of the matter. "Those sly traders, " she would be bound, "had writers in their pay, for whose work they received a noble price, and paid a sorry one. So nowonder they blow cold on you. Methinks you write too well. How know Ithat? say you. Marry--marry, because you lock not your door, like thechurl Pietro, and women will be curious. Ay, ay, you write too well forthem. "

Gerard asked an explanation. 

"Why, " said she, "your good work might put out the eyes of that they areselling. "

Gerard sighed. "Alas! dame, you read folk on the ill side, and you sokind and frank yourself. "

"My dear little heart, these Romans are a subtle race. Me? I am aSiennese, thanks to the Virgin. "

"My mistake was leaving Augsburg, " said Gerard. 

"Augsburg?" said she haughtily: "is that a place to even to Rome? Inever heard of it, for my part. "

She then assured him that he should make his fortune in spite of thebooksellers. "Seeing thee a stranger, they lie to thee without sense ordiscretion. Why, all the world knows that our great folk are bitten withthe writing spider this many years, and pour out their money like water, and turn good land and houses into writ sheepskins, to keep in a chestor a cupboard. God help them, and send them safe through this fury, asHe hath through a heap of others; and in sooth hath been somewhat lesscutting and stabbing among rival factions, and vindictive eating oftheir opposites' livers, minced and fried, since Scribbling came in. Why, I can tell you two. There is his eminence Cardinal Bassarion, andhis holiness the Pope himself. There be a pair could keep a score suchas thee a writing night and day. But I'll speak to Teresa; she hears thegossip of the court. "

The next day she told him she had seen Teresa, and had heard of fivemore signors who were bitten with the writing spider. Gerard took downtheir names, and bought parchment, and busied himself for some days inpreparing specimens. He left one, with his name and address, at each ofthese signors' doors, and hopefully awaited the result. 

There was none. 

Day after day passed and left him heartsick. 

And strange to say this was just the time when Margaret was fighting sohard against odds to feed her male dependents at Rotterdam, and arrestedfor curing without a licence instead of killing with one. 

Gerard saw ruin staring him in the face. 

He spent the afternoons picking up canzonets and mastering them. He laidin playing cards to colour, and struck off a meal per day. 

This last stroke of genius got him into fresh trouble. 

In these "camere locande" the landlady dressed all the meals, thoughthe lodgers bought the provisions. So Gerard's hostess speedily detectedhim, and asked him if he was not ashamed himself: by which brusqueopening, having made him blush and look scared, she pacified herselfall in a moment, and appealed to his good sense whether Adversity was athing to be overcome on an empty stomach. 

"Patienza, my lad! times will mend; meantime I will feed you for thelove of heaven. " (Italian for "gratis. ")

"Nay, hostess, " said Gerard, "my purse is not yet quite void, and itwould add to my trouble an if true folk should lose their due by me. "

"Why, you are as mad as your neighbour Pietro, with his one badpicture. "

"Why, how know you 'tis a bad picture?"

"Because nobody will buy it. There is one that hath no gift. He willhave to don casque and glaive, and carry his panel for a shield. "

Gerard pricked up his ears at this: so she told him more. Pietro hadcome from Florence with money in his purse, and an unfinished picture;had taken her one unfurnished room, opposite Gerard's, and furnishedit neatly. When his picture was finished, he received visitors and hadoffers for it: though in her opinion liberal ones, he had refused sodisdainfully as to make enemies of his customers. Since then he hadoften taken it out with him to try and sell, but had always brought itback; and the last month, she had seen one movable after another go outof his room, and now he wore but one suit, and lay at night on a greatchest. She had found this out only by peeping through the keyhole, forhe locked the door most vigilantly whenever he went out. "Is he afraidwe shall steal his chest, or his picture, that no soul in all Rome isweak enough to buy?"

"Nay, sweet hostess; see you not 'tis his poverty he would screen fromview?"

"And the more fool he! Are all our hearts as ill as his? A might give usa trial first, anyway. "

"How you speak of him. Why, his case is mine; and your countryman toboot. "

"Oh, we Siennese love strangers. His case yours? Nay, 'tis just thecontrary. You are the comeliest youth ever lodged in this house; hairlike gold: he is a dark, sour-visaged loon. Besides, you know how totake a woman on her better side; but not he. Natheless, I wish he wouldnot starve to death in my house, to get me a bad name. Anyway, onestarveling is enough in any house. You are far from home, and it is forme, which am the mistress here, to number your meals--for me and theDutch wife, your mother, that is far away: we two women shall settlethat matter. Mind thou thine own business, being a man, and leavecooking and the like to us, that are in the world for little else thatI see but to roast fowls, and suckle men at starting, and sweep theirgrownup cobwebs. "

"Dear kind dame, in sooth you do often put me in mind of my mother thatis far away. "

"All the better; I'll put you more in mind of her before I have donewith you. " And the honest soul beamed with pleasure. 

Gerard not being an egotist, nor blinded by female partialities, saw hisown grief in poor proud Pietro; and the more he thought of it the morehe resolved to share his humble means with that unlucky artist; Pietro'ssympathy would repay him. He tried to waylay him; but without success. 

One day he heard a groaning in the room. He knocked at the door, butreceived no answer. He knocked again. A surly voice bade him enter. 

He obeyed somewhat timidly, and entered a garret furnished with a chair, a picture, face to wall, an iron basin, an easel, and a long chest, on which was coiled a haggard young man with a wonderfully bright eye. Anything more like a coiled cobra ripe for striking the first comer wasnever seen. 

"Good Signor Pietro, " said Gerard, "forgive me that, weary of my ownsolitude, I intrude on yours; but I am your nighest neighbour in thishouse, and methinks your brother in fortune. I am an artist too. "

"You are a painter? Welcome, signer. Sit down on my bed. "

And Pietro jumped off and waved him into the vacant throne with amagnificent demonstration of courtesy. 

Gerard bowed, and smiled; but hesitated a little. "I may not callmyself a painter. I am a writer, a caligraph. I copy Greek and Latinmanuscripts, when I can get them to copy. "

"And you call that an artist?"

"Without offence to your superior merit, Signor Pietro. "

"No offence, stranger, none. Only, meseemeth an artist is one whothinks, and paints his thought. Now a caligraph but draws in black andwhite the thoughts of another. "

"'Tis well distinguished, signor. But then, a writer can write thethoughts of the great ancients, and matters of pure reason, such asno man may paint: ay, and the thoughts of God, which angels could notpaint. But let that pass. I am a painter as well; but a sorry one. "

"The better thy luck. 'They will buy thy work in Rome. "

"But seeking to commend myself to one of thy eminence, I thought it wellrather to call myself a capable writer, than a scurvy painter. "

At this moment a step was heard on the stair. "Ah! 'tis the good dame, "cried Gerard. "What oh! hostess, I am here in conversation with SignorPietro. I dare say he will let me have my humble dinner here. "

The Italian bowed gravely. 

The landlady brought in Gerard's dinner smoking and savoury. She put thedish down on the bed with a face divested of all expression, and went. 

Gerard fell to. But ere he had eaten many mouthfuls, he stopped, andsaid: "I am an ill-mannered churl, Signor Pietro. I ne'er eat to my mindwhen I eat alone. For our Lady's sake put a spoon into this ragout withme; 'tis not unsavoury, I promise you. "

Pietro fixed his glittering eye on him. 

"What, good youth, thou a stranger, and offerest me thy dinner?"

"Why, see, there is more than one can eat. "

"Well, I accept, " said Pietro; and took the dish with some appearance ofcalmness, and flung the contents out of window. 

Then he turned, trembling with mortification and ire, and said: "Letthat teach thee to offer alms to an artist thou knowest not, masterwriter. "

Gerard's face flushed with anger, and it cost him a bitter struggle notto box this high-souled creature's ears. And then to go and destroygood food! His mother's milk curdled in his veins with horror at suchimpiety. Finally, pity at Pietro's petulance and egotism, and a touch ofrespect for poverty-struck pride, prevailed. 

However, he said coldly, "Likely what thou hast done might pass in anovel of thy countryman, Signor Boccaccio; but 'twas not honest. "

"Make that good!" said the painter sullenly. 

"I offered thee half my dinner; no more. But thou hast ta'en it all. Hadst a right to throw away thy share, but not mine. Pride is well, butjustice is better. "

Pietro stared, then reflected. 

"'Tis well. I took thee for a fool, so transparent was thine artifice. Forgive me! And prithee leave me! Thou seest how 'tis with me. The worldhath soured me. I hate mankind. I was not always so. Once more excusethat my discourtesy, and fare thee well. "

Gerard sighed, and made for the door. 

But suddenly a thought struck him. "Signor Pietro, " said he, "weDutchmen are hard bargainers. We are the lads 'een eij scheeren, ' thatis, 'to shave an egg. ' Therefore, I, for my lost dinner, do claim tofeast mine eyes on your picture, whose face is toward the wall. "

"Nay, nay, " said the painter hastily, "ask me not that; I have alreadymisconducted myself enough towards thee. I would not shed thy blood. "

"Saints forbid! My blood?"

"Stranger, " said Pietro sullenly, "irritated by repeated insults to mypicture, which is my child, my heart, I did in a moment of rage make asolemn vow to drive my dagger into the next one that should flout it, and the labour and love that I have given to it. "

"What, are all to be slain that will not praise this picture?" and helooked at its back with curiosity. 

"Nay, nay; if you would but look at it, and hold your parrot tongues. But you will be talking. So I have turned it to the wall for ever. WouldI were dead, and buried in it for my coffin!"

Gerard reflected. 

"I accept the condition. Show me the picture! I can but hold my peace. "

Pietro went and turned its face, and put it in the best light the roomafforded, and coiled himself again on his chest, with his eye, andstiletto, glittering. 

The picture represented the Virgin and Christ, flying through the air ina sort of cloud of shadowy cherubic faces; underneath was a landscape, forty or fifty miles in extent, and a purple sky above. 

Gerard stood and looked at it in silence. Then he stepped close, andlooked. Then he retired as far off as he could, and looked; but said nota word. 

When he had been at this game half an hour, Pietro cried out querulouslyand somewhat inconsistently: "well, have you not a word to say aboutit?"

Gerard started. "I cry your mercy; I forgot there were three of us here. Ay, I have much to say. " And he drew his sword. 

"Alas! alas!" cried Pietro, jumping in terror from his lair. "Whatwouldst thou?"

"Marry, defend myself against thy bodkin, signor; and at due odds, being, as aforesaid, a Dutchman. Therefore, hold aloof, while I deliverjudgment, or I will pin thee to the wall like a cockchafer. "

"Oh! is that all?" said Pietro, greatly relieved. "I feared you weregoing to stab my poor picture with your sword, stabbed already by somany foul tongues. "

Gerard "pursued criticism under difficulties. " Put himself in a positionof defence, with his sword's point covering Pietro, and one eye glancingaside at the picture. "First, signor, I would have you know that, inthe mixing of certain colours, and in the preparation of your oil, youItalians are far behind us Flemings. But let that flea stick. For assmall as I am, I can show you certain secrets of the Van Eycks, that youwill put to marvellous profit in your next picture. Meantime I see inthis one the great qualities of your nation. Verily, ye are solis filii. If we have colour, you have imagination. Mother of Heaven! an he hathnot flung his immortal soul upon the panel. One thing I go by is this;it makes other pictures I once admired seem drossy, earth-born things. The drapery here is somewhat short and stiff, why not let it floatfreely, the figures being in air and motion?

"I will! I will!" cried Pietro eagerly. "I will do anything for thosewho will but see what I have done. "

"Humph! This landscape it enlightens me. Henceforth I scorn those littlehuddled landscapes that did erst content me. Here is nature's very face:a spacious plain, each distance marked, and every tree, house, figure, field, and river smaller and less plain, by exquisite gradation, tillvision itself melts into distance. O, beautiful! And the cunning roguehath hung his celestial figure in air out of the way of his little worldbelow. Here, floating saints beneath heaven's purple canopy. There, far down, earth and her busy hives. And they let you take this paintedpoetry, this blooming hymn, through the streets of Rome and bring ithome unsold. But I tell thee in Ghent or Bruges, or even in Rotterdam, they would tear it out of thy hands. But it is a common saying that astranger's eye sees clearest. Courage, Pietro Vanucci! I reverence theeand though myself a scurvy painter, do forgive thee for being a greatone. Forgive thee? I thank God for thee and such rare men as thou art;and bow the knee to thee in just homage. Thy picture is immortal, andthou, that hast but a chest to sit on, art a king in thy most royal art. Viva, il maestro! Viva!"

At this unexpected burst the painter, with all the abandon of hisnation, flung himself on Gerard's neck. "They said it was a maniac'sdream, " he sobbed. 

"Maniacs themselves! no, idiots!" shouted Gerard. 

"Generous stranger! I will hate men no more since the world hath such asthee. I was a viper to fling thy poor dinner away; a wretch, a monster. "

"Well, monster, wilt be gentle now, and sup with me?"

"Ah! that I will. Whither goest thou?"

"To order supper on the instant. We will have the picture for thirdman. "

"I will invite it whiles thou art gone. My poor picture, child of myheart. "

"Ah, master, 'twill look on many a supper after the worms have eaten youand me. "

"I hope so, " said Pietro. 

CHAPTER LVII

About a week after this the two friends sat working together, but not inthe same spirit. Pietro dashed fitfully at his, and did wonders in a fewminutes, and then did nothing, except abuse it; then presently resumedit in a fury, to lay it down with a groan. Through all which kept calmlyworking, calmly smiling, the canny Dutchman. 

To be plain, Gerard, who never had a friend he did not master, had puthis Onagra in harness. The friends were painting playing cards to boilthe pot. 

When done, the indignant master took up his picture to make his dailytour in search of a customer. 

Gerard begged him to take the cards as well, and try and sell them. He looked all the rattle-snake, but eventually embraced Gerard in theItalian fashion, and took them, after first drying the last-finishedones in the sun, which was now powerful in that happy clime. 

Gerard, left alone, executed a Greek letter or two, and then mendeda little rent in his hose. His landlady found him thus employed, andinquired ironically whether there were no women in the house. 

"When you have done that, " said she "come and talk to Teresa, my friendI spoke to thee of, that hath a husband not good for much, which bragshis acquaintance with the great. "

Gerard went down, and who should Teresa be but the Roman matron. 

"Ah, madama, " said he, "is it you? The good dame told me not that. Andthe little fair-haired boy, is he well is he none the worse for hisvoyage in that strange boat?"

"He is well, " said the matron. 

"Why, what are you two talking about?" said the landlady, staring atthem both in turn; "and why tremble you so, Teresa mia?"

"He saved my child's life, " said Teresa, making an effort to composeherself. 

"What! my lodger? and he never told me a word of that. Art not ashamedto look me in the face?"

"Alas! speak not harshly to him, " said the matron. She then turned toher friend and poured out a glowing description of Gerard's conduct, during which Gerard stood blushing like a girl, and scarce recognizinghis own performance, gratitude painted it so fair. 

"And to think thou shouldst ask me to serve thy lodger, of whom I knewnought but that he had thy good word, oh, Fiammina; and that was enoughfor me. Dear youth, in serving thee I serve myself. "

Then ensued an eager description, by the two women, of what had beendone, and what should be done, to penetrate the thick wall of fees, commissions, and chicanery, which stood between the patrons of art andan unknown artist in the Eternal City. 

Teresa smiled sadly at Gerard's simplicity in leaving specimens of hisskill at the doors of the great. 

"What!" said she, "without promising the servants a share--without evenfeeing them, to let the signors see thy merchandise! As well have flungit into Tiber. "

"Well-a-day!" sighed Gerard. "Then how is an artist to find a patron?for artists are poor, not rich. "

"By going to some city nobler and not so greedy as this, " said Teresa. "La corte Romana non vuol' pecora senza lana. "

She fell into thought, and said she would come again to-morrow. 

The landlady felicitated Gerard. "Teresa has got something in her head, "said she. 

Teresa was scarce gone when Pietro returned with his picture, lookingblack as thunder. Gerard exchanged a glance with the landlady, andfollowed him upstairs to console him. 

"What, have they let thee bring home thy masterpiece?"

"As heretofore. "

"More fools they, then. "

"That is not the worse. "

"Why, what is the matter?"

"They have bought the cards, " yelled Pietro, and hammered the airfuriously right and left. 

"All the better, " said Gerard cheerfully. 

"They flew at me for them. They were enraptured with them. They triedto conceal their longing for them, but could not. I saw, I feigned, Ipillaged; curse the boobies. "

And he flung down a dozen small silver coins on the floor and jumpedon them, and danced on them with basilisk eyes, and then kicked themassiduously, and sent them spinning and flying, and running all abroad. Down went Gerard on his knees, and followed the maltreated innocentsdirectly, and transferred them tenderly to his purse. 

"Shouldst rather smile at their ignorance, and put it to profit, " saidhe. 

"And so I will, " said Pietro, with concentrated indignation. "Thebrutes! We will paint a pack a day; we will set the whole city gamblingand ruining itself, while we live like princes on its vices andstupidity. There was one of the queens, though, I had fain have keptback. 'Twas you limned her, brother. She had lovely red-brown hair andsapphire eyes, and above all, soul. "

"Pietro, " said Gerard softly, "I painted that one from my heart. "

The quick-witted Italian nodded, and his eyes twinkled. 

"You love her so well, yet leave her. "

"Pietro, it is because I love her so dear that I have wandered all thisweary road. "

This interesting colloquy was interrupted by the landlady crying frombelow, "Come down, you are wanted. " He went down, and there was Teresaagain. 

"Come with me, Ser Gerard. "

CHAPTER LVIII

Gerard walked silently beside Teresa, wondering in his own mind, afterthe manner of artists, what she was going to do with him; instead ofasking her. So at last she told him of her own accord. A friend hadinformed her of a working goldsmith's wife who wanted a writer. "Hershop is hard by; you will not have far to go. "

Accordingly they soon arrived at the goldsmith's wife. 

"Madama, " said Teresa, "Leonora tells me you want a writer: I havebrought you a beautiful one; he saved my child at sea. Prithee look onhim with favour. "

The goldsmith's wife complied in one sense. She fixed her eyes onGerard's comely face, and could hardly take them off again. But herreply was unsatisfactory. "Nay, I have no use for a writer. Ah! I mindnow, it is my gossip, Claelia, the sausage-maker, wants one; she toldme, and I told Leonora. "

Teresa made a courteous speech and withdrew. 

Claelia lived at some distance, and when they reached her house she wasout. Teresa said calmly, "I will await her return, " and sat so still, and dignified, and statuesque, that Gerard was beginning furtively todraw her, when Claelia returned. 

"Madama, I hear from the goldsmith's wife, the excellent Olympia, that you need a writer" (here she took Gerard by the hand and led himforward); "I have brought you a beautiful one; he saved my child fromthe cruel waves. For our Lady's sake look with favour on him. "

"My good dame, my fair Ser, " said Claelia, "I have no use for a writer;but now you remind me, it was my friend Appia Claudia asked me for onebut the other day. She is a tailor, lives in the Via Lepida. "

Teresa retired calmly. 

"Madama, " said Gerard, "this is likely to be a tedious business foryou. "

Teresa opened her eyes. 

"What was ever done without a little patience?" She added mildly, "Wewill knock at every door at Rome but you shall have justice. "

"But, madama, I think we are dogged. I noticed a man that follows us, sometimes afar, sometimes close. "

"I have seen it, " said Teresa coldly; but her cheek coloured faintly. "It is my poor Lodovico. "

She stopped and turned, and beckoned with her finger. 

A figure approached them somewhat unwillingly. 

When he came up, she gazed him full in the face, and he looked sheepish. 

"Lodovico mio, " said she, "know this young Ser, of whom I have so oftenspoken to thee. Know him and love him, for he it was who saved thy wifeand child. "

At these last words Lodovico, who had been bowing and grinningartificially, suddenly changed to an expression of heartfelt gratitude, and embraced Gerard warmly. 

Yet somehow there was something in the man's original manner, and hishaving followed his wife by stealth, that made Gerard uncomfortableunder this caress. However, he said, "We shall have your company, SerLodovico?"

"No, signor, " replied Lodovico, "I go not on that side Tiber. "

"Addio, then, " said Teresa significantly. 

"When shall you return home, Teresa mia?"

"When I have done mine errand, Lodovico. "

They pursued their way in silence. Teresa now wore a sad and almostgloomy air. 

To be brief, Appia Claudia was merciful, and did not send them overTiber again, but only a hundred yards down the street to Lucretia, whokept the glove shop; she it was wanted a writer; but what for, AppiaClaudia could not conceive. Lucretia was a merry little dame, whoreceived them heartily enough, and told them she wanted no writer, keptall her accounts in her head. "It was for my confessor, Father Colonna;he is mad after them. "

"I have heard of his excellency, " said Teresa. 

"Who has not?"

"But, good dame, he is a friar; he has made vow of poverty. I cannot letthe young man write and not be paid. He saved my child at sea. 

"Did he now?" And Lucretia cast an approving look on Gerard. "Well, makeyour mind easy; a Colonna never wants for money. The good father hasonly to say the word, and the princes of his race will pour a thousandcrowns into his lap. And such a confessor, dame! the best in Rome. Hishead is leagues and leagues away all the while; he never heeds what youare saying. Why, I think no more of confessing my sins to him than oftelling them to that wall. Once, to try him, I confessed, along withthe rest, as how I had killed my lodger's little girl and baked her ina pie. Well, when my voice left off confessing, he started out of hisdream, and says he, a mustering up a gloom, 'My erring sister, say threePaternosters and three Ave Marias kneeling, and eat no butter nor eggsnext Wednesday, and pax vobiscum!' and off a went with his hands behindhim, looking as if there was no such thing as me in the world. "

Teresa waited patiently, then calmly brought this discursive lady backto the point: "Would she be so kind as go with this good youth to thefriar and speak for him?"

"Alack! how can I leave my shop? And what need? His door is aye open towriters, and painters, and scholars, and all such cattle. Why, one dayhe would not receive the Duke d'Urbino, because a learned Greek wascloseted with him, and the friar's head and his so close together over adusty parchment just come in from Greece, as you could put one cowl overthe pair. His wench Onesta told me. She mostly looks in here for a chatwhen she goes an errand. "

"This is the man for thee, my friend, " said Teresa. 

"All you have to do, " continued Lucretia, "is to go to his lodgings (myboy shall show them you), and tell Onesta you come from me, and you area writer, and she will take you up to him. If you put a piece of silverin the wench's hand, 'twill do you no harm: that stands to reason. "

"I have silver, " said Teresa warmly. 

"But stay, " said Lucretia, "mind one thing. What the young man saith hecan do, that he must be able to do, or let him shun the good friar likepoison. He is a very wild beast against all bunglers. Why, 'twas butt'other day, one brought him an ill-carved crucifix. Says he, 'Is thishow you present "Salvator Mundi?" who died for you in mortal agony; andyou go and grudge him careful work. This slovenly gimcrack, a crucifix?But that it is a crucifix of some sort, and I am a holy man, I'd dustyour jacket with your crucifix, ' says he. Onesta heard every wordthrough the key-hole; so mind. "

"Have no fears, madama, " said Teresa loftily. "I will answer for hisability; he saved my child. "

Gerard was not subtle enough to appreciate this conclusion; and was sofar from sharing Teresa's confidence that he begged a respite. He wouldrather not go to the friar to-day: would not to-morrow do as well?

"Here is a coward for ye, " said Lucretia. 

"No, he is not a coward, " said Teresa, firing up; "he is modest. "

"I am afraid of this high-born, fastidious friar, " said Gerard, "Consider he has seen the handiwork of all the writers in Italy, deardame Teresa; if you would but let me prepare a better piece of work thanyet I have done, and then to-morrow I will face him with it. "

"I consent, " said Teresa. 

They walked home together. 

Not far from his own lodging was a shop that sold vellum. There was abeautiful white skin in the window. Gerard looked at it wistfully; buthe knew he could not pay for it; so he went on rather hastily. However, he soon made up his mind where to get vellum, and parting with Teresa athis own door, ran hastily upstairs, and took the bond he had brought allthe way from Sevenbergen, and laid it with a sigh on the table. He thenprepared with his chemicals to erase the old writing; but as this washis last chance of reading it, he now overcame his deadly repugnanceto bad writing, and proceeded to decipher the deed in spite of itsdetestable contractions. It appeared by this deed that Ghysbrecht VanSwieten was to advance some money to Floris Brandt on a piece of land, and was to repay himself out of the rent. 

On this Gerard felt it would be imprudent and improper to destroy thedeed. On the contrary, he vowed to decipher every word, at his leisure. He went downstairs, determined to buy a small piece of vellum with hishalf of the card-money. 

At the bottom of the stairs he found the landlady and Teresa talking. Atsight of him the former cried, "Here he is. You are caught, donna mia. See what she has bought you?" And whipped out from under her apron thevery skin of vellum Gerard had longed for. 

"Why, dame! why, donna Teresa!" And he was speechless with pleasure andastonishment. 

"Dear donna Teresa, there is not a skin in all Rome like it. Howevercame you to hit on this one? 'Tis glamour. "

"Alas, dear boy, did not thine eye rest on it with desire? and didst thounot sigh in turning away from it? And was it for Teresa to let thee wantthe thing after that?"

"What sagacity! what goodness, madama! Oh, dame, I never thought Ishould possess this. What did you pay for it?"

"I forget. Addio, Fiammina. Addio, Ser Gerard. Be happy, be prosperous, as you are good. " And the Roman matron glided away while Gerard washesitating, and thinking how to offer to pay so stately a creature forher purchase. 

The next day in the afternoon he went to Lucretia, and her boy took himto Fra Colonna's lodgings. He announced his business, and feed Onesta, and she took him up to the friar. Gerard entered with a beating heart. The room, a large one, was strewed and heaped with objects of art, antiquity, and learning, lying about in rich profusion, and confusion. Manuscripts, pictures, carvings in wood and ivory, musical instruments;and in this glorious chaos sat the friar, poring intently over anArabian manuscript. 

He looked up a little peevishly at the interruption. Onesta whispered inhis ear. 

"Very well, " said he. "Let him be seated. Stay; young man, show me howyou write?" And he threw Gerard a piece of paper, and pointed to aninkhorn. 

"So please you, reverend father, " said Gerard, "my hand it trembleth toomuch at this moment; but last night I wrote a vellum page of Greek, andthe Latin version by its side, to show the various character. "

"Show it me?"

Gerard brought the work to him in fear and trembling; then stoodheart-sick, awaiting his verdict. 

When it came it staggered him. For the verdict was, a Dominican fallingon his neck. 

The next day an event took place in Holland, the effect of which onGerard's destiny, no mortal at the time, nor even my intelligent readernow, could, I think, foresee. 

Marched up to Eli's door a pageant brave to the eye of sense, and to thevulgar judgment noble, but to the philosophic, pitiable more or less. 

It looked one animal, a centaur; but on severe analysis proved two. Thehuman half were sadly bedizened with those two metals, to clothe hiscarcass with which and line his pouch, man has now and then disposed ofhis soul: still the horse was the vainer brute of the two; he was farworse beflounced, bebonneted, and bemantled, than any fair lady regnantecrinolina. For the man, under the colour of a warming-pan, retainedNature's outline. But it was subaudi equum! Scarce a pennyweight ofhonest horse-flesh to be seen. Our crinoline spares the noble parts ofwomen, and makes but the baser parts gigantic (why this preference?);but this poor animal from stem to stern was swamped in finery. His earswere hid in great sheaths of white linen tipped with silver and blue. His body swaddled in stiff gorgeous cloths descending to the ground, except just in front, where they left him room to mince. His tail, though dear to memory, no doubt, was lost to sight, being tucked inheaven knows how. Only his eyes shone out like goggles, through twoholes pierced in the wall of haberdashery, and his little front hoofspeeped in and out like rats. 

Yet did this compound, gorgeous and irrational, represent power;absolute power: it came straight from a tournament at the Duke's court, which being on a progress, lay last night at a neighbouring town--toexecute the behests of royalty. 

"What ho!" cried the upper half, and on Eli emerging, with his wifebehind him, saluted them. "Peace be with you, good people. Rejoice! I amcome for your dwarf. "

Eli looked amazed, and said nothing. But Catherine screamed over hisshoulder, "You have mistook your road, good man; here abides no dwarf. "

"Nay, wife, he means our Giles, who is somewhat small of stature: whygainsay what gainsayed may not be?"

"Ay!" cried the pageant, "that is he, and discourseth like the bigtaber. 

"His breast is sound for that matter, " said Catherine sharply. 

"And prompt with his fists though at long odds. "

"Else how would the poor thing keep his head in such a world as this?"

"'Tis well said, dame. Art as ready with thy weapon as he; art hismother, likely. So bring him forth, and that presently. See, they lead astunted mule for him. The Duke hath need of him, sore need; we are cleanout o' dwarven, and tiger-cats, which may not be, whiles earth themyieldeth. Our last hop o' my thumb tumbled down the well t'other day. "

"And think you I'll let my darling go to such an ill-guided house asyou, where the reckless trollops of servants close not the well mouth, but leave it open to trap innocents, like wolven?"

The representative of autocracy lost patience at this unwontedopposition, and with stern look and voice bade her bethink her whetherit was the better of the two; "to have your abortion at court fed like abishop and put on like a prince, or to have all your heads stricken offand borne on poles, with the bellman crying, 'Behold the heads of hardyrebels, which having by good luck a misbegotten son, did traitorouslygrudge him to the Duke, who is the true father of all his folk, littleor mickle?'

"Nay, " said Eli sadly, "miscall us not. We be true folk, and neitherrebels nor traitors. But 'tis sudden, and the poor lad is our true fleshand blood, and hath of late given proof of more sense than heretofore. "

"Avails not threatening our lives, " whimpered Catherine; "we grudge himnot to the Duke; but in sooth he cannot go; his linen is all in holes. So there is an end. "

But the male mind resisted this crusher. 

"Think you the Duke will not find linen, and cloth of gold to boot? Noneso brave, none so affected, at court, as our monsters, big or wee. "

How long the dispute might have lasted, before the iron arguments ofdespotism achieved the inevitable victory, I know not; but it was cutshort by a party whom neither disputant had deigned to consult. 

The bone of contention walked out of the house, and sided with monarchy. 

"If my folk are mad, I am not, " he roared. "I'll go with you and on theinstant. "

At this Catherine set up a piteous cry. She saw another of her broodescaping from under her wing into some unknown element. Giles was notquite insensible to her distress, so simple yet so eloquent. He said, "Nay, take not on, mother! Why, 'tis a godsend. And I am sick of this, ever since Gerard left it. "

"Ah, cruel Giles! Should ye not rather say she is bereaved of Gerard:the more need of you to stay aside her and comfort her. "

"Oh! I am not going to Rome. Not such a fool. I shall never be fartherthan Rotterdam; and I'll often come and see you; and if I like not theplace, who shall keep me there? Not all the dukes in Christendom. "

"Good sense lies in little bulk, " said the emissary approvingly. "Therefore, Master Giles, buss the old folk, and thank them formisbegetting of thee; and ho! you--bring hither his mule. "

One of his retinue brought up the dwarf mule. Giles refused it withscorn. And on being asked the reason, said it was not just. 

"What! would ye throw all into one scale! Put muckle to muckle, andlittle to wee! Besides, I hate and scorn small things. I'll go on thehighest horse here, or not at all. "

The pursuivant eyed him attentively a moment. He then adopted acourteous manner. "I shall study your will in all things reasonable. (Dismount, Eric, yours is the highest horse. ) And if you would halt inthe town an hour or so, while you bid them farewell, say but the word, and your pleasure shall be my delight. "

Giles reflected. 

"Master, " said he, "if we wait a month, 'twill be still the same: mymother is a good soul, but her body is bigger than her spirit. We shallnot part without a tear or two, and the quicker 'tis done the fewer; sobring yon horse to me. "

Catherine threw her apron over her face and sobbed. The high horse wasbrought, and Giles was for swarming up his tail, like a rope; but oneof the servants cried out hastily, "Forbear, for he kicketh. " "I'll kickhim, " said Giles. "Bring him close beneath this window, and I'll learnyou all how to mount a horse which kicketh, and will not be clomb bythe tail, the staircase of a horse. " And he dashed into the house, andalmost immediately reappeared at an upper window, with a rope in hishand. He fastened an end somehow, and holding the other, descendedas swift and smooth as an oiled thunderbolt in a groove, and lightedastride his high horse as unperceived by that animal as a fly settlingon him. 

The official lifted his hands to heaven in mawkish admiration. "I havegotten a pearl, " thought he, "and wow but this will be a good day's workfor me. "

"Come, father, come, mother, buss me, and bless me, and off I go. "

Eli gave him his blessing, and bade him be honest and true, and a creditto his folk. Catherine could not speak, but clung to him with many sobsand embraces; and even through the mist of tears her eye detected in amoment the little rent in his sleeve he had made getting out of window, and she whipped out her needle and mended it then and there, and hertears fell on his arm the while, unheeded--except by those unfleshlyeyes, with which they say the very air is thronged. 

And so the dwarf mounted the high horse, and rode away complacent withthe old hand laying the court butter on his back with a trowel. 

Little recked Perpusillus of two poor silly females that sat by thebereaved hearth, rocking themselves, and weeping, and discussing all hisvirtues, and how his mind had opened lately, and blind as two beetles tohis faults, who rode away from them, jocund and bold. 

Ingentes animos angusto pectore versans. 

Arrived at court he speedily became a great favourite. 

One strange propensity of his electrified the palace; but on accountof his small size, and for variety's sake, and as a monster, he wasindulged on it. In a word, he was let speak the truth. 

It is an unpopular thing. 

He made it an intolerable one. 

Bawled it. 

CHAPTER LIX

Happy the man who has two chain-cables: Merit, and Women. 

Oh, that I, like Gerard, had a 'chaine des dames' to pull up by. 

I would be prose laureat, or professor of the spasmodic, or something, in no time. En attendant, I will sketch the Fra Colonna. 

The true revivers of ancient learning and philosophy were two writers offiction--Petrarch and Boccaccio. 

Their labours were not crowned with great, public, and immediatesuccess; but they sowed the good seed; and it never perished, butquickened in the soil, awaiting sunshine. 

From their day Italy was never without a native scholar or two, versed in Greek; and each learned Greek who landed there was receivedfraternally. The fourteenth century, ere its close, saw the birthof Poggio, Valla, and the elder Guarino; and early in the fifteenthFlorence under Cosmo de Medici was a nest of Platonists. These, headedby Gemistus Pletho, a born Greek, began about A. D. 1440 to write downAristotle. For few minds are big enough to be just to great A withoutbeing unjust to capital B. 

Theodore Gaza defended that great man with moderation; George ofTrebizond with acerbity, and retorted on Plato. Then Cardinal Bessarion, another born Greek, resisted the said George, and his idol, in a tract"Adversus calumniatorem Platonis. "

Pugnacity, whether wise or not, is a form of vitality. Born withoutcontroversial bile in so zealous an epoch, Francesco Colonna, a youngnobleman of Florence, lived for the arts. At twenty he turned Dominicanfriar. His object was quiet study. He retired from idle company, andfaction fights, the humming and the stinging of the human hive, to St. Dominic and the Nine Muses. 

An eager student of languages, pictures, statues, chronology, coins, and monumental inscriptions. These last loosened his faith in popularhistories. 

He travelled many years in the East, and returned laden with spoils;master of several choice MSS. , and versed in Greek and Latin, Hebrew andSyriac. He found his country had not stood still. Other lettered princesbesides Cosmo had sprung up. Alfonso King of Naples, Nicolas d'Este, Lionel d'Este, etc. Above all, his old friend Thomas of Sarzana had beenmade Pope, and had lent a mighty impulse to letters; had accumulated5000 MSS. In the library of the Vatican, and had set Poggio to translateDiodorus Siculus and Xenophon's Cyropaedia, Laurentius Valla totranslate Herodotus and Thucydides, Theodore Gaza, Theophrastus; Georgeof Trebizond, Eusebius, and certain treatises of Plato, etc. Etc. 

The monk found Plato and Aristotle under armistice, but Poggio andValla at loggerheads over verbs and nouns, and on fire with odiumphilologicum. All this was heaven; and he settled down in his nativeland, his life a rosy dream. None so happy as the versatile, provided they have not their bread to make by it. And Fra Colonna wasVersatility. He knew seven or eight languages, and a little mathematics;could write a bit, paint a bit, model a bit, sing a bit, strum a bit;and could relish superior excellence in all these branches. Forthis last trait he deserved to be as happy as he was. For, gauge theintellects of your acquaintances, and you will find but few whose mindsare neither deaf, nor blind, nor dead to some great art or science--

"And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out. "

And such of them as are conceited as well as stupid shall even paradeinstead of blushing for the holes in their intellects. 

A zealot in art, the friar was a sceptic in religion. 

In every age there are a few men who hold the opinions of another age, past or future. Being a lump of simplicity, his sceptism was as naif ashis enthusiasm. He affected to look on the religious ceremonies of hisday as his models, the heathen philosophers, regarded the worship ofgods and departed heroes: mummeries good for the populace. But here hismind drew unconsciously a droll distinction. Whatever Christian ceremonyhis learning taught him was of purely pagan origin, that he respected, out of respect for antiquity; though had he, with his turn of mind, been a pagan and its contemporary, he would have scorned it from hisphilosophic heights. 

Fra Colonna was charmed with his new artist, and having the run of halfthe palaces in Rome, sounded his praises so, that he was soon calledupon to resign him. He told Gerard what great princes wanted him. "But Iam so happy with you, father, " objected Gerard. "Fiddlestick about beinghappy with me, " said Fra Colonna; "you must not be happy; you must be aman of the world; the grand lesson I impress on the young is, be a manof the world. Now these Montesini can pay you three times as much as Ican, and they shall too-by Jupiter. "

And the friar clapped a terrific price on Gerard's pen. It was accededto without a murmur. Much higher prices were going for copying thanauthorship ever obtained for centuries under the printing press. 

Gerard had three hundred crowns for Aristotle's treatise on rhetoric. 

The great are mighty sweet upon all their pets, while the fancy lasts;and in the rage for Greek MSS. The handsome writer soon became a pet, and nobles of both sexes caressed him like a lap dog. 

It would have turned a vain fellow's head; but the canny Dutchmansaw the steel hand beneath the velvet glove, and did not presume. Nevertheless it was a proud day for him when he found himself seatedwith Fra Colonna at the table of his present employer, CardinalBessarion. They were about a mile from the top of that table; but nevermind, there they were and Gerard had the advantage of seeing roastpheasants dished up with all their feathers as if they had just flownout of a coppice instead of off the spit: also chickens cooked inbottles, and tender as peaches. But the grand novelty was the napkins, surpassingly fine, and folded into cocked hats, and birds' wings, andfans, etc. , instead of lying flat. This electrified Gerard; though myreaders have seen the dazzling phenomenon without tumbling backwardschair and all. 

After dinner the tables were split in pieces, and carried away, and lo, under each was another table spread with sweetmeats. The signoras andsignorinas fell upon them and gormandized; but the signors eyed themwith reasonable suspicion. 

"But, dear father, " objected Gerard, "I see not the bifurcal daggers, with which men say his excellency armeth the left hand of a man. "

"Nay, 'tis the Cardinal Orsini which hath invented yon peevishinstrument for his guests to fumble their meat withal. One, being inhaste, did skewer his tongue to his palate with it, I hear; O tempora, O mores! The ancients, reclining godlike at their feasts, how had theyspurned such pedantries. "

As soon as the ladies had disported themselves among the sugar-plums, the tables were suddenly removed, and the guests sat in a row againstthe wall. Then came in, ducking and scraping, two ecclesiastics withlutes, and kneeled at the cardinal's feet and there sang the serviceof the day; then retired with a deep obeisance: In answer to whichthe cardinal fingered his skull cap as our late Iron Duke his hat: thecompany dispersed, and Gerard had dined with a cardinal and one that hadthrice just missed being pope. 

But greater honour was in store. 

One day the cardinal sent for him, and after praising the beauty of hiswork took him in his coach to the Vatican; and up a private stair to aluxurious little room, with a great oriel window. Here were inkstands, sloping frames for writing on, and all the instruments of art. Thecardinal whispered a courtier, and presently the Pope's privatesecretary appeared with a glorious grimy old MS. Of Plutarch's Lives. And soon Gerard was seated alone copying it, awe-struck, yet halfdelighted at the thought that his holiness would handle his work andread it. 

The papal inkstands were all glorious externally; but within the inkwas vile. But Gerard carried ever good ink, home-made, in a dirty littleinkhorn: he prayed on his knees for a firm and skilful hand, and set towork. 

One side of his room was nearly occupied by a massive curtain dividedin the centre; but its ample folds overlapped. After a while Gerardfelt drawn to peep through that curtain. He resisted the impulse. Itreturned. It overpowered him. He left Plutarch; stole across the mattedfloor; took the folds of the curtain, and gently gathered them up withhis fingers, and putting his nose through the chink ran it against acold steel halbert. Two soldiers, armed cap-a-pie, were holding theirglittering weapons crossed in a triangle. Gerard drew swiftly back; butin that instant he heard the soft murmur of voices, and saw a group ofpersons cringing before some hidden figure. 

He never repeated his attempt to pry through the guarded curtain; butoften eyed it. Every hour or so an ecclesiastic peeped in, eyed him, chilled him, and exit. All this was gloomy, and mechanical. But the nextday a gentleman, richly armed, bounced in, and glared at him. "What istoward here?" said he. 

Gerard told him he was writing out Plutarch, with the help of thesaints. The spark said he did not know the signor in question. Gerardexplained the circumstances of time and space that had deprived theSignor Plutarch of the advantage of the spark's conversation. 

"Oh! one of those old dead Greeks they keep such a coil about. "

"Ay, signor, one of them, who, being dead, yet live. "

"I understand you not, young man, " said the noble, with all the dignityof ignorance. "What did the old fellow write? Love stories?" and hiseyes sparkled: "merry tales, like Boccaccio. "

"Nay, lives of heroes and sages. "

"Soldiers and popes?"

"Soldiers and princes. "

"Wilt read me of them some day?"

"And willingly, signor. But what would they say who employ me, were I tobreak off work?"

"Oh, never heed that; know you not who I am? I am Jacques Bonaventura, nephew to his holiness the Pope, and captain of his guards. And I camehere to look after my fellows. I trow they have turned them out oftheir room for you. " Signor Bonaventura then hurried away. This livelycompanion, however, having acquired a habit of running into that littleroom, and finding Gerard good company, often looked in on him, andchattered ephemeralities while Gerard wrote the immortal lives. 

One day he came a changed and moody man, and threw himself into chair, crying, "Ah, traitress! traitress!" Gerard inquired what was his ill?"Traitress! traitress!" was the reply. Whereupon Gerard wrote Plutarch. Then says Bonaventura, "I am melancholy; and for our Lady's sake readme a story out of Ser Plutarcho, to soothe my bile: in all that Greek isthere nought about lovers betrayed?"

Gerard read him the life of Alexander. He got excited, marched about theroom, and embracing the reader, vowed to shun "soft delights, " that bedof nettles, and follow glory. 

Who so happy now as Gerard? His art was honoured, and fabulous pricespaid for it; in a year or two he should return by sea to Holland, withgood store of money, and set up with his beloved Margaret in Bruges, orAntwerp, or dear Augsburg, and end their days in peace, and love, andhealthy, happy labour. His heart never strayed an instant from her. 

In his prosperity he did not forget poor Pietro. He took the Fra Colonnato see his picture. The friar inspected it severely and closely, fell onthe artist's neck, and carried the picture to one of the Colonnas, whogave a noble price for it. 

Pietro descended to the first floor; and lived like a gentleman. 

But Gerard remained in his garret. To increase his expenses would havebeen to postpone his return to Margaret. Luxury had no charms for thesingle-hearted one, when opposed to love. 

Jacques Bonaventura made him acquainted with other gay young fellows. They loved him, and sought to entice him into vice, and other expenses. But he begged humbly to be excused. So he escaped that temptation. But agreater was behind. 

CHAPTER LX

FRA COLONNA had the run of the Pope's library, and sometimes leftoff work at the same hour and walked the city with Gerard, on whichoccasions the happy artist saw all things en beau, and was wrapped up inthe grandeur of Rome and its churches, palaces, and ruins. 

The friar granted the ruins, but threw cold water on the rest. 

"This place Rome? It is but the tomb of mighty Rome. " He showed Gerardthat twenty or thirty feet of the old triumphal arches were underground, and that the modern streets ran over ancient palaces, and over the topsof columns; and coupling this with the comparatively narrow limits ofthe modern city, and the gigantic vestiges of antiquity that peepedaboveground here and there, he uttered a somewhat remarkable simile. "Itell thee this village they call Rome is but as one of those swallows'nests ye shall see built on the eaves of a decayed abbey. "

"Old Rome must indeed have been fair then, " said Gerard. 

"Judge for yourself, my son; you see the great sewer, the work of theRomans in their very childhood, and shall outlast Vesuvius. You see thefragments of the Temple of Peace. How would you look could you see alsothe Capitol with its five-and-twenty temples? Do but note this MonteSavello; what is it, an it pleases you, but the ruins of the ancienttheatre of Marcellus? and as for Testacio, one of the highest hills inmodern Rome, it is but an ancient dust heap; the women of old Rome flungtheir broken pots and pans there, and lo--a mountain. 

"'Ex pede Herculem; ex ungue leonem. '"

Gerard listened respectfully, but when the holy friar proceeded byanalogy to imply that the moral superiority of the heathen Romans wasproportionally grand, he resisted stoutly. "Has then the world lostby Christ His coming?" said he; but blushed, for he felt himselfreproaching his benefactor. 

"Saints forbid!" said the friar. "'Twere heresy to say so. " And havingmade this direct concession, he proceeded gradually to evade it bysubtle circumlocution, and reached the forbidden door by the spiral backstaircase. In the midst of all which they came to a church with a knotof persons in the porch. A demon was being exorcised within. Now FraColonna had a way of uttering a curious sort of little moan, when thingsZeno or Epicurus would not have swallowed were presented to him asfacts. This moan conveyed to such as had often heard it not only strongdissent, but pity for human credulity, ignorance, and error, especiallyof course when it blinded men to the merits of Pagandom. 

The friar moaned, and said, "Then come away. 

"Nay, father, prithee! prithee! I ne'er saw a divell cast out. "

The friar accompanied Gerard into the church, but had a good shrugfirst. There they found the demoniac forced down on his knees before thealtar with a scarf tied round his neck, by which the officiating priestheld him like a dog in a chain. 

Not many persons were present, for fame had put forth that the lastdemon cast out in that church went no farther than into one of thecompany: "as a cony ferreted out of one burrow runs to the next. "

When Gerard and the friar came up, the priest seemed to think there werenow spectators enough; and began. 

He faced the demoniac, breviary in hand, and first set himself to learnthe individual's name with whom he had to deal. 

"Come out, Ashtaroth. Oho! it is not you then. Come out, Belial. Comeout, Tatzi. Come out, Eza. No; he trembles not. Come out, Azymoth. Comeout, Feriander. Come out, Foletho. Come out, Astyma. Come out, Nebul. Aha! what, have I found ye? 'tis thou, thou reptile; at thine oldtricks. Let us pray!

"Oh, Lord, we pray thee to drive the foul fiend Nebul out of this thycreature: out of his hair, and his eyes, out of his nose, out of hismouth, out of his ears, out of his gums, out of his teeth, out of hisshoulders, out of his arms, legs, loins, stomach, bowels, thighs, knees, calves, feet, ankles, finger-nails, toe-nails, and soul. Amen. "

The priest then rose from his knees, and turning to the company, said, with quiet geniality, "Gentles, we have here as obstinate a divell asyou may see in a summer day. " Then, facing the patient, he spoke tohim with great rigour, sometimes addressing 'the man and sometimes thefiend, and they answered him in turn through the same mouth, now sayingthat they hated those holy names the priest kept uttering, and nowcomplaining they did feel so bad in their inside. 

It was the priest who first confounded the victim and the culprit inidea, by pitching into the former, cuffing him soundly, kicking him, andspitting repeatedly in his face. Then he took a candle and lighted it, and turned it down, and burned it till it burned his fingers; when hedropped it double quick. Then took the custodial; and showed the patientthe Corpus Domini within. Then burned another candle as before, but morecautiously: then spoke civilly to the demoniac in his human character, dismissed him, and received the compliments of the company. 

"Good father, " said Gerard, "how you have their names by heart. Ournorthern priests have no such exquisite knowledge of the hellishsquadrons. "

"Ay, young man, here we know all their names, and eke their ways, thereptiles. This Nebul is a bitter hard one to hunt out. "

He then told the company in the most affable way several of hisexperiences; concluding with his feat of yesterday, when he drove agreat hulking fiend out of a woman by her mouth, leaving behind himcertain nails, and pins, and a tuft of his own hair, and cried out in avoice of anguish, "'Tis not thou that conquers me. See that stone onthe window sill. Know that the angel Gabriel coming down to earth oncelighted on that stone: 'tis that has done my business. "

The friar moaned. "And you believed him?"

"Certes! who but an infidel has discredited a revelation so precise. "

"What, believe the father of lies? That is pushing credulity beyond theage. "

"Oh, a liar does not always lie. "

"Ay doth he whenever he tells an improbable story to begin, and showsyou a holy relic; arms you against the Satanic host. Fiends (if any) benot so simple. Shouldst have answered him out of antiquity--

'Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes. '

Some blackguard chopped his wife's head off on that stone, young man;you take my word for it. " And the friar hurried Gerard away. 

"Alack, father, I fear you abashed the good priest. "

"Ay, by Pollux, " said the friar, with a chuckle; "I blistered him witha single touch of 'Socratic interrogation. ' What modern can parry theweapons of antiquity. "

One afternoon, when Gerard had finished his day's work, a fine lackeycame and demanded his attendance at the Palace Cesarini. He went, andwas ushered into a noble apartment; there was a girl seated in it, working on a tapestry. She rose and left the room, and said she wouldlet her mistress know. 

A good hour did Gerard cool his heels in that great room, and at lasthe began to fret. "These nobles think nothing of a poor fellow's time. "However, just as he was making up his mind to slip out, and go abouthis business, the door opened, and a superb beauty entered the room, followed by two maids. It was the young princess of the house ofCesarini. She came in talking rather loudly and haughtily to herdependents, but at sight of Gerard lowered her voice to a very femininetone, and said, "Are you the writer, messer?"

"I am, Signora. 

"'Tis well. "

She then seated herself; Gerard and her maids remained standing. 

"What is your name, good youth?"

"Gerard, signora. "

"Gerard? body of Bacchus! is that the name of a human creature?"

"It is a Dutch name, signora. I was born at Tergou, in Holland. "

"A harsh name, girls, for so well-favoured a youth; what say you?"

The maids assented warmly. 

"What did I send for him for?" inquired the lady, with lofty languor. "Ah, I remember. Be seated, Ser Gerardo, and write me a letter to ErcoleOrsini, my lover; at least he says so. "

Gerard seated himself, took out paper and ink, and looked up to theprincess for instructions. 

She, seated on a much higher chair, almost a throne, looked down at himwith eyes equally inquiring. 

"Well, Gerardo. "

"I am ready, your excellence. "

"Write, then. "

"I but await the words. "

"And who, think you, is to provide them?"

"Who but your grace, whose letter it is to be?"

"Gramercy! what, you writers, find you not the words? What avails yourart without the words? I doubt you are an impostor, Gerardo. "

"Nay, Signora, I am none. I might make shift to put your highness'sspeech into grammar, as well as writing. But I cannot interpret yoursilence. Therefore speak what is in your heart, and I will empaper itbefore your eyes. "

"But there is nothing in my heart. And sometimes I think I have got noheart. "

"What is in your mind, then?"

"But there is nothing in my mind; nor my head neither. "

"Then why write at all?"

"Why, indeed? That is the first word of sense either you or I havespoken, Gerardo. Pestilence seize him! why writeth he not first? then Icould say nay to this, and ay to that, withouten headache. Also is it alady's part to say the first word?"

"No, signora: the last. "

"It is well spoken, Gerardo. Ha! ha! Shalt have a gold piece for thywit. Give me my purse!" And she paid him for the article on the nail ala moyen age. Money never yet chilled zeal. Gerard, after getting a goldpiece so cheap, felt bound to pull her out of her difficulty, if the witof man might achieve it. "Signorina, " said he, "these things are onlyhard because folk attempt too much, are artificial and labour phrases. Do but figure to yourself the signor you love--"

"I love him not. "

"Well, then, the signor you love not-seated at this table, and dict tome just what you would say to him. "

"Well, if he sat there, I should say, 'Go away. '"

Gerard, who was flourishing his pen by way of preparation, laid it downwith a groan. 

"And when he was gone, " said Floretta, "your highness would say, 'Comeback. '"

"Like enough, wench. Now silence, all, and let me think. He pestered meto write, and I promised; so mine honour is engaged. What lie shall Itell the Gerardo to tell the fool?" and she turned her head away fromthem and fell into deep thought, with her noble chin resting on herwhite hand, half clenched. 

She was so lovely and statuesque, and looked so inspired with thoughtscelestial, as she sat thus, impregnating herself with mendacity, thatGerard forgot all, except art, and proceeded eagerly to transfer thatexquisite profile to paper. 

He had very nearly finished when the fair statue turned brusquely roundand looked at him. 

"Nay, Signora, " said he, a little peevishly; "for Heaven's sake changenot your posture--'twas perfect. See, you are nearly finished. "

All eyes were instantly on the work, and all tongues active. 

"How like! and done in a minute: nay, methinks her highness's chin isnot quite so. "

"Oh, a touch will make that right. "

"What a pity 'tis not coloured. I'm all for colours. Hang black andwhite! And her highness hath such a lovely skin. Take away her skin, andhalf her beauty is lost. "

"Peace. Can you colour, Ser Gerardo?"

"Ay, signorina. I am a poor hand at oils; there shines my friend Pietro;but in this small way I can tint you to the life, if you have time towaste on such vanity. "

"Call you this vanity? And for time, it hangs on me like lead. Send foryour colours now--quick, this moment--for love of all the saints. "

"Nay, signorina, I must prepare them. I could come at the same time. "

"So be it. And you, Floretta, see that he be admitted at all hours. Alack! Leave my head! leave my head!"

"Forgive me, Signora; I thought to prepare it at home to receive thecolours. But I will leave it. And now let us despatch the letter. "

"What letter?"

"To the Signor Orsini. "

"And shall I waste my time on such vanity as writing letters--and tothat empty creature, to whom I am as indifferent as the moon? Nay, notindifferent, for I have just discovered my real sentiments. I hate himand despise him. Girls, I here forbid you once for all to mention thatsignor's name to me again; else I'll whip you till the blood comes. Youknow how I can lay on when I'm roused. "

"We do. We do. "

"Then provoke me not to it;" and her eye flashed daggers, and she turnedto Gerard all instantaneous honey. "Addio, il Gerardo. " And Gerard bowedhimself out of this velvet tiger's den. 

He came next day and coloured her; and next he was set to make aportrait of her on a large scale; and then a full-length figure; andhe was obliged to set apart two hours in the afternoon, for drawing andpainting this princess, whose beauty and vanity were prodigious, andcandidates for a portrait of her numerous. Here the thriving Gerardfound a new and fruitful source of income. 

Margaret seemed nearer and nearer. 

It was Holy Thursday. No work this day. Fra Colonna and Gerard sat in awindow and saw the religious processions. Their number and pious ardourthrilled Gerard with the devotion that now seemed to animate the wholepeople, lately bent on earthly joys. 

Presently the Pope came pacing majestically at the head of hiscardinals, in a red hat, white cloak, a capuchin of red velvet, andriding a lovely white Neapolitan barb, caparisoned with red velvetfringed and tasselled with gold; a hundred horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, rode behind him with their lances erected, the butt-end resting on theman's thigh. The cardinals went uncovered, all but one, de Medicis, whorode close to the Pope and conversed with him as with an equal. At everyfifteen steps the Pope stopped a single moment, and gave the people hisblessing, then on again. 

Gerard and the friar now came down, and threading some by-streetsreached the portico of one of the seven churches. It was hung withblack, and soon the Pope and cardinals, who had entered the churchby another door, issued forth, and stood with torches on the steps, separated by barriers from the people; then a canon read a Latin Bull, excommunicating several persons by name, especially such princes as werekeeping the Church out of any of her temporal possessions. 

At this awful ceremony Gerard trembled, and so did the people. But twoof the cardinals spoiled the effect by laughing unreservedly the wholetime. 

When this was ended, the black cloth was removed, and revealed a gaypanoply; and the Pope blessed the people, and ended by throwing historch among them: so did two cardinals. Instantly there was a scramblefor the torches: they were fought for, and torn in pieces by thecandidates, so devoutly that small fragments were gained at the priceof black eyes, bloody noses, and burnt fingers; In which hurtling hisholiness and suite withdrew in peace. 

And now there was a cry, and the crowd rushed to a square where was alarge, open stage: several priests were upon it praying. They rose, andwith great ceremony donned red gloves. Then one of their number kneeled, and with signs of the lowest reverence drew forth from a shrine a squareframe, like that of a mirror, and inside was as it were the impressionof a face. 

It was the Verum icon, or true impression of our Saviour's face, takenat the very moment of His most mortal agony for us. Received as it waswithout a grain of doubt, imagine how it moved every Christian heart. 

The people threw themselves on their faces when the priest raised it onhigh; and cries of pity were in every mouth, and tears in almost everyeye. After a while the people rose, and then the priest went round theplatform, showing it for a single moment to the nearest; and at eachsight loud cries of pity and devotion burst forth. 

Soon after this the friends fell in with a procession of Flagellants, flogging their bare shoulders till the blood ran streaming down; butwithout a sign of pain in their faces, and many of them laughing andjesting as they lashed. The bystanders out of pity offered them wine;they took it, but few drank it; they generally used it to free the tailsof the cat, which were hard with clotted blood, and make the next strokemore effective. Most of them were boys, and a young woman took pity onone fair urchin. "Alas! dear child, " said she, "why wound thy white skinso?" "Basta, " said he, laughing, "'tis for your sins I do it, not formine. "

"Hear you that?" said the friar. "Show me the whip that can whipthe vanity out of man's heart! The young monkey; how knoweth he thatstranger is a sinner more than he?"

"Father, " said Gerard, "surely this is not to our Lord's mind. He was sopitiful. "

"Our Lord?" said the friar, crossing himself. "What has He to do withthis? This was a custom in Rome six hundred years before He was born. The boys used to go through the streets, at the Lupercalia floggingthemselves. And the married women used to shove in, and try and get ablow from the monkeys' scourges; for these blows conferred fruitfulnessin those days. A foolish trick this flagellation; but interesting tothe bystander; reminds him of the grand old heathen. We are so prone toforget all we owe them. "

Next they got into one of the seven churches, and saw the Pope give themass. The ceremony was imposing, but again--spoiled by the inconsistentconduct of the cardinals and other prelates, who sat about the altarwith their hats on, chattering all through the mass like a flock ofgeese. 

The eucharist in both kinds was tasted by an official before the Popewould venture on it; and this surprised Gerard beyond measure. "Who isthat base man? and what doth he there?"

"Oh, that is 'the Preguste, ' and he tastes the eucharist by way ofprecaution. This is the country for poison; and none fall oftener by itthan the poor Popes. "

"Alas! so I have heard; but after the miraculous change of the breadand wine to Christ His body and blood, poison cannot remain; gone is thebread with all its properties and accidents; gone is the wine. "

"So says Faith; but experience tells another tale. Scores have died inItaly poisoned in the host. "

"And I tell you, father, that were both bread and wine charged withdirest poison before his holiness had consecrated them, yet afterconsecration I would take them both withouten fear. "

"So would I, but for the fine arts. "

"What mean you?"

"Marry, that I would be as ready to leave the world as thou, were it notfor those arts, which beautify existence here below, and make it dear tomen of sense and education. No; so long as the Nine Muses strew my pathwith roses of learning and art, me may Apollo inspire with wisdom andcaution, that knowing the wiles of my countrymen, I may eat poisonneither at God's altar nor at a friend's table, since, wherever I eatit or drink it, it will assuredly cut short my mortal thread; and I amwriting a book--heart and soul in it--'The Dream of Polifilo, ' theman of many arts. So name not poison to me till that is finished andcopied. "

And now the great bells of St. John Lateran's were rung with a clash atshort intervals, and the people hurried thither to see the heads of St. Peter and St. Paul. 

Gerard and the friar got a good place in the church, and there was agreat curtain, and after long and breathless expectation of the people, this curtain was drawn by jerks, and at a height of about thirty feetwere two human heads with bearded faces, that seemed alive. They wereshown no longer than the time to say an Ave Maria, and then the curtaindrawn. But they were shown in this fashion three times. St. Peter'scomplexion was pale, his face oval, his beard grey and forked; his headcrowned with a papal mitre. St. Paul was dark skinned, with a thick, square beard; his face also and head were more square and massive, andfull of resolution. 

Gerard was awe-struck. The friar approved after his fashion. 

"This exhibition of the 'imagines, ' or waxen effigies of heroes anddemigods, is a venerable custom, and inciteth the vulgar to virtue bygreat and invisible examples. 

"Waxen images? What, are they not the apostles themselves, embalmed, orthe like?"

The friar moaned. 

"They did not exist in the year 800. The great old Roman families alwaysproduced at their funerals a series of these 'imagines, ' thereby tyingpast and present history together, and showing the populace thefeatures of far-famed worthies. I can conceive nothing more thrilling orinstructive. But then the effigies were portraits made during life orat the hour of death. These of St. Paul and St. Peter are moulded out ofpure fancy. "

"Ah! say not so, father. "

"But the worst is, this humour of showing them up on a shelf, and halfin the dark, and by snatches, and with the poor mountebank trick of adrawn curtain. 

'Quodcunque ostendis mihi sic incredulus odi. '

Enough; the men of this day are not the men of old. Let us have donewith these new-fangled mummeries, and go among the Pope's books; therewe shall find the wisdom we shall vainly hunt in the streets of modernRome. "

And this idea having once taken root, the good friar plunged and torethrough the crowd, and looked neither to the right hand nor to the left, till he had escaped the glories of the holy week, which had broughtfifty thousand strangers to Rome; and had got nice and quiet among thedead in the library of the Vatican. 

Presently, going into Gerard's room, he found a hot dispute afootbetween him and Jacques Bonaventura. That spark had come in, all steelfrom head to toe; doffed helmet, puffed, and railed most scornfully on aridiculous ceremony, at which he and his soldiers had been compelled toattend the Pope; to wit the blessing of the beasts of burden. 

Gerard said it was not ridiculous; nothing a Pope did could beridiculous. 

The argument grew warm, and the friar stood grimly neuter, waiting likethe stork that ate the frog and the mouse at the close of their combat, to grind them both between the jaws of antiquity; when lo, the curtainwas gently drawn, and there stood a venerable old man in a purple skullcap, with a beard like white floss silk, looking at them with a kindthough feeble smile. 

"Happy youth, " said he, "that can heat itself over such matters. "

They all fell on their knees. It was the Pope. 

"Nay, rise, my children, " said he, almost peevishly. "I came not intothis corner to be in state. How goes Plutarch?"

Gerard brought his work, and kneeling on one knee presented it to hisholiness, who had seated himself, the others standing. 

His holiness inspected it with interest. 

"'Tis excellently writ, " said he. 

Gerard's heart beat with delight. 

"Ah! this Plutarch, he had a wondrous art, Francesco. How each characterstandeth out alive on his page: how full of nature each, yet how unlikehis fellow!"

Jacques Bonaventura. "Give me the Signor Boccaccio. "

His Holiness. "An excellent narrator, capitano, and writeth exquisiteItalian. But in spirit a thought too monotonous. Monks and nuns werenever all unchaste: one or two such stories were right pleasant anddiverting; but five score paint his time falsely, and sadden the heartof such as love mankind. Moreover, he hath no skill at characters. Nowthis Greek is supreme in that great art: he carveth them with pen; andturning his page, see into how real and great a world we enter of war, and policy, and business, and love in its own place: for with him, as inthe great world, men are not all running after a wench. With this greatopen field compare me not the narrow garden of Boccaccio, and his littlemill-round of dishonest pleasures. "

"Your holiness, they say, hath not disdained to write a novel. "

"My holiness hath done more foolish things than one, whereof it repentstoo late. When I wrote novels I little thought to be head of theChurch. "

"I search in vain for a copy of it to add to my poor library. "

"It is well. Then the strict orders I gave four years ago to destroyevery copy in Italy have been well discharged. However, for yourcomfort, on my being made Pope, some fool turned it into French: so thatyou may read it, at the price of exile. "

"Reduced to this strait we throw ourselves on your holiness'sgenerosity. Vouchsafe to give us your infallible judgment on it!"

"Gently, gently, good Francesco. A Pope's novels are not matters offaith. I can but give you my sincere impression. Well then the workin question had, as far as I can remember, all the vices of Boccaccio, without his choice Italian. "

Fra Colonna. "Your holiness is known for slighting Aeneas Silvius asother men never slighted him. I did him injustice to make you hisjudge. Perhaps your holiness will decide more justly between these twoboys-about blessing the beasts. "

The Pope demurred. In speaking of Plutarch he had brightened up fora moment, and his eye had even flashed; but his general manner was asunlike what youthful females expect in a Pope as you can conceive. I canonly describe it in French. Le gentilhomme blase. A highbred, andhighly cultivated gentleman, who had done, and said, and seen, andknown everything, and whose body was nearly worn out. But double languorseemed to seize him at the father's proposal. 

"My poor Francesco, " said he, "bethink thee that I have had a life ofcontroversy, and am sick on't; sick as death. Plutarch drew me to thiscalm retreat; not divinity. "

"Nay, but, your holiness, for moderating of strife between two hot youngbloods, {Makarioi oi eirinopioi}. "

"And know you nature so ill, as to think either of these high-mettledyouths will reck what a poor old Pope saith?"

"Oh! your holiness, " broke in Gerard, blushing and gasping, "sure, hereis one who will treasure your words all his life as words from Heaven. "

"In that case, " said the Pope, "I am fairly caught. As Francesco herewould say--

{ouk estin ostis est' anyr eleutheos}. 

I came to taste that eloquent heathen, dear to me e'en as to thee, thoupaynim monk; and I must talk divinity, or something next door to it. But the youth hath a good and a winning face, and writeth Greek like anangel. Well then, my children, to comprehend the ways of the Church, weshould still rise a little above the earth, since the Church is betweenheaven and earth, and interprets betwixt them. 

"The question is then, not how vulgar men feel, but how the commonCreator of man and beast doth feel, towards the lower animals. This, ifwe are too proud to search for it in the lessons of the Church, the nextbest thing is to go to the most ancient history of men and animals. "

Colonna. "Herodotus. "

"Nay, nay; in this matter Herodotus is but a mushroom. Finely were wesped for ancient history, if we depended on your Greeks, who did butwrite on the last leaf of that great book, Antiquity. "

The friar groaned. Here was a Pope uttering heresy against his demigods. 

"'Tis the Vulgate I speak of. A history that handles matters threethousand years before him pedants call 'the Father of History. '"

Colonna. "Oh! the Vulgate? I cry your holiness mercy. How you frightenedme. I quite forgot the Vulgate. "

"Forgot it? art sure thou ever readst it, Francesco mio?"

"Not quite, your holiness. 'Tis a pleasure I have long promised myself, the first vacant moment. Hitherto these grand old heathen have left mesmall time for recreation. "

His Holiness. "First then you will find in Genesis that God, havingcreated the animals, drew a holy pleasure, undefinable by us, fromcontemplating of their beauty. Was it wonderful? See their myriad forms;their lovely hair and eyes, their grace, and of some the power andmajesty: the colour of others, brighter than roses, or rubies. And when, for man's sin, not their own, they were destroyed, yet were two of eachkind spared. 

"And when the ark and its trembling inmates tumbled solitary on theworld of water, then, saith the word, 'God remembered Noah, and thecattle that were with him in the ark. '

"Thereafter God did write His rainbow in the sky as a bond that earthshould be flooded no more; and between whom the bond? between God andman? nay, between God and man, and every living creature of all flesh:or my memory fails me with age. In Exodus God commanded that the cattleshould share the sweet blessing of the one day's rest. Moreover He'forbade to muzzle the ox that trod out the corn. 'Nay, let the pooroverwrought soul snatch a mouthful as he goes his toilsome round: thebulk of the grain shall still be for man. ' Ye will object perchancethat St. Paul, commenting this, saith rudely, 'Doth God care for oxen?'Verily, had I been Peter, instead of the humblest of his successors, I had answered him. 'Drop thy theatrical poets, Paul, and read theScriptures: then shalt thou know whether God careth only for men andsparrows, or for all his creatures. O, Paul, ' had I made bold to say, 'think not to learn God by looking into Paul's heart, nor any heart ofman, but study that which he hath revealed concerning himself. '

"Thrice he forbade the Jews to boil the kid in his mother's milk; notthat this is cruelty, but want of thought and gentle sentiments, and sopaves the way for downright cruelty. A prophet riding on an ass didmeet an angel. Which of these two, Paulo judice, had seen the heavenlyspirit? marry, the prophet. But it was not so. The man, his visioncloyed with sin, saw nought. The poor despised creature saw all. Nor isthis recorded as miraculous. Poor proud things, we overrate ourselves. The angel had slain the prophet and spared the ass, but for thatcreature's clearer vision of essences divine. He said so, methinks. But in sooth I read it many years agone. Why did God spare repentantNineveh? Because in that city were sixty thousand children, besides muchcattle. 

"Profane history and vulgar experience add their mite of witness. Thecruel to animals end in cruelty to man; and strange and violent deaths, marked with retribution's bloody finger, have in all ages fallen fromheaven on such as wantonly harm innocent beasts. This I myself haveseen. All this duly weighed, and seeing that, despite this Francesco'sfriends, the Stoics, who in their vanity say the creatures all subsistfor man's comfort, there be snakes and scorpions which kill 'Dominumterra' with a nip, musquitoes which eat him piecemeal, and tigers andsharks which crack him like an almond, we do well to be grateful tothese true, faithful, patient, four-footed friends, which, in lieu ofpowdering us, put forth their strength to relieve our toils, and do feedus like mothers from their gentle dugs. 

"Methinks then the Church is never more divine than in this benedictionof our four-footed friends, which has revolted you great theologicalauthority, the captain of the Pope's guards; since here she inculcateshumility and gratitude, and rises towards the level of the mind divine, and interprets God to man, God the Creator, parent, and friend of manand beast. 

"But all this, young gentles, you will please to receive, not asdelivered by the Pope ex cathedra, but uttered carelessly, in a freehour, by an aged clergyman. On that score you will perhaps do well toentertain it with some little consideration. For old age must surelybring a man somewhat, in return for his digestion (his 'dura puerorumilia, ' eh, Francesco!), which it carries away. "

Such was the purport of the Pope's discourse but the manner high bred, languid, kindly, and free from all tone of dictation. He seemed to begently probing the matter in concert with his hearers, not playingSir Oracle. At the bottom of all which was doubtless a slight touch ofhumbug, but the humbug that embellishes life; and all sense of it waslost in the subtle Italian grace of the thing. 

"I seem to hear the oracle of Delphi, " said Fra Colonnaenthusiastically. 

"I call that good sense, " shouted Jacques Bonaventura. 

"Oh, captain, good sense!" said Gerard, with a deep and tender reproach. 

The Pope smiled on Gerard. "Cavil not at words; that was an unheardof concession from a rival theologian. " He then asked for all Gerard'swork, and took it away in his hand. But before going, he gently pulledFra Colonna's ear, and asked him whether he remembered when they wereschool-fellows together and robbed the Virgin by the roadside of themoney dropped into her box. "You took a flat stick and applied bird-limeto the top, and drew the money out through the chink, you rogue, " saidhis holiness severely. 

"To every signor his own honour, " replied Fra Colonna. "It was yourholiness's good wit invented the manoeuvre. I was but the humbleinstrument. "

"It is well. Doubtless you know 'twas sacrilege. "

"Of the first water; but I did it in such good company, it troubles menot. "

"Humph! I have not even that poor consolation. What did we spend it in, dost mind?"

"Can your holiness ask? why, sugar-plums. "

"What, all on't?"

"Every doit. "

"These are delightful reminiscences, my Francesco. Alas! I am gettingold. I shall not be here long. And I am sorry for it, for thy sake. Theywill go and burn thee when I am gone. Art far more a heretic than Huss, whom I saw burned with these eyes; and oh, he died like a martyr. "

"Ay, your holiness; but I believe in the Pope; and Huss did not. "

"Fox! They will not burn thee; wood is too dear. Adieu, old playmate;adieu, young gentlemen; an old man's blessing be on you. "

That afternoon the Pope's secretary brought Gerard a little bag: in itwere several gold pieces. 

He added them to his store. 

Margaret seemed nearer and nearer. 

For some time past, too, it appeared as if the fairies had watched overhim. Baskets of choice provisions and fruits were brought to his door byporters, who knew not who had employed them, or affected ignorance; andone day came a jewel in a letter, but no words. 

CHAPTER LXI

The Princess Claelia ordered a full-length portrait of herself. Gerardadvised her to employ his friend Pietro Vanucci. 

But she declined. "'Twill be time to put a slight on the Gerardo, whenhis work discontents me. " Then Gerard, who knew he was an excellentdraughtsman, but not so good a colourist, begged her to stand to himas a Roman statue. He showed her how closely he could mimic marbleon paper. She consented at first; but demurred when this enthusiastexplained to her that she must wear the tunic, toga, and sandals of theancients. 

"Why, I had as lieve be presented in my smock, " said she, with mediaevalfrankness. 

"Alack! signorina, " said Gerard, "you have surely never noted theancient habit; so free, so ample, so simple, yet so noble; and mostbecoming your highness, to whom Heaven hath given the Roman features, and eke a shapely arm and hand, his in modern guise. "

"What, can you flatter, like the rest, Gerardo? Well, give me time tothink on't. Come o' Saturday, and then I will say ay or nay. "

The respite thus gained was passed in making the tunic and toga, etc. , and trying them on in her chamber, to see whether they suited her styleof beauty well enough to compensate their being a thousand years out ofdate. 

Gerard, hurrying along to this interview, was suddenly arrested, androoted to earth at a shop window. 

His quick eye had discerned in that window a copy of Lactantius lyingopen. "That is fairly writ, anyway, " thought he. 

He eyed it a moment more with all his eyes. 

It was not written at all. It was printed. 

Gerard groaned. 

"I am sped; mine enemy is at the door. The press is in Rome. "

He went into the shop, and affecting nonchalance, inquired how long theprinting-press had been in Rome. The man said he believed there was nosuch thing in the city. "Oh, the Lactantius; that was printed on the topof the Apennines. "

"What, did the printing-press fall down there out o' the moon?"

"Nay, messer, " said the trader, laughing; "it shot up there out ofGermany. See the title-page!"

Gerard took the Lactantius eagerly, and saw the following--

 Opera et impensis Sweynheim et Pannartz Alumnorum Joannis Fust. Impressum Subiacis. A. D. 1465. 

"Will ye buy, messer? See how fair and even be the letters. Few are leftcan write like that; and scarce a quarter of the price. "

"I would fain have it, " said Gerard sadly, "but my heart will not letme. Know that I am a caligraph, and these disciples of Fust run after meround the world a-taking the bread out of my mouth. But I wish them noill. Heaven forbid!" And he hurried from the shop. 

"Dear Margaret, " said he to himself, "we must lose no time; we mustmake our hay while shines the sun. One month more and an avalanche ofprinter's type shall roll down on Rome from those Apennines, and lay uswaste that writers be. "

And he almost ran to the Princess Claelia. 

He was ushered into an apartment new to him. It was not very large, but most luxurious; a fountain played in the centre, and the floor wascovered with the skins of panthers, dressed with the hair, so that nofootfall could be heard. The room was an ante-chamber to the princess'sboudoir, for on one side there was no door, but an ample curtain ofgorgeous tapestry. 

Here Gerard was left alone till he became quite uneasy, and doubtedwhether the maid had not shown him to the wrong place. 

These doubts were agreeably dissipated. 

A light step came swiftly behind the curtain; it parted in the middle, and there stood a figure the heathens might have worshipped. It was notquite Venus, nor quite Minerva; but between the two; nobler than Venus, more womanly than Jupiter's daughter. Toga, tunic, sandals; nothing wasmodern. And as for beauty, that is of all times. 

Gerard started up, and all the artist in him flushed with pleasure. 

"Oh!" he cried innocently, and gazed in rapture. 

This added the last charm to his model: a light blush tinted her cheeks, and her eyes brightened, and her mouth smiled with delicious complacencyat this genuine tribute to her charms. 

When they had looked at one another so some time, and she saw Gerard'seloquence was confined to ejaculating and gazing, she spoke. "Well, Gerardo, thou seest I have made myself an antique monster for thee. "

"A monster? I doubt Fra Colonna would fall down and adore your highness, seeing you so habited. "

"Nay, I care not to be adored by an old man. I would liever be loved bya young one: of my own choosing. "

Gerard took out his pencils, arranged his canvas, which he had coveredwith stout paper, and set to work; and so absorbed was he that he hadno mercy on his model. At last, after near an hour in one posture, "Gerardo, " said she faintly, "I can stand so no more, even for thee. "

"Sit down and rest awhile, Signora. "

"I thank thee, " said she; and sinking into a chair turned pale andsighed. 

Gerard was alarmed, and saw also he had been inconsiderate. He tookwater from the fountain and was about to throw it in her face; but sheput up a white hand deprecatingly: "Nay, hold it to my brow with thinehand: prithee, do not fling it at me!"

Gerard timidly and hesitating applied his wet hand to her brow. 

"Ah!" she sighed, "that is reviving. Again. "

He applied it again. She thanked him, and asked him to ring a littlehand-bell on the table. He did so, and a maid came, and was sent toFloretta with orders to bring a large fan. 

Floretta speedily came with the fan. 

She no sooner came near the princess, than that lady's highbred nostrilssuddenly expanded like a bloodhorse's. "Wretch!" said she; and risingup with a sudden return to vigour, seized Floretta with her left hand, twisted it in her hair, and with the right hand boxed her ears severelythree times. 

Floretta screamed and blubbered; but obtained no mercy. 

The antique toga left quite disengaged a bare arm, that now seemed aspowerful as it was beautiful: it rose and fell like the piston of amodern steam-engine, and heavy slaps resounded one after another onFloretta's shoulders; the last one drove her sobbing and screamingthrough the curtain, and there she was heard crying bitterly for sometime after. 

"Saints of heaven!" cried Gerard, "what is amiss? what has she done?"

"She knows right well. 'Tis not the first time. The nasty toad! I'lllearn her to come to me stinking of the musk-cat. "

"Alas! Signora, 'twas a small fault, methinks. "

"A small fault? Nay, 'twas a foul fault. " She added with an amazingsudden descent to humility and sweetness, "Are you wroth with me forbeating her, Gerar-do?"

"Signora, it ill becomes me to school you; but methinks such as Heavenappoints to govern others should govern themselves. "

"That is true, Gerardo. How wise you are, to be so young. " She thencalled the other maid, and gave her a little purse. "Take that toFloretta, and tell her 'the Gerardo' hath interceded for her; and so Imust needs forgive her. There, Gerardo. "

Gerard coloured all over at the compliment; but not knowing how toturn a phrase equal to the occasion, asked her if he should resume herpicture. 

"Not yet; beating that hussy hath somewhat breathed me. I'll sit awhile, and you shall talk to me. I know you can talk, an it pleases you, asrarely as you draw. "

"That were easily done. 

"Do it then, Gerardo. "

Gerard was taken aback. 

"But, signora, I know not what to say. This is sudden. "

"Say your real mind. Say you wish you were anywhere but here. "

"Nay, signora, that would not be sooth. I wish one thing though. "

"Ay, and what is that?" said she gently. 

"I wish I could have drawn you as you were beating that poor lass. Youwere awful, yet lovely. Oh, what a subject for a Pythoness!"

"Alas! he thinks but of his art. And why keep such a coil about mybeauty, Gerardo? You are far fairer than I am. You are more like Apollothan I to Venus. Also, you have lovely hair and lovely eyes--but youknow not what to do with them. "

"Ay, do I. To draw you, signora. "

"Ah, yes; you can see my features with them; but you cannot see what anyRoman gallant had seen long ago in your place. Yet sure you must havenoted how welcome you are to me, Gerardo?"

"I can see your highness is always passing kind to me; a poor strangerlike me. "

"No, I am not, Gerardo. I have often been cold to you; rude sometimes;and you are so simple you see not the cause. Alas! I feared for my ownheart. I feared to be your slave. I who have hitherto made slaves. Ah!Gerardo, I am unhappy. Ever since you came here I have lived uponyour visits. The day you are to come I am bright. The other days I amlistless, and wish them fled. You are not like the Roman gallants. Youmake me hate them. You are ten times braver to my eye; and you arewise and scholarly, and never flatter and lie. I scorn a man that lies. Gerar-do, teach me thy magic; teach me to make thee as happy by my sideas I am still by thine. "

As she poured out these strange words, the princess's mellow voice sunkalmost to a whisper, and trembled with half-suppressed passion, and herwhite hand stole timidly yet earnestly down Gerard's arm, till it restedlike a soft bird upon his wrist, and as ready to fly away at a word. 

Destitute of vanity and experience, wrapped up in his Margaret and hisart, Gerard had not seen this revelation coming, though it had come byregular and visible gradations. 

He blushed all over. His innocent admiration of the regal beauty thatbesieged him, did not for a moment displace the absent Margaret's image. Yet it was regal beauty, and wooing with a grace and tenderness he hadnever even figured in imagination. How to check her without woundingher?

He blushed and trembled. 

The siren saw, and encouraged him. 

"Poor Gerardo, " she murmured, "fear not; none shall ever harm thee undermy wing. Wilt not speak to me, Gerar-do mio?"

"Signora!" muttered Gerard deprecatingly. 

At this moment his eye, lowered in his confusion, fell on the shapelywhite arm and delicate hand that curled round his elbow like a tendervine, and it flashed across him how he had just seen that lovely limbemployed on Floretta. 

He trembled and blushed. 

"Alas!" said the princess, "I scare him. Am I then so very terrible? Isit my Roman robe? I'll doff it, and habit me as when thou first camestto me. Mindest thou? 'Twas to write a letter to yon barren knight Ercoled'Orsini. Shall I tell thee? 'twas the sight of thee, and thy prettyways, and thy wise words, made me hate him on the instant. I liked thefool well enough before; or wist I liked him. Tell me now how many timeshast thou been here since then. Ah! thou knowest not; lovest me not, Idoubt, as I love thee. Eighteen times, Gerardo. And each time dearerto me. The day thou comest not 'tis night, not day, to Claelia. Alas!I speak for both. Cruel boy, am I not worth a word? Hast every day aprincess at thy feet? Nay, prithee, prithee, speak to me, Gerar-do. "

"Signora, " faltered Gerard, "what can I say, that were not better leftunsaid? Oh, evil day that ever I came here. "

"Ah! say not so. 'Twas the brightest day ever shone on me or indeed onthee. I'll make thee confess so much ere long, ungrateful one. "

"Your highness, " began Gerard, in a low, pleading voice. 

"Call me Claelia, Gerar-do. "

"Signora, I am too young and too little wise to know how I ought tospeak to you, so as not to seem blind nor yet ungrateful. But this Iknow, I were both naught and ungrateful, and the worst foe e'er you had, did I take advantage of this mad fancy. Sure some ill spirit hath hadleave to afflict you withal. For 'tis all unnatural that a princessadorned with every grace should abase her affections on a churl. "

The princess withdrew her hand slowly from Gerard's wrist. 

Yet as it passed lightly over his arm it seemed to linger a moment atparting. 

"You fear the daggers of my kinsmen, " said she, half sadly, halfcontemptuously. 

"No more than I fear the bodkins of your women, " said Gerard haughtily. "But I fear God and the saints, and my own conscience. "

"The truth, Gerardo, the truth! Hypocrisy sits awkwardly on thee. Princesses, while they are young, are not despised for love of God, butof some other woman. Tell me whom thou lovest; and if she is worthy theeI will forgive thee. "

"No she in Italy, upon my soul. "

"Ah! there is one somewhere then. Where? where?"

"In Holland, my native country. "

"Ah! Marie de Bourgoyne is fair, they say. Yet she is but a child. "

"Princess, she I love is not noble. She is as I am. Nor is she sofair as thou. Yet is she fair; and linked to my heart for ever by hervirtues, and by all the dangers and griefs we have borne together, andfor one another. Forgive me; but I would not wrong my Margaret for allthe highest dames in Italy. "

The slighted beauty started to her feet, and stood opposite him, asbeautiful, but far more terrible than when she slapped Floretta, forthen her cheeks were red, but now they were pale, and her eyes full ofconcentrated fury. 

"This to my face, unmannered wretch, " she cried. "Was I born to beinsulted, as well as scorned, by such as thou? Beware! We nobles brookno rivals. Bethink thee whether is better, the love of a Cesarini, orher hate: for after all I have said and done to thee, it must be love orhate between us, and to the death. Choose now!"

He looked up at her with wonder and awe, as she stood towering over himin her Roman toga, offering this strange alternative. 

He seemed to have affronted a goddess of antiquity; he a poor punymortal. 

He sighed deeply, but spoke not. 

Perhaps something in his deep and patient sigh touched a tender chord inthat ungoverned creature; or perhaps the time had come for one passionto ebb and another to flow. The princess sank languidly into a seat, andthe tears began to steal rapidly down her cheeks. 

"Alas! alas!" said Gerard. "Weep not, sweet lady; your tears theydo accuse me, and I am like to weep for company. My kind patron, beyourself; you will live to see how much better a friend I was to youthan I seemed. "

"I see it now, Gerardo, " said the princess. "Friend is the word! theonly word can ever pass between us twain. I was mad. Any other man hadta'en advantage of my folly. You must teach me to be your friend andnothing more. "

Gerard hailed this proposition with joy; and told her out of Cicero howgodlike a thing was friendship, and how much better and rarer and morelasting than love: to prove to her he was capable of it, he even toldher about Denys and himself. 

She listened with her eyes half shut, watching his words to fathom hischaracter, and learn his weak point. 

At last, she addressed him calmly thus: "Leave me now, Gerardo, and comeas usual to-morrow. You will find your lesson well bestowed. "

She held out her hand to him: he kissed it; and went away ponderingdeeply this strange interview, and wondering whether he had doneprudently or not. 

The next day he was received with marked distance, and the princessstood before him literally like a statue, and after a very shortsitting, excused herself and dismissed him. Gerard felt the chillingdifference; but said to himself, "She is wise. " So she was in her way. 

The next day he found the princess waiting for him surrounded by youngnobles flattering her to the skies. She and they treated him like adog that could do one little trick they could not. The cavaliers inparticular criticised his work with a mass of ignorance and insolencecombined that made his cheeks burn. 

The princess watched his face demurely with half-closed eyes at eachsting the insects gave him; and when they had fled, had her doors closedagainst every one of them for their pains. 

The next day Gerard found her alone: cold and silent. After standing tohim so some time, she said, "You treated my company with less respectthan became you. "

"Did I, Signora?"

"Did you? you fired up at the comments they did you the honour to makeon your work. "

"Nay, I said nought, " observed Gerard. 

"Oh, high looks speak as plain as high words. Your cheeks were red asblood. "

"I was nettled a moment at seeing so much ignorance and ill-naturetogether. "

"Now it is me, their hostess, you affront. "

"Forgive me, Signora, and acquit me of design. It would ill become me toaffront the kindest patron and friend I have in Rome but one. "

"How humble we are all of a sudden. In sooth, Ser Gerardo, you are acapital feigner. You can insult or truckle at will. "

"Truckle? to whom?"

"To me, for one; to one, whom you affronted for a base-born girl likeyourself; but whose patronage you claim all the same. "

Gerard rose, and put his hand to his heart. "These are biting words, signora. Have I really deserved them?"

"Oh, what are words to an adventurer like you? cold steel is all youfear?"

"I am no swashbuckler, yet I have met steel with steel and methinks Ihad rather face your kinsmen's swords than your cruel tongue, lady. Whydo you use me so?"

"Gerar-do, for no good reason, but because I am wayward, and shrewish, and curst, and because everybody admires me but you. "

"I admire you too, Signora. Your friends may flatter you more; butbelieve me they have not the eye to see half your charms. Their babbleyesterday showed me that. None admire you more truly, or wish youbetter, than the poor artist, who might not be your lover, but hopedto be your friend; but no, I see that may not be between one so high asyou, and one so low as I. "

"Ay! but it shall, Gerardo, " said the princess eagerly. "I will not beso curst. Tell me now where abides thy Margaret; and I will give thee apresent for her; and on that you and I will be friends. "

"She is a daughter of a physician called Peter, and they bide atSevenbergen; ah me, shall I e'er see it again?"

"'Tis well. Now go. " And she dismissed him somewhat abruptly. 

Poor Gerard. He began to wade in deep waters when he encountered thisItalian princess; callida et calida selis filia. He resolved to go nomore when once he had finished her likeness. Indeed he now regrettedhaving undertaken so long and laborious a task. 

This resolution was shaken for a moment by his next reception, which wasall gentleness and kindness. 

After standing to him some time in her toga, she said she was fatigued, and wanted his assistance in another way: would he teach her to draw alittle? He sat down beside her, and taught her to make easy lines. Hefound her wonderfully apt. He said so. 

"I had a teacher before thee, Gerar-do. Ay, and one as handsome asthyself. " She then went to a drawer, and brought out several headsdrawn with a complete ignorance of the art, but with great patience andnatural talent. They were all heads of Gerard, and full of spirit; andreally not unlike. One was his very image. "There, " said she. "Now thouseest who was my teacher. "

"Not I, signora. "

"What, know you not who teaches us women to do all things? 'Tis love, Gerar-do. Love made me draw because thou draweth, Gerar-do. Love printsthine image in my bosom. My fingers touch the pen, and love supplies thewant of art, and lo thy beloved features lie upon the paper. "

Gerard opened his eyes with astonishment at this return to aninterdicted topic. "Oh, Signora, you promised me to be friends andnothing more. "

She laughed in his face. "How simple you are: who believes a womanpromising nonsense, impossibilities? Friendship, foolish boy, whoever built that temple on red ashes? Nay Gerardo, " she added gloomily, "between thee and me it must be love or hate. "

"Which you will, signora, " said Gerard firmly. "But for me I willneither love nor hate you; but with your permission I will leave you. "And he rose abruptly. 

She rose too, pale as death, and said, "Ere thou leavest me so, know thyfate; outside that door are armed men who wait to slay thee at a wordfrom me. "

"But you will not speak that word, signora. "

"That word I will speak. Nay, more, I shall noise it abroad it was forproffering brutal love to me thou wert slain; and I will send a specialmessenger to Sevenbergen: a cunning messenger, well taught his lesson. Thy Margaret shall know thee dead, and think thee faithless; now, go tothy grave; a dog's. For a man thou art not. "

Gerard turned pale, and stood dumb-stricken. "God have mercy on usboth. "

"Nay, have thou mercy on her, and on thyself. She will never know inHolland what thou dost in Rome; unless I be driven to tell her my tale. Come, yield thee, Gerar-do mio: what will it cost thee to say thoulovest me? I ask thee but to feign it handsomely. Thou art young: dienot for the poor pleasure of denying a lady what-the shadow of a heart. Who will shed a tear for thee? I tell thee men will laugh, not weepover thy tombstone-ah!" She ended in a little scream, for Gerard threwhimself in a moment at her feet, and poured out in one torrent ofeloquence the story of his love and Margaret's. How he had beenimprisoned, hunted with bloodhounds for her, driven to exile for her;how she had shed her blood for him, and now pined at home. How hehad walked through Europe environed by perils, torn by savage brutes, attacked by furious men with sword and axe and trap, robbed, shipwreckedfor her. 

The princess trembled, and tried to get away from him; but he heldher robe, he clung to her, he made her hear his pitiful story andMargaret's; he caught her hand, and clasped it between both his, and histears fell fast on her hand, as he implored her to think on all thewoes of the true lovers she would part; and what but remorse, swiftand lasting, could come of so deep a love betrayed, and so false a lovefeigned, with mutual hatred lurking at the bottom. 

In such moments none ever resisted Gerard. 

The princess, after in vain trying to get away from him, for she felthis power over her, began to waver, and sigh, and her bosom to rise andfall tumultuously, and her fiery eyes to fill. 

"You conquer me, " she sobbed. "You, or my better angel. Leave Rome!"

"I will, I will. "

"If you breathe a word of my folly, it will be your last. "

"Think not so poorly of me. You are my benefactress once more. Is it forme to slander you?"

"Go! I will send you the means. I know myself; if you cross my pathagain, I shall kill you. Addio; my heart is broken. "

She touched her bell. "Floretta, " said she, in a choked voice, "take himsafe out of the house, through my chamber, and by the side postern. "

He turned at the door; she was leaning with one hand on a chair, crying, with averted head. Then he thought only of her kindness, and ran backand kissed her robe. She never moved. 

Once clear of the house he darted home, thanking Heaven for his escape, soul and body. 

"Landlady, " said he, "there is one would pick a quarrel with me. What isto be done?"

"Strike him first, and at vantage! Get behind him; and then draw. "

"Alas, I lack your Italian courage. To be serious, 'tis a noble. "

"Oh, holy saints, that is another matter. Change thy lodging awhile, andkeep snug; and alter the fashion of thy habits. "

She then took him to her own niece, who let lodgings at some littledistance, and installed him there. 

He had little to do now, and no princess to draw, so he set himselfresolutely to read that deed of Floris Brandt, from which he hadhitherto been driven by the abominably bad writing. He mastered it, andsaw at once that the loan on this land must have been paid over and overagain by the rents, and that Ghysbrecht was keeping Peter Brandt out ofhis own. 

"Fool! not to have read this before, " he cried. He hired a horse androde down to the nearest port. A vessel was to sail for Amsterdam infour days. 

He took a passage; and paid a small sum to secure it. 

"The land is too full of cut-throats for me, " said he; "and 'tis lovelyfair weather for the sea. Our Dutch skippers are not shipwrecked likethese bungling Italians. "

When he returned home there sat his old landlady with her eyessparkling. 

"You are in luck, my young master, " said she. "All the fish run to yournet this day methinks. See what a lackey hath brought to our house! Thisbill and this bag. "

Gerard broke the seals, and found it full of silver crowns. The lettercontained a mere slip of paper with this line, cut out of some MS. :--"Lalingua non ha osso, ma fa rompere il dosso. "

"Fear me not!" said Gerard aloud. "I'll keep mine between my teeth. "

"What is that?"

"Oh, nothing. Am I not happy, dame? I am going back to my sweetheartwith money in one pocket, and land in the other. " And he fell to dancinground her. 

"Well, " said she, "I trow nothing could make you happier. "

"Nothing, except to be there. "

"Well, that is a pity, for I thought to make you a little happier with aletter from Holland. "

"A letter? for me? where? how? who brought it?--Oh, dame!"

"A stranger; a painter, with a reddish face and an outlandish name;Anselmin, I trow. "

"Hans Memling! a friend of mine. God bless him!"

"Ay, that is it: Anselmin. He could scarce speak a word, but a had thewit to name thee; and a puts the letter down, and a nods and smiles, andI nods and smiles, and gives him a pint o' wine, and it went down himlike a spoonful. "

"That is Hans, honest Hans. Oh, dame, I am in luck to-day; but Ideserve it. For, I care not if I tell you, I have just overcome a greattemptation for dear Margaret's sake. "

"Who is she?"

"Nay, I'd have my tongue cut out sooner than betray her, but oh, it wasa temptation. Gratitude pushing me wrong, Beauty almost divine pullingme wrong: curses, reproaches, and hardest of all to resist, gentle tearsfrom eyes used to command. Sure some saint helped me Anthony belike. Butmy reward is come. "

"Ay, is it, lad; and no farther off than my pocket. Come out, Gerard'sreward, " and she brought a letter out of her capacious pocket. 

Gerard threw his arm round her neck and hugged her. 

"My best friend, " said he, "my second mother, I'll read it to you. 

"Ay, do, do. "

"Alas! it is not from Margaret. This is not her hand. " And he turned itabout. 

"Alack; but maybe her bill is within. The lasses are aye for gliding intheir bills under cover of another hand. "

"True. Whose hand is this? sure I have seen it. I trow 'tis my dearfriend the demoiselle Van Eyck. Oh, then Margaret's bill will beinside. " He tore it open. "Nay, 'tis all in one writing. 'Gerard, mywell beloved son' (she never called me that before that I mind), 'thisletter brings thee heavy news from one would liever send thee joyfultidings. Know that Margaret Brandt died in these arms on Thursdaysennight last. ' (What does the doting old woman mean by that?) 'The lastword on her lips was "Gerard:" she said, "Tell him I prayed for him atmy last hour; and bid him pray for me. " She died very comfortable, andI saw her laid in the earth, for her father was useless, as you shallknow. So no more at present from her that is with sorrowing heart thyloving friend and servant, "MARGARET VAN EYCK. '"

"Ay, that is her signature sure enough. Now what d'ye think of that, dame?" cried Gerard, with a grating laugh. "There is a pretty letter tosend to a poor fellow so far from home. But it is Reicht Heynes I blamefor humouring the old woman and letting her do it; as for the old womanherself, she dotes, she has lost her head, she is fourscore. Oh, myheart, I'm choking. For all that she ought to be locked up, or her handstied. Say this had come to a fool; say I was idiot enough to believethis; know ye what I should do? run to the top of the highest churchtower in Rome and fling myself off it, cursing Heaven. Woman! woman!what are you doing?" And he seized her rudely by the shoulder. "What areye weeping for?" he cried, in a voice all unlike his own, and loud andhoarse as a raven. "Would ye scald me to death with your tears? Shebelieves it. She believes it. Ah! ah! ah! ah! ah! ah!--Then there is noGod. "

The poor woman sighed and rocked herself. 

"And must be the one to bring it thee all smiling and smirking? I couldkill myself for't. Death spares none, " she sobbed. "Death spares none. "

Gerard staggered against the window sill. "But He is master of death, "he groaned. "Or they have taught me a lie. I begin to fear there is noGod, and the saints are but dead bones, and hell is master of the world. My pretty Margaret; my sweet, my loving Margaret. The best daughter! thetruest lover! the pride of Holland! the darling of the world! It is alie. Where is this caitiff Hans? I'll hunt him round the town. I'll cramhis murdering falsehood down his throat. "

And he seized his hat and ran furiously about the streets for hours. 

Towards sunset he came back white as a ghost. He had not found Memling;but his poor mind had had time to realise the woman's simple words, thatDeath spares none. 

He crept into the house bent, and feeble as an old man, and refusedall food. Nor would he speak, but sat, white, with great staring eyes, muttering at intervals, "There is no God. " Alarmed both on his accountand on her own (for he looked a desperate maniac), his landlady ran forher aunt. 

The good dame came, and the two women, braver together, sat one on eachside of him, and tried to soothe him with kind and consoling voices. But he heeded them no more than the chairs they sat on. Then the youngerheld a crucifix out before him, to aid her. "Maria, mother of heaven, comfort him, " they sighed. But he sat glaring, deaf to all externalsounds. 

Presently, without any warning, he jumped up, struck the crucifix rudelyout of his way with a curse, and made a headlong dash at the door. Thepoor women shrieked. But ere he reached the door, something seemed tothem to draw him up straight by his hair, and twirl him round like atop. He whirled twice round with arms extended; then fell like a deadlog upon the floor, with blood trickling from his nostrils and ears. 

CHAPTER XLII

Gerard returned to consciousness and to despair. 

On the second day he was raving with fever on the brain. 

On a table hard by lay his rich auburn hair, long as a woman's. 

The deadlier symptoms succeeded one another rapidly. 

On the fifth day his leech retired and gave him up. 

On the sunset of that same day he fell into a deep sleep. 

Some said he would wake only to die. 

But an old gossip, whose opinion carried weight (she had been aprofessional nurse), declared that his youth might save him yet, couldhe sleep twelve hours. 

On this his old landlady cleared the room and watched him alone. Shevowed a wax candle to the Virgin for every hour he should sleep. 

He slept twelve hours. 

The good soul rejoiced, and thanked the Virgin on her knees. 

He slept twenty-four hours. 

His kind nurse began to doubt. At the thirtieth hour she sent for thewoman of art. 

"Thirty hours! shall we wake him?"

The other inspected him closely for some time. 

"His breath is even, his hand moist. I know there be learned leecheswould wake him, to look at his tongue, and be none the wiser; but wethat be women should have the sense to let bon Nature alone. When didsleep ever harm the racked brain or the torn heart?"

When he had been forty-eight hours asleep, it got wind, and they hadmuch ado to keep the curious out. But they admitted only Fra Colonna andhis friend the gigantic Fra Jerome. 

These two relieved the women, and sat silent; the former eyeing hisyoung friend with tears in his eyes, the latter with beads in hishand looked as calmly on him as he had on the sea when Gerard and heencountered it hand to hand. 

At last, I think it was about the sixtieth hour of this strange sleep, the landlady touched Fra Colonna with her elbow. He looked. Gerard hadopened his eyes as gently as if he had been but dozing. 

He stared. 

He drew himself up a little in bed. 

He put his hand to his head, and found his hair was gone. 

He noticed his friend Colonna, and smiled with pleasure. 

But in the middle of smiling his face stopped, and was convulsed in amoment with anguish unspeakable, and he uttered a loud cry, and turnedhis face to the wall. 

His good landlady wept at this. She had known what it is to awakebereaved. 

Fra Jerome recited canticles, and prayers from his breviary. 

Gerard rolled himself in the bed-clothes. 

Fra Colonna went to him, and whimpering, reminded him that all was notlost. The divine Muses were immortal. He must transfer his affection tothem; they would never betray him nor fail him like creatures of clay. The good, simple father then hurried away; for he was overcome by hisemotion. 

Fra Jerome remained behind. "Young man, " said he, "the Muses exist butin the brains of pagans and visionaries. The Church alone gives reposeto the heart on earth, and happiness to the soul hereafter. Hath earthdeceived thee, hath passion broken thy heart after tearing it, theChurch opens her arms: consecrate thy gifts to her! The Church is peaceof mind. "

He spoke these words solemnly at the door, and was gone as soon as theywere uttered. 

"The Church!" cried Gerard, rising furiously, and shaking his fist afterthe friar. "Malediction on the Church! But for the Church I shouldnot lie broken here, and she lie cold, cold, cold, in Holland. Oh, myMargaret! oh, my darling! my darling! And I must run from thee the fewmonths thou hadst to live. Cruel! cruel! The monsters, they let her die. Death comes not without some signs. These the blind selfish wretches sawnot, or recked not; but I had seen them, I that love her. Oh, had I beenthere, I had saved her, I had saved her. Idiot! idiot! to leave her fora moment. "

He wept bitterly a long time. 

Then, suddenly bursting into rage again, he cried vehemently "TheChurch! for whose sake I was driven from her; my malison be on theChurch! and the hypocrites that name it to my broken heart. Accursed bethe world! Ghysbrecht lives; Margaret dies. Thieves, murderers, harlots, live for ever. Only angels die. Curse life! curse death! and whosoevermade them what they are!"

The friar did not hear these mad and wicked words; but only the yell ofrage with which they were flung after him. 

It was as well. For, if he had heard them, he would have had his lateshipmate burned in the forum with as little hesitation as he would haveroasted a kid. 

His old landlady who had accompanied Fra Colonna down the stair, heardthe raised voice, and returned in some anxiety. 

She found Gerard putting on his clothes, and crying. 

She remonstrated. 

"What avails my lying here?" said he gloomily. "Can I find here thatwhich I seek?"

"Saints preserve us! Is he distraught again? What seek ye?"

"Oblivion. "

"Oblivion, my little heart? Oh, but y'are young to talk so. "

"Young or old, what else have I to live for?"

He put on his best clothes. 

The good dame remonstrated. "My pretty Gerard, know that it is Tuesday, not Sunday. "

"Oh, Tuesday is it? I thought it had been Saturday. "

"Nay, thou hast slept long. Thou never wearest thy brave clothes onworking days. Consider. "

"What I did, when she lived, I did. Now I shall do whatever erst I didnot. The past is the past. There lies my hair, and with it my way oflife. I have served one Master as well as I could. You see my reward. Now I'll serve another, and give him a fair trial too. "

"Alas!" sighed the woman, turning pale, "what mean these dark words? andwhat new master is this whose service thou wouldst try?"

"SATAN. "

And with this horrible declaration on his lips the miserable creaturewalked out with his cap and feather set jauntily on one side, and feeblelimbs, and a sinister face pale as ashes, and all drawn down as if byage. 

CHAPTER LXIII

A dark cloud fell on a noble mind. 

His pure and unrivalled love for Margaret had been his polar star. Itwas quenched, and he drifted on the gloomy sea of no hope. 

Nor was he a prey to despair alone, but to exasperation at all hisself-denial, fortitude, perils, virtue, wasted and worse than wasted;for it kept burning and stinging him, that, had he stayed lazily, selfishly at home, he should have saved his Margaret's life. 

These two poisons, raging together in his young blood, maddened anddemoralized him. He rushed fiercely into pleasure. And in those days, even more than now, pleasure was vice. Wine, women, gambling, whatevercould procure him an hour's excitement and a moment's oblivion. Heplunged into these things, as men tired of life have rushed among theenemy's bullets. 

The large sums he had put by for Margaret gave him ample means fordebauchery, and he was soon the leader of those loose companions he hadhitherto kept at a distance. 

His heart deteriorated along with his morals. 

He sulked with his old landlady for thrusting gentle advice and warningon him; and finally removed to another part of the town, to be clear ofremonstrance and reminiscences. When he had carried this game on sometime, his hand became less steady, and he could no longer write tosatisfy himself. Moreover, his patience declined as the habits ofpleasure grew on him. So he gave up that art, and took likenesses incolours. 

But this he neglected whenever the idle rakes, his companions, came forhim. 

And so he dived in foul waters, seeking that sorry oyster-shell, Oblivion. 

It is not my business to paint at full length the scenes of coarse vicein which this unhappy young man now played a part. But it is my businessto impress the broad truth, that he was a rake, a debauchee, and adrunkard, and one of the wildest, loosest, and wickedest young men inRome. 

They are no lovers of truth, nor of mankind, who conceal or slur thewickedness of the good, and so by their want of candour rob despondentsinners of hope. 

Enough, the man was not born to do things by halves. And he was notvicious by halves. 

His humble female friends often gossiped about him. His old landladytold Teresa he was going to the bad, and prayed her to try and find outwhere he was. 

Teresa told her husband Lodovico his sad story, and bade him look aboutand see if he could discover the young man's present abode. "Shouldstremember his face, Lodovico mio?"

"Teresa, a man in my way of life never forgets a face, least of all abenefactor's. But thou knowest I seldom go abroad by daylight. "

Teresa sighed. "And how long is it to be so, Lodovico?"

"Till some cavalier passes his sword through me. They will not let apoor fellow like me take to any honest trade. "

Pietro Vanucci was one of those who bear prosperity worse thanadversity. 

Having been ignominiously ejected for late hours by their old landlady, and meeting Gerard in the street, he greeted him warmly, and soon aftertook up his quarters in the same house. 

He brought with him a lad called Andrea, who ground his colours, andwas his pupil, and also his model, being a youth of rare beauty, and assharp as a needle. 

Pietro had not quite forgotten old times, and professed a warmfriendship for Gerard. 

Gerard, in whom all warmth of sentiment seemed extinct, submitted coldlyto the other's friendship. 

And a fine acquaintance it was. This Pietro was not only a libertine, but half a misanthrope, and an open infidel. 

And so they ran in couples, with mighty little in common. O, rarephenomenon!

One day, when Gerard had undermined his health, and taken the bloomoff his beauty, and run through most of his money, Vanucci got up agay party to mount the Tiber in a boat drawn by buffaloes. Lorenzo de'Medici had imported these creatures into Florence about three yearsbefore. But they were new in Rome, and nothing would content this beggaron horseback, Vanucci, but being drawn by the brutes up the Tiber. 

Each libertine was to bring a lady and she must be handsome, or hebe fined. But the one that should contribute the loveliest was to becrowned with laurel, and voted a public benefactor. Such was theirreading of "Vir bonus est quis?" They got a splendid galley, and twelvebuffaloes. And all the libertines and their female accomplices assembledby degrees at the place of embarkation. But no Gerard. 

They waited for him some time, at first patiently, then impatiently. 

Vanucci excused him. "I heard him say he had forgotten to providehimself with a fardingale. Comrades, the good lad is hunting fora beauty fit to take rank among these peerless dames. Consider thedifficulty, ladies, and be patient!"

At last Gerard was seen at some distance with a female in his hand. 

"She is long enough, " said one of her sex, criticising her from afar. 

"Gemini! what steps she takes, " said another. "Oh! it is wise to hurryinto good company, " was Pietro's excuse. 

But when the pair came up, satire was choked. 

Gerard's companion was a peerless beauty; she extinguished theboat-load, as stars the rising sun. Tall, but not too tall; and straightas a dart, yet supple as a young panther. Her face a perfect oval, herforehead white, her cheeks a rich olive with the eloquent blood mantlingbelow and her glorious eyes fringed with long thick silken eyelashes, that seemed made to sweep up sensitive hearts by the half dozen. Saucyred lips, and teeth of the whitest ivory. 

The women were visibly depressed by this wretched sight; the men inecstasies; they received her with loud shouts and waving of caps, andone enthusiast even went down on his knees upon the boat's gunwale, andhailed her of origin divine. But his chere amie pulling his hair forit--and the goddess giving him a little kick--cotemporaneously, he laysupine; and the peerless creature frisked over his body without deigninghim a look, and took her seat at the prow. Pietro Vanucci sat in a sortof collapse, glaring at her, and gaping with his mouth open like a dyingcod-fish. 

The drover spoke to the buffaloes, the ropes tightened, and they movedup stream. 

"What think ye of this new beef, mesdames?"

"We ne'er saw monsters so viley ill-favoured; with their nasty hornsthat make one afeard, and, their foul nostrils cast up into the air. Holes be they; not nostrils. "

"Signorina, the beeves are a present from Florence the beautiful Wouldye look a gift beef i' the nose?"

"They are so dull, " objected a lively lady. "I went up Tiber twice asfast last time with but five mules and an ass. "

"Nay, that is soon mended, " cried a gallant, and jumping ashore he drewhis sword, and despite the remonstrances of the drivers, went down thedozen buffaloes goading them. 

They snorted and whisked their tails, and went no faster, at which theboat-load laughed loud and long: finally he goaded a patriarch bull, who turned instantly on the sword, sent his long horns clean through thespark, and with a furious jerk of his prodigious neck sent him flyingover his head into the air. He described a bold parabola and fellsitting, and unconsciously waving his glittering blade, into the yellowTiber. The laughing ladies screamed and wrung their hands, all butGerard's fair. She uttered something very like an oath, and seizing thehelm steered the boat out, and the gallant came up sputtering, gripedthe gunwale, and was drawn in dripping. 

He glared round him confusedly. "I understand not that, " said he, alittle peevishly; puzzled, and therefore, it would seem, discontented. At which, finding he was by some strange accident not slain, his doubletbeing perforated, instead of his body, they began to laugh again louderthan ever. 

"What are ye cackling at?" remonstrated the spark, "I desire to knowhow 'tis that one moment a gentleman is out yonder a pricking of Africanbeef, and the next moment--"

Gerard's lady. "Disporting in his native stream. "

"Tell him not, a soul of ye, " cried Vanucci. "Let him find out 's ownriddle. "

Confound ye all. I might puzzle my brains till doomsday, I should ne'erfind it out. Also, where is my sword?

Gerard's lady. "Ask Tiber! Your best way, signor, will be to do it overagain; and, in a word, keep pricking of Afric's beef, till your mindreceives light. So shall you comprehend the matter by degrees, aslawyers mount heaven, and buffaloes Tiber. "

Here a chevalier remarked that the last speaker transcended the sons ofAdam as much in wit as she did the daughters of Eve in beauty. 

At which, and indeed at all their compliments, the conduct of PietroVanucci was peculiar. That signor had left off staring, and gapingbewildered; and now sat coiled up snake-like, on each, his mouthmuffled, and two bright eyes fixed on the' lady, and twinkling andscintillating most comically. 

He did not appear to interest or amuse her in return. Her glorious eyesand eyelashes swept him calmly at times, but scarce distinguished himfrom the benches and things. 

Presently the unanimity of the party suffered a momentary check. 

Mortified by the attention the cavaliers paid to Gerard's companion, theladies began to pick her to pieces sotto voce, and audibly. 

The lovely girl then showed that, if rich in beauty, she was poor infeminine tact. Instead of revenging herself like a true woman throughthe men, she permitted herself to overhear, and openly retaliate on herdetractors. 

"There is not one of you that wears Nature's colours, " said she. "Lookhere, " and she pointed rudely in one's face. "This is the beauty that isto be bought in every shop. Here is cerussa, here is stibium, andhere purpurissum. Oh, I know the articles bless you, I use them everyday--but not on my face, no thank you. "

Here Vanucci's eyes twinkled themselves nearly out of sight. 

"Why, your lips are coloured, and the very veins in your forehead: not acharm but would come off with a wet towel. And look at your great coarseblack hair like a horse's tail, drugged and stained to look like tow. And then your bodies are as false as your heads and your cheeks, andyour hearts I trow. Look at your padded bosoms, and your wooden heeledchopines to raise your little stunted limbs up and deceive the world. Skinny dwarfs ye are, cushioned and stultified into great fat giants. Aha, mesdames, well is it said of you, grande--di legni: grosse--distraci: rosse--di bettito: bianche--di calcina. "

This drew out a rejoinder. "Avaunt, vulgar toad, telling the meneverything. Your coarse, ruddy cheeks are your own, and your littlehandful of African hair. But who is padded more? Why, you are shapedlike a fire-shovel. "

"Ye lie, malapert. "

"Oh, the well-educated young person! Where didst pick her up, SerGerard?"

"Hold thy peace, Marcia, " said Gerard, awakened by the raised treblesfrom a gloomy reverie. "Be not so insolent! The grave shall close overthy beauty as it hath over fairer than thee. "

"They began, " said Marcia petulantly. 

"Then be thou the first to leave off. "

"At thy request, my friend. " She then whispered Gerard, "It was only tomake you laugh; you are distraught, you are sad. Judge whether I carefor the quips of these little fools, or the admiration of these bigfools. Dear Signor Gerard, would I were what they take me for? Youshould not be so sad. "

Gerard sighed deeply; and shook his head. But touched by the earnestyoung tones, caressed the jet black locks, much as one strokes the headof an affectionate dog. 

At this moment a galley drifting slowly down stream got entangled for aninstant in their ropes: for, the river turning suddenly, they had shotout into the stream; and this galley came between them and the bank. Init a lady of great beauty was seated under a canopy with gallants anddependents standing behind her. 

Gerard looked up at the interruption. It was the Princess Claelia. 

He coloured and withdrew his hand from Marcia's head. 

Marcia was all admiration. "Aha! ladies, " said she, "here is a rival anye will. Those cheeks were coloured by Nature-like mine. "

"Peace, child! peace!" said Gerard. "Make not too free with the great. "

"Why, she heard me not. Oh, Ser Gerard, what a lovely creature!"

Two of the females had been for some time past putting their headstogether and casting glances at Marcia. 

One of them now addressed her. 

"Signorina, do you love almonds?"

The speaker had a lapful of them. 

"Yes, I love them; when I can get them, " said Marcia pettishly, andeyeing the fruit with ill-concealed desire; "but yours is not the handto give me any, I trow. "

"You are much mistook, " said the other. "Here, catch!" And suddenlythrew a double handful into Marcia's lap. 

Marcia brought her knees together by an irresistible instinct. 

"Aha! you are caught, my lad, " cried she of the nuts. "'Tis a man; or aboy. A woman still parteth her knees to catch the nuts the surer in herapron; but a man closeth his for fear they should all between his hose. Confess, now, didst never wear fardingale ere to-day?"

"Give me another handful, sweetheart, and I'll tell thee. "

"There! I said he was too handsome for a woman. "

"Ser Gerard, they have found me out, " observed the Epicaene, calmlycracking an almond. 

The libertines vowed it was impossible, and all glared at the goddesslike a battery. But Vanucci struck in, and reminded the gaping gazersof a recent controversy, in which they had, with a unanimity not oftenfound among dunces, laughed Gerard and him to scorn, for saying that menwere as beautiful as women in a true artist's eye. 

"Where are ye now? This is my boy Andrea. And you have all been down onyour knees to him. Ha! ha! But oh, my little ladies, when he lecturedyou and flung your stibium, your cerussa, and your purpurissum back inyour faces, 'tis then I was like to burst; a grinds my colours. Ha! ha!he! he! he! ho!"

"The little impostor! Duck him!"

"What for, signors?" cried Andrea, in dismay, and lost his richcarnation. 

But the females collected round him, and vowed nobody should harm a hairof his head. 

"The dear child! How well his pretty little saucy ways become him. "

"Oh, what eyes and teeth!"

"And what eyebrows and hair!"

"And what lashes!"

"And what a nose!"

"The sweetest little ear in the world!"

"And what health! Touch but his cheek with a pin the blood shouldsquirt. "

"Who would be so cruel?"

"He is a rosebud washed in dew. "

And they revenged themselves for their beaux' admiration of her bylavishing all their tenderness on him. 

But one there was who was still among these butterflies, but no longerof them. The sight of the Princess Claelia had torn open his wound. 

Scarce three months ago he had declined the love of that peerlesscreature; a love illicit and insane; but at least refined. 

How much lower had he fallen now. 

How happy he must have been, when the blandishments of Claelia, thatmight have melted an anchorite, could not tempt him from the path ofloyalty!

Now what was he? He had blushed at her seeing him in such company. Yetit was his daily company. 

He hung over the boat in moody silence. 

And from that hour another phase of his misery began; and grew upon him. 

Some wretched fools try to drown care in drink. 

The fumes of intoxication vanish; the inevitable care remains, and mustbe faced at last--with an aching head, disordered stomach, and spiritsartificially depressed. 

Gerard's conduct had been of a piece with these maniacs'. To survivehis terrible blow he needed all his forces; his virtue, his health, hishabits of labour, and the calm sleep that is labour's satellite; aboveall, his piety. 

Yet all these balms to wounded hearts he flung away and trusted to moralintoxication. 

Its brief fumes fled; the bereaved heart lay still heavy as lead withinhis bosom; but now the dark vulture Remorse sat upon it rending it. 

Broken health; means wasted; innocence fled; Margaret parted from him byanother gulf wider than the grave! The hot fit of despair passed away. 

The cold fit of despair came on. 

Then this miserable young man spurned his gay companions, and all theworld. 

He wandered alone. He drank wine alone to stupefy himself; and paralyzea moment the dark foes to man that preyed upon his soul. He wanderedalone amidst the temples of old Rome, and lay stony eyed, woebegone, among their ruins, worse wrecked than they. 

Last of all came the climax, to which solitude, that gloomy yetfascinating foe of minds diseased, pushes the hopeless. 

He wandered alone at night by dark streams, and eyed them, andeyed them, with decreasing repugnance. There glided peace; perhapsannihilation. 

What else was left him?

These dark spells have been broken by kind words, by loving and cheerfulvoices. 

The humblest friend the afflicted one possesses may speak, or look, orsmile, a sunbeam between him and that worst madness Gerard now brooded. 

Where was Teresa? Where his hearty, kind old landlady?

They would see with their homely but swift intelligence; they would seeand save. 

No; they knew not where he was, or whither he was gliding. 

And is there no mortal eye upon the poor wretch, and the dark road he isgoing?

Yes; one eye there is upon him; watching his every movement; followinghim abroad; tracking him home. 

And that eye is the eye of an enemy. 

An enemy to the death. 

CHAPTER LXIV

In an apartment richly furnished, the floor covered with striped andspotted skins of animals, a lady sat with her arms extended before her, and her hands half clenched. The agitation of her face corresponded withthis attitude; she was pale and red by turns; and her foot restless. 

Presently the curtain was drawn by a domestic. 

The lady's brow flushed. 

The maid said, in an awe-struck whisper: "Altezza, the man is here. "

The lady bade her admit him, and snatched up a little black mask and putit on; and in a moment her colour was gone, and the contrast between herblack mask and her marble cheeks was strange and fearful. 

A man entered bowing and scraping. It was such a figure as crowds seemmade of; short hair, roundish head, plain, but decent clothes; featuresneither comely not forbidding. Nothing to remark in him but a singularlyrestless eye. 

After a profusion of bows he stood opposite the lady, and awaited herpleasure. 

"They have told you for what you are wanted?"

"Yes, Signora. "

"Did those who spoke to you agree as to what you are to receive?"

"Yes, Signora. 'Tis the full price; and purchases the greater vendetta:unless of your benevolence you choose to content yourself with thelesser. "

"I understand you not, " said the lady. 

"Ah; this is the Signora's first. The lesser vendetta, lady, is thedeath of the body only. We watch our man come out of a church; or takehim in an innocent hour; and so deal with him. In the greater vendettawe watch him, and catch him hot from some unrepented sin, and so slayhis soul as well as his body. But this vendetta is not so run upon nowas it was a few years ago. "

"Man, silence me his tongue, and let his treasonable heart beat no more. But his soul I have no feud with. "

"So be it, signora. He who spoke to me knew not the man, nor his name, nor his abode. From whom shall I learn these?"

"From myself. "

At this the man, with the first symptoms of anxiety he had shown, entreated her to be cautious, and particular, in this part of thebusiness. 

"Fear me not, " said she. "Listen. It is a young man, tall of stature, and auburn hair, and dark blue eyes, and an honest face, would deceivea saint. He lives in the Via Claudia, at the corner house; the glover's. In that house there lodge but three males: he; and a painter short ofstature and dark visaged, and a young, slim boy. He that hath betrayedme is a stranger, fair, and taller than thou art. "

The bravo listened with all his ears. "It is enough, " said he. 

"Stay, Signora; haunteth he any secret place where I may deal with him?"

"My spy doth report me he hath of late frequented the banks of Tiberafter dusk; doubtless to meet his light o' love, who calls me her rival;even there slay him! and let my rival come and find him; the smooth, heartless, insolent traitor. "

"Be calm, signora. He will betray no more ladies. "

"I know not that. He weareth a sword, and can use it. He is young andresolute. "

"Neither will avail him. "

"Are ye so sure of your hand? What are your weapons?"

The bravo showed her a steel gauntlet. "We strike with such forcewe need must guard our hand. This is our mallet. " He then undid hisdoublet, and gave her a glimpse of a coat of mail beneath, and finallylaid his glittering stiletto on the table with a flourish. 

The lady shuddered at first, but presently took it up in her white handand tried its point against her finger. 

"Beware, madam, " said the bravo. 

"What, is it poisoned?"

"Saints forbid! We steal no lives. We take them with steel point, notdrugs. But 'tis newly ground, and I feared for the Signora's whiteskin. "

"His skin is as white as mine, " said she, with a sudden gleam of pity. It lasted but a moment. "But his heart is black as soot. Say, do I notwell to remove a traitor that slanders me?"

"The signora will settle that with her confessor. I am but a tool innoble hands; like my stiletto. "

The princess appeared not to hear the speaker. "Oh, how I could haveloved him; to the death; as now I hate him. Fool! he will learn totrifle with princes; to spurn them and fawn on them, and prefer thescum of the town to them, and make them a by-word. " She looked up. "Whyloiter'st thou here? haste thee, revenge me. "

"It is customary to pay half the price beforehand, Signora. "

"Ah I forgot; thy revenge is bought. Here is more than half, " and shepushed a bag across the table to him. "When the blow is struck, come forthe rest. "

"You will soon see me again, signora. "

And he retired bowing and scraping. 

The princess, burning with jealousy, mortified pride, and dread ofexposure (for till she knew Gerard no public stain had fallen on her), sat where he left her, masked, with her arms straight out before her, and the nails of her clenched hand nipping the table. 

So sat the fabled sphynx: so sits a tigress. 

Yet there crept a chill upon her now that the assassin was gone. Andmoody misgivings heaved within her, precursors of vain remorse. Gerardand Margaret were before their age. This was your true mediaeval. Proud, amorous, vindictive, generous, foolish, cunning, impulsive, unprincipled: and ignorant as dirt. 

Power is the curse of such a creature. 

Forced to do her own crimes, the weakness of her nerves would havebalanced the violence of her passions, and her bark been worse than herbite. But power gives a feeble, furious woman, male instruments. And theeffect is as terrible as the combination is unnatural. 

In this instance it whetted an assassin's dagger for a poor forlornwretch just meditating suicide. 

CHAPTER LXV

It happened, two days after the scene I have endeavoured to describe, that Gerard, wandering through one of the meanest streets in Rome, wasovertaken by a thunderstorm, and entered a low hostelry. He called forwine, and the rain continuing, soon drank himself into a half stupidcondition, and dozed with his head on his hands and his hands upon thetable. 

In course of time the room began to fill and the noise of the rudeguests to wake him. 

Then it was he became conscious of two figures near him conversing in alow voice. 

One was a pardoner. The other by his dress, clean but modest, might havepassed for a decent tradesman; but the way he had slouched his hat overhis brows, so as to hide all his face except his beard, showed he wasone of those who shun the eye of honest men, and of the law. The pairwere driving a bargain in the sin market. And by an arrangementnot uncommon at that date, the crime to be forgiven was yet to becommitted--under the celestial contract. 

He of the slouched hat was complaining of the price pardons had reached. "If they go up any higher we poor fellows shall be shut out of heavenaltogether. "

The pardoner denied the charge flatly. "Indulgences were never cheaperto good husbandmen. "

The other inquired, "Who were they?"

"Why, such as sin by the market, like reasonable creatures. But if youwill be so perverse as go and pick out a crime the Pope hath set hisface against, blame yourself, not me!"

Then, to prove that crime of one sort or another was within the means ofall but the very scum of society, he read out the scale from a writtenparchment. 

It was a curious list; but not one that could be printed in this book. And to mutilate it would be to misrepresent it. It is to be found inany great library. Suffice it to say that murder of a layman was muchcheaper than many crimes my lay readers would deem light by comparison. 

This told; and by a little trifling concession on each side, the bargainwas closed, the money handed over, and the aspirant to heaven's favourforgiven beforehand for removing one layman. The price for disposing ofa clerk bore no proportion. 

The word assassination was never once uttered by either merchant. 

All this buzzed in Gerard's ear. But he never lifted his head from thetable; only listened stupidly. 

However, when the parties rose and separated, he half raised his head, and eyed with a scowl the retiring figure of the purchaser. 

"If Margaret was alive, " muttered he, "I'd take thee by the throat andthrottle thee, thou cowardly stabber. But she is dead; dead; dead. Dieall the world; 'tis nought to me: so that I die among the first. "

When he got home there was a man in a slouched hat walking briskly toand fro on the opposite side of the way. 

"Why, there is that cur again, " thought Gerard. 

But in this state of mind, the circumstance made no impression whateveron him. 

CHAPTER LXVI

Two nights after this Pietro Vanucci and Andrea sat waiting supper forGerard. 

The former grew peevish. It was past nine o'clock. At last he sentAndrea to Gerard's room on the desperate chance of his having come inunobserved. Andrea shrugged his shoulders and went. 

He returned without Gerard, but with a slip of paper. Andrea could notread, as scholars in his day and charity boys in ours understand theart; but he had a quick eye, and had learned how the words PietroVanucci looked on paper. 

"That is for you, I trow, " said he, proud of his intelligence. 

Pietro snatched it, and read it to Andrea, with his satirical comments. 

"'Dear Pietro, dear Andrea, life is too great a burden. '

"So 'tis, my lad, ' but that is no reason for being abroad atsupper-time. Supper is not a burden. "

"'Wear my habits!'

"Said the poplar to the juniper bush. "

"'And thou, Andrea, mine amethyst ring; and me in both your hearts amonth or two. '

"Why, Andrea?"

"'For my body, ere this ye read, it will lie in Tiber. Trouble not tolook for it. 'Tis not worth the pains. Oh unhappy day that it was bornoh happy night that rids me of it. 

"'Adieu! adieu!

"'The broken-hearted Gerard. '

"Here is a sorry jest of the peevish rogue, " said Pietro. But his palecheek and chattering teeth belied his words. Andrea filled the housewith his cries. 

"O, miserable day! O, calamity of calamities! Gerard, my friend, mysweet patron! Help! help! He is killing himself! Oh, good people, helpme save him!" And after alarming all the house he ran into the street, bareheaded, imploring all good Christians to help him save his friend. 

A number of persons soon collected. 

But poor Andrea could not animate their sluggishness. Go down to theriver? No. It was not their business. What part of the river? It was awild goose chase. 

It was not lucky to go down to the river after sunset. Too many ghostswalked those banks all night. 

A lackey, however, who had been standing some time opposite the house, said he would go with Andrea; and this turned three or four of theyounger ones. 

The little band took the way to the river. 

The lackey questioned Andrea. 

Andrea, sobbing, told him about the letter, and Gerard's moody ways oflate. 

That lackey was a spy of the Princess Claelia. 

Their Italian tongues went fast till they neared the Tiber. 

But the moment they felt the air from the river, and the smell of thestream in the calm spring night, they were dead silent. 

The moon shone calm and clear in a cloudless sky. Their feet soundedloud and ominous. Their tongues were hushed. 

Presently hurrying round a corner they met a man. He stopped irresoluteat sight of them. 

The man was bareheaded, and his dripping hair glistened in themoonlight; and at the next step they saw his clothes were drenched withwater. 

"Here he is, " cried one of the young men, unacquainted with Gerard'sface and figure. 

The stranger turned instantly and fled. 

They ran after him might and main, Andrea leading, and the princess'slackey next. 

Andrea gained on him; but in a moment he twisted up a narrow alley. Andrea shot by, unable to check himself; and the pursuers soon foundthemselves in a labyrinth in which it was vain to pursue a quickfootedfugitive who knew every inch of it, and could now only be followed bythe ear. 

They returned to their companions, and found them standing on the spotwhere the man had stood, and utterly confounded. For Pietro had assuredthem that the fugitive had neither the features nor the stature ofGerard. 

"Are ye verily sure?" said they. "He had been in the river. Why, in thesaints' names, fled he at our approach?"

Then said Vanucci, "Friends, methinks this has nought to do with him weseek. What shall we do, Andrea?"

Here the lackey put in his word. "Let us track him to the water's side, to make sure. See, he hath come dripping all the way. "

This advice was approved, and with very little difficulty they trackedthe man's course. 

But soon they encountered a new enigma. 

They had gone scarcely fifty yards ere the drops turned away from theriver, and took them to the gate of a large gloomy building. It was amonastery. 

They stood irresolute before it, and gazed at the dark pile. 

It seemed to them to hide some horrible mystery. 

But presently Andrea gave a shout. "Here be the drops again, " cried he. "And this road leadeth to the river. "

They resumed the chase; and soon it became clear the drops were nowleading them home. The track became wetter and wetter, and took themto the Tiber's edge. And there on the bank a bucketful appeared to havebeen discharged from the stream. 

At first they shouted, and thought they had made a discovery: butreflection showed them it amounted to nothing. Certainly a man had beenin the water, and had got out of it in safety; but that man was notGerard. One said he knew a fisherman hard by that had nets and drags. They found the fisherman and paid him liberally to sink nets in theriver below the place, and to drag it above and below; and promised himgold should he find the body. Then they ran vainly up and down the riverwhich flowed so calm and voiceless, holding this and a thousand morestrange secrets. Suddenly Andrea, with a cry of hope, ran back to thehouse. 

He returned in less than half an hour. 

"No, " he groaned, and wrung his hands. 

"What is the hour?" asked the lackey. 

"Four hours past midnight. "

"My pretty lad, " said the lackey solemnly, "say a mass for thy friend'ssoul: for he is not among living men. "

The morning broke. Worn out with fatigue, Andrea and Pietro went home, heart sick. 

The days rolled on, mute as the Tiber as to Gerard's fate. 

CHAPTER LXVII

It would indeed have been strange if with such barren data as theypossessed, those men could have read the handwriting on the river'sbank. 

For there on that spot an event had just occurred, which, take italtogether, was perhaps without a parallel in the history of mankind, and may remain so to the end of time. 

But it shall be told in a very few words, partly by me, partly by anactor in the scene. 

Gerard, then, after writing his brief adieu to Pietro and Andrea, hadstolen down to the river at nightfall. 

He had taken his measures with a dogged resolution not uncommon in thosewho are bent on self-destruction. He filled his pockets with all thesilver and copper he possessed, that he might sink the surer; and soprovided, hurried to a part of the stream that he had seen was littlefrequented. 

There are some, especially women, who look about to make sure there issomebody at hand. 

But this resolute wretch looked about him to make sure there was nobody. 

And to his annoyance, he observed a single figure leaning againstthe corner of an alley. So he affected to stroll carelessly away; butreturned to the spot. 

Lo! the same figure emerged from a side street and loitered about. 

"Can he be watching me? Can he know what I am here for?" thought Gerard. "Impossible. "

He went briskly off, walked along a street or two, made a detour andcame back. 

The man had vanished. But lo! on Gerard looking all round, to make sure, there he was a few yards behind, apparently fastening his shoe. 

Gerard saw he was watched, and at this moment observed in the moonlighta steel gauntlet in his sentinel's hand. 

Then he knew it was an assassin. 

Strange to say, it never occurred to him that his was the life aimed at. To be sure he was not aware he had an enemy in the world. 

He turned and walked up to the bravo. "My good friend, " said he eagerly, "sell me thine arm! a single stroke! See, here is all I have;" and heforced his money into the bravo's hands. 

"Oh, prithee! prithee! do one good deed, and rid me of my hateful life!"and even while speaking he undid his doublet and bared his bosom. 

The man stared in his face. 

"Why do ye hesitate?" shrieked Gerard. "Have ye no bowels? Is it so muchpains to lift your arm and fall it? Is it because I am poor, and can'tgive ye gold? Useless wretch, canst only strike a man behind; not lookone in the face. There, then, do but turn thy head and hold thy tongue!"

And with a snarl of contempt he ran from him, and flung himself into thewater. 

"Margaret!"

At the heavy plunge of his body in the stream the bravo seemed torecover from a stupor. He ran to the bank, and with a strange cry theassassin plunged in after the self-destroyer. 

What followed will be related by the assassin. 

CHAPTER LXVIII

A woman has her own troubles, as a man has his. And we male writersseldom do more than indicate the griefs of the other sex. Theintelligence of the female reader must come to our aid, and fill up ourcold outlines. So have I indicated, rather than described, what MargaretBrandt went through up to that eventful day, when she entered Eli'shouse an enemy, read her sweetheart's letter, and remained a friend. 

And now a woman's greatest trial drew near, and Gerard far away. 

She availed herself but little of Eli's sudden favour; for this reserveshe had always a plausible reason ready; and never hinted at the trueone, which was this; there were two men in that house at sight ofwhom she shuddered with instinctive antipathy and dread. She had readwickedness and hatred in their faces, and mysterious signals of secretintelligence. She preferred to receive Catherine and her daughter athome. The former went to see her every day, and was wrapped up in theexpected event. 

Catherine was one of those females whose office is to multiply, and rearthe multiplied: who, when at last they consent to leave off peltingone out of every room in the house with babies, hover about the fairscourges that are still in full swing, and do so cluck, they seem tomultiply by proxy. It was in this spirit she entreated Eli to let herstay at Rotterdam, while he went back to Tergou. 

"The poor lass hath not a soul about her, that knows anything aboutanything. What avail a pair o' soldiers? Why, that sort o' cattle shouldbe putten out o' doors the first, at such an a time. "

Need I say that this was a great comfort to Margaret. 

Poor soul, she was full of anxiety as the time drew near. 

She should die; and Gerard away. 

But things balance themselves. Her poverty, and her father'shelplessness, which had cost her such a struggle, stood her in goodstead now. 

Adversity's iron hand had forced her to battle the lassitude thatoverpowers the rich of her sex, and to be for ever on her feet, working. She kept this up to the last by Catherine's advice. 

And so it was, that one fine evening, just at sunset, she lay weakas water, but safe; with a little face by her side, and the heaven ofmaternity opening on her. 

"Why dost weep, sweetheart? All of a sudden?"

"He is not here to see it. "

"Ah, well, lass, he will be here ere 'tis weaned. Meantime God hathbeen as good to thee as to e'er a woman born; and do but bethink theeit might have been a girl; didn't my very own Kate threaten me with one;and here we have got the bonniest boy in Holland, and a rare heavy one, the saints be praised for't. "

"Ay, mother, I am but a sorry, ungrateful wretch to weep. If only Gerardwere here to see it. 'Tis strange; I bore him well enow to be away fromme in my sorrow; but oh, it does seem so hard he should not share myjoy. Prithee, prithee, come to me, Gerard! dear, dear Gerard!" And shestretched out her feeble arms. 

Catherine hustled about, but avoided Margaret's eyes; for she could notrestrain her own tears at hearing her own absent child thus earnestlyaddressed. 

Presently, turning round, she found Margaret looking at her with asingular expression. "Heard you nought?"

"No, my lamb. What?"

"I did cry on Gerard, but now. "

"Ay, ay, sure I heard that. "

"Well, he answered me. "

"Tush, girl: say not that. "

"Mother, as sure as I lie here, with his boy by my side, his voice cameback to me, 'Margaret!' So. Yet methought 'twas not his happy voice. Butthat might be the distance. All voices go off sad like at a distance. Why art not happy, sweetheart? and I so happy this night? Mother, I seemnever to have felt a pain or known a care. " And her sweet eyes turnedand gloated on the little face in silence. 

That very night Gerard flung himself into the Tiber. And that veryhour she heard him speak her name, he cried aloud in death's jaws anddespair's. 

"Margaret!"

Account for it those who can. I cannot. 

CHAPTER LXIX

In the guest chamber of a Dominican convent lay a single stranger, exhausted by successive and violent fits of nausea, which had at lastsubsided, leaving him almost as weak as Margaret lay that night inHolland. 

A huge wood fire burned on the hearth, and beside it hung the patient'sclothes. 

A gigantic friar sat by his bedside, reading pious collects aloud fromhis breviary. 

The patient at times eyed him, and seemed to listen: at others closedhis eyes and moaned. 

The monk kneeled down with his face touching the ground and prayed forhim; then rose and bade him farewell. "Day breaks, " said he; "I mustprepare for matins. "

"Good Father Jerome, before you go, how came I hither?"

"By the hand of Heaven. You flung away God's gift. He bestowed it on youagain. Think on it! Hast tried the world and found its gall. Now try theChurch! The Church is peace. Pax vobiscum. "

He was gone. Gerard lay back, meditating and wondering, till weak andwearied he fell into a doze. 

When he awoke again he found a new nurse seated beside him. It was alayman, with an eye as small and restless as Friar Jerome's was calm andmajestic. 

The man inquired earnestly how he felt. 

"Very, very weak. Where have I seen you before, messer?"

"None the worse for my gauntlet?" inquired the other, with considerableanxiety; "I was fain to strike you withal, or both you and I should beat the bottom of Tiber. "

Gerard stared at him. "What, 'twas you saved me? How?"

"Well, signor, I was by the banks of Tiber on-on an errand, no matterwhat. You came to me and begged hard for a dagger stroke. But ere Icould oblige you, ay, even as you spoke to me, I knew you for the signorthat saved my wife and child upon the sea. "

"It is Teresa's husband. And an assassin?!!?"

"At your service. Well, Ser Gerard, the next thing was, you flungyourself into Tiber, and bade me hold aloof. "

"I remember that. "

"Had it been any but you, believe me I had obeyed you, and not wagged afinger. Men are my foes. They may all hang on one rope, or drown in oneriver for me. But when thou, sinking in Tiber, didst cry 'Margaret!'"

"Ah!"

"My heart it cried 'Teresa!' How could I go home and look her in theface, did I let thee die, and by the very death thou savedst her from?So in I went; and luckily for us both I swim like a duck. You, seeingme near, and being bent on destruction, tried to grip me, and so end usboth. But I swam round thee, and (receive my excuses) so buffeted theeon the nape of the neck with my steel glove; that thou lost sense, andI with much ado, the stream being strong, did draw thy body to land, butinsensible and full of water. Then I took thee on my back and made formy own home. 'Teresa will nurse him, and be pleased with me, ' thought I. But hard by this monastery, a holy friar, the biggest e'er I saw, met usand asked the matter. So I told him. He looked hard at thee. 'I knowthe face, ' quoth he. ''Tis one Gerard, a fair youth from Holland. ''The same, ' quo' I. Then said his reverence, 'He hath friends among ourbrethren. Leave him with us! Charity, it is our office. '

"Also he told me they of the convent had better means to tend thee thanI had. And that was true enow. So I just bargained to be let in to seethee once a day, and here thou art. "

And the miscreant cast a strange look of affection and interest uponGerard. 

Gerard did not respond to it. He felt as if a snake were in the room. Heclosed his eyes. 

"Ah, thou wouldst sleep, " said the miscreant eagerly. "I go. " And heretired on tip-toe with a promise to come every day. 

Gerard lay with his eyes closed: not asleep, but deeply pondering. 

Saved from death, by an assassin

Was not this the finger of Heaven?

Of that Heaven he had insulted, cursed, and defied. 

He shuddered at his blasphemies. He tried to pray. 

He found he could utter prayers. But he could not pray. 

"I am doomed eternally, " he cried, "doomed, doomed. "

The organ of the convent church burst on his ear in rich and solemnharmony. 

Then rose the voices of the choir chanting a full service. 

Among them was one that seemed to hover above the others, and towertowards heaven; a sweet boy's voice, full, pure, angelic. 

He closed his eyes and listened. The days of his own boyhood flowed backupon him in those sweet, pious harmonies. No earthly dross there, nofoul, fierce passions, rending and corrupting the soul. 

Peace, peace; sweet, balmy peace. 

"Ay, " he sighed, "the Church is peace of mind. Till I left her bosom Ine'er knew sorrow, nor sin. "

And the poor torn, worn creature wept. 

And even as he wept, there beamed on him the sweet and reverend face ofone he had never thought to see again. It was the face of Father Anselm. 

The good father had only reached the convent the night before last. Gerard recognized him in a moment, and cried to him, "Oh, Father Anselm, you cured my wounded body in Juliers: now cure my hurt soul in Rome!Alas, you cannot. "

Anselm sat down by the bedside, and putting a gentle hand on his head, first calmed him with a soothing word or two. 

He then (for he had learned how Gerard came there) spoke to him kindlybut solemnly, and made him feel his crime, and urged him to repentance, and gratitude to that Divine Power which had thwarted his will to savehis soul. 

"Come, my son, " said he, "first purge thy bosom of its load. "

"Ah, father, " said Gerard, "in Juliers I could; then I was innocent butnow, impious monster that I am, I dare not confess to you. "

"Why not, my son? Thinkest thou I have not sinned against Heaven in mytime, and deeply? oh, how deeply! Come, poor laden soul, pour forth thygrief, pour forth thy faults, hold back nought! Lie not oppressed andcrushed by hidden sins. "

And soon Gerard was at Father Anselm's knees confessing his every sinwith sighs and groans of penitence. 

"Thy sins are great, " said Anselm. "Thy temptation also was great, terribly great. I must consult our good prior. "

The good Anselm kissed his brow, and left him, to consult the superioras to his penance. 

And lo! Gerard could pray now. 

And he prayed with all his heart. 

The phase, through which this remarkable mind now passed, may be summedin a word--Penitence. 

He turned with terror and aversion from the world, and beggedpassionately to remain in the convent. To him, convent nurtured, it waslike a bird returning wounded, wearied, to its gentle nest. 

He passed his novitiate in prayer, and mortification, and pious readingand meditation. 

The Princess Claelia's spy went home and told her that Gerard wascertainly dead, the manner of his death unknown at present. 

She seemed literally stunned. When, after a long time, she found breathto speak at all, it was to bemoan her lot, cursed with such ready tools. "So soon, " she sighed; "see how swift these monsters are to do illdeeds. They come to us in our hot blood, and first tempt us with theirvenal daggers, then enact the mortal deeds we ne'er had thought on butfor them. "

Ere many hours had passed, her pity for Gerard and hatred of hismurderer had risen to fever heat; which with this fool was blood heat. 

"Poor soul! I cannot call thee back to life. But he shall never livethat traitorously slew thee. "

And she put armed men in ambush, and kept them on guard all day, ready, when Lodovico should come for his money, to fall on him in a certainantechamber and hack him to pieces. 

"Strike at his head, " said she, "for he weareth a privy coat of mail;and if he goes hence alive your own heads shall answer it. "

And so she sat weeping her victim, and pulling the strings of machinesto shed the blood of a second for having been her machine to kill thefirst. 

CHAPTER LXX

One of the novice Gerard's self-imposed penances was to receive Lodovicokindly, feeling secretly as to a slimy serpent. 

Never was self-denial better bestowed; and like most rational penances, it soon became no penance at all. At first the pride and complacency, with which the assassin gazed on the one life he had saved, was perhapsas ludicrous as pathetic; but it is a great thing to open a good door ina heart. One good thing follows another through the aperture. Finding itso sweet to save life, the miscreant went on to be averse to takingit; and from that to remorse; and from remorse to something very likepenitence. And here Teresa cooperated by threatening, not for the firsttime, to leave him unless he would consent to lead an honest life. Thegood fathers of the convent lent their aid, and Lodovico and Teresawere sent by sea to Leghorn, where Teresa had friends, and the assassinsettled down and became a porter. 

He found it miserably dull work at first; and said so. 

But methinks this dull life of plodding labour was better for him, thanthe brief excitement of being hewn in pieces by the Princess Claelia'smyrmidons. His exile saved the unconscious penitent from that fate; andthe princess, balked of her revenge, took to brooding, and fell into aprofound melancholy; dismissed her confessor, and took a new one witha great reputation for piety, to whom she confided what she called hergriefs. The new confessor was no other than Fra Jerome. She could nothave fallen into better hands. 

He heard her grimly out. Then took her and shook the delusions out ofher as roughly as if she had been a kitchen-maid. For, to do this hardmonk justice, on the path of duty he feared the anger of princes aslittle as he did the sea. He showed her in a few words, all thunder andlightning, that she was the criminal of criminals. 

"Thou art the devil, that with thy money hath tempted one man to slayhis fellow, and then, blinded with self-love, instead of blaming andpunishing thyself, art thirsting for more blood of guilty men, but notso guilty as thou. "

At first she resisted, and told him she was not used to be taken to taskby her confessors. But he overpowered her, and so threatened her withthe Church's curse here and hereafter, and so tore the scales off hereyes, and thundered at her, and crushed her, that she sank down andgrovelled with remorse and terror at the feet of the gigantic Boanerges. 

"Oh, holy father, have pity on a poor weak woman, and help me save myguilty soul. I was benighted for want of ghostly counsel like thine, good father. I waken as from a dream. 

"Doff thy jewels, " said Fra Jerome sternly. 

"I will. I will. "

"Doff thy silk and velvet; and in humbler garb than wears thy meanestservant, wend thou instant to Loretto. "

"I will, " said the princess faintly. 

"No shoes; but a bare sandal. '

"No father. "

"Wash the feet of pilgrims both going and coming; and to such of them asbe holy friars tell thy sin, and abide their admonition. "

"Oh, holy father, let me wear my mask. "

"Humph!"

"Oh, mercy! Bethink thee! My features are known through Italy. "

"Ay. Beauty is a curse to most of ye. Well, thou mayst mask thine eyes;no more. "

On this concession she seized his hand, and was about to kiss it; but hesnatched it rudely from her. 

"What would ye do? That hand handled the eucharist but an hour agone: isit fit for such as thou to touch it?"

"Ah, no. But oh, go not without giving your penitent daughter yourblessing. "

"Time enow to ask it when you come back from Loretto. "

Thus that marvellous occurrence by Tiber's banks left its mark on allthe actors, as prodigies are said to do. The assassin, softened bysaving the life he was paid to take, turned from the stiletto to theporter's knot. The princess went barefoot to Loretto, weeping her crimeand washing the feet of base-born men. 

And Gerard, carried from the Tiber into that convent a suicide, nowpassed for a young saint within its walls. 

Loving but experienced eyes were on him. 

Upon a shorter probation than usual he was admitted to priest's orders. 

And soon after took the monastic vows, and became a friar of St. Dominic. 

Dying to the world, the monk parted with the very name by which he hadlived in it, and so broke the last link of association with earthlyfeelings. 

Here Gerard ended, and Brother Clement began. 

CHAPTER LXXI

"As is the race of leaves so is that of men. " And a great man buddedunnoticed in a tailor's house at Rotterdam this year, and a large mandropped to earth with great eclat. 

Philip, Duke of Burgundy, Earl of Holland, etc. , etc. , lay sick atBruges. Now paupers got sick and got well as Nature pleased; but woebetided the rich in an age when, for one Mr. Malady killed three fell byDr. Remedy. 

The Duke's complaint, nameless then, is now diphtheria. It is, and was, a very weakening malady, and the Duke was old; so altogether Dr. Remedybled him. 

The Duke turned very cold: wonderful!

Then Dr. Remedy had recourse to the arcana of science. 

"Ho! This is grave. Flay me an ape incontinent, and clap him to theDuke's breast!"

Officers of state ran septemvious, seeking an ape, to counteract thebloodthirsty tomfoolery of the human species. 

Perdition! The duke was out of apes. There were buffaloes, lizards, Turks, leopards; any unreasonable beast but the right one. 

"Why, there used to be an ape about, " said one. "If I stand here I sawhim. "

So there used; but the mastiff had mangled the sprightly creature forstealing his supper; and so fulfilled the human precept, "Soyez de votresiecle!"

In this emergency the seneschal cast his despairing eyes around; and notin vain. A hopeful light shot into them. 

"Here is this, " said he, sotto voce. "Surely this will serve: 'tisaltogether apelike, doublet and hose apart. "

"Nay, " said the chancellor peevishly, "the Princess Marie would hang us. She doteth on this. "

Now this was our friend Giles, strutting, all unconscious, in cloth ofgold. 

Then Dr. Remedy grew impatient, and bade flay a dog. 

"A dog is next best to an ape; only it must be a dog all of one colour. "

So they flayed a liver-coloured dog, and clapped it, yet palpitating, totheir sovereign's breast and he died. 

Philip the Good, thus scientifically disposed of, left thirty-onechildren: of whom one, somehow or another, was legitimate; and reignedin his stead. 

The good duke provided for nineteen out of the other thirty; the restshifted for themselves. 

According to the Flemish chronicle the deceased prince was descendedfrom the kings of Troy through Thierry of Aquitaine, and Chilperic, Pharamond, etc. , the old kings of Franconia. 

But this in reality was no distinction. Not a prince of his day haveI been able to discover who did not come down from Troy. "Priam" wasmediaeval for "Adam. "

The good duke's, body was carried into Burgundy, and laid in a noblemausoleum of black marble at Dijon. 

Holland rang with his death; and little dreamed that anything asfamous was born in her territory that year. That judgment has been longreversed. Men gaze at the tailor's house, here the great birth of thefifteenth century took place. In what house the good duke died "no oneknows and no one cares, " as the song says. 

And why?

Dukes Philip the Good come and go, and leave mankind not a halfpennywiser, nor better, nor other than they found it. 

But when, once in three hundred years, such a child is born to the worldas Margaret's son, lo! a human torch lighted by fire from heaven; and"FIAT LUX" thunder's from pole to pole. 

CHAPTER LXXII

The Cloister

The Dominicans, or preaching friars, once the most powerful order inEurope, were now on the wane; their rivals and bitter enemies, theFranciscans, were overpowering them throughout Europe; even in England, a rich and religious country, where under the name of the Black Friars, they had once been paramount. 

Therefore the sagacious men, who watched and directed the interests ofthe order, were never so anxious to incorporate able and zealous sonsand send them forth to win back the world. 

The zeal and accomplishments of Clement, especially his rare mastery oflanguage (for he spoke Latin, Italian, French, high and low Dutch), soon transpired, and he was destined to travel and preach in England, corresponding with the Roman centre. 

But Jerome, who had the superior's ear, obstructed this design. 

"Clement, " said he, "has the milk of the world still in his veins, itsfeelings, its weaknesses let not his new-born zeal and his humilitytempt us to forego our ancient wisdom. Try him first, and temper him, lest one day we find ourselves leaning on a reed for a staff. 

"It is well advised, " said the prior. "Take him in hand thyself. "

Then Jerome, following the ancient wisdom, took Clement and tried him. 

One day he brought him to a field where the young men amused themselvesat the games of the day; he knew this to be a haunt of Clement's latefriends. 

And sure enough ere long Pietro Vanucci and Andrea passed by them, andcast a careless glance on the two friars. They did not recognize theirdead friend in a shaven monk. 

Clement gave a very little start, and then lowered his eyes and said apaternoster. 

"Would ye not speak with them, brother?" said Jerome, trying him. 

"No brother: yet was it good for me to see them. They remind me of thesins I can never repent enough. "

"It is well, " said Jerome, and he made a cold report in Clement'sfavour. 

Then Jerome took Clement to many death-beds. And then into noisomedungeons; places where the darkness was appalling, and the stenchloathsome, pestilential; and men looking like wild beasts lay coiledin rags and filth and despair. It tried his body hard; but the soulcollected all its powers to comfort such poor wretches there as werenot past comfort. And Clement shone in that trial. Jerome reported thatClement's spirit was willing, but his flesh was weak. 

"Good!" said Anselm; "his flesh is weak, but his spirit is willing. "

But there was a greater trial in store. 

I will describe it as it was seen by others. 

One morning a principal street in Rome was crowded, and even the avenuesblocked up with heads. It was an execution. No common crime had beendone, and on no vulgar victim. 

The governor of Rome had been found in his bed at daybreak, slaughtered. His hand, raised probably in self-defence, lay by his side severed atthe wrist; his throat was cut, and his temples bruised with some bluntinstrument. The murder had been traced to his servant, and was to beexpiated in kind this very morning. 

Italian executions were not cruel in general. But this murder wasthought to call for exact and bloody retribution. 

The criminal was brought to the house of the murdered man and fastenedfor half an hour to its wall. After this foretaste of legal vengeancehis left hand was struck off, like his victim's. A new-killed fowl wascut open and fastened round the bleeding stump; with what view I reallydon't know; but by the look of it, some mare's nest of the poor deardoctors; and the murderer, thus mutilated and bandaged, was hurried tothe scaffold; and there a young friar was most earnest and affectionatein praying with him, and for him, and holding the crucifix close to hiseyes. 

Presently the executioner pulled the friar roughly on one side, and ina moment felled the culprit with a heavy mallet, and falling on him, cuthis throat from ear to ear. 

There was a cry of horror from the crowd. 

The young friar swooned away. 

A gigantic monk strode forward, and carried him off like a child. 

Brother Clement went back to the convent sadly discouraged. He confessedto the prior, with tears of regret. 

"Courage, son Clement, " said the prior. "A Dominican is not made ina day. Thou shalt have another trial. And I forbid thee to go to itfasting. " Clement bowed his head in token of obedience. He had not longto wait. A robber was brought to the scaffold; a monster of villainyand cruelty, who had killed men in pure wantonness, after robbing them. Clement passed his last night in prison with him, accompanied him tothe scaffold, and then prayed with him and for him so earnestly that thehardened ruffian shed tears and embraced him Clement embraced himtoo, though his flesh quivered with repugnance; and held the crucifixearnestly before his eyes. The man was garotted, and Clement lost sightof the crowd, and prayed loud and earnestly while that dark spirit waspassing from earth. He was no sooner dead than the hangman raised hishatchet and quartered the body on the spot. And, oh, mysterious heartof man! the people who had seen the living body robbed of life withindifference, almost with satisfaction, uttered a piteous cry at eachstroke of the axe upon his corpse that could feel nought. Clement tooshuddered then, but stood firm, like one of those rocks that vibrate butcannot be thrown down. But suddenly Jerome's voice sounded in his ear. 

"Brother Clement, get thee on that cart and preach to the people. Nay, quickly! strike with all thy force on all this iron, while yet 'tis hot, and souls are to be saved. "

Clement's colour came and went; and he breathed hard. But he obeyed, andwith ill-assured step mounted the cart, and preached his first sermonto the first crowd he had ever faced. Oh, that sea of heads! His throatseemed parched, his heart thumped, his voice trembled. 

By-and-by the greatness of the occasion, the sight of the eager upturnedfaces, and his own heart full of zeal, fired the pale monk. He told themthis robber's history, warm from his own lips in the prison, and showedhis hearers by that example the gradations of folly and crime, andwarned them solemnly not to put foot on the first round of that fatalladder. And as alternately he thundered against the shedders of blood, and moved the crowd to charity and pity, his tremors left him, and hefelt all strung up like a lute, and gifted with an unsuspected force; hewas master of that listening crowd, could feel their very pulse, could play sacred melodies on them as on his psaltery. Sobs and groansattested his power over the mob already excited by the tragedy beforethem. Jerome stared like one who goes to light a stick; and fires arocket. After a while Clement caught his look of astonishment, andseeing no approbation in it, broke suddenly off, and joined him. 

"It was my first endeavour, " said he apologetically. "Your behest cameon me like a thunderbolt. Was I?--Did I?--Oh, correct me, and aid mewith your experience, Brother Jerome. "

"Humph!" said Jerome doubtfully. He added, rather sullenly after longreflection, "Give the glory to God, Brother Clement; my opinion is thouart an orator born. "

He reported the same at headquarters, half reluctantly. For he was anhonest friar though a disagreeable one. 

One Julio Antonelli was accused of sacrilege; three witnesses swore theysaw him come out of the church whence the candle-sticks were stolen, andat the very time. Other witnesses proved an alibi for him as positively. Neither testimony could be shaken. In this doubt Antonelli was permittedthe trial by water, hot or cold. By the hot trial he must put his barearm into boiling water, fourteen inches deep, and take out a pebble; bythe cold trial his body must be let down into eight feet of water. The clergy, who thought him innocent, recommended the hot water trial, which, to those whom they favoured, was not so terrible as it sounded. But the poor wretch had not the nerve, and chose the cold ordeal. Andthis gave Jerome another opportunity of steeling Clement. Antonelli tookthe sacrament, and then was stripped naked on the banks of the Tiber, and tied hand and foot, to prevent those struggles by which a man, throwing his arms out of the water, sinks his body. 

He was then let down gently into the stream, and floated a moment, withjust his hair above water. A simultaneous roar from the crowd oneach bank proclaimed him guilty. But the next moment the ropes, which happened to be new, got wet, and he settled down. Another roarproclaimed his innocence. They left him at the bottom of the riverthe appointed time, rather more than half a minute, then drew him up, gurgling and gasping, and screaming for mercy; and after the appointedprayers, dismissed him, cleared of the charge. 

During the experiment Clement prayed earnestly on the bank. 

When it was over he thanked God in a loud but slightly quavering voice. 

By-and-by he asked Jerome whether the man ought not to be compensated. 

"For what?"

"For the pain, the dread, the suffocation. Poor soul, he liveth, buthath tasted all the bitterness of death. Yet he had done no ill. "

"He is rewarded enough in that he is cleared of his fault. "

"But being innocent of that fault, yet hath he drunk Death's cup, thoughnot to the dregs; and his accusers, less innocent than he, do suffernought. "

Jerome replied somewhat sternly--

"It is not in this world men are really punished, Brother Clement. Unhappy they who sin yet suffer not. And happy they who suffer such illsas earth hath power to inflict; 'tis counted to them above, ay, and ahundred-fold. "

Clement bowed his head submissively. 

"May thy good words not fall to the ground, but take root in my heart, Brother Jerome. "

But the severest trial Clement underwent at Jerome's hands wasunpremeditated. It came about thus. Jerome, in an indulgent moment, wentwith him to Fra Colonna, and there "The Dream of Polifilo" lay on thetable just copied fairly. The poor author, in the pride of his heart, pointed out a master-stroke in it. 

"For ages, " said he, "fools have been lavishing poetic praise andamorous compliment on mortal women, mere creatures of earth, smackingpalpably of their origin; Sirens at the windows, where our Roman womenin particular have by lifelong study learned the wily art to show theirone good feature, though but an ear or an eyelash, at a jalosy, andhide all the rest; Magpies at the door, Capre n' i giardini, Angeli inStrada, Sante in chiesa, Diavoli in casa. Then come I and ransack theminstrels' lines for amorous turns, not forgetting those which Petrarchwasted on that French jilt Laura, the sliest of them all; and I lay youthe whole bundle of spice at the feet of the only females worthy amorousincense; to wit, the Nine Muses. "

"By which goodly stratagem, " said Jerome, who had been turning the pagesall this time, "you, a friar of St. Dominic, have produced an obscenebook. " And he dashed Polifilo on the table. 

"Obscene? thou discourteous monk!" And the author ran round the table, snatched Polifilo away, locked him up, and trembling with mortification, said, "My Gerard, pshaw! Brother What's-his-name had not found Polifiloobscene. Puris omnia pura. "

"Such as read your Polifilo--Heaven grant they may be few--will find himwhat I find him. "

Poor Colonna gulped down this bitter pill as he might; and had henot been in his own lodgings, and a high-born gentleman as well as ascholar, there might have been a vulgar quarrel. 

As it was, he made a great effort, and turned the conversation toa beautiful chrysolite the Cardinal Colonna had lent him; and whileClement handled it, enlarged on its moral virtues: for he went the wholelength of his age as a worshipper of jewels. 

But Jerome did not, and expostulated with him for believing that onedead stone could confer valour on its wearer, another chastity, anothersafety from poison, another temperance. 

"The experience of ages proves they do, " said Colonna. "As to the lastvirtue you have named, there sits a living proof. This Gerard--I begpardon, Brother Thingemy--comes from the north, where men drink likefishes; yet was he ever most abstemious. And why? Carried an amethyst, the clearest and fullest coloured e'er I saw on any but noble finger. Where, in Heaven's name, is thine amethyst? Show it this unbeliever!"

"And 'twas that amethyst made the boy temperate?" asked Jeromeironically. 

"Certainly. Why, what is the derivation and meaning of amethyst? {a}negative, and {methua} to tipple. Go to, names are but the signs ofthings. A stone is not called {amethustos} for two thousand years out ofmere sport, and abuse of language. "

He then went through the prime jewels, illustrating their moralproperties, especially of the ruby, the sapphire, the emerald, and theopal, by anecdotes out of grave historians. 

"These be old wives' fables, " said Jerome contemptuously. "Was ever suchcredulity as thine?"

Now credulity is a reproach sceptics have often the ill-luck to incur;but it mortifies them none the less for that. 

The believer in stones writhed under it, and dropped the subject. ThenJerome, mistaking his silence, exhorted him to go a step farther, andgive up from this day his vain pagan lore, and study the lives of thesaints. "Blot out these heathen superstitions from thy mind, brother, asChristianity hath blotted them from the earth. "

And in this strain he proceeded, repeating, incautiously, some currentbut loose theological statements. Then the smarting Polifilo revengedhimself. He flew out, and hurled a mountain of crude, miscellaneouslore upon Jerome, of which, partly for want of time, partly for lack oflearning, I can reproduce but a few fragments. 

"The heathen blotted out? Why, they hold four-fifths of the world. Andwhat have we Christians invented without their aid? painting? sculpture?these are heathen arts, and we but pigmies at them. What modern mindcan conceive and grave so god-like forms as did the chief Atheniansculptors, and the Libyan Licas, and Dinocrates of Macedon, and Scopas, Timotheus, Leochares, and Briaxis; Chares, Lysippus, and the immortalthree of Rhodes, that wrought Laocoon from a single block? What princehath the genius to turn mountains into statues, as was done at Bagistan, and projected at Athos? What town the soul to plant a colossus of brassin the sea, for the tallest ships to sail in and out between his legs?Is it architecture we have invented? Why, here too we are but children. Can we match for pure design the Parthenon, with its clusters of doubleand single Doric columns? (I do adore the Doric when the scale islarge), and for grandeur and finish, the theatres of Greece and Rome, or the prodigious temples of Egypt, up to whose portals men walkedawe-struck through avenues a mile long of sphinxes, each as big as aVenetian palace. And all these prodigies of porphyry cut and polishedlike crystal, not rough hewn as in our puny structures. Even now theirpolished columns and pilasters lie o'erthrown and broken, o'ergrown withacanthus and myrtle, but sparkling still, and flouting the slovenly artof modern workmen. Is it sewers, aqueducts, viaducts?

"Why, we have lost the art of making a road--lost it with the world'sgreatest models under our very eye. Is it sepulchres of the dead? Why, no Christian nation has ever erected a tomb, the sight of which does notset a scholar laughing. Do but think of the Mausoleum, and the Pyramids, and the monstrous sepulchres of the Indus and Ganges, which outside aremountains, and within are mines of precious stones. Ah, you have notseen the East, Jerome, or you could not decry the heathen. "

Jerome observed that these were mere material things. True greatness wasin the soul. 

"Well then, " replied Colonna, "in the world of mind, what have wediscovered? Is it geometry? Is it logic? Nay, we are all pupils ofEuclid and Aristotle. Is it written characters, an invention almostdivine? We no more invented it than Cadmus did. Is it poetry? Homer hathnever been approached by us, nor hath Virgil, nor Horace. Is it tragedyor comedy? Why, poets, actors, theatres, all fell to dust at ourtouch. Have we succeeded in reviving them? Would you compare our littlemiserable mysteries and moralities, all frigid personification, and dogLatin, with the glories of a Greek play (on the decoration of whicha hundred thousand crowns had been spent) performed inside a marblemiracle, the audience a seated city, and the poet a Sophocles?

"What then have we invented? Is it monotheism? Why, the learned andphilosophical among the Greeks and Romans held it; even their moreenlightened poets were monotheists in their sleeves. 

 {Zeus estin ouranos, Zeus te gy Zeus toi panta} saith the Greek, and Lucan echoes him: 'Jupiter est quod cunque vides quo cunque moveris. '

"Their vulgar were polytheists; and what are ours? We have not invented'invocation of the saints. ' Our sancti answers to their Daemones andDivi, and the heathen used to pray their Divi or deified mortal tointercede with the higher divinity; but the ruder minds among them, incapable of nice distinctions, worshipped those lesser gods they shouldhave but invoked. And so do the mob of Christians in our day, followingthe heathen vulgar or by unbroken tradition. For in holy writ is nopolytheism of any sort or kind. 

"We have not invented so much as a form or variety of polytheism. Thepagan vulgar worshipped all sorts of deified mortals, and each had hisfavourite, to whom he prayed ten times for once to the Omnipotent. Ourvulgar worship canonized mortals, and each has his favourite, to whom heprays ten times for once to God. Call you that invention? Invention isconfined to the East. Among the ancient vulgar only the mariners weremonotheists; they worshipped Venus; called her 'Stella maris, ' and'Regina caelorum. ' Among our vulgar only the mariners are monotheists;they worship the Virgin Mary, and call her the 'Star of the Sea, ' andthe 'Queen of Heaven. ' Call you theirs a new religion? An old doubtletwith a new button. Our vulgar make images, and adore them, which isabsurd; for adoration is the homage due from a creature to its creator;now here man is the creator; so the statues ought to worship him, andwould, if they had brains enough to justify a rat in worshipping them. But even this abuse, though childish enough to be modern, is ancient. The pagan vulgar in these parts made their images, then knelt beforethem, adorned them with flowers, offered incense to them, lighted tapersbefore them, carried them in procession, and made pilgrimages to themjust to the smallest tittle as we their imitators do. "

Jerome here broke in impatiently, and reminded him that the images themost revered in Christendom were made by no mortal hand, but had droppedfrom heaven. 

"Ay, " cried Colonna, "such are the tutelary images of most great Italiantowns. I have examined nineteen of them, and made drafts of them. Ifthey came from the sky, our worst sculptors are our angels. But my mindis easy on that score. Ungainly statue or villainous daub fell never yetfrom heaven to smuggle the bread out of capable workmen's mouths. Allthis is Pagan, and arose thus. The Trojans had Oriental imaginations, and feigned that their Palladium, a wooden statue three cubits long, fell down from heaven. The Greeks took this fib home among the spoilsof Troy, and soon it rained statues on all the Grecian cities, and theirLatin apes. And one of these Palladia gave St. Paul trouble at Ephesus;'twas a statue of Diana that fell down from Jupiter: credat qui crederepossit. "

"What, would you cast your profane doubts on that picture of our blessedLady, which scarce a century agone hung lustrous in the air over thisvery city, and was taken down by the Pope and bestowed in St. Peter'sChurch?"

"I have no profane doubts on the matter, Jerome. This is the story ofNuma's shield, revived by theologians with an itch for fiction, but notalent that way; not being orientals. The 'ancile' or sacred shieldof Numa hung lustrous in the air over this very city, till that piousprince took it down and hung it in the temple of Jupiter. Be just, swallow both stories or neither. The 'Bocca della Verita' passes for astatue of the Virgin, and convicted a woman of perjury the other day;it is in reality an image of the goddess Rhea, and the modern figment isone of its ancient traditions; swallow both or neither. 

'Qui Bavium non odit amet tua carmina, Mavi. '

"But indeed we owe all our Palladiuncula, and all our speaking, nodding, winking, sweating, bleeding statues, to these poor abused heathens; theAthenian statues all sweated before the battle of Chaeronea, so did theRoman statues during Tully's consulship, viz. , the statue of Victory atCapua, of Mars at Rome, and of Apollo outside the gates. The Palladiumitself was brought to Italy by Aeneas, and after keeping quiet threecenturies, made an observation in Vesta's Temple: a trivial one, I fear, since it hath not survived; Juno's statue at Veii assented with a nod togo to Rome. Antony's statue on Mount Alban bled from every vein in itsmarble before the fight of Actium. Others cured diseases: as that ofPelichus, derided by Lucian; for the wiser among the heathen believed insweating marble, weeping wood, and bleeding brass--as I do. Of all ourmarks and dents made in stone by soft substances, this saint's knee, andthat saint's finger, and t'other's head, the original is heathen. Thusthe footprints of Hercules were shown on a rock in Scythia. Castor andPollux fighting on white horses for Rome against the Latians, left theprints of their hoofs on a rock at Regillum. A temple was built to themon the spot, and the marks were to be seen in Tully's day. You may see, near Venice, a great stone cut nearly in half by St. George's sword. This he ne'er had done but for the old Roman who cut the whetstone intwo with his razor. 

'Qui Bavium non odit amet tua carmina, Mavi. '

"Kissing of images, and the Pope's toe, is Eastern Paganism. TheEgyptians had it of the Assyrians, the Greeks of the Egyptians, theRomans of the Greeks, and we of the Romans, whose Pontifex Maximus hadhis toe kissed under the Empire. The Druids kissed the High Priest's toea thousand years B. C. The Mussulmans, who, like you, profess to abhorHeathenism, kiss the stone of the Caaba: a Pagan practice. 

"The Priests of Baal kissed their idols so. 

"Tully tells us of a fair image of Hercules at Agrigentum, whose chinwas worn by kissing. The lower parts of the statue we call Peter areJupiter. The toe is sore worn, but not all by Christian mouths. Theheathen vulgar laid their lips there first, for many a year, and ourshave but followed them, as monkeys their masters. And that is why, downwith the poor heathen!

Pereant qui ante nos nostra fecerint. 

"Our infant baptism is Persian, with the font and the signing of thechild's brow. Our throwing three handfuls of earth on the coffin, andsaying dust to dust, is Egyptian. 

"Our incense is Oriental, Roman, Pagan; and the early Fathers of theChurch regarded it with superstitious horror, and died for refusing tohandle it. Our Holy water is Pagan, and all its uses. See, here is aPagan aspersorium. Could you tell it from one of ours? It stood in thesame part of their temples, and was used in ordinary worship as ours, and in extraordinary purifications. They called it Aqua lustralis. Theirvulgar, like ours, thought drops of it falling on the body would washout sin; and their men of sense, like ours, smiled or sighed at suchcredulity. What saith Ovid of this folly, which hath outlived him?

 'Ah nimium faciles, qui tristia crimina coedis Fluminea tolli posse putetis aqua. '

Thou seest the heathen were not all fools. No more are we. Not all. "

Fra Colonna uttered all this with such volubility, that his hearerscould not edge in a word of remonstrance; and not being interruptedin praising his favourites, he recovered his good humour, without anydiminution of his volubility. 

"We celebrate the miraculous Conception of the Virgin on the 2nd ofFebruary. The old Romans celebrated the Miraculous Conception of Juno onthe 2nd of February. Our feast of All Saints is on the 2nd November. TheFestum Dei Mortis was on the 2nd November. Our Candlemas is also an oldRoman feast; neither the date nor the ceremony altered one tittle. The patrician ladies carried candles about the city that night as oursignoras do now. At the gate of San Croce our courtesans keep a feaston the 20th August. Ask them why! The little noodles cannot tell you. Onthat very spot stood the Temple of Venus. Her building is gone; but herrite remains. Did we discover Purgatory? On the contrary, all we reallyknow about it is from two treatises of Plato, the Gorgias and thePhaedo, and the sixth book of Virgil's Aeneid. 

"I take it from a holier source: St. Gregory, " said Jerome sternly. 

"Like enough, " replied Colonna drily. "But St. Gregory was not so nice;he took it from Virgil. Some souls, saith Gregory, are purged by fire, others by water, others by air. 

"Says Virgil--

 'Aliae panduntur inanes, Suspensae ad ventous, aliis sub gurgite vasto Infectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur igni. '

But peradventure, you think Pope Gregory I lived before Virgil, andVirgil versified him. 

"But the doctrine is Eastern, and as much older than Plato as Platothan Gregory. Our prayers for the dead came from Asia with Aeneas. Ovidtells, that when he prayed for the soul of Anchises, the custom wasstrange in Italy. 

 'Hunc morem Aeneas, pietatis idoneus auctor Attulit in terras, juste Latine, tuas. '

The 'Biblicae' Sortes, ' which I have seen consulted on the altar, area parody on the 'Sortes Virgilianae. ' Our numerous altars in one churchare heathen: the Jews, who are monotheists, have but one altar in achurch. But the Pagans had many, being polytheists. In the temple ofPathian Venus were a hundred of them. 'Centum que Sabaeo thure calentarae. ' Our altar's and our hundred lights around St. Peter's tomb arePagan. 'Centum aras posuit vigilemque sacraverat ignem. ' We inventnothing, not even numerically. Our very Devil is the god Pan, horns andhoofs and all; but blackened. For we cannot draw; we can but daub thefigures of Antiquity with a little sorry paint or soot. Our Moses hathstolen the horns of Ammon; our Wolfgang the hook of Saturn; and Janusbore the keys of heaven before St. Peter. All our really old Italianbronzes of the Virgin and Child are Venuses and Cupids. So is the woodenstatue, that stands hard by this house, of Pope Joan and the childshe is said to have brought forth there in the middle of a procession. Idiots! are new-born children thirteen years old? And that boy is not aday younger. Cupid! Cupid! Cupid! And since you accuse me of credulity, know that to my mind that Papess is full as mythological, born of froth, and every way unreal, as the goddess who passes for her in the nextstreet, or as the saints you call St. Baccho and St. Quirina: or St. Oracte, which is a dunce-like corruption of Mount Soracte, or St. Amphibolus, an English saint, which is a dunce-like corruption of thecloak worn by their St. Alban, Or as the Spanish saint, St. Viar: whichwords on his tombstone, written thus, 'S. Viar, ' prove him no saint, but a good old nameless heathen, and 'praefectus Viarum, ' or overseerof roads (would he were back to earth, and paganizing of our Christianroads!), or as our St. Veronica of Benasco, which Veronica is adunce-like corruption of the 'Vera icon, ' which this saint broughtinto the church. I wish it may not be as unreal as the donor, Or as theeleven thousand virgins of Cologne, who were but a couple. "

Clement interrupted him to inquire what he meant. "I have spoken withthose have seen their bones. "

"What, of eleven thousand virgins all collected in one place and at onetime? Do but bethink thee, Clement. Not one of the great Eastern citiesof antiquity could collect eleven thousand Pagan virgins at one time, far less a puny Western city. Eleven thousand Christian virgins in alittle, wee, Paynim city!

'Quod cunque ostendis mihi sic incredulus odi. '

The simple sooth is this. The martyrs were two: the Breton princessherself, falsely called British, and her maid, Onesimilla, which isa Greek name, Onesima, diminished. This some fool did mis-pronounceundecim mille, eleven thousand: loose tongue found credulous ears, andso one fool made many; eleven thousand of them, an' you will. And youcharge me with credulity, Jerome? and bid me read the Lives of theSaints. Well, I have read them, and many a dear old Pagan acquaintanceI found there. The best fictions in the book are Oriental, and are knownto have been current in Persia and Arabia eight hundred years and morebefore the dates the Church assigns to them as facts. As for the trueWestern figments, they lack the Oriental plausibility. Think you I amcredulous enough to believe that St. Ida joined a decapitated head toits body? that Cuthbert's carcass directed his bearers where to go, andwhere to stop; that a city was eaten up of rats to punish one Hattofor comparing the poor to mice; that angels have a little horn intheir foreheads, and that this was seen and recorded at the time bySt. Veronica of Benasco, who never existed, and hath left us thisinformation and a miraculous handkercher? For my part, I think theholiest woman the world ere saw must have an existence ere she can havea handkercher or an eye to take unicorns for angels. Think you I believethat a brace of lions turned sextons and helped Anthony bury Paul ofThebes? that Patrick, a Scotch saint, stuck a goat's beard on all thedescendants of one that offended him? that certain thieves, havingstolen the convent ram, and denying it, St. Pol de Leon bade the rambear witness, and straight the mutton bleated in the thief's belly?Would you have me give up the skilful figments of antiquity for such oldwives' fables as these? The ancients lied about animals, too; but thenthey lied logically; we unreasonably. Do but compare Ephis and hislion, or, better still, Androcles and his lion, with Anthony and his twolions. Both the Pagan lions do what lions never did' but at the leastthey act in character. A lion with a bone in his throat, or a thornin his foot, could not do better than be civil to a man. But Anthony'slions are asses in a lion's skin. What leonine motive could they have inturning sextons? A lion's business is to make corpses, not inter them. "He added, with a sigh, "Our lies are as inferior to the lies of theancients as our statues, and for the same reason; we do not study natureas they did. We are imitatores, servum pecus. Believe you 'the lives ofthe saints;' that Paul the Theban was the first hermit, and Anthony thefirst Caenobite? Why, Pythagoras was an Eremite, and under ground forseven years; and his daughter was an abbess. Monks and hermits were inthe East long before Moses, and neither old Greece nor Rome was everwithout them. As for St. Francis and his snowballs, he did but mimicDiogenes, who, naked, embraced statues on which snow had fallen. Thefolly without the poetry. Ape of an ape--for Diogenes was but a mimictherein of the Brahmins and Indian gymnosophists. Natheless, thechildren of this Francis bid fair to pelt us out of the Church withtheir snowballs. Tell me now, Clement, what habit is lovelier thanthe vestments of our priests? Well, we owe them all to Numa Pompilius, except the girdle and the stole, which are judaical. As for the amiceand the albe, they retain the very names they bore in Numa's day. The'pelt' worn by the canons comes from primeval Paganism. 'Tis a relicof those rude times when the sacrificing priest wore the skins of thebeasts with the fur outward. Strip off thy black gown, Jerome, thygirdle and cowl, for they come to us all three from the Pagan ladies. Let thy hair grow like Absolom's, Jerome! for the tonsure is as Pagan asthe Muses. "

"Take care what thou sayest, " said Jerome sternly. "We know the veryyear in which the Church did first ordain it. "

"But not invent it, Jerome. The Brahmins wore it a few thousands yearsere that. From them it came through the Assyrians to the priests of Isisin Egypt, and afterwards of Serapis at Athens. The late Pope (the saintsbe good to him) once told me the tonsure was forbidden by God to theLevites in the Pentateuch. If so, this was because of the Egyptianpriests wearing it. I trust to his holiness. I am no biblical scholar. The Latin of thy namesake Jerome is a barrier I cannot overleap. 'Dixitad me Dominus Dens. Dixi ad Dominum Deum. ' No, thank you, holy Jerome;I can stand a good deal, but I cannot stand thy Latin. Nay; give me theNew Testament! 'Tis not the Greek of Xenophon; but 'tis Greek. And therebe heathen sayings in it too. For St. Paul was not so spiteful againstthem as thou. When the heathen said a good thing that suited his matter, by Jupiter he just took it, and mixed it to all eternity with theinspired text. "

"Come forth, Clement, come forth!" said Jerome, rising; "and thou, profane monk, know that but for the powerful house that upholds thee, thy accursed heresy should go no farther, for I would have thee burnedat the stake. " And he strode out white with indignation. 

Colonna's reception of this threat did credit to him as an enthusiast. He ran and hallooed joyfully after Jerome. "And that is Pagan. Burningof men's bodies for the opinions of their souls is a purely Pagancustom--as Pagan as incense, holy water, a hundred altars in one church, the tonsure, the cardinal's, or flamen's hat, the word Pope, the--"

Here Jerome slammed the door. 

But ere they could get clear of the house a jalosy was flung open, andthe Paynim monk came out head and shoulders, and overhung the streetshouting, "Affecti suppliciis Chrisitiani, genus hominum Novas superstitionis ac maleficae, '"

And having delivered this parting blow, he felt a great triumphant joy, and strode exultant to and fro; and not attending with his usual careto the fair way (for his room could only be threaded by little pathswriggling among the antiquities), tripped over the beak of an Egyptianstork, and rolled upon a regiment of Armenian gods, which he found toughin argument though small in stature. 

"You will go no more to that heretical monk, " said Jerome to Clement. 

Clement sighed. "Shall we leave him and not try to correct him? Makeallowance for heat of discourse! he was nettled, His words are worsethan his acts. Oh 'tis a pure and charitable soul. "

"So are all arch-heretics. Satan does not tempt them like other men. Rather he makes them more moral, to give their teaching weight. FraColonna cannot be corrected; his family is all-powerful in Rome, Pray wethe saints he blasphemes to enlighten him, 'Twill not be the first timethey have returned good for evil, Meantime thou art forbidden to consortwith him, From this day go alone through the city! Confess and absolvesinners! exorcise demons! comfort the sick! terrify the impenitent!preach wherever men are gathered and occasion serves! and hold noconverse with the Fra Colonna!"

Clement bowed his head. 

Then the prior, at Jerome's request, had the young friar watched. Andone day the spy returned with the news that Brother Clement had passedby the Fra Colonna's lodging, and had stopped a little while in thestreet, and then gone on, but with his hand to his eyes and slowly. 

This report Jerome took to the prior. The prior asked his opinion, and also Anselm's, who was then taking leave of him on his return toJuliers. 

Jerome. "Humph! He obeyed, but with regret, ay, with childish repining. "

Anselm, "He shed a natural tear at turning his back on a friend and abenefactor, But he obeyed. "

Now Anselm was one of your gentle irresistibles, He had at times a mildascendant even over Jerome. 

"Worthy Brother Anselm, " said Jerome, "Clement is weak to the verybone, He will disappoint thee, He will do nothing, great, either for theChurch or for our holy order. Yet he is an orator, and hath drunken ofthe spirit of St. Dominic. Fly him, then, with a string. "

That same day it was announced to Clement that he was to go to Englandimmediately with Brother Jerome. 

Clement folded his hands on his breast, and bowed his head in calmsubmission. 

CHAPTER LXXIII

THE HEARTH

A Catherine is not an unmixed good in a strange house. The governingpower is strong in her. She has scarce crossed the threshold ere theutensils seem to brighten; the hearth to sweep itself; the windows tolet in more light; and the soul of an enormous cricket to animatethe dwelling-place. But this cricket is a Busy Body. And that is atremendous character. It has no discrimination. It sets everything torights, and everybody. Now many things are the better for being set torights. But everything is not. Everything is the one thing that won'tstand being set to rights; except in that calm and cool retreat, thegrave. 

Catherine altered the position of every chair and table in Margaret'shouse; and perhaps for the better. 

But she must go farther, and upset the live furniture. 

When Margaret's time was close at hand, Catherine treacherously invitedthe aid of Denys and Martin; and on the poor, simple-minded fellowsasking her earnestly what service they could be, she told them theymight make themselves comparatively useful by going for a little walk. So far so good. But she intimated further that should the promenadeextend into the middle of next week all the better. This was notingratiating. The subsequent conduct of the strong under the yoke of theweak might have propitiated a she-bear with three cubs, one sickly. They generally slipped out of the house at daybreak; and stole in likethieves at night; and if by any chance they were at home, they wentabout like cats on a wall tipped with broken glass, and wearingawe-struck visages, and a general air of subjugation and depression. 

But all would not do. Their very presence was ill-timed; and jarred uponCatherine's nerves. 

Did instinct whisper, a pair of depopulators had no business in a housewith multipliers twain?

The breastplate is no armour against a female tongue; and Catherine raninfinite pins and needles of speech into them. In a word, when Margaretcame down stairs, she found the kitchen swept of heroes. 

Martin, old and stiff, had retreated no farther than the street, andwith the honours of war: for he had carried off his baggage, a stool;and sat on it in the air. 

Margaret saw he was out in the sun; but was not aware he was a fixturein that luminary. She asked for Denys. "Good, kind Denys; he will beright pleased to see me about again. "

Catherine, wiping a bowl with now superfluous vigour, told her Denys wasgone to his friends in Burgundy. "And high time, Hasn't been anigh themthis three years, by all accounts. "

"What, gone without bidding me farewell?" said Margaret, uplifting twotender eyes like full-blown violets. 

Catherine reddened. For this new view of the matter set her consciencepricking her. 

But she gave a little toss and said, "Oh, you were asleep at the time:and I would not have you wakened. "

"Poor Denys, " said Margaret, and the dew gathered visibly on the openviolets. 

Catherine saw out of the corner of her eye, and without taking a bit ofopen notice, slipped off and lavished hospitality and tenderness on thesurviving depopulator. 

It was sudden: and Martin old and stiff in more ways than one--

"No, thank you, dame. I have got used to out o' doors. And I love notchanging and changing. I meddle wi' nobody here; and nobody meddles wi'me. "

"Oh, you nasty, cross old wretch!" screamed Catherine, passing in amoment from treacle to sharpest vinegar. And she flounced back into thehouse. 

On calm reflection she had a little cry. Then she half reconciledherself to her conduct by vowing to be so kind, Margaret should nevermiss her plagues of soldiers. But feeling still a little uneasy, shedispersed all regrets by a process at once simple and sovereign. 

She took and washed the child. 

From head to foot she washed him in tepid water; and heroes, and theirwrongs, became as dust in an ocean--of soap and water. 

While this celestial ceremony proceeded, Margaret could not keep quiet. She hovered round the fortunate performer. She must have an apparenthand in it, if not a real. She put her finger into the water--to pavethe way for her boy, I suppose; for she could not have deceived herselfso far as to think Catherine would allow her to settle the temperature. During the ablution she kneeled down opposite the little Gerard, andprattled to him with amazing fluency; taking care, however, not toarticulate like grown-up people; for, how could a cherub understandtheir ridiculous pronunciation?

"I wish you could wash out THAT, " said she, fixing her eyes on thelittle boy's hand. 

"What?"

"What, have you not noticed? on his little finger. "

Granny looked, and there was a little brown mole, "Eh, but this is wonderful!" she cried. "Nature, my lass, y'are strong;and meddlesome to boot. Hast noticed such a mark on some one else? Tellthe truth, girl!"

"What, on him? Nay, mother, not I. "

"Well then he has; and on the very spot. And you never noticed thatmuch. But, dear heart, I forgot; you han't known him from child to manas I have, I have had him hundreds o' times on my knees, the sameas this, and washed him from top to toe in luke-warm water. " And sheswelled with conscious superiority; and Margaret looked meekly up to heras a woman beyond competition. 

Catherine looked down from her dizzy height and moralized. She differedfrom other busy-bodies in this, that she now and then reflected: notdeeply; or of course I should take care not to print it. 

"It is strange, " said she, "how things come round and about, Life is buta whirligig. Leastways, we poor women, our lives are all cut upon onepattern. Wasn't I for washing out my Gerard's mole in his young days?'Oh, fie! here's a foul blot, ' quo' I; and scrubbed away at it I didtill I made the poor wight cry; so then I thought 'twas time to giveover. And now says you to me, 'Mother, ' says you, 'do try and wash youout o' my Gerard's finger, ' says you. Think on't!"

"Wash it out?" cried Margaret; "I wouldn't for all the world, Why, it isthe sweetest bit in his little darling body. I'll kiss it morn and nighttill he that owned it first comes back to us three, Oh, bless you, my jewel of gold and silver, for being marked like your own daddy, tocomfort me. "

And she kissed little Gerard's little mole; but she could not stopthere; she presently had him sprawling on her lap, and kissed hisback all over again and again, and seemed to worry him as wolf a lamb;Catherine looking on and smiling. She had seen a good many of thesesavage onslaughts in her day. 

And this little sketch indicates the tenor of Margaret's life forseveral months, One or two small things occurred to her during that timewhich must be told; but I reserve them, since one string will serve formany glass beads. But while her boy's father was passing through thosefearful tempests of the soul, ending in the dead monastic calm, her lifemight fairly be summed in one great blissful word--Maternity. 

You, who know what lies in that word, enlarge my little sketch, and seethe young mother nursing and washing, and dressing and undressing, andcrowing and gambolling with her first-born; then swifter than lightningdart your eye into Italy, and see the cold cloister; and the monkspassing like ghosts, eyes down, hands meekly crossed over bosoms dead toearthly feelings. 

One of these cowled ghosts is he, whose return, full of love, and youth, and joy, that radiant young mother awaits. 

In the valley of Grindelwald the traveller has on one side theperpendicular Alps, all rock, ice, and everlasting snow, towering abovethe clouds, and piercing to the sky; on his other hand little every-dayslopes, but green as emeralds, and studded with cows and pretty cots, and life; whereas those lofty neighbours stand leafless, lifeless, inhuman, sublime. Elsewhere sweet commonplaces of nature are apt to passunnoticed; but, fronting the grim Alps, they soothe, and even gentlystrike, the mind by contrast with their tremendous opposites. Such, intheir way, are the two halves of this story, rightly looked at; onthe Italian side rugged adventure, strong passion, blasphemy, vice, penitence, pure ice, holy snow, soaring direct at heaven. On the Dutchside, all on a humble scale and womanish, but ever green. And as apathway parts the ice towers of Grindelwald, aspiring to the sky, fromits little sunny braes, so here is but a page between

"the Cloister and the Hearth. "

CHAPTER LXXIV

THE CLOISTER

THE new pope favoured the Dominican order. The convent received amessage from the Vatican, requiring a capable friar to teach at theUniversity of Basle. Now Clement was the very monk for this: well versedin languages, and in his worldly days had attended the lectures ofGuarini the younger. His visit to England was therefore postponed thoughnot resigned; and meantime he was sent to Basle; but not being wantedthere for three months, he was to preach on the road. 

He passed out of the northern gate with his eyes lowered, and the wholeman wrapped in pious contemplation. 

Oh, if we could paint a mind and its story, what a walking fresco wasthis barefooted friar!

Hopeful, happy love, bereavement, despair, impiety, vice, suicide, remorse, religious despondency, penitence, death to the world, resignation. 

And all in twelve short months. 

And now the traveller was on foot again. But all was changed: noperilous adventures now. The very thieves and robbers bowed to theground before him, and instead of robbing him, forced stolen money onhim, and begged his prayers. 

This journey therefore furnished few picturesque incidents. I have, however, some readers to think of, who care little for melodrama, andexpect a quiet peep at what passes inside a man, To such students thingsundramatic are often vocal, denoting the progress of a mind. 

The first Sunday of Clement's journey was marked by this. He prayed forthe soul of Margaret. He had never done so before. Not that her eternalwelfare was not dearer to him than anything on earth. It was hishumility. The terrible impieties that burst from him on the news of herdeath horrified my well-disposed readers; but not as on reflection theyhorrified him who had uttered them. For a long time during his novitiatehe was oppressed with religious despair. He thought he must havecommitted that sin against the Holy Spirit which dooms the soul forever, By degrees that dark cloud cleared away, Anselmo juvante; butdeep self-abasement remained. He felt his own salvation insecure, andmoreover thought it would be mocking Heaven, should he, the deeplystained, pray for a soul so innocent, comparatively, as Margaret's. Sohe used to coax good Anselm and another kindly monk to pray for her. They did not refuse, nor do it by halves. In general the good old monks(and there were good, bad, and indifferent in every convent) had a pureand tender affection for their younger brethren, which, in truth, wasnot of this world. 

Clement then, having preached on Sunday morning in a small Italian town, and being mightily carried onward, was greatly encouraged; and that daya balmy sense of God's forgiveness and love descended on him. And heprayed for the welfare of Margaret's soul. And from that hour thisbecame his daily habit, and the one purified tie, that by memoryconnected his heart with earth. 

For his family were to him as if they had never been. 

The Church would not share with earth. Nor could even the Church curethe great love without annihilating the smaller ones. 

During most of this journey Clement rarely felt any spring of lifewithin him, but when he was in the pulpit. The other exceptions were, when he happened to relieve some fellow-creature. 

A young man was tarantula bitten, or perhaps, like many more, fanciedit. Fancy or reality, he had been for two days without sleep, and inmost extraordinary convulsions, leaping, twisting, and beating thewalls. The village musicians had only excited him worse with theirmusic. Exhaustion and death followed the disease, when it gained such ahead. Clement passed by and learned what was the matter. He sent for apsaltery, and tried the patient with soothing melodies; but if the othertunes maddened him, Clement's seemed to crush him. He groaned and moanedunder them, and grovelled on the floor. At last the friar observed thatat intervals his lips kept going. He applied his ear, and found thepatient was whispering a tune; and a very singular one, that had noexistence. He learned this tune and played it. The patient's facebrightened amazingly. He marched about the room on the light fantastictoe enjoying it; and when Clement's fingers ached nearly off withplaying it, he had the satisfaction of seeing the young man sinkcomplacently to sleep to this lullaby, the strange creation of his ownmind; for it seems he was no musician, and never composed a tune beforeor after. This sleep saved his life. And Clement, after teaching thetune to another, in case it should be wanted again, went forward withhis heart a little warmer. On another occasion he found a mob halinga decently dressed man along, who struggled and vociferated, but ina strange language. This person had walked into their town erect andsprightly, waving a mulberry branch over his head. Thereupon the nativesfirst gazed stupidly, not believing their eyes, then pounced on him anddragged him before the podesta, Clement went with them; but on the waydrew quietly near the prisoner and spoke to him in Italian; no answer. In French' German; Dutch; no assets. Then the man tried Clementin tolerable Latin, but with a sharpish accent. He said he was anEnglishman, and oppressed with the heat of Italy, had taken a bough offthe nearest tree, to save his head. "In my country anybody is welcome towhat grows on the highway. Confound the fools; I am ready to pay for it. But here is all Italy up in arms about a twig and a handful of leaves. "

The pig-headed podesta would have sent the dogged islander to prison;but Clement mediated, and with some difficulty made the prisonercomprehend that silkworms, and by consequence mulberry leaves, weresacred, being under the wing of the Sovereign, and his source of income;and urged on the podesta that ignorance of his mulberry laws was naturalin a distant country, where the very tree perhaps was unknown, Theopinionative islander turned the still vibrating scale by pulling' outa long purse and repeating his original theory, that the whole questionwas mercantile. "Quid damni?" said he, "Dic; et cito solvam. " Thepodesta snuffed the gold: fined him a ducat for the duke; about thevalue of the whole tree; and pouched the coin. 

The Englishman shook off his ire the moment he was liberated, andlaughed heartily at the whole thing; but was very grateful to Clement. 

"You are too good for this hole of a country, father, " said he, "Cometo England! That is the only place in the world, I was an uneasy fool toleave it, and wander among mulberries and their idiots. I am a Kentishsquire, and educated at Cambridge University. My name it is Rolfe, myplace Betshanger, The man and the house are both at your service. Comeover and stay till domesday. We sit down forty to dinner every day atBetshanger. One more or one less at the board will not be seen. Youshall end your days with me and my heirs if you will, Come now! What anEnglishman says he means. " And he gave him a great hearty grip of thehand to confirm it, "I will visit thee some day, my son, " said Clement; "but not to wearythy hospitality. "

The Englishman then begged Clement to shrive him. "I know not whatwill become of my soul, " said he, "I live like a heathen since I leftEngland. "

Clement consented gladly, and soon the islander was on his knees to himby the roadside, confessing the last month's sins. 

Finding him so pious a son of the Church, Clement let him know he wasreally coming to England. He then asked him whether it was true thatcountry was overrun with Lollards and Wickliffites. 

The other coloured up a little. "There be black sheep in every land, "said he. Then after some reflection he said gravely, "Holy father, hearthe truth about these heretics. None are better disposed towards HolyChurch than we English. But we are ourselves, and by ourselves. We loveour own ways, and above all, our own tongue. The Norman could conquerour bill-hooks, but not our tongues; and hard they tried it for many along year by law and proclamation. Our good foreign priests utter Godto plain English folk in Latin, or in some French or Italian lingo, likethe bleating of a sheep. Then come the fox Wickliff and his crew, andread him out of his own book in plain English, that all men's heartswarm to. Who can withstand this? God forgive me, I believe the Englishwould turn deaf ears to St, Peter himself, spoke he not to them in thetongue their mothers sowed in their ears and their hearts along withmothers' kisses. " He added hastily, "I say not this for myself; I amCambridge bred; and good words come not amiss to me in Latin; but forthe people in general. Clavis ad corda Anglorum est lingua materna. "

"My son, " said Clement, "blessed be the hour I met thee; for thy wordsare sober and wise. But alas! how shall I learn your English tongue? Nobook have I. "

"I would give you my book of hours, father. 'Tis in English and Latin, cheek by jowl. But then, what would become of my poor soul, wanting my'hours' in a strange land? Stay, you are a holy man, and I am an honestone; let us make a bargain; you to pray for me every day for two months, and I to give you my book of hours. Here it is. What say you to that?"And his eyes sparkled, and he was all on fire with mercantility. 

Clement smiled gently at this trait; and quietly detached a MS. From hisgirdle, and showed him that it was in Latin and Italian. 

"See, my son, " said he, "Heaven hath foreseen our several needs, andgiven us the means to satisfy them: let us change books; and, my dearson, I will give thee my poor prayers and welcome, not sell them thee. Ilove not religious bargains. "

The islander was delighted. "So shall I learn the Italian tongue withoutrisk to my eternal weal, Near is my purse, but nearer is my soul. "

He forced money on Clement. In vain the friar told him it was contraryto his vow to carry more of that than was barely necessary. 

"Lay it out for the good of the Church and of my soul, " said theislander. "I ask you not to keep it, but take it you must and shall. "And he grasped Clement's hand warmly again; and Clement kissed him onthe brow, and blessed him, and they went each his way. 

About a mile from where they parted, Clement found two tired wayfarerslying in the deep shade of a great chestnut-tree, one of a thickgrove the road skirted. Near the men was a little cart, and in ita printing-press, rude and clumsy as a vine-press, A jaded mule washarnessed to the cart. 

And so Clement stood face to face with his old enemy. 

And as he eyed it, and the honest, blue-eyed faces of the weariedcraftsmen, he looked back as on a dream at the bitterness he had oncefelt towards this machine. He looked kindly down on them, and saidsoftly--

"Sweynheim!"

The men started to their feet. 

"Pannartz!"

They scuttled into the wood, and were seen no more. 

Clement was amazed, and stood puzzling himself. 

Presently a face peeped from behind a tree. 

Clement addressed it, "What fear ye?"

A quavering voice replied--

"Say, rather, by what magic you, a stranger, can call us by our names! Inever clapt eyes on you till now. "

"O, superstition! I know ye, as all good workmen are known--by yourworks. Come hither and I will tell ye. "

They advanced gingerly from different sides; each regulating his advanceby the other's. 

"My children, " said Clement, "I saw a Lactantius in Rome, printed bySweynheim and Pannartz, disciples of Fust. "

"D'ye hear that, Pannartz? our work has gotten to Rome already. "

"By your blue eyes and flaxen hair I wist ye were Germans; and theprinting-press spoke for itself. Who then should ye be but Fust'sdisciples, Pannartz and Sweynheim?"

The honest Germans were now astonished that they had suspected magic inso simple a matter. 

"The good father hath his wits about him, that is all, " said Pannartz. 

"Ay, " said Sweynheim, "and with those wits would he could tell us how toget this tired beast to the next town. "

"Yea, " said Sweynheim, "and where to find money to pay for his meat andours when we get there. "

"I will try, " said Clement. "Free the mule of the cart, and of allharness but the bare halter. "

This was done, and the animal immediately lay down and rolled on hisback in the dust like a kitten. Whilst he was thus employed, Clementassured them he would rise up a new mule. 

"His Creator hath taught him this art to refresh himself, which thenobler horse knoweth not. Now, with regard to money, know that a worthyEnglishman hath entrusted me with a certain sum to bestow in charity. To whom can I better give a stranger's money than to strangers? Take it, then, and be kind to some Englishman or other stranger in his need; andmay all nations learn to love one another one day. "

The tears stood in the honest workmen's eyes. They took the money withheartfelt thanks. 

"It is your nation we are bound to thank and bless, good father, if webut knew it. "

"My nation is the Church. "

Clement was then for bidding them farewell, but the honest fellowsimplored him to wait a little; they had no silver nor gold, but they hadsomething they could give their benefactor, They took the press out ofthe cart, and while Clement fed the mule, they hustled about, now on thewhite hot road, now in the deep cool shade, now half in and half out, and presently printed a quarto sheet of eight pages, which was alreadyset up. They had not type enough to print two sheets at a time. When, after the slower preliminaries, the printed sheet was pulled all in amoment, Clement was amazed in turn. 

"What, are all these words really fast upon the paper?" said he. "Is itverily certain they will not go as swiftly as they came? And you tookme for a magician! 'Tis 'Augustine de civitate Dei. ' My sons, you carryhere the very wings of knowledge. Oh, never abuse this great craft!Print no ill books! They would fly abroad countless as locusts, and laywaste men's souls. "

The workmen said they would sooner put their hands under the screw thanso abuse their goodly craft. 

And so they parted. 

There is nothing but meeting and parting in this world. 

At a town in Tuscany the holy friar had a sudden and strange recontrewith the past. He fell in with one of those motley assemblages ofpatricians and plebeians, piety and profligacy, "a company of pilgrims;"a subject too well painted by others for me to go and daub. 

They were in an immense barn belonging to the inn, Clement, dusty andwearied, and no lover of idle gossip, sat in a corner studying theEnglishman's hours, and making them out as much by his own Dutch as bythe Latin version. 

Presently a servant brought a bucket half full of water, and put it downat his feet. A female servant followed with two towels. And then a womancame forward, and crossing herself, kneeled down without a word at thebucket-side, removed her sleeves entirely, and motioned to him to puthis feet into the water. It was some lady of rank doing penance. Shewore a mask scarce an inch broad, but effectual. Moreover, she handledthe friar's feet more delicately than those do who are born to suchoffices. 

These penances were not uncommon; and Clement, though he had littlefaith in this form of contrition, received the services of the incognitaas a matter of course. But presently she sighed deeply, and with herheartfelt sigh and her head bent low over her menial office, she seemedso bowed with penitence, that he pitied her, and said calmly but gently, "Can I aught for your soul's weal, my daughter?"

She shook her head with a faint sob. "Nought, holy father, nought; onlyto hear the sin of her who is most unworthy to touch thy holy feet. 'Tispart of my penance to tell sinless men how vile I am. "

"Speak, my daughter. "

"Father, " said the lady, bending lower and lower, "these hands of minelook white, but they are stained with blood--the blood of the man Iloved. Alas! you withdraw your foot. Ah me! What shall I do? All holythings shrink from me. "

"Culpa mea! culpa mea!" said Clement eagerly. "My daughter, it was anunworthy movement of earthly weakness, for which I shall do penance. Judge not the Church by her feebler servants, Not her foot, but herbosom, is offered to thee, repenting truly. Take courage, then, andpurge thy conscience of its load. "

On this the lady, in a trembling whisper, and hurriedly, and cringing alittle, as if she feared the Church would strike her bodily for what shehad done, made this confession. 

"He was a stranger, and base-born, but beautiful as Spring, and wisebeyond his years. I loved him, I had not the prudence to conceal mylove. Nobles courted me. I ne'er thought one of humble birth couldreject me. I showed him my heart oh, shame of my sex! He drew back; yethe admired me; but innocently, He loved another; and he was constant. Iresorted to a woman's wiles, They availed not. I borrowed the wickednessof men, and threatened his life, and to tell his true lover he diedfalse to her, Ah! you shrink your foot trembles. Am I not a monster?Then he wept and prayed to me for mercy; then my good angel helped me; Ibade him leave Rome. Gerard, Gerard, why did you not obey me? I thoughthe was gone. But two months after this I met him, Never shall I forgetit. I was descending the Tiber in my galley, when he came up it with agay company, and at his side a woman beautiful as an angel, but bold andbad. That woman claimed me aloud for her rival. Traitor and hypocrite, he had exposed me to her, and to all the loose tongues in Rome. Interror and revenge I hired-a bravo. When he was gone on his bloodyerrand, I wavered too late. The dagger I had hired struck, He never cameback to his lodgings. He was dead. Alas! perhaps he was not so much toblame: none have ever cast his name in my teeth. His poor body is notfound: or I should kiss its wounds; and slay myself upon it. All aroundhis very name seems silent as the grave, to which this murderous handhath sent him. " (Clement's eye was drawn by her movement. He recognizedher shapely arm, and soft white hand. ) "And oh! he was so young to die. A poor thoughtless boy, that had fallen a victim to that bad woman'sarts, and she had made him tell her everything. Monster of cruelty, whatpenance can avail me? Oh, holy father, what shall I do?"

Clement's lips moved in prayer, but he was silent. He could not see hisduty clear. 

Then she took his feet and began to dry them. She rested his footupon her soft arm, and pressed it with the towel so gently she seemedincapable of hurting a fly. Yet her lips had just told another story, and a true one. 

While Clement was still praying for wisdom, a tear fell upon his foot. It decided him. "My daughter, " said he, "I myself have been a greatsinner. "

"You, father?"

"I; quite as great a sinner as thou; though not in the same way. Thedevil has gins and snares, as well as traps. But penitence softened myimpious heart, and then gratitude remoulded it. Therefore, seeing youpenitent, I hope you can be grateful to Him, who has been more mercifulto you than you have to your fellow-creature. Daughter, the Church sendsyou comfort. "

"Comfort to me? ah! never! unless it can raise my victim from the dead. "

"Take this crucifix in thy hand, fix thine eyes on it, and listen tome, " was all the reply. 

"Yes, father; but let me thoroughly dry your feet first; 'tis illsitting in wet feet; and you are the holiest man of all whose feet Ihave washed. I know it by your voice. "

"Woman, I am not. As for my feet, they can wait their turn. Obey thoume. 

"Yes, father, " said the lady humbly. But with a woman's evasivepertinacity she wreathed one towel swiftly round the foot she wasdrying, and placed his other foot on the dry napkin; then obeyed hiscommand. 

And as she bowed over the crucifix, the low, solemn tones of the friarfell upon her ear, and his words soon made her whole body quiver withvarious emotion, in quick succession. 

"My daughter, he you murdered--in intent--was one Gerard, a Hollander. He loved a creature, as men should love none but their Redeemer and HisChurch. Heaven chastised him. A letter came to Rome. She was dead. "

"Poor Gerard! Poor Margaret!" moaned the penitent. 

Clement's voice faltered at this a moment. But soon, by a strong effort, he recovered all his calmness. 

"His feeble nature yielded, body and soul, to the blow, He was strickendown with fever. He revived only to rebel against Heaven. He said, 'There is no God. '"

"Poor, poor Gerard!"

"Poor Gerard? thou feeble, foolish woman! Nay, wicked, impious Gerard. He plunged into vice, and soiled his eternal jewel: those you methim with were his daily companions; but know, rash creature, that theseeming woman you took to be his leman was but a boy, dressed in woman'shabits to flout the others, a fair boy called Andrea. What that Andreasaid to thee I know not; but be sure neither he, nor any layman, knowsthy folly, This Gerard, rebel against Heaven, was no traitor to thee, unworthy. "

The lady moaned like one in bodily agony, and the crucifix began totremble in her trembling hands. 

"Courage!" said Clement. "Comfort is at hand. "

"From crime he fell into despair, and bent on destroying his soul, hestood one night by Tiber, resolved on suicide. He saw one watching him. It was a bravo. "

"Holy saints!"

"He begged the bravo to despatch him; he offered him all his money, toslay him body and soul. The bravo would not. Then this desperate sinner, not softened even by that refusal, flung himself into Tiber. "

"Ah!"

"And the assassin saved his life. Thou hadst chosen for the taskLodovico, husband of Teresa, whom this Gerard had saved at sea, her andher infant child. "

"He lives! he lives! he lives! I am faint. "

The friar took the crucifix from her hands, fearing it might fall, Ashower of tears relieved her. The friar gave her time; then continuedcalmly, "Ay, he lives; thanks to thee and thy wickedness, guided to hiseternal good by an almighty and all-merciful hand. Thou art his greatestearthly benefactor. "

"Where is he? where? where?"

"What is that to thee?"

"Only to see him alive. To beg him on my knees forgive me. I swear toyou I will never presume again to--How could I? He knows all. Oh, shame!Father, does he know?"

"All. "

"Then never will I meet his eye; I should sink into the earth. But Iwould repair my crime. I would watch his life unseen. He shall rise inthe world, whence I so nearly thrust him, poor soul; the Caesare, myfamily, are all-powerful in Rome; and I am near their head. "

"My daughter, " said Clement coldly, "he you call Gerard needs nothingman can do for him. Saved by a miracle from double death, he has leftthe world, and taken refuge from sin and folly in the bosom of theChurch. "

"A priest?"

"A priest, and a friar. "

"A friar? Then you are not his confessor? Yet you know all. That gentlevoice!"

She raised her head slowly, and peered at him through her mask. 

The next moment she uttered a faint shriek, and lay with her brow uponhis bare feet. 

CHAPTER LXXV

Clement sighed. He began to doubt whether he had taken the wisest coursewith a creature so passionate. 

But young as he was, he had already learned many lessons ofecclesiastical wisdom. For one thing he had been taught to pause, ie. , in certain difficulties, neither to do nor to say anything, until thematter should clear itself a little. 

He therefore held his peace and prayed for wisdom. 

All he did was gently to withdraw his foot. 

But his penitent flung her arms round it with a piteous cry, and held itconvulsively, and wept over it. 

And now the agony of shame, as well as penitence, she was in, showeditself by the bright red that crept over her very throat, as she layquivering at his feet. 

"My daughter, " said Clement gently, "take courage. Torment thyself nomore about this Gerard, who is not. As for me, I am Brother Clement, whom Heaven hath sent to thee this day to comfort thee, and help theesave thy soul. Thou last made me thy confessor, I claim, then, thineobedience. "

"Oh, yes, " sobbed the penitent. 

"Leave this pilgrimage, and instant return to Rome. Penitence abroad islittle worth. There where we live lie the temptations we must defeat, orperish; not fly in search of others more showy, but less lethal. Easy towash the feet of strangers, masked ourselves, Hard to be merely meek andcharitable with those about us. "

"I'll never, never lay finger on her again. "

"Nay, I speak not of servants only, but of dependents, kinsmen, friends. This be thy penance; the last thing at night, and the first thing aftermatins, call to mind thy sin, and God His goodness; and so be humble andgentle to the faults of those around thee. The world it courts the rich;but seek thou the poor: not beggars; these for the most are neitherhonest nor truly poor. But rather find out those who blush to seek thee, yet need thee sore. Giving to them shalt lend to Heaven. Marry a goodson of the Church. "

"Me? I will never marry. "

"Thou wilt marry within the year. I do entreat and command thee to marryone that feareth God. For thou art very clay. Mated ill thou shalt benaught. But wedding a worthy husband thou mayest, Dei gratia, live apious princess; ay, and die a saint. "

"I?"

"Thou. "

He then desired her to rise and go about the good work he had set her. 

She rose to her knees, and removing her mask, cast an eloquent look uponhim, then lowered her eyes meekly. 

"I will obey you as I would an angel. How happy I am, yet unhappy; foroh, my heart tells me I shall never look on you again. I will not gotill I have dried your feet. "

"It needs not. I have excused thee this bootless penance. "

"'Tis no penance to me. Ah! you do not forgive me, if you will not letme dry your poor feet. "

"So be it then, " said Clement resignedly; and thought to himself, "Levius quid foemina. "

But these weak creatures, that gravitate towards the small, as heavenlybodies towards the great, have yet their own flashes of angelicintelligence. 

When the princess had dried the friar's feet, she looked at him withtears in her beautiful eyes, and murmured with singular tenderness andgoodness--

"I will have masses said for her soul. May I?" she added timidly. 

This brought a faint blush into the monk's cheek, and moistened his coldblue eye. It came so suddenly from one he was just rating so low. 

"It is a gracious thought, " he said. "Do as thou wilt: often such actsfall back on the doer like blessed dew. I am thy confessor, not hers;thine is the soul I must now do my all to save, or woe be to my own. Mydaughter, my dear daughter, I see good and ill angels fighting for thysoul this day, ay, this moment; oh, fight thou on thine own side. Dostthou remember all I bade thee?"

"Remember!" said the princess. "Sweet saint, each syllable of thine isgraved in my heart. "

"But one word more, then. Pray much to Christ, and little to hissaints. "

"I will. "

"And that is the best word I have light to say to thee. So part we onit. Thou to the place becomes thee best, thy father's house, I to myholy mother's work. "

"Adieu, " faltered the princess. "Adieu, thou that I have loved too well, hated too ill, known and revered too late; forgiving angel, adieu--forever. "

The monk caught her words, though but faltered in a sigh. 

"For ever?" he cried aloud, with sudden ardour. "Christians live 'forever, ' and love 'for ever, ' but they never part 'for ever. They part, aspart the earth and sun, to meet more brightly in a little while. You andI part here for life. And what is our life? One line in the great storyof the Church, whose son and daughter we are; one handful in the sand oftime, one drop in the ocean of 'For ever. ' Adieu--for the little momentcalled 'a life!' We part in trouble, we shall meet in peace: we partcreatures of clay, we shall meet immortal spirits: we part in a world ofsin and sorrow, we shall meet where all is purity and love divine; whereno ill passions are, but Christ is, and His saints around Him clad inwhite. There, in the turning of an hour-glass, in the breaking of abubble, in the passing of a cloud, she, and thou, and I, shall meetagain; and sit at the feet of angels and archangels, apostles andsaints, and beam like them with joy unspeakable, in the light of theshadow of God upon His throne, FOR EVER--AND EVER--AND EVER. "

And so they parted. The monk erect, his eyes turned heavenwards andglowing with the sacred fire of zeal; the princess slowly retiring andturning more than once to cast a lingering glance of awe and tenderregret on that inspired figure. 

She went home subdued, and purified. Clement, in due course, reachedBasle, and entered on his duties, teaching in the University, andpreaching in the town and neighbourhood. He led a life that can becomprised in two words; deep study, and mortification. My reader hasalready a peep into his soul. At Basle he advanced in holy zeal andknowledge. 

The brethren of his order began to see in him a descendant of the saintsand martyrs. 

CHAPTER LXXVI

THE HEARTH

When little Gerard was nearly three months old, a messenger came hotfrom Tergou for Catherine. 

"Now just you go back, " said she, "and tell them I can't come, and Iwon't: they have got Kate, " So he departed, and Catherine continued hersentence; "there, child, I must go: they are all at sixes and sevens:this is the third time of asking; and to-morrow my man would comehimself and take me home by the ear, with a flea in't. " She thenrecapitulated her experiences of infants, and instructed Margaret whatto do in each coming emergency, and pressed money upon her, Margaretdeclined it with thanks, Catherine insisted, and turned angry. Margaretmade excuses all so reasonable that Catherine rejected them with calmcontempt; to her mind they lacked femininity, "Come, out with your heart, " said she "and you and me parting; andmayhap shall never see one another's face again. "

"Oh! mother, say not so. "

"Alack, girl, I have seen it so often; 'twill come into my mind now ateach parting, When I was your age, I never had such a thought, Nay, wewere all to live for ever then: so out wi' it. "

"Well, then, mother--I would rather not have told you--your Cornelismust say to me, 'So you are come to share with us, eh, mistress?' thosewere his words, I told him I would be very sorry. 

"Beshrew his ill tongue! What signifies it? He will never know, "Most likely he would sooner or later, But whether or no, I will takeno grudged bounty from any family; unless I saw my child starving, and--Heaven only knows what I might do, Nay, mother, give me but thylove--I do prize that above silver, and they grudge me not that, by allI can find--for not a stiver of money will I take out of your house. "

"You are a foolish lass, Why, were it me, I'd take it just to spitehim. "

"No, you would not, You and I are apples off one tree"

Catherine yielded with a good grace; and when the actual parting came, embraces and tears burst forth on both sides. 

When she was gone the child cried a good deal; and all attempts topacify him failing, Margaret suspected a pin, and searching between hisclothes and his skin, found a gold angel incommoding his backbone. 

"There, now, Gerard, " said she to the babe; "I thought granny gave inrather sudden. "

She took the coin and wrapped it in a piece of linen, and laid it at thebottom of her box, bidding the infant observe she could be at times asresolute as granny herself. 

Catherine told Eli of Margaret's foolish pride, and how she had baffledit. Eli said Margaret was right, and she was wrong. 

Catherine tossed her head. Eli pondered. 

Margaret was not without domestic anxieties. She had still two men tofeed, and could not work so hard as she had done. She had enough to doto keep the house, and the child, and cook for them all. But she had alittle money laid by, and she used to tell her child his father would behome to help them before it was spent. And with these bright hopes, andthat treasury of bliss, her boy, she spent some happy months. 

Time wore on; and no Gerard came; and stranger still, no news of him. 

Then her mind was disquieted, and contrary to her nature, which waspractical, she was often lost in sad reverie; and sighed in silence. Andwhile her heart was troubled, her money was melting. And so it was, that one day she found the cupboard empty, and looked in her dependents'faces; and at the sight of them, her bosom was all pity; and sheappealed to the baby whether she could let grandfather and poor oldMartin want a meal; and went and took out Catherine's angel. As sheunfolded the linen a tear of gentle mortification fell on it. She sentMartin out to change it. While he was gone a Frenchman came with one ofthe dealers in illuminated work, who had offered her so poor a price. He told her he was employed by his sovereign to collect masterpieces forher book of hours. Then she showed him the two best things she had; andhe was charmed with one of them, viz. , the flowers and raspberries andcreeping things, which Margaret Van Eyck had shaded. He offered her anunheard-of price. "Nay, flout not my need, good stranger, " said she;"three mouths there be in this house, and none to fill them but me. "

Curious arithmetic! Left out No. 1. 

"I'd out thee not, fair mistress. My princess charged me strictly, 'Seekthe best craftsmen'; but I will no hard bargains; make them content withme, and me with them. '"

The next minute Margaret was on her knees kissing little Gerard inthe cradle, and showering four gold pieces on him again and again, andrelating the whole occurrence to him in very broken Dutch, "And oh, what a good princess: wasn't she? We will pray for her, won'twe, my lambkin; when we are old enough?"

Martin came in furious. "They will not change it. I trow they think Istole it. "

"I am beholden to thee, " said Margaret hastily, and almost snatchedit from Martin, and wrapped it up again, and restored it to itshiding-place. 

Ere these unexpected funds were spent, she got to her ironing andstarching again. In the midst of which Martin sickened; and died afteran illness of nine days. 

Nearly all her money went to bury him decently. 

He was gone; and there was an empty chair by her fireside, For he hadpreferred the hearth to the sun as soon as the Busy Body was gone. 

Margaret would not allow anybody to sit in this chair now. Yet whenevershe let her eye dwell too long on it vacant, it was sure to cost her atear. 

And now there was nobody to carry her linen home, To do it herself shemust leave little Gerard in charge of a neighbour, But she dared nottrust such a treasure to mortal; and besides she could not bear him outof her sight for hours and hours. So she set inquiries on foot for a boyto carry her basket on Saturday and Monday. 

A plump, fresh-coloured youth, called Luke Peterson, who looked fifteen, but was eighteen, came in, and blushing, and twiddling his bonnet, askedher if a man would not serve her turn as well as a boy. 

Before he spoke she was saying to herself, "This boy will just do. "

But she took the cue, and said, "Nay; but a man will maybe seek morethan I can well pay. 

"Not I, " said Luke warmly. "Why, Mistress Margaret, I am your neighbour, and I do very well at the coopering. I can carry your basket for youbefore or after my day's work, and welcome, You have no need to pay meanything. 'Tisn't as if we were strangers, ye know. "

"Why, Master Luke, I know your face, for that matter; but I cannot callto mind that ever a word passed between us. "

"Oh yes, you did, Mistress Margaret. What, have you forgotten? One dayyou were trying to carry your baby and eke your pitcher full o' water;and quo' I, 'Give me the baby to carry. ' 'Nay, says you, 'I'll give youthe pitcher, and keep the bairn myself;' and I carried the pitcher home, and you took it from me at this door, and you said to me, 'I am muckleobliged to you, young man, ' with such a sweet voice; not like the folkin this street speak to a body. "

"I do mind now, Master Luke; and methinks it was the least I could say. "

"Well, Mistress Margaret, if you will say as much every time I carryyour basket, I care not how often I bear it, nor how far. "

"Nay, nay, " said Margaret, colouring faintly. "I would not put upongood nature, You are young, Master Luke, and kindly. Say I give youyour supper on Saturday night, when you bring the linen home, and yourdawn-mete o' Monday; would that make us anyways even?"

"As you please; only say not I sought a couple o' diets! for such atrifle as yon. "

With chubby-faced Luke's timely assistance, and the health and strengthwhich Heaven gave this poor young woman, to balance her many ills, thehouse went pretty smoothly awhile. But the heart became more and moretroubled by Gerard's long, and now most mysterious silence. 

And then that mental torturer, Suspense, began to tear her heavy heartwith his hot pincers, till she cried often and vehemently, "Oh, that Icould know the worst. "

Whilst she was in this state, one day she heard a heavy step mountthe stair. She started and trembled, "That is no step that I know. Illtidings?"

The door opened, and an unexpected visitor, Eli, came in, looking graveand kind. 

Margaret eyed him in silence, and with increasing agitation, "Girl. " said he, "the skipper is come back. "

"One word, " gasped Margaret; "is he alive?"

"Surely I hope so. No one has seen him dead. "

"Then they must have seen him alive. "

"No, girl; neither dead nor alive hath he been seen this many months inRome. My daughter Kate thinks he is gone to some other city. She bade metell you her thought. "

"Ay, like enough, " said Margaret gloomily; "like enough. My poor babe!"

The old man in a faintish voice asked her for a morsel to eat: he hadcome fasting. 

The poor thing pitied him with the surface of her agitated mind, andcooked a meal for him, trembling, and scarce knowing what she was about. 

Ere he went he laid his hand upon her head, and said, "Be he alive, orbe he dead, I look on thee as my daughter. Can I do nought for thee thisday? bethink thee now?"

"Ay, old man. Pray for him; and for me!"

Eli sighed, and went sadly and heavily down the stairs. 

She listened half stupidly to his retiring footsteps till they ceased. Then she sank moaning down by the cradle, and drew little Gerard tightto her bosom. "Oh, my poor fatherless boy; my fatherless boy!"

CHAPTER LXXVII

Not long after this, as the little family at Tergou sat at dinner, LukePeterson burst in on them, covered with dust. "Good people, MistressCatherine is wanted instantly at Rotterdam. "

"My name is Catherine, young man. Kate, it will be Margaret. "

"Ay, dame, she said to me, 'Good Luke, hie thee to Tergou, and ask forEli the hosier, and pray his wife Catherine to come to me, for God Hislove. ' I didn't wait for daylight. "

"Holy saints! He has come home, Kate. Nay, she would sure have said so. What on earth can it be?" And she heaped conjecture on conjecture. 

"Mayhap the young man can tell us, " hazarded Kate timidly. 

"That I can, " said Luke, "Why, her babe is a-dying, And she was sowrapped up in it!"

Catherine started up: "What is his trouble?"

"Nay, I know not. But it has been peaking and pining worse and worsethis while. "

A furtive glance of satisfaction passed between Cornelis and Sybrandt. Luckily for them Catherine did not see it. Her face was turned towardsher husband. "Now, Eli, " cried she furiously, "if you say a word againstit, you and I shall quarrel, after all these years. '

"Who gainsays thee, foolish woman? Quarrel with your own shadow, while Igo borrow Peter's mule for ye. "

"Bless thee, my good man! Bless thee! Didst never yet fail me at apinch, Now eat your dinners who can, while I go and make ready. "

She took Luke back with her in the cart, and on the way questioned andcross-questioned him severely and seductively by turns, till she hadturned his mind inside out, what there was of it. 

Margaret met her at the door, pale and agitated, and threw her armsround her neck, and looked imploringly in her face. 

"Come, he is alive, thank God, " said Catherine, after scanning hereagerly. 

She looked at the failing child, and then at the poor hollow-eyedmother, alternately, "Lucky you sent for me, " said she, "The child ispoisoned. "

"Poisoned! by whom?"

"By you. You have been fretting. "

"Nay, indeed, mother. How can I help fretting?"

"Don't tell me, Margaret. A nursing mother has no business to fret. Shemust turn her mind away from her grief to the comfort that lies in herlap. Know you not that the child pines if the mother vexes herself? Thiscomes of your reading and writing. Those idle crafts befit a man;but they keep all useful knowledge out of a woman. The child must beweaned. "

"Oh, you cruel woman, " cried Margaret vehemently; "I am sorry I sent foryou. Would you rob me of the only bit of comfort I have in the world?A-nursing my Gerard, I forget I am the most unhappy creature beneath thesun. "

"That you do not, " was the retort, "or he would not be the way he is. "

"Mother!" said Margaret imploringly. 

"'Tis hard, " replied Catherine, relenting. "But bethink thee; would itnot be harder to look down and see his lovely wee face a-looking up atyou out of a little coffin?"

"Oh, Jesu!"

"And how could you face your other troubles with your heart aye full, and your lap empty?"

"Oh, mother, I consent to anything. Only save my boy. "

"That is a good lass, Trust to me! I do stand by, and see clearer thanthou. "

Unfortunately there was another consent to be gained--the babe's; and hewas more refractory than his mother. 

"There, " said Margaret, trying to affect regret at his misbehaviour; "heloves me too well. "

But Catherine was a match for them both. As she came along she hadobserved a healthy young woman, sitting outside her own door, with aninfant, hard by. She went and told her the case; and would she nurse thepining child for the nonce, till she had matters ready to wean him?

The young woman consented with a smile, and popped her child into thecradle, and came into Margaret's house. She dropped a curtsey, andCatherine put the child into her hands. She examined, and pitied it, andpurred over it, and proceeded to nurse it, just as if it had been herown. 

Margaret, who had been paralyzed at her assurance, cast a rueful look atCatherine, and burst out crying. 

The visitor looked up. "What is to do? Wife, ye told me not the motherwas unwilling. "

"She is not: she is only a fool. Never heed her; and you, Margaret, I amashamed of you. "

"You are a cruel, hard-hearted woman, " sobbed Margaret. 

"Them as take in hand to guide the weak need be hardish. And you willexcuse me; but you are not my flesh and blood; and your boy is. "

After giving this blunt speech time to sink, she added, "Come now, sheis robbing her own to save yours, and you can think of nothing betterthan bursting out a-blubbering in the woman's face. Out fie, for shame!"

"Nay, wife, " said the nurse. "Thank Heaven, I have enough for my ownand for hers to boot. And prithee wyte not on her! Maybe the troubles o'life ha' soured her own milk. "

"And her heart into the bargain, " said the remorseless Catherine. 

Margaret looked her full in the face; and down went her eyes. 

"I know I ought to be very grateful to you, " sobbed Margaret to thenurse: then turned her head and leaned away over the chair, not towitness the intolerable sight of another nursing her Gerard, and Gerarddrawing no distinction between this new mother and her the banished one. 

The nurse replied, "You are very welcome, my poor woman. And so are you, Mistress Catherine, which are my townswoman, and know it not. "

"What, are ye from Tergou? all the better, But I cannot call your faceto mind. "

"Oh, you know not me: my husband and me, we are very humble folk by you. But true Eli and his wife are known of all the town; and respected, So, I am at your call, dame; and at yours, wife; and yours, my prettypoppet; night or day. "

"There's a woman of the right old sort, " said Catherine, as the doorclosed upon her. 

"I HATE her. I HATE her. I HATE her, " said Margaret, with wonderfulfervour. 

Catherine only laughed at this outburst. 

"That is right, " said she; "better say it, as set sly and think it. Itis very natural after all, Come, here is your bundle o' comfort. Takeand hate that, if ye can;" and she put the child in her lap. 

"No, no, " said Margaret, turning her head half way from him; she couldnot for her life turn the other half. "He is not my child now; he ishers. I know not why she left him here, for my part. It was very good ofher not to take him to her house, cradle and all; oh! oh! oh! oh! oh! ohoh! oh!"

"Ah! well, one comfort, he is not dead. This gives me light: some otherwoman has got him away from me; like father, like son; oh! oh! oh! oh!oh!"

Catherine was sorry for her, and let her cry in peace. And after that, when she wanted Joan's aid, she used to take Gerard out, to give hima little fresh air. Margaret never objected; nor expressed the leastincredulity; but on their return was always in tears. 

This connivance was short-lived. She was now altogether as eager towean little Gerard. It was done; and he recovered health and vigour; andanother trouble fell upon him directly teething, But here Catherine'sexperience was invaluable; and now, in the midst of her grief andanxiety about the father, Margaret had moments of bliss, watching theson's tiny teeth come through. "Teeth, mother? I call them not teeth, but pearls of pearls. " And each pearl that peeped and sparkled on hisred gums, was to her the greatest feat Nature had ever achieved. 

Her companion partook the illusion. And had we told them standing cornwas equally admirable, Margaret would have changed to a reproachfulgazelle, and Catherine turned us out of doors; so each pearl's arrivalwas announced with a shriek of triumph by whichever of them was thefortunate discoverer. 

Catherine gossiped with Joan, and learned that she was the wife ofJorian Ketel of Tergou, who had been servant to Ghysbrecht Van Swieten, but fallen out of favour, and come back to Rotterdam, his native place. His friends had got him the place of sexton to the parish, and what withthat and carpentering, he did pretty well. 

Catherine told Joan in return whose child it was she had nursed, and allabout Margaret and Gerard, and the deep anxiety his silence had plungedthem in. "Ay, " said Joan, "the world is full of trouble. " One day shesaid to Catherine, "It's my belief my man knows more about your Gerardthan anybody in these parts; but he has got to be closer than ever oflate. Drop in some day just afore sunset, and set him talking. And forour Lady's sake say not I set you on. The only hiding he ever gave mewas for babbling his business; and I do not want another. Gramercy! Imarried a man for the comfort of the thing, not to be hided. "

Catherine dropped in. Jorian was ready enough to tell her how he hadbefriended her son and perhaps saved his life. But this was no news toCatherine; and the moment she began to cross-question him as to whetherhe could guess why her lost boy neither came nor wrote, he cast a grimlook at his wife, who received it with a calm air of stolid candour andinnocent unconsciousness; and his answers became short and sullen. 

"What should he know more than another?" and so on. He added, after apause, "Think you the burgomaster takes such as me into his secrets?"

"Oh, then the burgomaster knows something?" said Catherine sharply. 

"Likely. Who else should?"

"I'll ask him. "

"I would. "

"And tell him you say he knows. "

"That is right, dame. Go make him mine enemy. That is what a poor fellowalways gets if he says a word to you women. "

And Jorian from that moment shrunk in and became impenetrable as ahedgehog, and almost as prickly. 

His conduct caused both the poor women agonies of mind, alarm, andirritated curiosity. Ghysbrecht was for some cause Gerard's mortalenemy; had stopped his marriage, imprisoned him, hunted him. And herewas his late servant, who when off his guard had hinted that this enemyhad the clue to Gerard's silence. After sifting Jorian's every word andlook, all remained dark and mysterious. Then Catherine told Margaret togo herself to him. "You are young, you are fair. You will maybe get moreout of him than I could. "

The conjecture was a reasonable one. 

Margaret went with her child in her arms and tapped timidly at Jorian'sdoor just before sunset. "Come in, " said a sturdy voice. She entered, and there sat Jorian by the fireside. At sight of her he rose, snorted, and burst out of the house. "Is that for me, wife?" inquired Margaret, turning very red. 

"You must excuse him, " replied Joan, rather coldly; "he lays it to yourdoor that he is a poor man instead of a rich one. It is something abouta piece of parchment, There was one amissing, and he got nought from theburgomaster all along of that one. "

"Alas! Gerard took it. "

"Likely, But my man says you should not have let him: you were pledgedto him to keep them all safe. And sooth to Say, I blame not my Jorianfor being wroth, 'Tis hard for a poor man to be so near fortune and loseit by those he has befriended. However, I tell him another story. SaysI, 'Folk that are out o' trouble like you and me didn't ought to be toohard on folk that are in trouble; and she has plenty. Going already?What is all your hurry, mistress?"

"Oh, it is not for me to drive the goodman out of his own house. "

"Well, let me kiss the bairn afore ye go. He is not in fault anyway, poor innocent. "

Upon this cruel rebuff Margaret came to a resolution, which she did notconfide even to Catherine. 

After six weeks' stay that good woman returned home. 

On the child's birthday, which occurred soon after, Margaret did nowork; but put on her Sunday clothes, and took her boy in her arms andwent to the church and prayed there long and fervently for Gerard's safereturn. 

That same day and hour Father Clement celebrated a mass and prayed forMargaret's departed soul in the minster church at Basle. 

CHAPTER LXXVIII

Some blackguard or other, I think it was Sybrandt, said, "A lie is notlike a blow with a curtal axe. "

True: for we can predict in some degree the consequences of a strokewith any material weapon. But a lie has no bounds at all. The nature ofthe thing is to ramify beyond human calculation. 

Often in the everyday world a lie has cost a life, or laid waste two orthree. 

And so, in this story, what tremendous consequences of that oneheartless falsehood!

Yet the tellers reaped little from it. 

The brothers, who invented it merely to have one claimant the less fortheir father's property, saw little Gerard take their brother's placein their mother's heart. Nay, more, one day Eli openly proclaimed that, Gerard being lost, and probably dead, he had provided by will for littleGerard, and also for Margaret, his poor son's widow. 

At this the look that passed between the black sheep was a caution totraitors. Cornelis had it on his lips to say. Gerard was most likelyalive, But he saw his mother looking at him, and checked himself intime. 

Ghysbrecht Van Swieten, the other partner in that lie, was now a failingman. He saw the period fast approaching when all his wealth would dropfrom his body, and his misdeeds cling to his soul. 

Too intelligent to deceive himself entirely, he had never been freefrom gusts of remorse. In taking Gerard's letter to Margaret he hadcompounded. "I cannot give up land and money, " said his giant Avarice. "I will cause her no unnecessary pain, " said his dwarf Conscience. 

So, after first tampering with the seal, and finding there was not asyllable about the deed, he took it to her with his own hand; and made amerit of it to himself: a set-off; and on a scale not uncommon where theself-accuser is the judge. 

The birth of Margaret's child surprised and shocked him, and put histreacherous act in a new light. Should his letter take effect he shouldcause the dishonour of her who was the daughter of one friend, thegranddaughter of another, and whose land he was keeping from her too. 

These thoughts preying on him at that period of life when the strengthof body decays, and the memory of old friends revives, filled him withgloomy horrors. Yet he was afraid to confess. For the cure was an honestman, and would have made him disgorge. And with him Avarice was aningrained habit, Penitence only a sentiment. 

Matters were thus when, one day, returning from the town hall to his ownhouse, he found a woman waiting for him in the vestibule, with a childin her arms. She was veiled, and so, concluding she had something tobe ashamed of, he addressed her magisterially, On this she let down herveil and looked him full in the face. 

It was Margaret Brandt. 

Her sudden appearance and manner startled him, and he could not concealhis confusion. 

"Where is my Gerard?" cried she, her bosom heaving. "Is he alive?"

"For aught I know, " stammered Ghysbrecht. "I hope so, for your sake. Prithee come into this room. The servants!"

"Not a step, " said Margaret, and she took him by the shoulder, and heldhim with all the energy of an excited woman. "You know the secret ofthat which is breaking my heart. Why does not my Gerard come, nor senda line this many months? Answer me, or all the town is like to hear me, let alone thy servants, My misery is too great to be sported with. "

In vain he persisted he knew nothing about Gerard. She told him thosewho had sent her to him told her another tale. 

"You do know why he neither comes nor sends, " said she firmly. 

At this Ghysbrecht turned paler and paler; but he summoned all hisdignity, and said, "Would you believe those two knaves against a man ofworship?"

"What two knaves?" said she keenly. 

He stammered, "Said ye not--? There I am a poor old broken man, whosememory is shaken. And you come here, and confuse me so, I know not whatI say. "

"Ay, sir, your memory is shaken, or sure you would not be my enemy. Myfather saved you from the plague, when none other would come anigh you;and was ever your friend. My grandfather Floris helped you in your earlypoverty, and loved you, man and boy. Three generations of us you haveseen; and here is the fourth of us; this is your old friend Peter'sgrandchild, and your old friend Floris his great-grandchild. Look downon his innocent face, and think of theirs!"

"Woman, you torture me, " sighed Ghysbrecht, and sank upon a bench. Butshe saw her advantage, and kneeled before him, and put the boy on hisknees. "This fatherless babe is poor Margaret Brandt's, that never didyou ill, and comes of a race that loved you. Nay, look at his face. 'Twill melt thee more than any word of mine, Saints of heaven, what cana poor desolate girl and her babe have done to wipe out all memory ofthine own young days, when thou wert guiltless as he is, that now looksup in thy face and implores thee to give him back his father?"

And with her arms under the child she held him up higher and higher, smiling under the old man's eyes. 

He cast a wild look of anguish on the child, and another on the kneelingmother, and started up shrieking, "Avaunt, ye pair of adders. "

The stung soul gave the old limbs a momentary vigour, and he walkedrapidly, wringing his hands and clutching at his white hair. "Forgetthose days? I forget all else. Oh, woman, woman, sleeping or waking Isee but the faces of the dead, I hear but the voices of the dead, and Ishall soon be among the dead, There, there, what is done is done. I amin hell. I am in hell. "

And unnatural force ended in prostration. 

He staggered, and but for Margaret would have fallen, With her onedisengaged arm she supported him as well as she could and cried forhelp. 

A couple of servants came running, and carried him away in a statebordering on syncope, The last Margaret saw of him was his old furrowedface, white and helpless as his hair that hung down over the servant'selbow. 

"Heaven forgive me, " she said. "I doubt I have killed the poor old man. "

Then this attempt to penetrate the torturing mystery left it as dark, or darker than before. For when she came to ponder every word, hersuspicion was confirmed that Ghysbrecht did know something about Gerard. "And who were the two knaves he thought had done a good deed, and toldme? Oh, my Gerard, my poor deserted babe, you and I are wading in deepwaters. "

The visit to Tergou took more money than she could well afford; and acustomer ran away in her debt. She was once more compelled to unfoldCatherine's angel. But strange to say, as she came down stairs with itin her hand she found some loose silver on the table, with a writtenline--

For Gerard his wife. 

She fell with a cry of surprise on the writing; and soon it rose into acry of joy. 

"He is alive. He sends me this by some friendly hand. "

She kissed the writing again and again, and put it in her bosom. 

Time rolled on, and no news of Gerard. 

And about every two months a small sum in silver found its way into thehouse. Sometimes it lay on the table. Once it was flung in through thebedroom window in a purse. Once it was at the bottom of Luke's basket. He had stopped at the public-house to talk to a friend. The giver or hisagent was never detected. Catherine disowned it. Margaret Van Eyck sworeshe had no hand in it. So did Eli. And Margaret, whenever it came, usedto say to little Gerard, "Oh, my poor deserted child, you and I arewading in deep waters. "

She applied at least half this modest, but useful supply, to dressingthe little Gerard beyond his station in life. "If it does come fromGerard, he shall see his boy neat. " All the mothers in the street beganto sneer, especially such as had brats out at elbows. 

The months rolled on, and dead sickness of heart succeeded to thesekeener torments. She returned to her first thought: "Gerard must bedead. She should never see her boy's father again, nor her marriagelines. " This last grief, which had been somewhat allayed by Eli andCatherine recognizing her betrothal, now revived in full force; otherswould not look so favourably on her story. And often she moaned over herboy's illegitimacy. 

"Is it not enough for us to be bereaved? Must we be dishonoured too? Oh, that we had ne'er been born. "

A change took place in Peter Brandt. His mind, clouded for nearly twoyears, seemed now to be clearing; he had intervals of intelligence; andthen he and Margaret used to talk of Gerard, till he wandered again. Butone day, returning after an absence of some hours, Margaret foundhim conversing with Catherine, in a way he had never done since hisparalytic stroke. "Eh, girl, why must you be out?" said she. "Butindeed I have told him all; and we have been a-crying together over thytroubles. "

Margaret stood silent, looking joyfully from one to the other. 

Peter smiled on her, and said, "Come, let me bless thee. "

She kneeled at his feet, and he blessed her most eloquently. 

He told her she had been all her life the lovingest, truest, and mostobedient daughter Heaven ever sent to a poor old widowed man. "May thyson be to thee what thou hast been to me!"

After this he dozed. Then the females whispered together; and Catherinesaid--"All our talk e'en now was of Gerard. It lies heavy on his mind. His poor head must often have listened to us when it seemed quite dark. Margaret, he is a very understanding man; he thought of many things: 'Hemay be in prison, says he, 'or forced to go fighting for some king, or sent to Constantinople to copy books there, or gone into the Churchafter all. ' He had a bent that way. "

"Ah, mother, " whispered Margaret, in reply, "he doth but deceive himselfas we do. "

Ere she could finish the sentence, a strange interruption occurred. 

A loud voice cried out, "I SEE HIM, I SEE HIM. "

And the old man with dilating eyes seemed to be looking right throughthe wall of the house. 

"IN A BOAT; ON A GREAT RIVER; COMING THIS WAY. Sore disfigured; but Iknew him. Gone! gone! all dark. "

And he sank back, and asked feebly where was Margaret. 

"Dear father, I am by thy side, Oh, mother! mother, what is this?"

"I cannot see thee, and but a moment agone I saw all round the world, Ay, ay. Well, I am ready. Is this thy hand? Bless thee, my child, blessthee! Weep not! The tree is ripe. "

The old physician read the signs aright. These calm words were his last. The next moment he drooped his head, and gently, placidly, drifted awayfrom earth, like an infant sinking to rest, The torch had flashed upbefore going out. 

CHAPTER LXXIX

She who had wept for poor old Martin was not likely to bear this blow sostoically as the death of the old is apt to be borne. In vain Catherinetried to console her with commonplaces; in vain told her it was a happyrelease for him; and that, as he himself had said, the tree was ripe. But her worst failure was, when she urged that there were now but twomouths to feed; and one care the less. 

"Such cares are all the joys I have, " said Margaret. "They fill mydesolate heart, which now seems void as well as waste. Oh, empty chair, my bosom it aches to see thee. Poor old man, how could I love him byhalves, I that did use to sit and look at him and think, 'But for methou wouldst die of hunger. ' He, so wise, so learned erst, was got tobe helpless as my own sweet babe, and I loved him as if he had beenmy child instead of my father. Oh, empty chair! Oh, empty heart!Well-a-day! well-a-day!"

And the pious tears would not be denied. 

Then Catherine held her peace; and hung her head. And one day she madethis confession, "I speak to thee out o' my head, and not out o' mybosom; thou dost well to be deaf to me. Were I in thy place I shouldmourn the old man all one as thou dost. "

Then Margaret embraced her, and this bit of true sympathy did her alittle good. The commonplaces did none. 

Then Catherine's bowels yearned over her, and she said, "My poor girl, you were not born to live alone. I have got to look on you as my owndaughter. Waste not thine youth upon my son Gerard. Either he is dead orhe is a traitor. It cuts my heart to say it; but who can help seeing it?Thy father is gone; and I cannot always be aside thee. And here isan honest lad that loves thee well this many a day. I'd take him andComfort together. Heaven hath sent us these creatures to torment us andcomfort us and all; we are just nothing in the world without 'em, " Thenseeing Margaret look utterly perplexed, she went on to say, "Why, sureyou are not so blind as not to see it?"

"What? Who?"

"Who but this Luke Peterson. "

"What, our Luke? The boy that carries my basket?"

"Nay, he is over nineteen, and a fine healthy lad; and I have madeinquiries for you; and they all do say he is a capable workman, andnever touches a drop; and that is much in a Rotterdam lad, which theyare mostly half man, half sponge. "

Margaret smiled for the first time this many days. "Luke loves driedpuddings dearly, " said she, "and I make them to his mind, 'Tis them hecomes a-courting here. " Then she suddenly turned red. "But if I thoughthe came after your son's wife that is, or ought to be, I'd soon put himto the door. "

"Nay, nay; for Heaven's sake let me not make mischief. Poor lad! Why, girl, Fancy will not be bridled, Bless you, I wormed it out of him neara twelvemonth agone. "

"Oh, mother, and you let him?"

"Well, I thought of you. I said to myself, 'If he is fool enough tobe her slave for nothing, all the better for her. A lone woman is lostwithout a man about her to fetch and carry her little matters, ' But nowmy mind is changed, and I think the best use you can put him to is tomarry him. "

"So then, his own mother is against him, and would wed me to the firstcomer. An, Gerard, thou hast but me; I will not believe thee dead tillI see thy tomb, nor false till I see thee with another lover in thinehand. Foolish boy, I shall ne'er be civil to him again. "

Afflicted with the busybody's protection, Luke Peterson met a coldreception in the house where he had hitherto found a gentle and kindone. And by-and-by, finding himself very little spoken to at all, andthen sharply and irritably, the great soft fellow fell to whimpering, and asked Margaret plump if he had done anything to offend her. 

"Nothing. I am to blame. I am curst. If you will take my counsel youwill keep out of my way awhile. "

"It is all along of me, Luke, " said the busybody. 

"You, Mistress Catherine, Why, what have I done for you to set heragainst me?"

"Nay, I meant all for the best. I told her I saw you were lookingtowards her through a wedding ring, But she won't hear of it. "

"There was no need to tell her that, wife; she knows I am courting herthis twelvemonth. "

"Not I, " said Margaret; "or I should never have opened the street doorto you. 

"Why, I come here every Saturday night. And that is how the lads inRotterdam do court. If we sup with a lass o' Saturdays, that wooing. "

"Oh, that is Rotterdam, is it? Then next time you come, let it beThursday or Friday. For my part, I thought you came after my puddings, boy. "

"I like your puddings well enough. You make them better than motherdoes, But I like you still better than the puddings, " said Luketenderly. 

"Then you have seen the last of them. How dare you talk so to anotherman's wife, and him far away?" She ended gently, but very firmly, "Youneed not trouble yourself to come here any more, Luke; I can carry mybasket myself. "

"Oh, very well, " said Luke; and after sitting silent and stupid for alittle while, he rose, and said sadly to Catherine, "Dame, I daresay Ihave got the sack;" and went out. 

But the next Saturday Catherine found him seated on the doorstepblubbering. He told her he had got used to come there, and every otherplace seemed strange. She went in, and told Margaret; and Margaretsighed, and said, "Poor Luke, he might come in for her, if he couldknow his place, and treat her like a married wife. " On this beingcommunicated to Luke, he hesitated, "Pshaw!" said Catherine, "promisesare pie-crusts. Promise her all the world, sooner than sit outsidelike a fool, when a word will carry you inside, now you humour her ineverything, and then, if Poor Gerard come not home and claim her, youwill be sure to have her--in time. A lone woman is aye to be tired out, thou foolish boy. "

CHAPTER LXXX

THE CLOISTER

Brother Clement had taught and preached in Basle more than atwelvemonth, when one day Jerome stood before him, dusty, with atriumphant glance in his eye. 

"Give the glory to God, Brother Clement; thou canst now wend to Englandwith me. "

"I am ready, Brother Jerome; and expecting thee these many months, havein the intervals of teaching and devotion studied the English tonguesomewhat closely. "

"'Twas well thought of, " said Jerome. He then told him he had butdelayed till he could obtain extraordinary powers from the Pope tocollect money for the Church's use in England, and to hear confessionin all the secular monasteries. "So now gird up thy loins, and let us goforth and deal a good blow for the Church, and against the Franciscans. "

The two friars went preaching down the Rhine for England. In the largerplaces they both preached. At the smaller they often divided, and tookdifferent sides of the river, and met again at some appointed spot. Bothwere able orators, but in different styles. 

Jerome's was noble and impressive, but a little contracted in religioustopics, and a trifle monotonous in delivery compared with Clement's, though in truth not so, compared with most preachers. 

Clement's was full of variety, and often remarkably colloquial. In itsgeneral flow, tender and gently winning, it curled round the reason andthe heart. But it always rose with the rising thought; and so at timesClement soared as far above Jerome as his level speaking was below him. Indeed, in these noble heats he was all that we hue read of inspiredprophet or heathen orator: Vehemens ut procella, excitatus ut torrens, incensus ut fulmen, tonabat, fulgurabat, et rapidis eloquentiaefiuctibus cuncta proruebat et perturbabat. 

I would give literal specimens, but for five objections; it isdifficult; time is short; I have done it elsewhere; an able imitatorhas since done it better and similarity, a virtue in peas, is a vice inbooks. 

But (not to evade the matter entirely) Clement used secretly to try andlearn the recent events and the besetting sin of each town he was topreach in. 

But Jerome, the unbending, scorned to go out of his way for any people'svices. At one great town, some leagues from the Rhine, they mountedthe same pulpit in turn. Jerome preached against vanity in dress, afavourite theme of his. He was eloquent and satirical, and the peoplelistened with complacency. It was a vice that they were little given to. 

Clement preached against drunkenness. It was a besetting sin, and sacredfrom preaching in these parts: for the clergy themselves were infectedwith it, and popular prejudice protected it, Clement dealt it mercilessblows out of Holy Writ and worldly experience. A crime itself, it wasthe nursing mother of most crimes, especially theft and murder. Hereminded them of a parricide that had lately been committed in theirtown by all honest man in liquor; and also how a band of drunkards hadroasted one of their own comrades alive at a neighbouring village. "Yourlast prince, " said he, "is reported to have died of apoplexy, but wellyou know he died of drink; and of your aldermen one perished miserablylast month dead drunk, suffocated in a puddle. Your children's backs gobare that you may fill your bellies with that which makes you theworst of beasts, silly as calves, yet fierce as boars; and drives yourfamilies to need, and your souls to hell. I tell ye your town, ay, andyour very nation, would sink to the bottom of mankind did your womendrink as you do. And how long will they be temperate, and contrary tonature, resist the example of their husbands and fathers? Vice ne'eryet stood still. Ye must amend yourselves, or see them come down toyour mark, Already in Bohemia they drink along with the men. How showsa drunken woman? Would you love to see your wives drunken, your mothersdrunken?" At this there was a shout of horror, for mediaeval audienceshad not learned to sit mumchance at a moving sermon. "Ah, that comeshome to you, " cried the friar. "What madmen! think you it doth notmore shock the all-pure God to see a man, His noblest work, turned toa drunken beast, than it can shock you creatures of sin and unreason tosee a woman turned into a thing no better nor worse than yourselves. "

He ended with two pictures: a drunkard's house and family, and a soberman's; both so true and dramatic in all their details that the wivesfell all to "ohing" and "ahing, " and "Eh, but that is a true word. "

This discourse caused quite all uproar. The hearers formed knots; themen were indignant; so the women flattered them and took their partopenly against the preacher. A married man had a right to a drop; heneeded it, working for all the family. And for their part they did notcare to change their men for milksops. 

The double faces! That very evening a hand of men caught near a hundredof them round Brother Clement, filling his wallet with the best, andoffering him the very roses off their heads, and kissing his frock, andblessing him "for taking in hand to mend their sots. "

Jerome thought this sermon too earthly. 

"Drunkenness is not heresy, Clement, that a whole sermon should bepreached against it. "

As they went on, he found to his surprise that Clement's sermons sankinto his hearers deeper than his own; made them listen, think, cry, andsometimes even amend their ways. "He hath the art of sinking to theirpeg, " thought Jerome, "Yet he can soar high enough at times. "

Upon the whole it puzzled Jerome, who had a secret sense of superiorityto his tenderer brother. And after about two hundred miles of it, itgot to displease him as well as puzzle him. But he tried to check thissentiment as petty and unworthy. "Souls differ like locks, " said he, "and preachers must differ like keys, or the fewer should the Churchopen for God to pass in. And certes, this novice hath the key to thesenorthern souls, being himself a northern man. "

And so they came slowly down the Rhine, sometimes drifting a few milesdown the stream; but in general walking by the banks preaching, andteaching, and confessing sinners in the towns and villages; and theyreached the town of Dusseldorf. 

There was the little quay where Gerard and Denys had taken boat up theRhine, The friars landed on it. There were the streets, there was"The Silver Lion. " Nothing had changed but he, who walked through itbarefoot, with his heart calm and cold, his hands across his breast, and his eyes bent meekly on the ground, a true son of Dominic and HolyChurch. 

CHAPTER LXXXI

THE HEARTH

"Eli, " said Catherine, "answer me one question like a man, and I'll askno more to-day. What is wormwood?"

Eli looked a little helpless at this sudden demand upon his faculties;but soon recovered enough to say it was something that tasted mainbitter. 

"That is a fair answer, my man, but not the one I look for. "

"Then answer it yourself. "

"And shall. Wormwood is--to have two in the house a-doing nought, butwaiting for thy shoes and mine, " Eli groaned. The shaft struck home. 

"Methinks waiting for their best friend's coffin, that and nothing todo, are enow to make them worse than Nature meant. Why not set them upsomewhere, to give 'em a chance?"

Eli said he was willing, but afraid they would drink and gamble theirvery shelves away. 

"Nay, " said Catherine, "Dost take me for a simpleton? Of course I meanto watch them at starting, and drive them wi' a loose rein, as thesaying is. "

"Where did you think of? Not here; to divide our own custom. "

"Not likely. I say Rotterdam against the world. Then I could startthem. "

Oh, self-deception! The true motive of all this was to get near littleGerard. 

After many discussions and eager promises of amendment on these termsfrom Cornelis and Sybrandt, Catherine went to Rotterdam shop-hunting, and took Kate with her; for a change, They soon found one, and in a goodstreet; but it was sadly out of order. However, they got it cheaper forthat, and instantly set about brushing it up, fitting proper shelves forthe business, and making the dwelling-house habitable. 

Luke Peterson was always asking Margaret what he could do for her. Theanswer used to be in a sad tone, "Nothing, Luke, nothing. "

"What, you that are so clever, can you think of nothing for me to do foryou?"

"Nothing, Luke, nothing. "

But at last she varied the reply thus: "If you could make something tohelp my sweet sister Kate about. "

The slave of love consented joyfully, and soon made Kate a little cart, and cushioned it, and yoked himself into it, and at eventide drew herout of the town, and along the pleasant boulevard, with Margaret andCatherine walking beside. It looked a happier party than it was. 

Kate, for one, enjoyed it keenly, for little Gerard was put in herlap, and she doted on him; and it was like a cherub carried by a littleangel, or a rosebud lying in the cup of a lily. 

So the vulgar jeered; and asked Luke how a thistle tasted, and if hismistress could not afford one with four legs, etc. 

Luke did not mind these jeers; but Kate minded them for him. 

"Thou hast made the cart for me, good Luke, " said she, "'Twas much. Idid ill to let thee draw me too; we can afford to pay some poor soul forthat. I love my rides, and to carry little Gerard; but I'd liever rideno more than thou be mocked fort. "

"Much I care for their tongues, " said Luke; "if I did care I'd knocktheir heads together. I shall draw you till my mistress says give over. 

"Luke, if you obey Kate, you will oblige me. "

"Then I will obey Kate. "

An honourable exception to popular humour was Jorian Ketel's wife. "Thatis strength well laid out, to draw the weak. And her prayers will beyour guerdon; she is not long for this world; she smileth in pain. "These were the words of Joan. 

Single-minded Luke answered that he did not want the poor lass's prayershe did it to please his mistress, Margaret. 

After that Luke often pressed Margaret to give him something todo--without success. 

But one day, as if tired with his importuning, she turned on him, andsaid with a look and accent I should in vain try to convey:

"Find me my boy's father. "

CHAPTER LXXXII

"Mistress, they all say he is dead. "

"Not so. They feed me still with hopes. "

"Ay, to your face, but behind your back they all say he is dead. "

At this revelation Margaret's tears began to flow'. 

Luke whimpered for company. He had the body of a man but the heart of agirl. 

"Prithee, weep not so, sweet mistress, " said he. "I'd bring him back tolife an I could, rather than see thee weed so sore. "

Margaret said she thought she was weeping because they were sodouble-tongued with her. 

She recovered herself, and laying her hand on his shoulder, saidsolemnly, "Luke, he is not dead. Dying men are known to have a strangesight. And listen, Luke! My poor father, when he was a-dying, and I, simple fool, was so happy, thinking he was going to get well altogether, he said to mother and me--he was sitting in that very chair where youare now, and mother was as might be here, and I was yonder making asleeve--said he, 'I see him!' I see him! Just so. Not like a failing manat all, but all o' fire. 'Sore disfigured-on a great river-coming thisway. '

"Ah, Luke, if you were a woman, and had the feeling for me you think youhave, you would pity me, and find him for me. Take a thought! The fatherof my child!"

"Alack, I would if I knew how, " said Luke, "but how can I?"

"Nay, of course you cannot. I am mad to think it. But oh, if any onereally cared for me, they would; that is all I know. "

Luke reflected in silence for some time. 

"The old folk all say dying men can see more than living wights. Let methink: for my mind cannot gallop like thine. On a great river Well, theMaas is a great river. " He pondered on. 

"Coming this way? Then if it 'twas the Maas, he would have been hereby this time, so 'tis not the Maas. The Rhine is a great river, greaterthan the Maas; and very long. I think it will be the Rhine. "

"And so do I, Luke; for Denys bade him come down the Rhine. But even ifit is, he may turn off before he comes anigh his birthplace. He does notpine for me as I for him; that is clear. Luke, do you not think he hasdeserted me?" She wanted him to contradict her, but he said, "It looksvery like it; what a fool he must be!"

"What do we know?" objected Margaret imploringly. 

"Let me think again, " said Luke. "I cannot gallop. "

The result of this meditation was this. He knew a station about sixtymiles up the Rhine, where all the public boats put in; and he would goto that station, and try and cut the truant off. To be sure he did noteven know him by sight; but as each boat came in he would mingle withthe passengers, and ask if one Gerard was there. "And, mistress, if youwere to give me a bit of a letter to him; for, with us being strangers, mayhap a won't believe a word I say. "

"Good, kind, thoughtful Luke, I will (how I have undervalued thee!). But give me till supper-time to get it writ. " At supper she put a letterinto his hand with a blush; it was a long letter, tied round with silkafter the fashion of the day, and sealed over the knot. 

Luke weighed it in his hand, with a shade of discontent, and said to hervery gravely, "Say your father was not dreaming, and say I have the luckto fall in with this man, and say he should turn out a better bit ofstuff than I think him, and come home to you then and there--what is tobecome o' me?"

Margaret coloured to her very brow. "Oh, Luke, Heaven will reward thee. And I shall fall on my knees and bless thee; and I shall love thee allmy days, sweet Luke, as a mother does her son. I am so old by thee:trouble ages the heart. Thou shalt not go 'tis not fair of me. Lovemaketh us to be all self. "

"Humph!" said Luke. "And if, " resumed he, in the same grave way, "yonscapegrace shall read thy letter, and hear me tell him how thou pinestfor him, and yet, being a traitor, or a mere idiot, will not turn tothee what shall become of me then? Must I die a bachelor, and thou farelonely to thy grave, neither maid, wife, nor widow?"

Margaret panted with fear and emotion at this terrible piece of goodsense, and the plain question which followed it. But at last shefaltered out, "If, which our Lady be merciful to me, and forbid--Oh!"

"Well, mistress?"

"If he should read my letter, and hear thy words--and, sweet Luke, bejust and tell him what a lovely babe he hath, fatherless, fatherless. Oh, Luke, can he be so cruel?"

"I trow not but if?"

"Then he will give thee up my marriage lines, and I shall be an honestwoman, and a wretched one, and my boy will not be a bastard; and ofcourse, then we could both go into any honest man's house that wouldbe troubled with us; and even for thy goodness this day, I will--Iwill--ne'er be so ungrateful as go past thy door to another man's. "

"Ay, but will you come in at mine? Answer me that!"

"Oh, ask me not! Some day, perhaps, when my wounds leave bleeding. Alas, I'll try. If I don't fling myself and my child into the Maas. Do not go, Luke! do not think of going! 'Tis all madness from first to last. "

But Luke was as slow to forego an idea as to form one. 

His reply showed how fast love was making a man of him. "Well, " said he, "madness is something, anyway; and I am tired of doing nothing for thee;and I am no great talker. To-morrow, at peep of day, I start. But hold, I have no money. My mother, she takes care of all mine; and I ne'er seeit again. "

Then Margaret took out Catherine's gold angel, which had escaped sooften, and gave it to Luke; and he set out on his mad errand. 

It did not, however, seem so mad to him as to us. It was a superstitiousage; and Luke acted on the dying man's dream, or vision, or illusion, orwhatever it was, much as we should act on respectable information. 

But Catherine was downright angry when she heard of it, "To send thepoor lad on such a wild-goose chase! But you are like a many moregirls; and mark my words; by the time you have worn that Luke fairlyout, and made him as sick of you as a dog, you will turn as fond on himas a cow on a calf, and 'Too late' will be the cry. "

THE CLOISTER

The two friars reached Holland from the south just twelve hours afterLuke started up the Rhine. 

Thus, wild-goose chase or not, the parties were nearing each other, andrapidly too. For Jerome, unable to preach in low Dutch, now beganto push on towards the coast, anxious to get to England as soon aspossible. 

And having the stream with them, the friars would in point of fact havemissed Luke by passing him in full stream below his station, but for theincident which I am about to relate. 

About twenty miles above the station Luke was making for, Clement landedto preach in a large village; and towards the end of his sermon henoticed a grey nun weeping. 

He spoke to her kindly, and asked her what was her grief. 

"Nay, " said she, "'tis not for myself flow these tears; 'tis for my lostfriend. Thy words reminded me of what she was, and what she is, poorwretch, But you are a Dominican, and I am a Franciscan nun. "

"It matters little, my sister, if we are both Christians, and if I canaid thee in aught. "

The nun looked in his face, and said, "These are strange words, butmethinks they are good; and thy lips are oh, most eloquent, I will tellthee our grief. "

She then let him know that a young nun, the darling of the convent, andher bosom friend, had been lured away from her vows, and after variousgradations of sin, was actually living in a small inn as chambermaid, in reality as a decoy, and was known to be selling her favours to thewealthier customers, She added, "Anywhere else we might, by kindlyviolence, force her away from perdition, But this innkeeper was theservant of the fierce baron on the height there, and hath his ear still, and he would burn our convent to the ground, were we to take her byforce. "

"Moreover, souls will not be saved by brute force, " said Clement. 

While they were talking Jerome came up, and Clement persuaded him to lieat the convent that night, But when in the morning Clement told him hehad had a long talk with the abbess, and that she was very sad, and hehad promised her to try and win back her nun, Jerome objected, and said, "It was not their business, and was a waste of time, " Clement, however, was no longer a mere pupil. He stood firm, and at last they agreed thatJerome should go forward, and secure their passage in the next ship forEngland, and Clement be allowed time to make his well-meant but idleexperiment. 

About ten o'clock that day, a figure in a horseman's cloak, and greatboots to match, and a large flapping felt hat, stood like a statue nearthe auberge, where was the apostate nun, Mary. The friar thus disguisedwas at that moment truly wretched. These ardent natures undertakewonders; but are dashed when they come hand to hand with the sickeningdifficulties. But then, as their hearts are steel, though their nervesare anything but iron, they turn not back, but panting and dispirited, struggle on to the last. 

Clement hesitated long at the door, prayed for help and wisdom, and atlast entered the inn and sat down faint at heart, and with his body in acold perspiration, But inside he was another man. He called lustily fora cup of wine: it was brought him by the landlord, He paid for it withmoney the convent had supplied him; and made a show of drinking it. 

"Landlord, " said he, "I hear there is a fair chambermaid in thinehouse. "

"Ay, stranger, the buxomest in Holland. But she gives not her company toall comers only to good customers. "

Friar Clement dangled a massive gold chain in the landlord's sight. Helaughed, and shouted, "Here, Janet, here is a lover for thee wouldbind thee in chains of gold; and a tall lad into the bargain, I promisethee. "

"Then I am in double luck, " said a female voice; "send him hither. "

Clement rose, shuddered, and passed into the room, where Janet wasseated playing with a piece of work, and laying it down every minute, tosing a mutilated fragment of a song. For, in her mode of life, she hadnot the patience to carry anything out. 

After a few words of greeting, the disguised visitor asked her if theycould not be more private somewhere. 

"Why not?" said she. And she rose and smiled, and went tripping beforehim, He followed, groaning inwardly, and sore perplexed. 

"There, " said she. "Have no fear! Nobody ever comes here, but such aspay for the privilege. "

Clement looked round the room, and prayed silently for wisdom. Then hewent softly, and closed the window-shutters carefully. 

"What on earth is that for?" said Janet, in some uneasiness. 

"Sweetheart, " whispered the visitor, with a mysterious air, "it is thatGod may not see us. 

"Madman, " said Janet; "think you a wooden shutter can keep out His eye?"

"Nay, I know not. Perchance He has too much on hand to notice us, But Iwould not the saints and angels should see us. Would you?"

"My poor soul, hope not to escape their sight! The only way is not tothink of them; for if you do, it poisons your cup. For two pins I'd runand leave thee. Art pleasant company in sooth. "

"After all, girl, so that men see us not, what signify God and thesaints seeing us? Feel this chain! 'Tis virgin gold. I shall cut two ofthese heavy links off for thee. "

"Ah! now thy discourse is to the point, " And she handled the chaingreedily. "Why, 'tis as massy as the chain round the virgin's neck atthe conv--" She did not finish the word. 

"Whisht! whisht! whisht! 'Tis it. And thou shalt have thy share. Butbetray me not. "

"Monster!" cried Janet, drawing back from him with repugnance; "what, rob the blessed Virgin of her chain, and give it to an--"

"You are none, " cried Clement exultingly, "or you had not recked forthat-Mary!"

"Ah! ah! ah!"

"Thy patron saint, whose chain this is, sends me to greet thee"

She ran screaming to the window and began to undo the shutters. 

Her fingers trembled, and Clement had time to debarass himself of hisboots and his hat before the light streamed in upon him, He then let hiscloak quietly fall, and stood before her, a Dominican friar, calm andmajestic as a statue, and held his crucifix towering over her with aloving, sad, and solemn look, that somehow relieved her of the physicalpart of fear, but crushed her with religious terror and remorse. Shecrouched and cowered against the wall. 

"Mary, " said he gently; "one word! Are you happy?"

"As happy as I shall be in hell. "

"And they are not happy at the convent; they weep for you. "

"For me?"

"Day and night; above all, the Sister Ursula. "

"Poor Ursula!" And the strayed nun began to weep herself at the thoughtof her friend. 

"The angels weep still more. Wilt not dry all their tears in earth andheaven and save thyself?"

"Ay! would I could; but it is too late. "

"Satan avaunt, " cried the monk sternly. "'Tis thy favourite temptation;and thou, Mary, listen not to the enemy of man, belying God, andwhispering despair. I who come to save thee have been a far greatersinner than thou. Come, Mary, sin, thou seest, is not so sweet, e'n inthis world, as holiness; and eternity is at the door. "

"How can they ever receive me again?"

"'Tis their worthiness thou doubtest now. But in truth they pine forthee. 'Twas in pity of their tears that I, a Dominican, undertook thistask; and broke the rule of my order by entering an inn; and broke itagain by donning these lay vestments. But all is well done, and quit fora light penance, if thou wilt let us rescue thy soul from this den ofwolves, and bring thee back to thy vows. "

The nun gazed at him with tears in her eyes. "And thou, a Dominican, hast done this for a daughter of St. Francis! Why, the Franciscans andDominicans hate one another. "

"Ay, my daughter; but Francis and Dominic love one another. "

The recreant nun seemed struck and affected by this answer

Clement now reminded her how shocked she had been that the Virgin shouldbe robbed of her chain. "But see now, " said he, "the convent, andthe Virgin too, think ten times more of their poor nun than of goldenchains; for they freely trusted their chain to me a stranger, thatperadventure the sight of it might touch their lost Mary and remind herof their love, " Finally he showed her with such terrible simplicity theend of her present course, and on the other hand so revived her dormantmemories and better feelings, that she kneeled sobbing at his feet, andowned she had never known happiness nor peace since she betrayed hervows; and said she would go back if he would go with her; but aloneshe dared not, could not: even if she reached the gate she could neverenter. How could she face the abbess and the sisters? He told her hewould go with her as joyfully as the shepherd bears a strayed lamb tothe fold. 

But when he urged her to go at once, up sprung a crop of thoseprodigiously petty difficulties that entangle her sex, like silken nets, liker iron cobwebs. 

He quietly swept them aside. 

"But how can I walk beside thee in this habit?"

"I have brought the gown and cowl of thy holy order. Hide thy braverywith them. And leave thy shoes as I leave these" (pointing to hishorseman's boots). 

She collected her jewels and ornaments. 

"What are these for?" inquired Clement. 

"To present to the convent, father. "

"Their source is too impure. "

"But, " objected the penitent, "it would be a sin to leave them here. They can be sold to feed the poor. "

"Mary, fix thine eye on this crucifix, and trample those devilishbaubles beneath thy feet. "

She hesitated; but soon threw them down and trampled on them. 

"Now open the window and fling them out on that dunghill. 'Tis welldone. So pass the wages of sin from thy hands, its glittering yoke fromthy neck, its pollution from thy soul. Away, daughter of St. Francis, wetarry in this vile place too long. " She followed him. 

But they were not clear yet. 

At first the landlord was so astounded at seeing a black friar and agrey nun pass through his kitchen from the inside, that he gaped, andmuttered, "Why, what mummery is this?" But he soon comprehended thematter, and whipped in between the fugitives and the door. "What ho!Reuben! Carl! Gavin! here is a false friar spiriting away our Janet. "

The men came running in with threatening looks. The friar rushed at themcrucifix in hand. "Forbear, " he cried, in a stentorian voice. "She isa holy nun returning to her vows. The hand that touches her cowl or herrobe to stay her, it shall wither, his body shall lie unburied, cursedby Rome, and his soul shall roast in eternal fire. " They shrank back asif a flame had met them. "And thou--miserable panderer!"

He did not end the sentence in words, but seized the man by the neck, and strong as a lion in his moments of hot excitement, hurled himfuriously from the door and sent him all across the room, pitching headforemost on to the stone floor; then tore the door open and carried thescreaming nun out into the road. 

"Hush! poor trembler, " he gasped; "they dare not molest thee on thehighroad. Away!"

The landlord lay terrified, half stunned, and bleeding; and Mary, thoughshe often looked back apprehensively, saw no more of him. 

On the road he bade her observe his impetuosity. 

"Hitherto, " said he, "we have spoken of thy faults: now for mine. Mycholer is ungovernable; furious. It is by the grace of God I am not amurderer, I repent the next moment; but a moment too late is all toolate. Mary, had the churls laid finger on thee, I should have scatteredtheir brains with my crucifix, Oh, I know myself; go to; and tremble atmyself. There lurketh a wild beast beneath this black gown of mine. "

"Alas, father, " said Mary, "were you other than you are I had been lost. To take me from that place needed a man wary as a fox; yet bold as alion. "

Clement reflected. "This much is certain: God chooseth well his fleshlyinstruments; and with imperfect hearts doeth His perfect work, Glory beto God!"

When they were near the convent Mary suddenly stopped, and seized thefriar's arm, and began to cry. He looked at her kindly, and told her shehad nothing to fear. It would be the happiest day she had ever spent. He then made her sit down and compose herself till he should return, Heentered the convent, and desired to see the abbess. 

"My sister, give the glory to God: Mary is at the gate. "

The astonishment and delight of the abbess were unbounded. 

She yielded at once to Clement's earnest request that the road ofpenitence might be smoothed at first to this unstable wanderer, andafter some opposition, she entered heartily into his views as to heractual reception. To give time for their little preparations Clementwent slowly back, and seating himself by Mary soothed her; and heard herconfession. 

"The abbess has granted me that you shall propose your own penance. "

"It shall be none the lighter, " said she. 

"I trow not, " said he; "but that is future: to-day is given to joyalone. "

He then led her round the building to the abbess's postern. 

As they went they heard musical instruments and singing. 

"'Tis a feastday, " said Mary; "and I come to mar it. "

"Hardly, " said Clement, smiling; "seeing that you are the queen of thefete. "

"I, father? what mean you?"

"What, Mary, have you never heard that there is more joy in heaven overone sinner that repenteth, than over ninety-nine just persons which needno repentance? Now this convent is not heaven; nor the nuns angels; yetare there among then, some angelic spirits; and these sing and exultat thy return. But here methinks comes one of them; for I see her handtrembles at the keyhole. "

The postern was flung open, and in a moment Sister Ursula clung sobbingand kissing round her friend's neck. The abbess followed more sedately, but little less moved. 

Clement bade them farewell. They entreated him to stay; but he told themwith much regret he could not. He had already tried his good BrotherJerome's patience, and must hasten to the river; and perhaps sail forEngland to-morrow. 

So Mary returned to the fold, and Clement strode briskly on towards theRhine, and England. 

This was the man for whom Margaret's boy lay in wait with her letter. 

THE HEARTH

And that letter was one of those simple, touching appeals only her sexcan write to those who have used them cruelly, and they love them. Shebegan by telling him of the birth of the little boy, and the comfort hehad been to her in all the distress of mind his long and strange silencehad caused her. She described the little Gerard minutely, not forgettingthe mole on his little finger. 

"Know you any one that hath the like on his? If you only saw him youcould not choose but be proud of him; all the mothers in the street doenvy me; but I the wives; for thou comest not to us. My own Gerard, somesay thou art dead. But if thou wert dead, how could I be alive? Otherssay that thou, whom I love so truly, art false. But this will I believefrom no lips but thine. My father loved thee well; and as he lay a-dyinghe thought he saw thee on a great river, with thy face turned towardsthy Margaret, but sore disfigured. Is't so, perchance? Have cruel menscarred thy sweet face? or hast thou lost one of thy precious limbs?Why, then thou hast the more need of me, and I shall love thee notworse, alas! thinkest thou a woman's love is light as a man's? butbetter, than I did when I shed those few drops from my arm, not worththe tears, thou didst shed for them; mindest thou? 'tis not so very longagone, dear Gerard. "

The letter continued in this strain, and concluded without a word ofreproach or doubt as to his faith and affection. Not that she was freefrom most distressing doubts; but they were not certainties; and to showthem might turn the scale, and frighten him away from her with fear ofbeing scolded. And of this letter she made soft Luke the bearer. 

So she was not an angel after all. 

Luke mingled with the passengers of two boats, and could hear nothing ofGerard Eliassoen. Nor did this surprise him. 

He was more surprised when, at the third attempt, a black friar saidto him, somewhat severely, "And what would you with him you call GerardEliassoen?"

"Why, father, if he is alive I have got a letter for him. "

"Humph!" said Jerome. "I am sorry for it, However, the flesh is weak. Well, my son, he you seek will be here by the next boat, or the nextboat after. And if he chooses to answer to that name--After all, I amnot the keeper of his conscience. "

"Good father, one plain word, for Heaven's sake, This Gerard Eliassoenof Tergou--is he alive?"

"Humph! Why, certes, he that went by that name is alive. "

"Well, then, that is settled, " said Luke drily. But the next moment hefound it necessary to run out of sight and blubber. 

"Oh, why did the Lord make any women?" said he to himself. "I wascontent with the world till I fell in love. Here his little finger ismore to her than my whole body, and he is not dead, And here I have gotto give him this. " He looked at the letter and dashed it on the ground. But he picked it up again with a spiteful snatch, and went to thelandlord, with tears in his eyes, and begged for work, The landlorddeclined, said he had his own people. 

"Oh, I seek not your money, " said Luke, "I only want some work to keepme from breaking my heart about another man's lass. "

"Good lad! good lad!" exploded the landlord; and found him lots ofbarrels to mend--on these terms, And he coopered with fury in theinterval of the boats coming down the Rhine. 

CHAPTER LXXXIII

THE HEARTH

Waiting an earnest letter seldom leaves the mind in statu quo. 

Margaret, in hers, vented her energy and her faith in her dying father'svision, or illusion; and when this was done, and Luke gone, she wonderedat her credulity, and her conscience pricked her about Luke; andCatherine came and scolded her, and she paid the price of false hopes, and elevation of spirits, by falling into deeper despondency. She wasfound in this state by a staunch friend she had lately made, Joan Ketel. This good woman came in radiant with an idea. 

"Margaret, I know the cure for thine ill: the hermit of Gouda a wondrousholy man, Why, he can tell what is coming, when he is in the mood. "

"Ay, I have heard of him, " said Margaret hopelessly. Joan with somedifficulty persuaded her to walk out as far as Gouda, and consult thehermit. They took some butter and eggs in a basket, and went to hiscave. 

What had made the pair such fast friends? Jorian some six weeks ago fellill of a bowel disease; it began with raging pain; and when this wentoff, leaving him weak, an awkward symptom succeeded; nothing, eitherliquid or solid, would stay in his stomach a minute. The doctor said:"He must die if this goes on many hours; therefore boil thou now achicken with a golden angel in the water, and let him sup that!"Alas! Gilt chicken broth shared the fate of the humbler viands, itspredecessors. Then the cure steeped the thumb of St. Sergius in beefbroth. Same result. Then Joan ran weeping to Margaret to borrow somelinen to make his shroud. "Let me see him, " said Margaret. She came inand felt his pulse. "Ah!" said she, "I doubt they have not gone to theroot. Open the window! Art stifling him; now change all his linen. 

"Alack, woman, what for? Why foul more linen for a dying man?" objectedthe mediaeval wife. 

"Do as thou art bid, " said Margaret dully, and left the room. 

Joan somehow found herself doing as she was bid. Margaret returned withher apron full of a flowering herb. She made a decoction, and took itto the bedside; and before giving it to the patient, took a spoonfulherself, and smacked her lips hypocritically. "That is fair, " said he, with a feeble attempt at humour. "Why, 'tis sweet, and now 'tis bitter. "She engaged him in conversation as soon as he had taken it. Thisbitter-sweet stayed by him. Seeing which she built on it as cards arebuilt: mixed a very little schiedam in the third spoonful, and a littlebeaten yoke of egg in the seventh. And so with the patience of her sexshe coaxed his body out of Death's grasp; and finally, Nature, beingpatted on the back, instead of kicked under the bed, set Jorian Ketelon his legs again. But the doctress made them both swear never to tell asoul her guilty deed. "They would put me in prison, away from my child. "

The simple that saved Jorian was called sweet feverfew. She gathered itin his own garden. Her eagle eye had seen it growing out of the window. 

Margaret and Joan, then, reached the hermit's cave, and placed theirpresent on the little platform. Margaret then applied her mouth to theaperture, made for that purpose, and said: "Holy hermit, we bring theebutter and eggs of the best; and I, a poor deserted girl, wife, yet nowife, and mother of the sweetest babe, come to pray thee tell me whetherhe is quick or dead, true to his vows or false. "

A faint voice issued from the cave: "Trouble me not with the things ofearth, but send me a holy friar, I am dying. "

"Alas!" cried Margaret. "Is it e'en so, poor soul? Then let us in tohelp thee. "

"Saints forbid! Thine is a woman's voice. Send me a holy friar. "

They went back as they came. Joan could not help saying, "Are women impso' darkness then, that they must not come anigh a dying bed?"

But Margaret was too deeply dejected to say anything. Joan applied roughconsolation. But she was not listened to till she said: "And Jorian willspeak out ere long; he is just on the boil, He is very grateful to thee, believe it. "

"Seeing is believing, " replied Margaret, with quiet bitterness. 

"Not but what he thinks you might have saved him with something more outo' the common than yon. 'A man of my inches to be cured wi' feverfew, 'says he. 'Why, if there is a sorry herb, ' says he. 'Why, I was thinkingo' pulling all mine up, says he. I up and told him remedies were nonethe better for being far-fetched; you and feverfew cured him, when thegrand medicines came up faster than they went down. So says I, 'You maygo down on your four bones to feverfew. ' But indeed, he is grateful atbottom; you are all his thought and all his chat. But he sees Gerard'sfolk coming around ye, and good friends, and he said only last night--"

"Well?"

"He made me vow not to tell ye. "

"Prithee, tell me. "

"Well, he said: 'An' if I tell what little I know, it won't bringhim back, and it will set them all by the ears. I wish I had moreheadpiece, ' said he; 'I am sore perplexed. But least said is soonestmended. ' Yon is his favourite word; he comes back to't from a mile off. "

Margaret shook her head. "Ay, we are wading in deep waters, my poor babeand me. "

It was Saturday night and no Luke. 

"Poor Luke!" said Margaret. "It was very good of him to go on such anerrand. "

"He is one out of a hundred, " replied Catherine warmly. 

"Mother, do you think he would be kind to little Gerard?"

"I am sure he would. So do you be kinder to him when he comes back! Willye now?"

"Ay. "

THE CLOISTER

Brother Clement, directed by the nuns, avoided a bend in the river, andstriding lustily forward, reached a station some miles nearer the coastthan that where Luke lay in wait for Gerard Eliassoen. And the nextmorning he started early, and was in Rotterdam at noon. He made at oncefor the port, not to keep Jerome waiting. 

He observed several monks of his order on the quay; he went to them;but Jerome was not amongst them. He asked one of them whether Jerome hadarrived? "Surely, brother, was the reply. 

"Prithee, where is he?"

"Where? Why, there!" said the monk, pointing to a ship in full sail. AndClement now noticed that all the monks were looking seaward. 

"What, gone without me! Oh, Jerome! Jerome!" cried he, in a voice ofanguish. Several of the friars turned round and stared. 

"You must be brother Clement, " said one of them at length; and on thisthey kissed him and greeted him with brotherly warmth, and gave him aletter Jerome had charged them with for him. It was a hasty scrawl. Thewriter told him coldly a ship was about to sail for England, and he wasloth to lose time. He (Clement) might follow if he pleased, but he woulddo much better to stay behind, and preach to his own country folk. "Givethe glory to God, brother; you have a wonderful power over Dutch hearts;but you are no match for those haughty islanders: you are too tender. 

"Know thou that on the way I met one, who asked me for thee under thename thou didst bear in the world. Be on thy guard! Let not the worldcatch thee again by any silken net, And remember, Solitude, Fasting, andPrayer are the sword, spear, and shield of the soul. Farewell. "

Clement was deeply shocked and mortified at this contemptuous desertion, and this cold-blooded missive. 

He promised the good monks to sleep at the convent, and to preachwherever the prior should appoint for Jerome had raised him to the skiesas a preacher, and then withdrew abruptly, for he was cut to the quick, and wanted to be alone. He asked himself, was there some incurable faultin him, repulsive to so true a son of Dominic? Or was Jerome himselfdevoid of that Christian Love which St. Paul had placed above Faithitself? Shipwrecked with him, and saved on the same fragment of thewreck: his pupil, his penitent, his son in the Church, and now for fourhundred miles his fellow-traveller in Christ; and to be shaken off likedirt, the first opportunity, with harsh and cold disdain. "Why worldlyhearts are no colder nor less trusty than this, " said he. "The onlyone that ever really loved me lies in a grave hard by. Fly me, fly toEngland, man born without a heart; I will go and pray over a grave atSevenbergen. "

Three hours later he passed Peter's cottage. A troop of noisy childrenwere playing about the door, and the house had been repaired, and anew outhouse added. He turned his head hastily away, not to disturb apicture his memory treasured; and went to the churchyard. 

He sought among the tombstones for Margaret's. He could not find it. He could not believe they had grudged her a tombstone, so searched thechurchyard all over again. 

"Oh poverty! stern poverty! Poor soul, thou wert like me no one was leftthat loved thee, when Gerard was gone. "

He went into the church, and after kissing the steps, prayed long andearnestly for the soul of her whose resting-place he could not find. 

Coming out of the church he saw a very old man looking over the littlechurchyard gate. He went towards him, and asked him did he live in theplace. 

"Four score and twelve years, man and boy. And I come here every dayof late, holy father, to take a peep. This is where I look to bide erelong. "

"My son, can you tell me where Margaret lies?"

"Margaret? There's a many Margarets here. "

"Margaret Brandt. She was daughter to a learned physician. "

"As if I didn't know that, " said the old man pettishly. "But she doesn'tlie here. Bless you, they left this a longful while ago. Gone in amoment, and the house empty. What, is she dead? Margaret a Peter dead?Now only think on't. Like enow; like enow, They great towns do terriblydisagree wi' country folk. "

"What great towns, my son?"

"Well, 'twas Rotterdam they went to from here, so I heard tell; or wasit Amsterdam? Nay, I trow 'twas Rotterdam? And gone there to die!"

Clement sighed. 

"'Twas not in her face now, that I saw. And I can mostly tell, Alack, there was a blooming young flower to be cut off so soon, and all oldweed like me left standing still. Well, well, she was a May rose yon;dear heart, what a winsome smile she had, and--"

"God bless thee, my son, " said Clement; "farewell!" and he hurried away. 

He reached the convent at sunset, and watched and prayed in the chapelfor Jerome and Margaret till it was long past midnight, and his soul hadrecovered its cold calm. 

CHAPTER LXXXIV

THE HEARTH

The next day, Sunday, after mass, was a bustling day at Catherine'shouse in the Hoog Straet. The shop was now quite ready, and Cornelis andSybrandt were to open it next day; their names were above the door; alsotheir sign, a white lamb sucking a gilt sheep. Eli had come, and broughtthem some more goods from his store to give them a good start. Thehearts of the parents glowed at what they were doing, and the pairthemselves walked in the garden together, and agreed they were sick oftheir old life, and it was more pleasant to make money than waste it;they vowed to stick to business like wax. Their mother's quick and everwatchful ear overheard this resolution through an open window, and shetold Eli, The family supper was to include Margaret and her boy, and bea kind of inaugural feast, at which good trade advice was to flow fromthe elders, and good wine to be drunk to the success of the convertsto Commerce from Agriculture in its unremunerative form--wild oats. SoMargaret had come over to help her mother-in-law, and also to shakeoff her own deep languor; and both their faces were as red as the fire. Presently in came Joan with a salad from Jorian's garden. 

"He cut it for you, Margaret; you are all his chat; I shall be jealous. I told him you were to feast to-day. But oh, lass, what a sermon in thenew kerk! Preaching? I never heard it till this day. "

"Would I had been there then, " said Margaret; "for I am dried up forwant of dew from heaven. "

"Why, he preacheth again this afternoon. But mayhap you are wantedhere. "

"Not she, " said Catherine. "Come, away ye go, if y'are minded. "

"Indeed, " said Margaret, "methinks I should not be such a damper attable if I could come to 't warm from a good sermon. "

"Then you must be brisk, " observed Joan. "See the folk are wending thatway, and as I live, there goes the holy friar. Oh, bless us and save us, Margaret; the hermit! We forgot. " And this active woman bounded out ofthe house, and ran across the road, and stopped the friar. She returnedas quickly. "There, I was bent on seeing him nigh hand. "

"What said he to thee?"

"Says he, 'My daughter, I will go to him ere sunset, God willing. ' Thesweetest voice. But oh, my mistresses, what thin cheeks for a young man, and great eyes, not far from your colour, Margaret. "

"I have a great mind to go hear him, " said Margaret. "But my cap is notvery clean, and they will all be there in their snow-white mutches. "

"There, take my handkerchief out of the basket, " said Catherine; "youcannot have the child, I want him for my poor Kate. It is one of her illdays. "

Margaret replied by taking the boy upstairs. She found Kate in bed. 

"How art thou, sweetheart? Nay, I need not ask. Thou art in sore pain;thou smilest so, See, ' I have brought thee one thou lovest. "

"Two, by my way of counting, " said Kate, with an angelic smile. She hada spasm at that moment would have made some of us roar like bulls. 

"What, in your lap?" said Margaret, answering a gesture of the sufferinggirl. "Nay, he is too heavy, and thou in such pain. "

"I love him too dear to feel his weight, " was the reply. 

Margaret took this opportunity, and made her toilet. "I am for thekerk, " said she, "to hear a beautiful preacher. " Kate sighed. "And aminute ago, Kate, I was all agog to go; that is the way with me thismonth past; up and down, up and down, like the waves of the Zuyder Zee. I'd as lieve stay aside thee; say the word!"

"Nay, " said Kate, "prithee go; and bring me back every word. Well-a-daythat I cannot go myself. " And the tears stood in the patient's eyes. This decided Margaret, and she kissed Kate, looked under her lashes atthe boy, and heaved a little sigh. "I trow I must not, " said she. "Inever could kiss him a little; and my father was dead against wakinga child by day or night When 'tis thy pleasure to wake, speak thy auntKate the two new words thou hast gotten. " And she went out, lookinglovingly over her shoulder, and shut the door inaudibly. 

"Joan, you will lend me a hand, and peel these?" said Catherine. 

"That I will, dame. " And the cooking proceeded with silent vigour. 

"Now, Joan, them which help me cook and serve the meat, they help me eatit; that's a rule. "

"There's worse laws in Holland than that. Your will is my pleasure, mistress; for my Luke hath got his supper i' the air. He is diggingto-day by good luck. " (Margaret came down. )

"Eh, woman, yon is an ugly trade. There she has just washed her faceand gi'en her hair a turn, and now who is like her? Rotterdam, that foryou!" and Catherine snapped her fingers at the capital. "Give us a buss, hussy! Now mind, Eli won't wait supper for the duke. Wherefore, loiternot after your kerk is over. "

Joan and she both followed her to the door, and stood at it watchingher a good way down the street. For among homely housewives going outo' doors is half an incident. Catherine commented on the launch: "There, Joan, it is almost to me as if I had just started my own daughter forkerk, and stood a looking after: the which I've done it manys and manysthe times. Joan, lass, she won't hear a word against our Gerard; andhe be alive, he has used her cruel; that is why my bowels yearn for thepoor wench. I'm older and wiser than she; and so I'll wed her to yonsimple Luke, and there an end. What's one grandchild?"

CHAPTER LXXXV

THE CLOISTER AND THE HEARTH

The sermon had begun when Margaret entered the great church of St. Laurens. It was a huge edifice, far from completed. Churches were notbuilt in a year. The side aisles were roofed, but not the mid aisle northe chancel; the pillars and arches were pretty perfect, and some ofthem whitewashed. But only one window in the whole church was glazed;the rest were at present great jagged openings in the outer walls. 

But to-day all these uncouth imperfections made the church beautiful. It was a glorious summer afternoon, and the sunshine came broken intomarvellous forms through those irregular openings, and played bewitchingpranks upon so many broken surfaces. 

It streamed through the gaping walls, and clove the dark cool sideaisles with rivers of glory, and dazzled and glowed on the white pillarsbeyond. 

And nearly the whole central aisle was chequered with light and shade inbroken outlines; the shades seeming cooler and more soothing than evershade was, and the lights like patches of amber diamond animated withheavenly fire. And above, from west to east the blue sky vaulted thelofty aisle, and seemed quite close. 

The sunny caps of the women made a sea of white contrasting exquisitelywith that vivid vault of blue. 

For the mid aisle, huge as it was, was crammed, yet quite still. Thewords and the mellow, gentle, earnest voice of the preacher held themmute. 

Margaret stood spellbound at the beauty, the devotion, "the great calm, "She got behind a pillar in the north aisle; and there, though she couldhardly catch a word, a sweet devotional langour crept over her at theloveliness of the place and the preacher's musical voice; and balmy oilseemed to trickle over the waves in her heart and smooth them. So sheleaned against the pillar with eyes half closed, and all seemed soft anddreamy. 

She felt it good to be there. 

Presently she saw a lady leave an excellent place opposite to get out ofthe sun, which was indeed pouring on her head from the window. Margaretwent round softly but swiftly; and was fortunate enough to get theplace. She was now beside a pillar of the south aisle, and not abovefifty feet from the preacher. She was at his side, a little behind him, but could hear every word. 

Her attention, however, was soon distracted by the shadow of a man'shead and shoulders bobbing up and down so drolly she had some ado tokeep from smiling. 

Yet it was nothing essentially droll. 

It was the sexton digging. 

She found that out in a moment by looking behind her, through thewindow, to whence the shadow came. 

Now as she was looking at Jorian Ketel digging, suddenly a tone of thepreacher's voice fell upon her ear and her mind so distinctly, it seemedliterally to strike her, and make her vibrate inside and out. 

Her hand went to her bosom, so strange and sudden was the thrill. Thenshe turned round, and looked at the preacher. His back was turned, andnothing visible but his tonsure. She sighed. That tonsure, being all shesaw, contradicted the tone effectually. 

Yet she now leaned a little forward with downcast eyes, hoping for thataccent again. It did not come. But the whole voice grew strangely uponher. It rose and fell as the preacher warmed; and it seemed to wakenfaint echoes of a thousand happy memories. She would not look to dispelthe melancholy pleasure this voice gave her. 

Presently, in the middle of an eloquent period, the preacher stopped. 

She almost sighed; a soothing music had ended. Could the sermon be endedalready? No; she looked round; the people did not move. 

A good many faces seemed now to turn her way. ' She looked behind hersharply. There was nothing there. 

Startled countenances near her now eyed the preacher. She followed theirlooks; and there, in the pulpit, was a face as of a staring corpse. Thefriar's eyes, naturally large, and made larger by the thinness of hischeeks, were dilated to supernatural size, and glaring her way out of abloodless face. 

She cringed and turned fearfully round: for she thought there must besome terrible thing near her. No; there was nothing; she was the outsidefigure of the listening crowd. 

At this moment the church fell into commotion, Figures got up all overthe building, and craned forward; agitated faces by hundreds gazed fromthe friar to Margaret, and from Margaret to the friar. The turning toand fro of so many caps made a loud rustle. Then came shrieks of nervouswomen, and buzzing of men; and Margaret, seeing so many eyes levelled ather, shrank terrified behind the pillar, with one scared, hurried glanceat the preacher. 

Momentary as that glance was, it caught in that stricken face anexpression that made her shiver. 

She turned faint, and sat down on a heap of chips the workmen had left, and buried her face in her hands, The sermon went on again. She heardthe sound of it; but not the sense. She tried to think, but her mind wasin a whirl, Thought would fix itself in no shape but this: that on thatprodigy-stricken face she had seen a look stamped. And the recollectionof that look now made her quiver from head to foot. 

For that look was "RECOGNITION. "

The sermon, after wavering some time, ended in a strain of exalted, nay, feverish eloquence, that went far to make the crowd forget thepreacher's strange pause and ghastly glare. Margaret mingled hastilywith the crowd, and went out of the church with them. 

They went their ways home. But she turned at the door, and went into thechurchyard; to Peter's grave. Poor as she was, she had given him a slaband a headstone. She sat down on the slab, and kissed it. Then threw herapron over her head that no one might distinguish her by her hair. 

"Father, " she said, "thou hast often heard me say I am wading in deepwaters; but now I begin to think God only knows the bottom of them. I'llfollow that friar round the world, but I'll see him at arm's length. Andhe shall tell me why he looked towards me like a dead man wakened; andnot a soul behind me. Oh, father; you often praised me here: speak aword for me there. For I am wading in deep waters. "

Her father's tomb commanded a side view of the church door. And on thattomb she sat, with her face covered, waylaying the holy preacher. 

CHAPTER LXXXVI

THE CLOISTER AND THE HEARTH

The cool church chequered with sunbeams and crowned with heavenlypurple, soothed and charmed Father Clement, as it did Margaret; andmore, it carried his mind direct to the Creator of all good and puredelights. Then his eye fell on the great aisle crammed with his countryfolk; a thousand snowy caps, filigreed with gold. Many a hundred leagueshe had travelled; but seen nothing like them, except snow. In themorning he had thundered; but this sweet afternoon seemed out of tunewith threats. His bowels yearned over that multitude; and he must tellthem of God's love: poor souls, they heard almost as little of itfrom the pulpit then a days as the heathen used. He told them the gladtidings of salvation. The people hung upon his gentle, earnest tongue. 

He was not one of those preachers who keep gyrating in the pulpit likethe weathercock on the steeple. He moved the hearts of others more thanhis own body. But on the other hand he did not entirely neglect thosewho were in bad places. And presently, warm with this theme, that noneof all that multitude might miss the joyful tidings of Christ's love, heturned him towards the south aisle. 

And there, in a stream of sunshine from the window, was the radiant faceof Margaret Brandt. He gazed at it without emotion. It just benumbedhim, soul and body. 

But soon the words died in his throat, and he trembled as he glared atit. 

There, with her auburn hair bathed in sunbeams, and glittering like thegloriola of a saint, and her face glowing doubly, with its own beauty, and the sunshine it was set in-stood his dead love. 

She was leaning very lightly against a white column. She was listeningwith tender, downcast lashes. 

He had seen her listen so to him a hundred times. 

There was no change in her. This was the blooming Margaret he had left:only a shade riper and more lovely. 

He started at her with monstrous eyes and bloodless cheeks. 

The people died out of his sight. He heard, as in a dream, a rustlingand rising all over the church; but could not take his prodigy-strickeneyes off that face, all life, and bloom, and beauty, and that wondrousauburn hair glistening gloriously in the sun. 

He gazed, thinking she must vanish. 

She remained. 

All in a moment she was looking at him, full. 

Her own violet eyes!!

At this he was beside himself, and his lips parted to shriek out hername, when she turned her head swiftly, and soon after vanished, but notwithout one more glance, which, though rapid as lightning, encounteredhis, and left her couching and quivering with her mind in a whirl, andhim panting and gripping the pulpit convulsively. For this glance ofhers, though not recognition, was the startled inquiring, nameless, indescribable look that precedes recognition. He made a mighty effort, and muttered something nobody could understand: then feebly resumed hisdiscourse; and stammered and babbled on a while, till by degrees forcinghimself, now she was out of sight, to look on it as a vision from theother world, he rose into a state of unnatural excitement, and concludedin a style of eloquence that electrified the simple; for it bordered onrhapsody. 

The sermon ended, he sat down on the pulpit stool, terribly shaken, Butpresently an idea very characteristic of the time took possession ofhim, He had sought her grave at Sevenbergen in vain. She had now beenpermitted to appear to him, and show him that she was buried here;probably hard by that very pillar, where her spirit had showed itself tohim. 

This idea once adopted soon settled on his mind with all the Certaintyof a fact. And he felt he had only to speak to the sexton (whom to hisgreat disgust he had seen working during the sermon), to learn the spotwhere she was laid. 

The church was now quite empty. He came down from the pulpit and steppedthrough an aperture in the south wall on to the grass, and went up tothe sexton. He knew him in a moment. But Jorian never suspected thepoor lad, whose life he had saved, in this holy friar. The loss of hisshapely beard had wonderfully altered the outline of his face. This hadchanged him even more than his tonsure, his short hair sprinkled withpremature grey, and his cheeks thinned and paled by fasts and vigils. 

"My son, " said Friar Clement softly, "if you keep any memory of thosewhom you lay in the earth, prithee tell me is any Christian buriedinside the church, near one of the pillars?"

"Nay, father, " said Jorian, "here in the churchyard lie buried all thatburied be. Why?"

"No matter, Prithee tell me then where lieth Margaret Brandt. "

"Margaret Brandt?" And Jorian stared stupidly at the speaker. 

"She died about three years ago, and was buried here. "

"Oh, that is another matter, " said Jorian; "that was before my time; thevicar could tell you, likely; if so be she was a gentlewoman, or at theleast rich enough to pay him his fee. "

"Alas, my son, she was poor (and paid a heavy penalty for it); but bornof decent folk. Her father, Peter, was a learned physician; she camehither from Sevenbergen--to die. "

When Clement had uttered these words his head sunk upon his breast, andhe seemed to have no power nor wish to question Jorian more. I doubteven if he knew where he was. He was lost in the past. 

Jorian put down his spade, and standing upright in the grave, set hisarms akimbo, and said sulkily, "Are you making a fool of me, holy sir, or has some wag been making a fool of you!" And having relieved his mindthus, he proceeded to dig again, with a certain vigour that showed hissomewhat irritable temper was ruffled. 

Clement gazed at him with a puzzled but gently reproachful eye, forthe tone was rude, and the words unintelligible. Good-natured, thoughcrusty, Jorian had not thrown up three spadefuls ere he became ashamedof it himself. "Why, what a base churl am I to speak thus to thee, holyfather; and thou a standing there, looking at me like a lamb. Aha! Ihave it; 'tis Peter Brandt's grave you would fain see, not Margaret's. He does lie here; hard by the west door. There; I'll show you. " And helaid down his spade, and put on his doublet and jerkin to go with thefriar. 

He did not know there was anybody sitting on Peter's tomb. Still lessthat she was watching for this holy friar. 

Pietro Vanucci and Andrea did not recognize him without his beard. Thefact is, that the beard which has never known a razor grows in a verypicturesque and characteristic form, and becomes a feature in the face;so that its removal may in some cases be an effectual disguise. 

CHAPTER LXXXVII

While Jorian was putting on his doublet and jerkin to go to Peter'stomb, his tongue was not idle. "They used to call him a magician outSevenbergen way. And they do say he gave 'em a touch of his trade atparting; told 'em he saw Margaret's lad a-coming down Rhine in braveclothes and store o' money, but his face scarred by foreign glaive, and not altogether so many arms and legs as a went away wi'. But, dearheart, nought came on't. Margaret is still wearying for her lad; andPeter, he lies as quiet as his neighbours; not but what she hath put astone slab over him, to keep him where he is: as you shall see. "

He put both hands on the edge of the grave, and was about to raisehimself out of it, but the friar laid a trembling hand on his shoulder, and said in a strange whisper--

"How long since died Peter Brandt?"

"About two months, Why?"

"And his daughter buried him, say you?"

"Nay, I buried him, but she paid the fee and reared the stone. "

"Then--but he had just one daughter; Margaret?"

"No more leastways, that he owned to. "

"Then you think Margaret is--is alive?"

"Think? Why, I should be dead else. Riddle me that. "

"Alas, how can I? You love her!"

"No more than reason, being a married man, and father of four moresturdy knaves like myself. Nay, the answer is, she saved my life scarcesix weeks agone. Now had she been dead she couldn't ha' kept me alive. Bless your heart, I couldn't keep a thing on my stomach; nor doctorscouldn't make me. My Joan says, ''Tis time to buy thee a shroud. ' 'I daresay, so 'tis, ' says I; but try and borrow one first. ' In comes my lady, this Margaret, which she died three years ago, by your way on't, opens the windows, makes 'em shift me where I lay, and cures me in thetwinkling of a bedpost; but wi' what? there pinches the shoe; with thescurviest herb, and out of my own garden, too; with sweet feverfew. Aherb, quotha, 'tis a weed; leastways it was a weed till it cured me, but now whene'er I pass my hunch I doff bonnet, and says I, 'fly servicet'ye. ' Why, how now, father, you look wondrous pale, and now you arered, and now you are white? Why, what is the matter? What, in Heaven'sname, is the matter?"

"The surprise--the joy--the wonder--the fear, " gasped Clement. 

"Why, what is it to thee? Art thou of kin to Margaret Brandt?"

"Nay; but I knew one that loved her well, so well her death nigh killedhim, body and soul. And yet thou sayest she lives. And I believe thee. "

Jorian stared, and after a considerable silence said very gravely, "Father, you have asked me many questions, and I have answered themtruly; now for our Lady's sake answer me but two. Did you in very soothknow one who loved this poor lass? Where?"

Clement was on the point of revealing himself, but he rememberedJerome's letter, and shrank from being called by the name he had bornein the world. 

"I knew him in Italy, " said he. 

"If you knew him you can tell me his name, " said Jorian cautiously. 

"His name was Gerard Eliassoen. "

"Oh, but this is strange. Stay, what made thee say Margaret Brandt wasdead?"

"I was with Gerard when a letter came from Margaret Van Eyck. The lettertold him she he loved was dead and buried. Let me sit down, for mystrength fails me, Foul play! Foul play!"

"Father, " said Jorian, "I thank Heaven for sending thee to me, Ay, sitye down; ye do look like a ghost; ye fast overmuch to be strong. My mindmisgives me; methinks I hold the clue to this riddle, and if I do, therebe two knaves in this town whose heads I would fain batter to pieces asI do this mould;" and he clenched his teeth and raised his long spadeabove his head, and brought it furiously down upon the heap severaltimes. "Foul play? You never said a truer word i' your life; and if youknow where Gerard is now, lose no time, but show him the trap they havelaid for him. Mine is but a dull head, but whiles the slow hound puzzlesout the scent--go to, And I do think you and I ha' got hold of two endso' one stick, and a main foul one. "

Jorian then, after some of those useless preliminaries men of his classalways deal in, came to the point of the story. He had been employed bythe burgomaster of Tergou to repair the floor of an upper room in hishouse, and when it was almost done, Coming suddenly to fetch away histools, curiosity had been excited by some loud words below, and he hadlain down on his stomach, and heard the burgomaster talking about aletter which Cornelis and Sybrandt were minded to convey into the placeof one that a certain Hans Memling was taking to Gerard; "and it seemstheir will was good, but their stomach was small; so to give themcourage the old man showed them a drawer full of silver, and if they didthe trick they should each put a hand in, and have all the silver theycould hold in't. Well, father, " continued Jorian, "I thought not muchon't at the time, except for the bargain itself, that kept me awakemostly all night. Think on't! Next morning at peep of day who should Isee but my masters Cornelis and Sybrandt come out of their house eachwith a black eye. 'Oho, ' says I, 'what yon Hans hath put his mark on ye;well now I hope that is all you have got for your pains. ' Didn't theymake for the burgomaster's house? I to my hiding-place. "

At this part of Jorian's revelation the monk's nostril dilated, and hisrestless eye showed the suspense he was in. 

"Well, father, " continued Jorian, "the burgomaster brought them intothat same room. He had a letter in his hand; but I am no scholar;however, I have got as many eyes in my head as the Pope hath, and I sawthe drawer opened, and those two knaves put in each a hand and draw itout full. And, saints in glory, how they tried to hold more, and more, and more o' yon stuff! And Sybrandt, he had daubed his hand in somethingsticky, I think 'twas glue, and he made shift to carry one or two piecesaway a sticking to the back of his hand, he! he! he! 'Tis a sin tolaugh. So you see luck was on the wrong side as usual; they had donethe trick; but how they did it, that, methinks, will never be known tilldoomsday. Go to, they left their immortal jewels in yon drawer. Well, they got a handful of silver for them; the devil had the worst o' yonbargain. There, father, that is off my mind; often I longed to tell itsome one, but I durst not to the women; or Margaret would not have hada friend left in the world; for those two black-hearted villains are thefavourites, 'Tis always so. Have not the old folk just taken a brave newshop for them in this very town, in the Hoog Straet? There may you seetheir sign, a gilt sheep and a lambkin; a brace of wolves sucking theirdam would be nigher the mark. And there the whole family feast this day;oh, 'tis a fine world. What, not a word, holy father; you sit there likestone, and have not even a curse to bestow on them, the stony-heartedmiscreants. What, was it not enough the poor lad was all alone in astrange land; must his own flesh and blood go and lie away the oneblessing his enemies had left him? And then think of her pining andpining all these years, and sitting at the window looking adown thestreet for Gerard! and so constant, so tender, and true: my wife saysshe is sure no woman ever loved a man truer than she loves the lad thosevillains have parted from her; and the day never passes but she weepssalt tears for him. And when I think, that, but for those two greedylying knaves, yon winsome lad, whose life I saved, might be by her sidethis day the happiest he in Holland; and the sweet lass, that saved mylife, might be sitting with her cheek upon her sweetheart's shoulder, the happiest she in Holland in place of the saddest; oh, I thirst fortheir blood, the nasty, sneaking, lying, cogging, cowardly, heartless, bowelless--how now?"

The monk started wildly up, livid with fury and despair, and rushedheadlong from the place with both hands clenched and raised on high. So terrible was this inarticulate burst of fury, that Jorian's puny iredied out at sight of it, and he stood looking dismayed after the humantempest he had launched. 

While thus absorbed he felt his arm grasped by a small, tremulous hand. 

It was Margaret Brandt. 

He started; her coming there just then seemed so strange. She had waitedlong on Peter's tombstone, but the friar did not come, So she went intothe church to see if he was there still. She could not find him. 

Presently, going up the south aisle, the gigantic shadow of a friar camerapidly along the floor and part of a pillar, and seemed to pass throughher. She was near screaming; but in a moment remembered Jorian's shadowhad come in so from the churchyard; and tried to clamber out the nearestway. She did so, but with some difficulty; and by that time Clement wasjust disappearing down the street; yet, so expressive at times is thebody as well as the face, she could see he was greatly agitated. Jorianand she looked at one another, and at the wild figure of the distantfriar. 

"Well?" said she to Jorian, trembling. 

"Well, " said he, "you startled me. How come you here of all people?"

"Is this a time for idle chat? What said he to you? He has been speakingto you; deny it not. "

"Girl, as I stand here, he asked me whereabout you were buried in thischurchyard. "

"Ah!"

"I told him, nowhere, thank Heaven: you were alive and saving other folkfrom the churchyard. "

"Well?"

"Well, the long and the short is, he knew thy Gerard in Italy; and aletter came saying you were dead; and it broke thy poor lad's heart. Letme see; who was the letter written by? Oh, by the demoiselle vanEyck. That was his way of it. But I up and told him nay; 'twas neitherdemoiselle nor dame that penned yon lie, but Ghysbrecht Van Swieten, andthose foul knaves, Cornelis and Sybrandt; these changed the true letterfor one of their own; I told him as how I saw the whole villainy donethrough a chink; and now, if I have not been and told you!"

"Oh, cruel! cruel! But he lives. The fear of fears is gone. Thank God!"

"Ay, lass; and as for thine enemies, I have given them a dig. For yonfriar is friendly to Gerard, and he is gone to Eli's house, methinks. For I told him where to find Gerard's enemies and thine, and wow but hewill give them their lesson. If ever a man was mad with rage, its yon. He turned black and white, and parted like a stone from a sling. Girl, there was thunder in his eye and silence on his lips. Made me cold adid. "

"Oh, Jorian, what have you done?" cried Margaret. "Quick! quick! help methither, for the power is gone all out of my body. You know him not asI do. Oh, if you had seen the blow he gave Ghysbrecht; and heard thefrightful crash! Come, save him from worse mischief. The water is deepenow; but not bloody yet, come!"

Her accents were so full of agony that Jorian sprang out of the graveand came with her, huddling on his jerkin as he went. 

But as they hurried along, he asked her what on earth she meant? "I talkof this friar, and you answer me of Gerard. "

"Man, see you not, this is Gerard!"

"This, Gerard? what mean ye?"

"I mean, yon friar is my boy's father. I have waited for him long, Jorian. Well, he is come to me at last. And thank God for it. Oh, mypoor child! Quicker, Jorian, quicker!"

"Why, thou art mad as he. Stay! By St. Bavon, yon was Gerard's face;'twas nought like it; yet somehow--'twas it. Come on! come on! let mesee the end of this. "

"The end? How many of us will live to see that?"

They hurried along in breathless silence, till they reached Hoog Straet. 

Then Jorian tried to reassure her. "You are making your own trouble, "said he; "who says he has gone thither? more likely to the convent toweep and pray, poor soul. Oh, cursed, cursed villains!"

"Did not you tell him where those villains bide?"

"Ay, that I did. "

"Then quicker, oh, Jorian, quicker. I see the house. Thank God and allthe saints, I shall be in time to calm him. I know what I'll say to him;Heaven forgive me! Poor Catherine; 'tis of her I think: she has been amother to me. "

The shop was a corner house, with two doors; one in the main street, forcustomers, and a house-door round the corner. 

Margaret and Jorian were now within twenty yards of the shop, when theyheard a roar inside, like as of some wild animal, and the friar burstout, white and raging, and went tearing down the street. 

Margaret screamed, and sank fainting on Jorian's arm. 

Jorian shouted after him, "Stay, madman, know thy friends. " But he wasdeaf, and went headlong, shaking his clenched fists high, high in theair. 

"Help me in, good Jorian, " moaned Margaret, turning suddenly calm. "Letme know the worst; and die. "

He supported her trembling limbs into the house. 

It seemed unnaturally still; not a sound. 

Jorian's own heart beat fast. 

A door was before him, unlatched. He pushed it softly with his lefthand, and Margaret and he stood on the threshold. 

What they saw there you shall soon know. 

CHAPTER LXXXVIII

It was supper-time. Eli's family were collected round the board;Margaret only was missing. To Catherine's surprise, Eli said he wouldwait a bit for her. 

"Why, I told her you would not wait for the duke. "

"She is not the duke; she is a poor, good lass, that hath waited notminutes, but years, for a graceless son of mine. You can put the meaton the board all the same; then we can fall to, without farther loss o'time, when she does come. "

The smoking dishes smelt so savoury that Eli gave way. "She will come ifwe begin, " said he; "they always do, Come, sit ye down, Mistress Joan;y'are not here for a slave, I trow, but a guest. There, I hear a quickstep off covers, and fall to. "

The covers were withdrawn, and the knives brandished. 

Then burst into the room, not the expected Margaret, but a Dominicanfriar, livid with rage. 

He was at the table in a moment, in front of Cornelis and Sybrandt, threw his tall body over the narrow table, and with two hands hoveringabove their shrinking heads, like eagles over a quarry, he cursedthem by name, soul and body, in this world and the next. It was an ageeloquent in curses; and this curse was so full, so minute, so blighting, blasting, withering, and tremendous, that I am afraid to put all thewords on paper. "Cursed be the lips, " he shrieked, "which spoke thelie that Margaret was dead; may they rot before the grave, and kisswhite-hot iron in hell thereafter; doubly cursed be the hands thatchanged those letters, and be they struck off by the hangman's knife, and handle hell fire for ever; thrice accursed be the cruel heartsthat did conceive that damned lie, to part true love for ever; may theysicken and wither on earth joyless, loveless, hopeless; and wither todust before their time; and burn in eternal fire, " He cursed the meatat their mouths and every atom of their bodies, from their hair to thesoles of their feet. Then turning from the cowering, shuddering pair, who had almost hid themselves beneath the table, he tore a letter out ofhis bosom, and flung it down before his father. 

"Read that, thou hard old man, that didst imprison thy son, read, andsee what monsters thou hast brought into the world, The memory of mywrongs and hers dwell with you all for ever! I will meet you again atthe judgment day; on earth ye will never see me more. "

And in a moment, as he had come, so he was gone, leaving them stiff, andcold, and white as statues round the smoking board. 

And this was the sight that greeted Margaret's eyes and Jorian's--palefigures of men and women petrified around the untasted food, as Easternpoets feigned. 

Margaret glanced her eye round, and gasped out, "Oh, joy! all here; noblood hath been shed. Oh, you cruel, cruel men! I thank God he hath notslain you. "

At sight of her Catherine gave an eloquent scream; then turned her headaway. But Eli, who had just cast his eye over the false letter, andbegun to understand it all, seeing the other victim come in at that verymoment with her wrongs reflected in her sweet, pale face, started to hisfeet in a transport of rage, and shouted, "Stand clear, and let me getat the traitors, I'll hang for them, " And in a moment he whipped out hisshort sword, and fell upon them. 

"Fly!" screamed Margaret. "Fly!"

They slipped howling under the table, and crawled out the other side. 

But ere they could get to the door, the furious old man ran round andintercepted them. Catherine only screamed and wrung her hands; yournotables are generally useless at such a time; and blood would certainlyhave flowed, but Margaret and Jorian seized the fiery old man's arms, and held them with all their might, whilst the pair got clear of thehouse; then they let him go; and he went vainly raging after them outinto the street. 

They were a furlong off, running like hares. 

He hacked down the board on which their names were written, and broughtit indoors, and flung it into the chimney-place. Catherine was sittingrocking herself with her apron over her head. Joan had run to herhusband. Margaret had her arms round Catherine's neck; and pale andpanting, was yet making efforts to comfort her. 

But it was not to be done, "Oh, my poor children!" she cried. "Oh, miserable mother! 'Tis a mercy Kate was ill upstairs. There, I havelived to thank God for that!" she cried, with a fresh burst of sobs. "Itwould have killed her. He had better have stayed in Italy, as come hometo curse his own flesh and blood and set us all by the ears. 

"Oh, hold your chat, woman, " cried Eli angrily; "you are still on theside of the ill-doer, You are cheap served; your weakness made therogues what they are; I was for correcting them in their youth: forsore ills, sharp remedies; but you still sided with their faults, andundermined me, and baffled wise severity. And you, Margaret, leavecomforting her that ought rather to comfort you; for what is her hurtto yours? But she never had a grain of justice under her skin; and neverwill. So come thou to me, that am thy father from this hour. "

This was a command; so she kissed Catherine, and went tottering to him, and he put her on a chair beside him, and she laid her feeble head onhis honest breast; but not a tear: it was too deep for that. 

"Poor lamb, " said he. After a while--"Come, good folks, " said true Eli, in a broken voice, to Jorian and Joan, "we are in a little trouble, asyou see; but that is no reason you should starve. For our Lady's sake, fall to; and add not to my grief the reputation of a churl. What thedickens!" added he, with a sudden ghastly attempt at stout-heartedness, "the more knaves I have the luck to get shut of, the more my need oftrue men and women, to help me clear the dish, and cheer mine eye withhonest faces about me where else were gaps. Fall to, I do entreat ye. "

Catherine, sobbing, backed his request. Poor, simple, antique, hospitable souls! Jorian, whose appetite, especially since his illness, was very keen, was for acting on this hospitable invitation; but Joanwhispered a word in his ear, and he instantly drew back, "Nay, I'lltouch no meat that Holy Church hath cursed. "

"In sooth, I forgot, " said Eli apologetically. "My son, who was rearedat my table, hath cursed my victuals. That seems strange. Well, what Godwills, man must bow to. "

The supper was flung out into the yard. 

Jorian took his wife home, and heavy sadness reigned in Eli's house thatnight. 

Meantime, where was Clement?

Lying at full length upon the floor of the convent church, with his lipsupon the lowest step of the altar, in an indescribable state of terror, misery, penitence, and self-abasement: through all which struggledgleams of joy that Margaret was alive. 

Night fell and found him lying there weeping and praying; and morningwould have found him there too; but he suddenly remembered that, absorbed in his own wrongs and Margaret's, he had committed another sinbesides intemperate rage. He had neglected a dying man. 

He rose instantly, groaning at his accumulated wickedness, and set outto repair the omission. The weather had changed; it was raining hard, and when he got clear of the town, he heard the wolves baying; they wereon the foot, But Clement was himself again, or nearly; he thought littleof danger or discomfort, having a shameful omission of religious duty torepair: he went stoutly forward through rain and darkness. 

And as he went, he often beat his breast, and cried, "MEA CULPA! MEACULPA!"

CHAPTER LXXXIX

What that sensitive mind, and tender conscience, and loving heart, andreligious soul, went through even in a few hours, under a situation sosudden and tremendous, is perhaps beyond the power of words to paint. 

Fancy yourself the man; and then put yourself in his place! Were I towrite a volume on it, we should have to come to that at last. 

I shall relate his next two overt acts. They indicate his state of mindafter the first fierce tempest of the soul had subsided. Afterspending the night with the dying hermit in giving and receiving holyconsolations, he set out not for Rotterdam, but for Tergou. He wentthere to confront his fatal enemy the burgomaster, and by means of thatparchment, whose history, by-the-by was itself a romance, to make himdisgorge; and give Margaret her own. 

Heated and dusty, he stopped at the fountain, and there began to eat hisblack bread and drink of the water. But in the middle of his frugal meala female servant came running, and begged him to come and shrive herdying master, He returned the bread to his wallet, and followed herwithout a word. 

She took him--to the Stadthouse. 

He drew back with a little shudder when he saw her go in. 

But he almost instantly recovered himself, and followed her into thehouse, and up the stairs. And there in bed, propped up by pillows, layhis deadly enemy, looking already like a corpse. 

Clement eyed him a moment from the door, and thought of all the tower, the wood, the letter. Then he said in a low voice, "Pax vobiscum!" Hetrembled a little while he said it. 

The sick man welcomed him as eagerly as his weak state permitted. "ThankHeaven, thou art come in time to absolve me from my sins, father, andpray for my soul, thou and thy brethren. "

"My son, " said Clement, "before absolution cometh confession. In whichact there must be no reservation, as thou valuest thy soul's weal. Bethink thee, therefore, wherein thou hast most offended God and theChurch, while I offer up a prayer for wisdom to direct thee. "

Clement then kneeled and prayed; and when he rose from his knees, hesaid to Ghysbrecht, with apparent calmness, "My son, confess thy sins. "

"Ah, father, " said the sick man, "they are many and great. "

"Great, then, be thy penitence, my son; so shalt thou find God's mercygreat. "

Ghysbrecht put his hands together, and began to confess with everyappearance of contrition. 

He owned he had eaten meat in mid-Lent. He had often absented himselffrom mass on the Lord's day, and saints' days; and had trifled withother religious observances, which he enumerated with scrupulousfidelity. 

When he had done, the friar said quietly, "'Tis well, my son, These befaults. Now to thy crimes, Thou hadst done better to begin with them. "

"Why, father, what crimes lie to my account if these be none?"

"Am I confessing to thee, or thou to me?" said Clement somewhatseverely. 

"Forgive me, father! Why, surely, I to you. But I know not what you callcrimes. "

"The seven deadly sins, art thou clear of them?"

"Heaven forefend I should be guilty of them. I know them not by name. "

"Many do them all that cannot name them. Begin with that one which leadsto lying, theft, and murder. "

"I am quit of that one, any way. How call you it?"

"AVARICE, my son. "

"Avarice? Oh, as to that, I have been a saving man all my day; but Ihave kept a good table, and not altogether forgotten the poor. But, alas, I am a great sinner, Mayhap the next will catch me, What is thenext?"

"We have not yet done with this one. Bethink thee, the Church is not tobe trifled with. "

"Alas! am I in a condition to trifle with her now? Avarice? Avarice?"

He looked puzzled and innocent. 

"Hast thou ever robbed the fatherless?" inquired the friar. 

"Me? robbed the fatherless?" gasped Ghysbrecht; "not that I mind. "

"Once more, my son, I am forced to tell thee thou art trifling with theChurch. Miserable man! another evasion, and I leave thee, and fiendswill straightway gather round thy bed, and tear thee down to thebottomless pit. "

"Oh, leave me not! leave me not!" shrieked the terrified old man. "TheChurch knows all. I must have robbed the fatherless. I will confess. Whoshall I begin with? My memory for names is shaken. "

The defence was skilful, but in this case failed. 

"Hast thou forgotten Floris Brandt?" said Clement stonily. 

The sick man reared himself in bed in a pitiable state of terror. "Howknew you that?" said he. 

"The Church knows many things, " said Clement coldly, "and by many waysthat are dark to thee, Miserable impenitent, you called her to yourside, hoping to deceive her, You said, 'I will not confess to the curebut to some friar who knows not my misdeeds. So will I cheat the Churchon my deathbed, and die as I have lived, ' But God, kinder to thee thanthou art to thyself, sent to thee one whom thou couldst not deceive. Hehas tried thee; He was patient with thee, and warned thee not to triflewith Holy Church; but all is in vain; thou canst not confess; for thouart impenitent as a stone. Die, then, as thou hast lived. Methinks I seethe fiends crowding round the bed for their prey. They wait but for meto go. And I go. "

He turned his back; but Ghysbrecht, in extremity of terror, caught himby the frock. "Oh, holy man, mercy! stay. I will confess all, all. Irobbed my friend Floris, Alas! would it had ended there; for he lostlittle by me; but I kept the land from Peter his son, and from Margaret, Peter's daughter. Yet I was always going to give it back; but Icouldn't, I couldn't. "

"Avarice, my son, avarice, Happy for thee 'tis not too late. "

"No; I will leave it her by will. She will not have long to wait for itnow; not above a month or two at farthest. "

"For which month's possession thou wouldst damn thy soul for ever, Thoufool!"

The sick man groaned, and prayed the friar to be reasonable. 

The friar firmly, but gently and persuasively, persisted, and withinfinite patience detached the dying man's gripe from another'sproperty. There were times when his patience was tried, and he was onthe point of thrusting his hand into his bosom and producing the deed, which he had brought for that purpose; but after yesterday's outbreakhe was on his guard against choler; and to conclude, he conquered hisimpatience; he conquered a personal repugnance to the man, so strongas to make his own flesh creep all the time he was struggling with thismiser for his soul; and at last, without a word about the deed, he wonupon him to make full and prompt restitution. 

How the restitution was made will be briefly related elsewhere: alsocertain curious effects produced upon Ghysbrecht by it; and when and onwhat terms Ghysbrecht and Clement parted. 

I promised to relate two acts of the latter, indicative of his mind. 

This is one. The other is told in two words. 

As soon as he was quite sure Margaret had her own, and was a richwoman--

He disappeared. 

CHAPTER XC

It was the day after that terrible scene: the little house in theHoog Straet was like a grave, and none more listless and dejected thanCatherine, so busy and sprightly by nature, After dinner, her eyes redwith weeping, she went to the convent to try and soften Gerard, and laythe first stone at least of a reconciliation. 

It was some time before she could make the porter understand whom shewas seeking. Eventually she learned he had left late last night, and wasnot expected back, She went sighing with the news to Margaret. She foundher sitting idle, like one with whom life had lost its savour; she hadher boy clasped so tight in her arms, as if he was all she had left, andshe feared some one would take him too. Catherine begged her to come tothe Hoog Straet. 

"What for?" sighed Margaret. "You cannot but say to yourselves, she isthe cause of all. "

"Nay, nay, " said Catherine, "we are not so ill-hearted, and Eli is sofond on you; you will maybe soften him. "

"Oh, if you think I can do any good, I'll come, " said Margaret, with aweary sigh. 

They found Eli and a carpenter putting up another name in place ofCornelis and Sybrandt's; and what should that name be but MargaretBrandt's. 

With all her affection for Margaret, this went through poor Catherinelike a knife. "The bane of one is another's meat, " said she. 

"Can he make me spend the money unjustly?" replied Margaret coldly. 

"You are a good soul, " said Catherine. "Ay, so best, sith he is thestrongest. "

The next day Giles dropped in, and Catherine told the story all infavour of the black sheep, and invited his pity for them, anathematizedby their brother, and turned on the wide world by their father. ButGiles's prejudices ran the other way; he heard her out, and told herbluntly the knaves had got off cheap; they deserved to be hanged atMargaret's door into the bargain, and dismissing them with contempt, crowed with delight at the return of his favourite. "I'll show him, "said he, "what 'tis to have a brother at court with a heart to serve afriend, and a head to point the way. "

"Bless thee, Giles, " murmured Margaret softly. 

"Thou wast ever his stanch friend, dear Giles, " said little Kate; "butalack, I know not what thou canst do for him now. "

Giles had left them, and all was sad and silent again, when awell-dressed man opened the door softly, and asked was Margaret Brandthere. 

"D'ye hear, lass? You are wanted, " said Catherine briskly. In her theGossip was indestructible. 

"Well, mother, " said Margaret listlessly, "and here I am. "

A shuffling of feet was heard at the door, and a colourless, feeble oldman was assisted into the room. It was Ghysbrecht Van Swieten. Atsight of him Catherine shrieked, and threw her apron over her head, andMargaret shuddered violently, and turned her head swiftly away, not tosee him. 

A feeble voice issued from the strange visitor's lips, "Good people, adying man hath come to ask your forgiveness. "

"Come to look on your work, you mean, " said Catherine, taking down herapron and bursting out sobbing. "There, there, she is fainting; look toher, Eli, quick. "

"Nay, " said Margaret, in a feeble voice, "the sight of him gave me aturn, that is all, Prithee, let him say his say, and go; for he is themurderer of me and mine. "

"Alas, " said Ghysbrecht, "I am too feeble to say it standing and no onebiddeth me sit down. "

Eli, who had followed him into the house, interfered here, and said, half sullenly, half apologetically, "Well, burgomaster, 'tis not ourwont to leave a visitor standing whiles we sit. But man, man, you havewrought us too much ill. " And the honest fellow's voice began to shakewith anger he fought hard to contain, because it was his own house. 

Then Ghysbrecht found an advocate in one who seldom spoke in vain inthat family. 

It was little Kate. "Father, mother, " said she, "my duty to you, butthis is not well. Death squares all accounts, And see you not death inhis face? I shall not live long, good friends; and his time is shorterthan mine. "

Eli made haste and set a chair for their dying enemy with his own hands. Ghysbrecht's attendants put him into it. "Go fetch the boxes, " said he. They brought in two boxes, and then retired, leaving their master alonein the family he had so cruelly injured. 

Every eye was now bent on him, except Margaret's. He undid the boxeswith unsteady fingers, and brought out of one the title-deeds of aproperty at Tergou. "This land and these houses belonged to FlorisBrandt, and do belong to thee of right, his granddaughter. These I didusurp for a debt long since defrayed with interest. These I now restoretheir rightful owner with penitent tears. In this other box are threehundred and forty golden angels, being the rent and fines I havereceived from that land more than Floris Brandt's debt to me, I havekept it compt, still meaning to be just one day; but Avarice withheldme, pray, good people, against temptation! I was not born dishonest: yetyou see. "

"Well, to be sure!" cried Catherine. "And you the burgomaster! Hastwhipt good store of thieves in thy day. However, " said she, on secondthoughts, "'tis better late than never, What, Margaret, art deaf? Thegood man hath brought thee back thine own. Art a rich woman. Alack, whata mountain o' gold!"

"Bid him keep land and gold, and give me back my Gerard, that he stolefrom me with his treason, " said Margaret, with her head still averted. 

"Alas!" said Ghysbrecht, "would I could, what I can I have done. Is itnought? It cost me a sore struggle; and I rose from my last bed to do itmyself, lest some mischance should come between her and her rights. "

"Old man, " said Margaret, "since thou, whose idol is pelf, hast donethis, God and the saints will, as I hope, forgive thee. As for me, I amneither saint nor angel, but only a poor woman, whose heart thou hastbroken, Speak to him, Kate, for I am like the dead. "

Kate meditated a little while; and then her soft silvery voice felllike a soothing melody upon the air, "My poor sister hath a sorrow thatriches cannot heal, Give her time, Ghysbrecht; 'tis not in nature sheshould forgive thee all. Her boy is fatherless; and she is neither maid, wife, nor widow; and the blow fell but two days syne, that laid herheart a bleeding. "

A single heavy sob from Margaret was the comment to these words. 

"Therefore, give her time! And ere thou diest, she will forgive theeall, ay, even to pleasure me, that haply shall not be long behind thee, Ghysbrecht. Meantime, we, whose wounds be sore, but not so deep as hers, do pardon thee, a penitent and a dying man; and I, for one, will prayfor thee from this hour; go in peace!"

Their little oracle had spoken; it was enough. Eli even invited himto break a manchet and drink a stoup of wine to give him heart for hisjourney. 

But Ghysbrecht declined, and said what he had done was a cordial to him, "Man seeth but a little way before him, neighbour. This land I clungso to it was a bed of nettles to me all the time. 'Tis gone; and I feelhappier and livelier like for the loss on't. "

He called his men, and they lifted him into the litter. 

When he was gone Catherine gloated over the money. She had never seenso much together, and was almost angry with Margaret, for "sitting outthere like an image. " And she dilated on the advantages of money. 

And she teased Margaret till at last she prevailed on her to come andlook at it. 

"Better let her be, mother, " said Kate, "How can she relish gold, with aheart in her bosom liker lead?" But Catherine persisted. 

The result was, Margaret looked down at all her wealth with wonderingeyes. Then suddenly wrung her hands and cried with piercing anguish, "TOO LATE! TOO LATE!" And shook off her leaden despondency, only to gointo strong hysterics over the wealth that came too late to be sharedwith him she loved. 

A little of this gold, a portion of this land, a year or two ago, whenit was as much her own as now; and Gerard would have never left her sidefor Italy or any other place. 

"Too late! Too late!"

CHAPTER XCI

Not many days after this came the news that Margaret Van Eyck was deadand buried. By a will she had made a year before, she left all herproperty, after her funeral expenses and certain presents to ReichtHeynes, to her dear daughter Margaret Brandt, requesting her to keepReicht as long as unmarried. 

By this will Margaret inherited a furnished house, and pictures andsketches that in the present day would be a fortune: among the pictureswas one she valued more than a gallery of others. 

It represented "A Betrothal. " The solemnity of the ceremony was markedin the grave face of the man, and the demure complacency of the woman. She was painted almost entirely by Margaret Van Eyck, but the restof the picture by Jan. The accessories were exquisitely finished, andremain a marvel of skill to this day. Margaret Brandt sent word toReicht to stay in the house till such time as she could find the heartto put foot in it, and miss the face and voice that used to meet herthere; and to take special care of the picture "in the little cubboord:"meaning the diptych. 

The next thing was, Luke Peterson came home, and heard that Gerard was amonk. 

He was like to go mad with joy. He came to Margaret, and said--"heed, mistress. If he cannot marry you I can. "

"You?" said Margaret. "Why, I have seen him. "

"But he is a friar. "

"He was my husband, and my boy's father long ere he was a friar. And Ihave seen him, I've seen him. "

Luke was thoroughly puzzled. "I'll tell you what, " said he; "I havegot a cousin a lawyer. I'll go and ask him whether you are married orsingle. "

"Nay, I shall ask my own heart, not a lawyer. So that is your regard forme; to go making me the town talk, oh, fie!"

"That is done already without a word from me. "

"But not by such as seek my respect. And if you do it, never come nighme again. "

"Ay, " said Luke, with a sigh, "you are like a dove to all the rest; butyou are a hardhearted tyrant to me. "

"'Tis your own fault, dear Luke, for wooing me. That is what lets mefrom being as kind to you as I desire, Luke, my bonny lad, listen tome. I am rich now; I can make my friends happy, though not myself. Lookround the street, look round the parish. There is many a quean in itfairer than I twice told, and not spoiled with weeping. Look high; andtake your choice. Speak you to the lass herself, and I'll speak to themother; they shall not say thee nay; take my word for't. "

"I see what ye mean, " said Luke, turning very red. "But if I can't haveyour liking, I will none o' your money. I was your servant when you werepoor as I; and poorer. No; if you would liever be a friar's leman thanan honest man's wife, you are not the woman I took you for: so part wewithouten malice: seek you your comfort on yon road, where never a shedid find it yet, and for me, I'll live and die a bachelor. Good even, mistress. "

"Farewell, dear Luke; and God forgive you for saying that to me. "

For some days Margaret dreaded, almost as much as she desired, thecoming interview with Gerard. She said to herself, "I wonder not hekeeps away a while; for so should I. " However, he would hear he wasa father; and the desire to see their boy would overcome everything. "And, " said the poor girl to herself, "if so be that meeting does notkill me, I feel I shall be better after it than I am now. "

But when day after day went by, and he was not heard of, a freezingsuspicion began to crawl and creep towards her mind. What if his absencewas intentional? What if he had gone to some cold-blooded monks hisfellows, and they had told him never to see her more? The convent hadere this shown itself as merciless to true lovers as the grave itself. 

At this thought the very life seemed to die out of her. 

And now for the first time deep indignation mingled at times with hergrief and apprehension. "Can he have ever loved me? To run from me andhis boy without a word! Why, this poor Luke thinks more of me than hedoes. "

While her mind was in this state, Giles came roaring. "I've hit theclout; our Gerard is Vicar of Gouda. "

A very brief sketch of the dwarf's court life will suffice to preparethe reader for his own account of this feat. Some months before he wentto court his intelligence had budded. He himself dated the change froma certain 8th of June, when, swinging by one hand along with the week'swashing on a tight rope in the drying ground, something went crackinside his head; and lo! intellectual powers unchained. At court hisshrewdness and bluntness of speech, coupled with his gigantic voice andhis small stature, made him a Power: without the last item I fear theywould have conducted him to that unpopular gymnasium, the gallows. Theyoung Duchess of Burgundy, and Marie the heiress apparent, both pettedhim, as great ladies have petted dwarfs in all ages; and the court poetmelted butter by the six-foot rule, and poured enough of it down hisback to stew Goliah in. He even amplified, versified, and enfeebledcertain rough and ready sentences dictated by Giles. 

The centipedal prolixity that resulted went to Eli by letter, thusentitled--

 "The high and puissant Princess Marie of Bourgogne her lytel jantilman hys complaynt of y' Coort, and praise of a rusticall lyfe, versificated, and empapyred by me the lytel jantilman's right lovynge and obsequious servitor, etc. "

But the dwarf reached his climax by a happy mixture of mind and muscle;thus:

The day before a grand court joust he challenged the Duke's giant toa trial of strength. This challenge made the gravest grin, and arousedexpectation. 

Giles had a lofty pole planted ready, and at the appointed hour went upit like a squirrel, and by strength of arm made a right angle with hisbody, and so remained: then slid down so quickly, that the high andpuissant princess squeaked, and hid her face in her hands, not to seethe demise of her pocket-Hercules. 

The giant effected only about ten feet, then looked ruefully up andruefully down, and descended, bathed in perspiration to argue thematter. 

"It was not the dwarf's greater strength, but his smaller body. "

The spectators received this excuse with loud derision. There was thefact, the dwarf was great at mounting a pole: the giant only great atexcuses. In short Giles had gauged their intellects: with his own bodyno doubt. 

"Come, " said he, "an ye go to that, I'll wrestle ye, my lad, if so beyou will let me blindfold your eyne. "

The giant, smarting under defeat, and thinking he could surely recoverit by this means, readily consented. 

"Madam, " said Giles, "see you yon blind Samson? At a signal from me heshall make me a low obeisance, and unbonnet to me. "

"How may that be, being blinded?" inquired a maid of honour. 

"I'll wager on Giles for one, " said the princess. 

"That is my affair. "

When several wagers were laid pro and con, Giles hit the giant in thebread-basket. He went double (the obeisance), and his bonnet fell off. 

The company yelled with delight at this delicate stroke of wit, andGiles took to his heels. The giant followed as soon as he could recoverhis breath and tear off his bandage. But it was too late; Giles hadprepared a little door in the wall, through which he could pass, but nota giant, and had coloured it so artfully, it looked like a wall; thisdoor he tore open, and went headlong through, leaving no vestige butthis posy, written very large upon the reverse of his trick door--

 Long limbs, big body, panting wit By wee and wise is bet and bit

After this Giles became a Force. 

He shall now speak for himself. 

Finding Margaret unable to believe the good news, and sceptical as tothe affairs of Holy Church being administered by dwarfs, he narrated asfollows:

"When the princess sent for me to her bedroom as of custom, to keep herout of languor, I came not mirthful nor full of country dicts, as is mywont, but dull as lead. 

"'Why, what aileth thee?' quo' she. 'Art sick?' 'At heart, ' quo' I. 'Alas, he is in love, ' quo' she. Whereat five brazen hussies, which theycall them maids of honour, did giggle loud. 'Not so mad as that, ' saidI, 'seeing what I see at court of women folk. '

"'There, ladies, ' quo' the princess, 'best let him a be. 'Tis a liberalmannikin, and still giveth more than he taketh of saucy words. '

"'In all sadness, ' quo' she, 'what is the matter?'

"I told her I was meditating, and what perplexed me was, that other folkcould now and then keep their word, but princes never. 

"'Heyday, ' says she, 'thy shafts fly high this morn. ' I told her, 'Ay, for they hit the Truth. '

"She said I was as keen as keen; but it became not me to put riddles toher, nor her to answer them. 'Stand aloof a bit, mesdames, ' said she, 'and thou speak withouten fear;' for she saw I was in sad earnest. 

"I began to quake a bit; for mind ye, she can doff freedom and dondignity quicker than she can slip out of her dressing-gown into kirtleof state. But I made my voice so soft as honey (wherefore smilest?), andI said 'Madam, one evening, a matter of five years agone, as ye satwith your mother, the Countess of Charolois, who is now in heaven, worseluck, you wi' your lute, and she wi' her tapestry, or the like, do yemind there came came into ye a fair youth with a letter from a painterbody, one Margaret Van Eyck?"

"She said she thought she did, 'Was it not a tall youth, exceedingcomely?'

"'Ay, madam, ' said I; 'he was my brother. '

"'Your brother?' said she, and did eye me like all over, (What dostsmile at?")

"So I told her all that passed between her and Gerard, and how she wasfor giving him a bishopric; but the good countess said, 'Gently, Marie!he is too young; and with that they did both promise him a living:'Yet, ' said I, 'he hath been a priest a long while, and no living. Hencemy bile. '

"'Alas!' said she, ''tis not by my good will; for all this thou hast saidis sooth, and more. I do remember my dear mother said to me, "See thouto it if I be not here. "' So then she cried out, 'Ay, dear mother, noword of thine shall ever fall to the ground. '

"I, seeing her so ripe, said quickly, 'Madam, the Vicar of Gouda diedlast week. ' (For when ye seek favours of the great, behoves ye know thevery thing ye aim at. )

"'Then thy brother is vicar of Gouda, ' quo' she, 'so sure as I amheiress of Burgundy and the Netherlands. Nay, thank me not, good Giles, 'quo' she, 'but my good mother. And I do thank thee for giving of mesomewhat to do for her memory. And doesn't she fall a weeping for hermother? And doesn't that set me off a-snivelling for my good brotherthat I love so dear, and to think that a poor little elf like me couldyet speak in the ear of princes, and make my beautiful brother vicar ofGouda; eh, lass, it is a bonny place, and a bonny manse, and hawthorn inevery bush at spring-tide, and dog-roses and eglantine in every summerhedge. I know what the poor fool affects, leave that to me. "

The dwarf began his narrative strutting to and fro before Margaret, buthe ended it in her arms; for she could not contain herself, but caughthim, and embraced him warmly. "Oh, Giles, " she said, blushing, andkissing him, "I cannot keep my hands off thee, thy body it is so little, and thy heart so great. Thou art his true friend. Bless thee! blessthee! bless thee! Now we shall see him again. We have not set eyes onhim since that terrible day. "

"Gramercy, but that is strange, " said Giles. "Maybe he is ashamed ofhaving cursed those two vagabones, being our own flesh and blood, worseluck. "

"Think you that is why he hides?" said Margaret eagerly;

"Ay, if he is hiding at all. However, I'll cry him by bellman. 

"Nay, that might much offend him. "

"What care I? Is Gouda to go vicarless and the manse in nettles?"

And to Margaret's secret satisfaction, Giles had the new vicar cried inRotterdam and the neighbouring towns. He easily persuaded Margaret thatin a day or two Gerard would be sure to hear, and come to his benefice. She went to look at his manse, and thought how comfortable it might bemade for him, and how dearly she should love to do it. 

But the days rolled on, and Gerard came neither to Rotterdam nor Gouda. Giles was mortified, Margaret indignant, and very wretched. She said toherself, "Thinking me dead, he comes home, and now, because I am alive, he goes back to Italy, for that is where he has gone. "

Joan advised her to consult the hermit of Gouda. 

"Why, sure he is dead by this time. "

"Yon one, belike. But the cave is never long void; Gouda ne'er wants ahermit. "

But Margaret declined to go again to Gouda on such an errand, "What canhe know, shut up in a cave? less than I, belike. Gerard hath gone backt' Italy. He hates me for not being dead. "

Presently a Tergovian came in with a word from Catherine that GhysbrechtVan Swieten had seen Gerard later than any one else. On this Margaretdetermined to go and see the house and goods that had been left her, andtake Reicht Heynes home to Rotterdam. And as may be supposed, her stepstook her first to Ghysbrecht's house. She found him in his garden, seated in a chair with wheels. He greeted her with a feeble voice, butcordially; and when she asked him whether it was true he had seenGerard since the fifth of August, he replied, "Gerard no more, but FriarClement. Ay, I saw him; and blessed be the day he entered my house. "

He then related in his own words his interview with Clement. 

He told her, moreover, that the friar had afterwards acknowledged hecame to Tergou with the missing deed in his bosom on purpose to make himdisgorge her land; but that finding him disposed towards penitence, hehad gone to work the other way. 

"Was not this a saint; who came to right thee, but must needs save hisenemy's soul in the doing it?"

To her question, whether he had recognized him, he said, "I ne'ersuspected such a thing. 'Twas only when he had been three days with methat he revealed himself, Listen while I speak my shame and his praise. 

"I said to him, 'The land is gone home, and my stomach feels lighter;but there is another fault that clingeth to me still;' then told I himof the letter I had writ at request of his brethren, I whose place itwas to check them. Said I, 'Yon letter was writ to part two lovers, andthe devil aiding, it hath done the foul work. Land and houses I cangive back, but yon mischief is done for ever. ' 'Nay, ' quoth he, 'not forever, but for life. Repent it then while thou livest. ' 'I shall, ' saidI, 'but how can God forgive it? I would not, ' said I, 'were I He. '

"'Yet will He certainly forgive it, ' quoth he; 'for He is ten times moreforgiving than I am, and I forgive thee. ' I stared at him; and then hesaid softly, but quavering like, 'Ghysbrecht, look at me closer. I amGerard, the son of Eli. ' And I looked, and looked, and at last, lo! itwas Gerard. Verily I had fallen at his feet with shame and contrition, but he would not suffer me. 'That became not mine years and his, for aparticular fault. I say not I forgive thee without a struggle, ' said he, 'not being a saint. But these three days thou hast spent in penitence, I have worn under thy roof in prayer; and I do forgive thee. ' Those werehis very words. "

Margaret's tears began to flow, for it was in a broken and contritevoice the old man told her this unexpected trait in her Gerard. Hecontinued, "And even with that he bade me farewell. 

"'My work here is done now, ' said he. I had not the heart to stay him;for let him forgive me ever so, the sight of me must be wormwood tohim. He left me in peace, and may a dying man's blessing wait on him, gowhere he will. Oh, girl, when I think of his wrongs, and thine, and howhe hath avenged himself by saving this stained soul of mine, my heart isbroken with remorse, and these old eyes shed tears by night and day. "

"Ghysbrecht, " said Margaret, weeping, "since he hath forgiven thee, Iforgive thee too: what is done, is done; and thou hast let me know thisday that which I had walked the world to hear. But oh, burgomaster, thouart an understanding man, now help a poor woman, which hath forgiventhee her misery. "

She then told him all that had befallen, "And, " said she, "they will notkeep the living for him for ever. He bids fair to lose that, as well asbreak all our hearts. "

"Call my servant, " cried the burgomaster, with sudden vigour. 

He sent him for a table and writing materials, and dictated letters tothe burgomasters in all the principal towns in Holland, and one to aPrussian authority, his friend. His clerk and Margaret wrote them, and he signed them. "There, " said he, "the matter shall be despatchedthroughout Holland by trusty couriers, and as far as Basle inSwitzerland; and fear not, but we will soon have the vicar of Gouda tohis village. "

She went home animated with fresh hopes, and accusing herself ofingratitude to Gerard. "I value my wealth now, " said she. 

She also made a resolution never to blame his conduct till she shouldhear from his own lips his reason. 

Not long after her return from Tergou a fresh disaster befell. Catherine, I must premise, had secret interviews with the black sheep, the very day after they were expelled; and Cornelis followed her toTergou, and lived there on secret contributions, but Sybrandt chose toremain in Rotterdam. Ere Catherine left, she asked Margaret to lend hertwo gold angels. "For, " said she, "all mine are spent. " Margaret wasdelighted to lend them or give them; but the words were scarce out ofher mouth ere she caught a look of regret and distress on Kate's face, and she saw directly whither her money was going. She gave Catherine themoney, and went and shut herself up with her boy. Now this money was tolast Sybrandt till his mother could make some good excuse for visitingRotterdam again, and then she would bring the idle dog some of her ownindustrious savings. 

But Sybrandt, having gold in his pocket, thought it inexhaustible: andbeing now under no shadow of restraint, led the life of a complete sot;until one afternoon, in a drunken frolic, he climbed on the roof of thestable at the inn he was carousing in, and proceeded to walk along it, afeat he had performed many times when sober. But now his unsteady brainmade his legs unsteady, and he rolled down the roof and fell with aloud thwack on to an horizontal paling, where he hung a moment in asemicircle; then toppled over and lay silent on the ground, amidst roarsof laughter from his boon companions. When they came to pick him up hecould not stand; but fell down giggling at each attempt. 

On this they went staggering and roaring down the street with him, and carried him at great risk of another fall to the shop in the HoogStraet. For he had babbled his own shame all over the place. 

As soon as he saw Margaret he hiccupped out, "Here is the doctor thatcures all hurts, a bonny lass. " He also bade her observe he bore her nomalice, for he was paying her a visit sore against his will. "Wherefore, prithee send away these drunkards, and let you and me have t'otherglass, to drown all unkindness. "

All this time Margaret was pale and red by turns at sight of her enemyand at his insolence; but one of the men whispered what had happened, and a streaky something in Sybrandt's face arrested her attention. 

"And he cannot stand up, say you?"

"A couldn't just now. Try, comrade! Be a man now!"

"I am a better man than thou, " roared Sybrandt. "I'll stand up and fightye all for a crown. "

He started to his feet, and instantly rolled into his attendant's armswith a piteous groan. He then began to curse his boon companions, anddeclare they had stolen away his legs. "He could feel nothing below thewaist. "

"Alas, poor wretch, " said Margaret. She turned very gravely to the men, and said, "Leave him here. And if you have brought him to this, go onyour knees, for you have spoiled him for life. He will never walk again;his back is broken. "

The drunken man caught these words, and the foolish look of intoxicationfled, and a glare of anguish took its place. "The curse, " he groaned;"the curse!"

Margaret and Reicht Heynes carried him carefully, and laid him on thesoftest bed. 

"I must do as he would do, " whispered Margaret. "He was kind toGhysbrecht. "

Her opinion was verified, Sybrandt's spine was fatally injured; andhe lay groaning and helpless, fed and tended by her he had so deeplyinjured. 

The news was sent to Tergou, and Catherine came over. 

It was a terrible blow to her. Moreover, she accused herself as thecause. "Oh, false wife; oh, weak mother, " she cried, "I am rightlypunished for my treason to my poor Eli. "

She sat for hours at a time by his bedside rocking herself in silence, and was never quite herself again; and the first grey hairs began tocome in her poor head from that hour. 

As for Sybrandt, all his cry was now for Gerard, He used to whineto Margaret like a suffering hound, "Oh, sweet Margaret, oh, bonnyMargaret, for our Lady's sake find Gerard, and bid him take his curseoff me. Thou art gentle, thou art good; thou wilt entreat for me, and hewill refuse thee nought. "

Catherine shared his belief that Gerard could cure him, and joined herentreaties to his, Margaret hardly needed this. The burgomaster and hisagents having failed, she employed her own, and spent money like water. And among these agents poor Luke enrolled himself. She met him one daylooking very thin, and spoke to him compassionately. On this he beganto blubber, and say he was more miserable than ever; he would like to begood friends again upon almost any terms. 

"Dear heart, " said Margaret sorrowfully, "why can you not say toyourself, now I am her little brother, and she is my old, marriedsister, worn down with care? Say so, and I will indulge thee, and petthee, and make thee happier than a prince. "

"Well, I will, " said Luke savagely, "sooner than keep away from youaltogether. But above all give me something to do. Perchance I may havebetter luck this time. "

"Get me my marriage lines, " said Margaret, turning sad and gloomy in amoment. 

"That is as much as to say, get me him! for where they are, he is. "

"Not so. He may refuse to come nigh me; but certes he will not deny apoor woman, who loved him once, her lines of betrothal. How can she gowithout them into any honest man's house?"

"I'll get them you if they are in Holland, " said Luke. 

"They are as like to be in Rome, " replied Margaret. 

"Let us begin with Holland, " observed Luke prudently. 

The slave of love was furnished with money by his soft tyrant, andwandered hither and thither, Coopering, and carpentering, and lookingfor Gerard. "I can't be worse if I find the vagabone, " said he, "and Imay be a hantle better. "

The months rolled on, and Sybrandt improved in spirit, but not in body;he was Margaret's pensioner for life; and a long-expected sorrow fellupon poor Catherine, and left her still more bowed down; and she losther fine hearty bustling way, and never went about the house singingnow; and her nerves were shaken, and she lived in dread of some terriblemisfortune falling on Cornelis. The curse was laid on him as well asSybrandt. She prayed Eli, if she had been a faithful partner all theseyears, to take Cornelis into his house again, and let her live awhile atRotterdam. 

"I have good daughters here, " said she; "but Margaret is so tender, and thoughtful, and the little Gerard, he is my joy; he grows liker hisfather every day, and his prattle cheers my heavy heart; and I do lovechildren. "

And Eli, sturdy but kindly, consented sorrowfully. 

And the people of Gouda petitioned the duke for a vicar, a real vicar. "Ours cometh never nigh us, " said they, "this six months past; ourchildren they die unchristened, and our folk unburied, except by somechance comer. " Giles' influence baffled this just complaint once; but asecond petition was prepared, and he gave Margaret little hope that thepresent position could be maintained a single day. 

So then Margaret went sorrowfully to the pretty manse to see it for thelast time, ere it should pass for ever into stranger's hands. 

"I think he would have been happy here, " she said, and turned heart-sickaway. 

On their return, Reicht Heynes proposed to her to go and consult thehermit. 

"What, " said Margaret, "Joan has been at you. She is the one forhermits. I'll go, if 'tis but to show thee they know no more than wedo. " And they went to the cave. 

It was an excavation partly natural, partly artificial, in a bank ofrock overgrown by brambles. There was a rough stone door on hinges, anda little window high up, and two apertures, through one of which thepeople announced their gifts to the hermit, and put questions of allsorts to him; and when he chose to answer, his voice came dissonant andmonstrous out at another small aperture. 

On the face of the rock this line was cut--

Felix qui in Domino nixus ab orbe fugit. 

Margaret observed to her companion that this was new since she was herelast. 

"Ay, " said Reicht, "like enough;" and looked up at it with awe. Writingeven on paper she thought no trifle; but on rock! She whispered, "Tisa far holier hermit than the last; he used to come in the town now andthen, but this one ne'er shows his face to mortal man. "

"And that is holiness?"

"Ay, sure. "

"Then what a saint a dormouse must be?"

"Out, fie, mistress. Would ye even a beast to a man?"

"Come, Reicht, " said Margaret, "my poor father taught me overmuch, So Iwill e'en sit here, and look at the manse once more. Go thou forward andquestion thy solitary, and tell me whether ye get nought or nonsenseout of him, for 'twill be one. "

As Reicht drew near the cave a number of birds flew out of it. , She gavea little scream, and pointed to the cave to show Margaret they had comethence, On this Margaret felt sure there was no human being in the cave, and gave the matter no further attention, She fell into a deep reveriewhile looking at the little manse. 

She was startled from it by Reicht's hand upon her shoulder, and a faintvoice saying, "Let us go home. "

"You got no answer at all, Reicht, " said Margaret calmly. 

"No, Margaret, " said Reicht despondently. And they returned home. 

Perhaps after all Margaret had nourished some faint secret hope in herheart, though her reason had rejected it, for she certainly went homemore dejectedly. 

Just as they entered Rotterdam, Reicht said, "Stay! Oh, Margaret, I amill at deceit; but 'tis death to utter ill news to thee; I love thee sodear. "

"Speak out, sweetheart, " said Margaret. "I have gone through so much, Iam almost past feeling any fresh trouble. "

"Margaret, the hermit did speak to me. "

"What, a hermit there? among all those birds. "

"Ay; and doth not that show him a holy man?"

"I' God's name, what said he to thee, Reicht?"

"Alas! Margaret, I told him thy story, and I prayed him for our Lady'ssake tell me where thy Gerard is, And I waited long for an answer, andpresently a voice came like a trumpet: 'Pray for the soul of Gerard theson of Eli!"

"Ah!"

"Oh, woe is me that I have this to tell thee, sweet Margaret! bethinkthee thou hast thy boy to live for yet. "

"Let me get home, " said Margaret faintly. 

Passing down the Brede Kirk Straet they saw Joan at the door. Reichtsaid to her, "Eh, woman, she has been to your hermit, and heard no goodnews. "

"Come in, " said Joan, eager for a gossip. 

Margaret would not go in; but she sat down disconsolate on the loweststep but one of the little external staircase that led into Joan'shouse, and let the other two gossip their fill at the top of it. 

"Oh, " said Joan, "what yon hermit says is sure to be sooth, He is thatholy, I am told, that the very birds consort with him. "

"What does that prove?" said Margaret deprecatingly. "I have seen myGerard tame the birds in winter till they would eat from his hand. "

A look of pity at this parallel passed between the other two, but theywere both too fond of her to say what they thought. 

Joan proceeded to relate all the marvellous tales she had heard of thishermit's sanctity; how he never came out but at night, and prayed amongthe wolves, and they never molested him; and now he bade the people notbring him so much food to pamper his body, but to bring him candles. 

"The candles are to burn before his saint, " whispered Reicht solemnly. 

"Ay, lass; and to read his holy books wi'. A neighbour o' mine saw hishand come out, and the birds sat thereon and pecked crumbs. She wentfor to kiss it, but the holy man whippit it away in a trice. They can'tabide a woman to touch 'en, or even look at 'em, saints can't. "

"What like was his hand, wife? Did you ask her?"

"What is my tongue for, else? Why, dear heart, all one as yourn; by thesame token a had a thumb and four fingers. "

"Look ye there now. "

"But a deal whiter nor yourn and mine. "

"Ay, ay. "

"And main skinny. "

"Alas. "

"What could ye expect? Why, a live upon air, and prayer, and candles. "

"Ah, well, " continued Joan; "poor thing, I whiles think 'tis best forher to know the worst. And now she hath gotten a voice from heaven, Oralmost as good, and behoves her pray for his soul. One thing, she is notso poor now as she was; and never fell riches to a better hand; and sheis only come into her own for that matter, so she can pay the priest tosay masses for him, and that is a great comfort. "

In the midst of their gossip, Margaret, in whose ears it was allbuzzing, though she seemed lost in thought, got softly up, and creptaway with her eyes on the ground, and her brows bent. 

"She hath forgotten I am with her, " said Reicht Heynes ruefully. 

She had her gossip out with Joan, and then went home. 

She found Margaret seated cutting out a pelisse of grey cloth, and acape to match. Little Gerard was standing at her side, inside her leftarm, eyeing the work, and making it more difficult by wriggling about, and fingering the arm with which she held the cloth steady, to all whichshe submitted with imperturbable patience and complacency, Fancy a maleworkman so entangled, impeded, worried!

"Ot's that, mammy?"

"A pelisse, my pet. "

"Ot's a p'lisse?"

"A great frock. And this is the cape to't. "

"Ot's it for?"

"To keep his body from the cold; and the cape is for his shoulders, orto go over his head like the country folk. 'Tis for a hermit. "

"Ot's a 'ermit?"

"A holy man that lives in a cave all by himself. "

"In de dark?"

"Ay, whiles. "

"Oh. "

In the morning Reicht was sent to the hermit with the pelisse, and apound of thick candles. 

As she was going out of the door Margaret said to her, "Said you whoseson Gerard was?"

"Nay, not I. "

"Think, girl! How could he call him Gerard, son of Eli, if you had nottold him?"

Reicht persisted she had never mentioned him but as plain Gerard. ButMargaret told her flatly she did not believe her; at which Reicht wasaffronted, and went out with a little toss of the head. However, shedetermined to question the hermit again, and did not doubt he would bemore liberal in his communication when he saw his nice new pelisse andthe candles. 

She had not been gone long when Giles came in with ill news. 

The living of Gouda would be kept vacant no longer. 

Margaret was greatly distressed at this. 

"Oh, Giles, " said she, "ask for another month. They will give theeanother month, maybe. "

He returned in an hour to tell her he could not get a month. 

"They have given me a week, " said he. "And what is a week?"

"Drowning bodies catch at strawen, " was her reply. "A week? a littleweek?"

Reicht came back from her errand out of spirits. Her oracle had declinedall further communication. So at least its obstinate silence mightfairly be interpreted. 

The next day Margaret put Reicht in charge of the shop, and disappearedall day. So the next day, and so the next. Nor would she tell any onewhere she had been. Perhaps she was ashamed. The fact is, she spent allthose days on one little spot of ground. When they thought her dreaming, she was applying to every word that fell from Joan and Reicht the wholepowers of a far acuter mind than either of them possessed. 

She went to work on a scale that never occurred to either of them. Shewas determined to see the hermit, and question him face to face, notthrough a wall. She found that by making a circuit she could get abovethe cave, and look down without being seen by the solitary. But when shecame to do it, she found an impenetrable mass of brambles. After tearingher clothes, and her hands and feet, so that she was soon covered withblood, the resolute, patient girl took out her scissors and steadilysnipped and cut till she made a narrow path through the enemy. But soslow was the work that she had to leave it half done. The next day shehad her scissors fresh ground, and brought a sharp knife as well, andgently, silently, cut her way to the roof of the cave. There she made anambush of some of the cut brambles, so that the passers-by might not seeher, and couched with watchful eye till the hermit should come out. Sheheard him move underneath her. But he never left his cell. She began tothink it was true that he only came out at night. 

The next day she came early and brought a jerkin she was making forlittle Gerard, and there she sat all day, working, and watching withdogged patience. 

At four o'clock the birds began to feed; and a great many of the smallerkinds came fluttering round the cave, and one or two went in. But mostof them, taking a preliminary seat on the bushes, suddenly discoveredMargaret, and went off with an agitated flirt of their little wings. Andalthough they sailed about in the air, they would not enter the cave. Presently, to encourage them, the hermit, all unconscious of the causeof their tremors, put out a thin white hand with a few crumbs in it, Margaret laid down her work softly, and gliding her body forward like asnake, looked down at it from above; it was but a few feet from her. Itwas as the woman described it, a thin, white hand. 

Presently the other hand came out with a piece of bread, and the twohands together broke it and scattered the crumbs. 

But that other hand had hardly been out two seconds ere the violet eyesthat were watching above dilated; and the gentle bosom heaved, and thewhole frame quivered like a leaf in the wind. 

What her swift eye had seen I leave the reader to guess. She suppressedthe scream that rose to her lips, but the effort cost her dear. Soon theleft hand of the hermit began to swim indistinctly before her gloatingeyes; and with a deep sigh her head drooped, and she lay like a brokenlily. 

She was in a deep swoon, to which perhaps her long fast to-day and theagitation and sleeplessness of many preceding days contributed. 

And there lay beauty, intelligence, and constancy, pale and silent, Andlittle that hermit guessed who was so near him. The little birds hoppedon her now, and one nearly entangled his little feet in her rich auburnhair. 

She came back to her troubles. The sun was set. She was very cold, Shecried a little, but I think it was partly from the remains of physicalweakness. And then she went home, praying God and the saints toenlighten her and teach her what to do for the best. 

When she got home she was pale and hysterical, and would say nothing inanswer to all their questions but her favourite word, "We are wading indeep waters. "

The night seemed to have done wonders for her. 

She came to Catherine, who was sitting sighing by the fireside, andkissed her, and said--

"Mother, what would you like best in the world?"

"Eh, dear, " replied Catherine despondently, "I know nought that wouldmake me smile now; I have parted from too many that were dear to me. Gerard lost again as soon as found; Kate in heaven; and Sybrandt downfor life. "

"Poor mother! Mother dear, Gouda manse is to be furnished, and cleaned, and made ready all in a hurry, See, here be ten gold angels. Make themgo far, good mother; for I have ta'en over many already from my boy fora set of useless loons that were aye going to find him for me. "

Catherine and Reicht stared at her a moment in silence, and then outburst a flood of questions, to none of which would she give a reply. "Nay, " said she, "I have lain on my bed and thought, and thought, andthought whiles you were all sleeping; and methinks I have got the clueto all, I love you, dear mother; but I'll trust no woman's tongue. If Ifail this time, I'll have none to blame but Margaret Brandt. "

A resolute woman is a very resolute thing. And there was a deep, doggeddetermination in Margaret's voice and brow that at once convincedCatherine it would be idle to put any more questions at that time, She and Reicht lost themselves in conjectures; and Catherine whisperedReicht, "Bide quiet; then 'twill leak out;" a shrewd piece of advice, founded on general observation. 

Within an hour Catherine was on the road to Gouda in a cart, with twostout girls to help her, and quite a siege artillery of mops, and pails, and brushes, She came back with heightened colour, and something of theold sparkle in her eye, and kissed Margaret with a silent warmth thatspoke volumes, and at five in the morning was off again to Gouda. 

That night as Reicht was in her first sleep a hand gently pressedher shoulder, and she awoke, and was going to scream, "Whisht, " saidMargaret, and put her finger to her lips. 

She then whispered, "Rise softly, don thy habits, and come with me!"

When she came down, Margaret begged her to loose Dragon and bring himalong. Now Dragon was a great mastiff, who had guarded Margaret Van Eyckand Reicht, two lone women, for some years, and was devotedly attachedto the latter. 

Margaret and Reicht went out, with Dragon walking majestically behindthem. They came back long after midnight, and retired to rest. 

Catherine never knew. 

Margaret read her friends: she saw the sturdy, faithful Frisian couldhold her tongue, and Catherine could not. Yet I am not sure she wouldhave trusted even Reicht had her nerve equalled her spirit; but withall her daring and resolution, she was a tender, timid woman, a littleafraid of the dark, very afraid of being alone in it, and desperatelyafraid of wolves. Now Dragon could kill a wolf in a brace of shakes; butthen Dragon would not go with her, but only with Reicht; so altogethershe made one confidante. 

The next night they made another moonlight reconnaissance, and as Ithink, with some result. For not the next night (it rained that nightand extinguished their courage), but the next after they took with thema companion, the last in the world Reicht Heynes would have thought of;yet she gave her warm approval as soon as she was told he was to go withthem. 

Imagine how these stealthy assailants trembled and panted when themoment of action came; imagine, if you can, the tumult in Margaret'sbreast, the thrilling hopes, chasing, and chased by sickening fears;the strange and perhaps unparalleled mixture of tender familiarity anddistant awe with which a lovely and high-spirited, but tender, adoringwoman, wife in the eye of the Law, and no wife in the eye of theChurch, trembling, blushing, paling, glowing, shivering, stole at night, noiseless as the dew, upon the hermit of Gouda. 

And the stars above seemed never so bright and calm. 

CHAPTER XCII

Yes, the hermit of Gouda was the vicar of Gouda, and knew it not, soabsolute was his seclusion. 

My reader is aware that the moment the frenzy of his passion passed, hewas seized with remorse for having been betrayed into it. But perhapsonly those who have risen as high in religious spirit as he had, andsuddenly fallen, can realize the terror at himself that took possessionof him. He felt like one whom self-confidence had betrayed to the veryedge of a precipice. 

"Ah, good Jerome, " he cried, "how much better you knew me than I knewmyself! How bitter yet wholesome was your admonition!"

Accustomed to search his own heart, he saw at once that the true causeof his fury was Margaret. "I love her then better than God, " said hedespairingly; "better than the Church, From such a love what can springto me, or to her?" He shuddered at the thought. "Let the strong battletemptation; 'tis for the weak to flee. And who is weaker than I haveshown myself? What is my penitence, my religion? A pack of cards builtby degrees into a fair-seeming structure; and lo! one breath of earthlylove, and it lies in the dust, I must begin again, and on a surerfoundation. " He resolved to leave Holland at once, and spend years ofhis life in some distant convent before returning to it. By that timethe temptations of earthly passion would be doubly baffled; and olderand a better monk, he should be more master of his earthly affections, and Margaret, seeing herself abandoned, would marry, and love another, The very anguish this last thought cost him showed the self-searcher andself-denier that he was on the path of religious duty. 

But in leaving her for his immortal good and hers, he was not toneglect her temporal weal. Indeed, the sweet thought, he could make hercomfortable for life, and rich in this world's goods, which she was notbound to despise, sustained him in the bitter struggle it cost him toturn his back on her without one kind word or look, "Oh, what will shethink of me?" he groaned. "Shall I not seem to her of all creatures themost heartless, inhuman? but so best; ay, better she should hate me, miserable that I am, Heaven is merciful, and giveth my broken heart thiscomfort; I can make that villain restore her own, and she shall neverlose another true lover by poverty. Another? Ah me! ah me! God and thesaints to mine aid!"

How he fared on this errand has been related. But first, as you mayperhaps remember, he went at night to shrive the hermit of Gouda. Hefound him dying, and never left him till he had closed his eyes andburied him beneath the floor of the little oratory attached to his cell. It was the peaceful end of a stormy life. The hermit had been a soldier, and even now carried a steel corselet next his skin, saying he was nowChrist's soldier as he had been Satan's. When Clement had shriven himand prayed by him, he, in his turn, sought counsel of one who was dyingin so pious a frame, The hermit advised him to be his successor in thispeaceful retreat. "His had been a hard fight against the world, theflesh, and the devil, and he had never thoroughly baffled them till heretired into the citadel of Solitude. "

These words and the hermit's pious and peaceful death, which speedilyfollowed, and set as it were the seal of immortal truth on them, made adeep impression upon Clement. Nor in his case had they any prejudice tocombat; the solitary recluse was still profoundly revered in the Church, whether immured as an anchorite or anchoress in some cave or cellbelonging to a monastery, or hidden in the more savage but laxerseclusion of the independent hermitage. And Clement knew more about thehermits of the Church than most divines at his time of life; he had readmuch thereon at the monastery near Tergou, had devoured their liveswith wonder and delight in the manuscripts of the Vatican, and conversedearnestly about them with the mendicant friars of several nations. Before Printing these friars were the great circulators of those localannals and biographies which accumulated in the convents of every land. Then his teacher, Jerome, had been three years an anchorite on theheights of Camaldoli, where for more than four centuries the Thebaid hadbeen revived; and Jerome, cold and curt on most religious themes, waswarm with enthusiasm on this one. He had pored over the annals ofSt. John Baptist's abbey, round about which the hermit's caves werescattered, and told him the names of many a noble, and many a famouswarrior who had ended his days there a hermit, and of many a bishop andarchbishop who had passed from the see to the hermitage, or from thehermitage to the see. Among the former the Archbishop of Ravenna; amongthe latter Pope Victor the Ninth. He told him too, with grim delight, oftheir multifarious austerities, and how each hermit set himself to findwhere he was weakest, and attacked himself without mercy or remissiontill there, even there, he was strongest. And how seven times in thetwenty-four hours, in thunder, rain, or snow, by daylight, twilight, moonlight, or torchlight, the solitaries flocked from distant points, over rugged precipitous ways, to worship in the convent church; atmatins, at prime, tierce, sexte, nones, vespers, and compline. Heeven, under eager questioning, described to him the persons of famousanchorites he had sung the Psalter and prayed with there; the onlyintercourse their vows allowed, except with special permission. Moncata, Duke of Moncata and Cardova, and Hidalgo of Spain, who in the flower ofhis youth had retired thither from the pomps, vanities, and pleasures ofthe world; Father John Baptist of Novara, who had led armies tobattle, but was now a private soldier of Christ; Cornelius, Samuel, and Sylvanus. This last, when the great Duchess de' Medici obtained thePope's leave, hitherto refused, to visit Camaldoli, went down and mether at the first wooden cross, and there, surrounded as she was withcourtiers and flatterers, remonstrated with her, and persuaded her, andwarned her, not to profane that holy mountain, where no woman for somany centuries had placed her foot; and she, awed by the place and theman, retreated with all her captains, soldiers, courtiers, and pagesfrom that one hoary hermit. At Basle Clement found fresh materials, especially with respect to German and English anchorites; and he hadeven prepared a "Catena Eremitarum" from the year of our Lord 250, whenPaul of Thebes commenced his ninety years of solitude, down to the year1470. He called them Angelorum amici et animalium, i. E. 

FRIENDS OF ANGELS AND ANIMALS. 

Thus, though in those days he never thought to be a recluse, the roadwas paved, so to speak; and when the dying hermit of Gouda blessed thecitadel of Solitude, where he had fought the good fight and won it, andinvited him to take up the breast-plate of faith that now fell off hisown shrunken body, Clement said within himself: "Heaven itself led myfoot hither to this end. " It struck him, too, as no small coincidencethat his patron, St. Bavon, was a hermit, and an austere one, acuirassier of the solitary cell. 

As soon as he was reconciled to Ghysbrecht Van Swieten, he went eagerlyto his abode, praying Heaven it might not have been already occupied inthese three days. The fear was not vain; these famous dens never wanteda human tenant long. He found the rude stone door ajar; then he madesure he was too late; he opened the door and went softly in. No; thecell was vacant, and there were the hermit's great ivory crucifix, hispens, ink, seeds, and, memento mori, a skull; his cilice of hair, andanother of bristles; his well-worn sheepskin pelisse and hood; hishammer, chisel, and psaltery, etc. Men and women had passed thatway, but none had ventured to intrude, far less to steal. Faith andsimplicity had guarded that keyless door more securely than the housesof the laity were defended by their gates like a modern gaol, and thinkiron bars at every window, and the gentry by moat, bastion, chevaux defrise, and portcullis. 

As soon as Clement was fairly in the cell there was a loud flap, and aflutter, and down came a great brown owl from a corner, and whirled outof the window, driving the air cold on Clement's face, He started andshuddered. 

Was this seeming owl something diabolical? trying to deter him from hissoul's good? On second thoughts, might it not be some good spiritthe hermit had employed to keep the cell for him, perhaps the hermithimself? Finally he concluded that it was just an owl, and that he wouldtry and make friends with it. 

He kneeled down and inaugurated his new life with prayer. 

Clement had not only an earthly passion to quell, the power of whichmade him tremble for his eternal weal, but he had a penance to do forhaving given way to ire, his besetting sin, and cursed his own brothers. 

He looked round this roomy cell furnished with so many comforts, andcompared it with the pictures in his mind of the hideous place, eremusin eremo, a desert in a desert, where holy Jerome, hermit, and thePlutarch of hermits, had wrestled with sickness, temptation, and despairfour mortal years; and with the inaccessible and thorny niche, a holein a precipice, where the boy hermit Benedict buried himself, and livedthree years on the pittance the good monk Romanus could spare him fromhis scanty commons, and subdivided that mouthful with his friend, araven; and the hollow tree of his patron St. Bavon; and the earthlypurgatory at Fribourg, where lived a nameless saint in a horrid cavern, his eyes chilled with perpetual gloom, and his ears stunned with aneternal waterfall; and the pillar on which St. Simeon Stylita existedforty-five years; and the destina, or stone box, of St. Dunstan, where, like Hilarion in his bulrush hive, sepulchro potius quam domu, he couldscarce sit, stand, or lie; and the living tombs, sealed with lead, ofThais, and Christina, and other recluses; and the damp dungeon of St. Alred. These and scores more of the dismal dens in which true hermitshad worn out their wasted bodies on the rock, and the rock under theirsleeping bodies, and their praying knees, all came into his mind, and hesaid to himself, "This sweet retreat is for safety of the soul; but whatfor penance Jesu aid me against faults to come; and for the fault I rue, face of man I will not see for a twelvemonth and a day. " He had famousprecedents in his eye even for this last and unusual severity. In factthe original hermit of this very cell was clearly under the same vow. Hence the two apertures, through which he was spoken to, and replied. 

Adopting, in other respects, the uniform rule of hermits and anchorites, he divided his day into the seven offices, ignoring the pettyaccidents of light and dark, creations both of Him to whom he prayed sounceasingly. He learned the psalter by heart, and in all the intervalsof devotion, not occupied by broken slumbers, he worked hard with hishands. No article of the hermit's rule was more strict or more ancientthan this. And here his self-imposed penance embarrassed him, forwhat work could he do, without being seen, that should benefit hisneighbours? for the hermit was to labour for himself in those cases onlywhere his subsistence depended on it. Now Clement's modest needs wereamply supplied by the villagers. 

On moonlight nights he would steal out like a thief, and dig somepoor man's garden on the outskirts of the village. He made baskets anddropped them slily at humble doors. 

And since he could do nothing for the bodies of those who passed by hiscell in daytime, he went out in the dead of the night with his hammerand his chisel, and carved moral and religious sentences all down theroad upon the sandstone rocks. "Who knows?" said he, "often a chanceshaft strikes home. "

Oh, sore heart, comfort thou the poor and bereaved with holy words ofsolace in their native tongue; for he said "well, 'tis 'clavis ad cordaplebis. '" Also he remembered the learned Colonna had told him ofthe written mountains in the east, where kings had inscribed theirvictories, "What, " said Clement, "are they so wise, those Easternmonarchs, to engrave their war-like glory upon the rock, making a bloodbubble endure so long as earth; and shall I leave the rocks about mesilent on the King of Glory, at whose word they were, and at whosebreath they shall be dust? Nay, but these stones shall speak to wearywayfarers of eternal peace, and of the Lamb, whose frail and afflictedyet happy servant worketh them among. "

Now at this time the inspired words that have consoled the poor and theafflicted for so many ages were not yet printed in Dutch, so that thesesentences of gold from the holy evangelists came like fresh oraclesfrom heaven, or like the dew on parched flowers; and the poor hermit'swritten rocks softened a heart Or two, and sent the heavy laden singingon their way(1). 

These holy oracles that seemed to spring up around him like magic; hisprudent answers through his window to such as sought ghostly counsel;and above all, his invisibility, soon gained him a prodigiousreputation, This was not diminished by the medical advice they now andthen extorted from him sore against his will, by tears and entreaties;for if the patients got well they gave the holy hermit the credit, andif not they laid all the blame on the devil. "I think he killed nobody, for his remedies were womanish and weak. " Sage and wormwood, sion, hyssop, borage, spikenard, dog's-tongue, our Lady's mantle, feverfew, and Faith, and all in small quantities except the last. 

Then his abstinence, sure sign of a saint. The eggs and milk theybrought him at first he refused with horror. Know ye not the hermit'srule is bread, or herbs, and water? Eggs, they are birds in disguise;for when the bird dieth, then the egg rotteth. As for milk, it is littlebetter than white blood. And when they brought him too much bread herefused it. Then they used to press it on him. "Nay, holy father; givethe overplus to the poor. "

"You who go among the poor can do that better. Is bread a thing to flinghaphazard from an hermit's window?" And to those who persisted afterthis: "To live on charity, yet play Sir Bountiful, is to lie with theright hand. Giving another's to the poor, I should beguile them of theirthanks, and cheat thee the true giver. Thus do thieves, whose boast itis they bleed the rich into the lap of the poor. Occasio avaritiae nomenpauperum. "

When nothing else would convince the good souls, this piece of Latinalways brought them round. So would a line of Virgil's Aeneid. 

This great reputation of sanctity was all external. Inside the cell wasa man who held the hermit of Gouda as cheap as dirt. 

"Ah!" said he, "I cannot deceive myself; I cannot deceive God's animals. See the little birds, how coy they be; I feed and feed them, and longfor their friendship, yet will they never come within, nor take my hand, by lighting on't. For why? No Paul, no Benedict, no Hugh of Lincoln, noColumba, no Guthlac bides in this cell. Hunted doe flieth not hither, for here is no Fructuosus, nor Aventine, nor Albert of Suabia; nor e'ena pretty squirrel cometh from the wood hard by for the acorns I havehoarded; for here abideth no Columban. The very owl that was here hathfled. They are not to be deceived; I have a Pope's word for that; Heavenrest his soul. "

Clement had one advantage over her whose image in his heart he was benton destroying. 

He had suffered and survived the pang of bereavement, and the mindcannot quite repeat such anguish. Then he had built up a habit oflooking on her as dead. After that strange scene in the church andchurchyard of St. Laurens, that habit might be compared to a structureriven by a thunderbolt. It was shattered, but stones enough stood tofound a similar habit on; to look on her as dead to him. 

And by severe subdivision of his time and thoughts, by unceasing prayersand manual labour, he did in about three months succeed in benumbing theearthly half of his heart. 

But lo! within a day or two of this first symptom of mental peacereturning slowly, there descended upon his mind a horrible despondency. 

Words cannot utter it, for words never yet painted a likeness ofdespair. Voices seemed to whisper in his ear, "Kill thyself! kill! kill!kill!"

And he longed to obey the voices, for life was intolerable. 

He wrestled with his dark enemy with prayers and tears; he prayed Godbut to vary his temptation. "Oh let mine enemy have power to scourge mewith red-hot whips, to tear me leagues and leagues over rugged placesby the hair of my head, as he has served many a holy hermit, that yetbaffled him at last; to fly on me like a raging lion; to gnaw me witha serpent's fangs; any pain, any terror, but this horrible gloom of thesoul that shuts me from all light of Thee and of the saints. "

And now a freezing thought crossed him. What if the triumphs of thepowers of darkness over Christian souls in desert places had beensuppressed, and only their defeats recorded, or at least in full; fordark hints were scattered about antiquity that now first began to grinat him with terrible meaning. 

"THEY WANDERED IN THE DESERT AND PERISHED BY SERPENTS, " said an ancientfather of hermits that went into solitude, "and were seen no more. " Andanother at a more recent epoch wrote: Vertuntur ad melancholiam: "theyturn to gloomy madness. " These two statements, were they not one? forthe ancient fathers never spoke with regret of the death of the body. No, the hermits so lost were perished souls, and the serpents werediabolical (2) thoughts, the natural brood of solitude. 

St. Jerome went into the desert with three companions; one fled in thefirst year, two died; how? The single one that lasted was a giganticsoul with an iron body. 

The cotemporary who related this made no comment, expressed no wonder, What, then, if here was a glimpse of the true proportion in every age, and many souls had always been lost in solitude for one gigantic mindand iron body that survived this terrible ordeal. 

The darkened recluse now cast his despairing eyes over antiquity to seewhat weapons the Christian arsenal contained that might befriend him. The greatest of all was prayer. Alas! it was a part of his malady tobe unable to pray with true fervour. The very system of mechanicalsupplication he had for months carried out so severely by rule hadrather checked than fostered his power of originating true prayer. 

He prayed louder than ever, but the heart hung back cold and gloomy, andlet the words go up alone. 

"Poor wingless prayers, " he cried, "you will not get half-way toheaven. "

A fiend of this complexion had been driven out of King Saul by music. 

Clement took up the hermit's psaltery, and with much trouble mended thestrings and tuned it. 

No, he could not play it. His soul was so out of tune. The sounds jarredon it, and made him almost mad. 

"Ah, wretched me!" he cried; "Saul had a saint to play to him. He wasnot alone with the spirits of darkness; but here is no sweet bard ofIsrael to play to me; I, lonely, with crushed heart, on which a blackfiend sitteth mountain high, must make the music to uplift that heartto heaven; it may not be. " And he grovelled on the earth weeping andtearing his hair. 

VERTEBATUR AD MELANCHOLIAM. 

 (1) It requires nowadays a strong effort of the imagination to realize the effect on poor people who had never seen them before of such sentences as this

 "Blessed are the poor" etc. 

 (2) The primitive writer was so interpreted by others besides Clement; and in particular by Peter of Blois, a divine of the twelfth century, whose comment is noteworthy, as he himself was a forty-year hermit. 

CHAPTER XCIII

One day as he lay there sighing and groaning, prayerless, tuneless, hopeless, a thought flashed into his mind. What he had done for thepoor and the wayfarer, he would do for himself. He would fill his den ofdespair with the name of God and the magic words of holy writ, and thepious, prayerful consolations of the Church. 

Then, like Christian at Apollyon's feet, he reached his hand suddenlyout and caught, not his sword, for he had none, but peaceful labour'shumbler weapon, his chisel, and worked with it as if his soul dependedon his arm. 

They say that Michael Angelo in the next generation used to carvestatues, not like our timid sculptors, by modelling the work in clay, and then setting a mechanic to chisel it, but would seize the block, conceive the image, and at once, with mallet and steel, make the marblechips fly like mad about him, and the mass sprout into form. Even soClement drew no lines to guide his hand. He went to his memory for thegracious words, and then dashed at his work and eagerly graved them inthe soft stone, between working and fighting. 

He begged his visitors for candle ends, and rancid oil. 

"Anything is good enough for me, " he said, "if 'twill but burn. " So atnight the cave glowed afar off like a blacksmith's forge, through thewindow and the gaping chinks of the rude stone door, and the rusticsbeholding crossed themselves and suspected deviltries, and within theholy talismans, one after another, came upon the walls, and the sparksand the chips flew day and night, night and day, as the soldier ofSolitude and of the Church plied, with sighs and groans, his bloodlessweapon, between working and fighting. 

Kyrie Eleison. 

Christe Eleison. 

{ton Satanan suntripson upo tous pothas ymwn}(1)

Sursum Corda. (2)

Deus Refugium nostrum et virtus. (3)

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi miserere mihi. (4)

Sancta Trinitas unus Deus, miserere nobis. (5)

Ab infestationibus Daemonum, a ventura ira, a damnatione perpetua. Libera nos Domine. (6)

Deus, qui miro ordine Angelorum ministeria, etc, (the whole collect). (7)

Quem quaerimus adjutorem nisi te Domine qui pro peccatis nostris justeirascaris? (8)

Sancte Deus, Sancte fortis, Sancte et misericors Salvator, amarae mortine tradas nos. 

And underneath the great crucifix, which was fastened to the wall, hegraved this from Augustine:

O anima Christiana, respice vulnera patientis, sanguinem morientis, pretium redemptionis. Haec quanta sint cogitate, et in statera mentisvestrae appendite, ut totus vobis figatur in corde, qui pro vobis totusfixus est in cruce. Nam si passio Christi ad memoriam revocetur, nihilest tam durum quod non aequo animo toleretur. 

Which may be thus rendered: O Christian soul, look on the wounds ofthe suffering One, the blood of the dying One, the price paid for ourredemption! These things, oh, think how great they be, and weigh them inthe balance of thy mind: that He may be wholly nailed to thy heart, who for thee was all nailed unto the cross. For do but call to mind thesufferings of Christ, and there is nought on earth too hard to endurewith composure. 

Soothed a little, a very little, by the sweet and pious words he wasraising all round him, and weighed down with watching and working nightand day, Clement one morning sank prostrate with fatigue, and a deepsleep overpowered him for many hours. Awaking quietly, he heard a littlecheep; he opened his eyes, and lo! upon his breviary, which was on a lowstool near his feet, ruffling all his feathers with a single pull, andsmoothing them as suddenly, and cocking his bill this way and that witha vast display of cunning purely imaginary, perched a robin redbreast. 

Clement held his breath. 

He half closed his eyes lest they should frighten the airy guest. 

Down came robin on the floor. 

When there he went through his pantomime of astuteness; and then, pim, pim, pim, with three stiff little hops, like a ball of worsted onvertical wires, he was on the hermit's bare foot. On this eminence heswelled and contracted again, with ebb and flow of feathers; but Clementlost this, for he quite closed his eyes and scarce drew his breath infear of frightening and losing his visitor. He was content to feel theminute claw on his foot. He could but just feel it, and that by help ofknowing it was there. 

Presently a little flirt with two little wings, and the featheredbusybody was on the breviary again. 

Then Clement determined to try and feed this pretty little fidgetwithout frightening it away. But it was very difficult. 

He had a piece of bread within reach, but how get at it? I think he wasfive minutes creeping his hand up to that bread, and when there he mustnot move his arm. 

He slily got a crumb between a finger and thumb and shot it as boys domarbles, keeping the hand quite still. 

Cockrobin saw it fall near him, and did sagacity, but moved not. 

When another followed, and then another, he popped down and caught upone of the crumbs, but not quite understanding this mystery fled withit, for more security, to an eminence; to wit, the hermit's knee. 

And so the game proceeded till a much larger fragment than usual rolledalong. 

Here was a prize. Cockrobin pounced on it, bore it aloft, and fled soswiftly into the world with it, the cave resounded with the buffetedair. 

"Now, bless thee, sweet bird, " sighed the stricken solitary; "thy wingsare music, and thou a feathered ray camedst to light my darkened soul. "

And from that to his orisons, and then to his tools with a little bit ofcourage, and this was his day's work:

 Veni, Creator Spiritus, Mentes tuorem visita, Imple superna gratia Quae tu creasti pectora

 Accende lumen sensibus, Mentes tuorum visita, Infirma nostri corporis, Virtute firmans perpeti. 

And so the days rolled on; and the weather got colder, and Clement'sheart got warmer, and despondency was rolling away; and by-and-by, somehow or another, it was gone. He had outlived it. 

It had come like a cloud, and it went like one. 

And presently all was reversed; his cell seemed illuminated with joy. His work pleased him; his prayers were full of unction; his psalms ofpraise. Hosts of little birds followed their crimson leader, and flyingfrom snow, and a parish full of Cains, made friends one after anotherwith Abel; fast friends. And one keen frosty night as he sang thepraises of God to his tuneful psaltery, and his hollow cave rang forththe holy psalmody upon the night, as if that cave itself was Tubal'ssurrounding shell, or David's harp, he heard a clear whine, notunmelodious; it became louder and less in tune. He peeped throughthe chinks of his rude door, and there sat a great red wolf moaningmelodiously with his nose high in the air. 

Clement was rejoiced. "My sins are going, " he cried, "and the creaturesof God are owning me, one after another. " And in a burst of enthusiasmhe struck up the laud:

"Praise Him all ye creatures of His!

"Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord. "

And all the time he sang the wolf bayed at intervals. 

But above all he seemed now to be drawing nearer to that celestialintercourse which was the sign and the bliss of the true hermit; for hehad dreams about the saints and angels, so vivid, they were more likevisions. He saw bright figures clad in woven snow. They bent on him eyeslovelier than those of the antelope's he had seen at Rome, and fannedhim with broad wings hued like the rainbow, and their gentle voices badehim speed upon his course. 

He had not long enjoyed this felicity when his dreams began to takeanother and a strange complexion. He wandered with Fra Colonna over therelics of antique nations, and the friar was lame and had a staff, and this staff he waved over the mighty ruins, and were they Egyptian, Greek, or Roman, straightway the temples and palaces, whose wrecks theywere, rose again like an exhalation, and were thronged with the famousdead. Songsters that might have eclipsed both Apollo and his rivalpoured forth their lays; women, god-like in form, and draped likeMinerva, swam round the marble courts in voluptuous but easy andgraceful dances. Here sculptors carved away amidst admiring pupils, andforms of supernatural beauty grew out of Parian marble in a quarter ofan hour; and grave philosophers conversed on high and subtle matters, with youth listening reverently; it was a long time ago. And stillbeneath all this wonderful panorama a sort of suspicion or expectationlurked in the dreamer's mind. "This is a prologue, a flourish, there issomething behind; something that means me no good, something mysterious, awful. "

And one night that the wizard Colonna had transcended himself, hepointed with his stick, and there was a swallowing up of many greatancient cities, and the pair stood on a vast sandy plain with a hugecrimson sun sinking to rest, There were great palm-trees; and therewere bulrush hives, scarce a man's height, dotted all about to the sandyhorizon, and the crimson sun. 

"These are the anchorites of the Theban desert, " said Colonna calmly;"followers not of Christ and His apostles, and the great fathers, butof the Greek pupils of the Egyptian pupils of the Brachmans andGymnosophists. "

And Clement thought that he burned to go and embrace the holy men andtell them his troubles, and seek their advice. But he was tied by thefeet somehow, and could not move, and the crimson sun sank, and it gotdusk, and the hives scarce visible, And Colonna's figure became shadowyand shapeless, but his eyes glowed ten times brighter; and this thingall eyes spoke and said: "Nay, let them be, a pack of fools I see howdismal it all is. " Then with a sudden sprightliness, "But I hear one ofthem has a manuscript of Petronius, on papyrus; I go to buy it; farewellfor ever, for ever, for ever. "

And it was pitch dark, and a light came at Clement's back like a gentlestroke, a glorious roseate light. It warmed as well as brightened. Itloosened his feet from the ground; he turned round, and there, her faceirradiated with sunshine, and her hair glittering like the gloriola of asaint, was Margaret Brandt. 

She blushed and smiled and cast a look of ineffable tenderness on him, "Gerard, " she murmured, "be whose thou wilt by day, but at night bemine!"

Even as she spoke, the agitation of seeing her so suddenly awakened him, and he found himself lying trembling from head to foot. 

That radiant figure and mellow voice seemed to have struck his nightlykeynote. 

Awake he could pray, and praise, and worship God; he was master of histhoughts. But if he closed his eyes in sleep, Margaret, or Satan in hershape, beset him, a seeming angel of light. He might dream of a thousanddifferent things, wide as the poles asunder, ere he woke the imperialfigure was sure to come and extinguish all the rest in a moment, stellasexortus uti aetherius sol; for she came glowing with two beauties neverbefore united, an angel's radiance and a woman's blushes. 

Angels cannot blush. So he knew it was a fiend. 

He was alarmed, but not so much surprised as at the demon's lastartifice. From Anthony to Nicholas of the Rock scarce hermit that hadnot been thus beset; sometimes with gay voluptuous visions, sometimeswith lovely phantoms, warm, tangible, and womanly without, demonswithin, nor always baffled even by the saints. Witness that "angel formwith a devil's heart" that came hanging its lovely head, like a bruisedflower, to St. Macarius, with a feigned tale, and wept, and wept, andwept, and beguiled him first of his tears and then of half his virtue. 

But with the examples of Satanic power and craft had come down copiousrecords of the hermits' triumphs and the weapons by which they hadconquered. 

Domandum est Corpus; the body must be tamed; this had been theirwatchword for twelve hundred years. It was a tremendous war-cry; forthey called the earthly affections, as well as appetites, body, andcrushed the whole heart through the suffering and mortified flesh. 

Clement then said to himself that the great enemy of man had retiredbut to spring with more effect, and had allowed him a few days oftrue purity and joy only to put him off his guard against the softblandishments he was pouring over the soul that had survived thebuffeting of his black wings. He applied himself to tame the body, heshortened his sleep, lengthened his prayers, and increased his severetemperance to abstinence. Hitherto, following the ordinary rule, he hadeaten only at sunset. Now he ate but once in forty-eight hours, drinkinga little water every day. 

On this the visions became more distinct. 

Then he flew to a famous antidote, to "the grand febrifuge" ofanchorites--cold water. 

He found the deepest part of the stream that ran by his cell; it rosenot far off at a holy well; and clearing the bottom of the large stones, made a hole where he could stand in water to the chin, and fortified byso many examples, he sprang from his rude bed upon the next diabolicalassault, and entered the icy water. 

It made him gasp and almost shriek with the cold. It froze his marrow. "I shall die, " he cried, "I shall die; but better this than fireeternal. "

And the next day he was so stiff in all his joints he could not move, and he seemed one great ache. And even in sleep he felt that his verybones were like so many raging teeth, till the phantom he dreaded cameand gave one pitying smile, and all the pain was gone. 

Then, feeling that to go into the icy water again, enfeebled by fastsas he was, might perhaps carry the guilt of suicide, he scourged himselftill the blood ran, and so lay down smarting. And when exhaustion beganto blunt the smart down to a throb, that moment the present was away, and the past came smiling back. He sat with Margaret at the duke'sfeast, the minstrels played divinely, and the purple fountains gushed. Youth and love reigned in each heart, and perfumed the very air. 

Then the scene shifted, and they stood at the altar together man andwife. And no interruption this time, and they wandered hand in hand, andtold each other their horrible dreams. As for him, "he had dreamed shewas dead, and he was a monk; and really the dream had been so vivid andso full of particulars that only his eyesight could even now convincehim it was only a dream, and they were really one. "

And this new keynote once struck, every tune ran upon it. Awake hewas Clement the hermit, risen from unearthly visions of the night, asdangerous as they were sweet; asleep he was Gerard Eliassoen, the happyhusband of the loveliest and best, and truest girl in Holland: all thehappier that he had been for some time the sport of hideous dreams, inwhich he had lost her. 

His constant fasts, coupled with other austerities, and the deep mentalanxiety of a man fighting with a supernatural foe, had now reducedhim nearly to a skeleton; but still on those aching bones hung fleshunsubdued, and quivering with an earthly passion; so, however, hethought; "or why had ill spirits such power over him?" His opinion wasconfirmed, when one day he detected himself sinking to sleep actuallywith a feeling of complacency, because now Margaret would come and heshould feel no more pain, and the unreal would be real, and the realunreal, for an hour. 

On this he rose hastily with a cry of dismay, and stripping to the skinclimbed up to the brambles above his cave, and flung himself on them, and rolled on them writhing with the pain: then he came into his den amass of gore, and lay moaning for hours; till, out of sheer exhaustion, he fell into a deep and dreamless sleep. 

He awoke to bodily pain, and mental exultation; he had broken the fatalspell. Yes, it was broken; another and another day passed, and her imagemolested him no more. But he caught himself sighing at his victory. 

The birds got tamer and tamer, they perched upon his hand. Two of themlet him gild their little claws. Eating but once in two days he had moreto give them. 

His tranquility was not to last long. 

A woman's voice came in from the outside, told him his own story in avery few words, and asked him to tell her where Gerard was to be found. 

He was so astounded he could only say, with an instinct of self-defence, "Pray for the soul of Gerard the son of Eli!" meaning that he was deadto the world. And he sat wondering. 

When the woman was gone, he determined, after an inward battle, to riskbeing seen, and he peeped after her to see who it could be; but he tookso many precautions, and she ran so quickly back to her friend, that theroad was clear. 

"Satan!" said he directly. 

And that night back came his visions of earthly love and happiness sovividly, he could count every auburn hair in Margaret's head, and seethe pupils of her eyes. 

Then he began to despair, and said, "I must leave this country; here Iam bound fast in memory's chain;" and began to dread his cell. He said, "A breath from hell hath infected it, and robbed even these holy wordsof their virtue. " And unconsciously imitating St. Jerome, a victimof earthly hallucinations, as overpowering, and coarser, he took hiswarmest covering out into the wood hard by, and there flung down undera tree that torn and wrinkled leather bag of bones, which a little agomight have served a sculptor for Apollo. 

Whether the fever of his imagination intermitted, as a master mind ofour day has shown that all things intermit(9) or that this really brokesome subtle link, I know not, but his sleep was dreamless. 

He awoke nearly frozen, but warm with joy within. 

"I shall yet be a true hermit, Dei gratia, " said he. 

The next day some good soul left on his little platform a new lambs-woolpelisse and cape, warm, soft, and ample. 

He had a moment's misgiving on account of its delicious softness andwarmth; but that passed. It was the right skin(10), and a mark thatHeaven approved his present course. 

It restored warmth to his bones after he came in from his short rest. 

And now, at one moment he saw victory before him if he could but liveto it; at another, he said to himself, "'Tis but another lull; be on thyguard, Clement. "

And this thought agitated his nerves and kept him in continual awe. 

He was like a soldier within the enemy's lines. 

One night, a beautiful clear frosty night, he came back to his cell, after a short rest. The stars were wonderful. Heaven seemed a thousandtimes larger as well as brighter than earth, and to look with a thousandeyes instead of one. 

"Oh, wonderful, " he cried, "that there should be men who do crimes bynight; and others scarce less mad, who live for this little world, andnot for that great and glorious one, which nightly, to all eyes notblinded by custom, reveals its glowing glories. Thank God I am ahermit. "

And in this mood he came to his cell door. 

He paused at it; it was closed. 

"Why, methought I left it open, " said he, "The wind. There is not abreath of wind. What means this?"

He stood with his hand upon the rugged door. He looked through one ofthe great chinks, for it was much smaller in places than the apertureit pretended to close, and saw his little oil wick burning just where hehad left it. 

"How is it with me, " he sighed, "when I start and tremble at nothing?Either I did shut it, or the fiend hath shut it after me to disturb myhappy soul. Retro Sathanas!"

And he entered his cave rapidly, and began with somewhat nervousexpedition to light one of his largest tapers. While he was lighting it, there was a soft sigh in the cave. 

He started and dropped the candle just as it was lighting, and it wentout. 

He stooped for it hurriedly and lighted it, listening intently. 

When it was lighted he shaded it with his hand from behind, and threwthe faint light all round the cell. 

In the farthest corner the outline of the wall seemed broken. 

He took a step towards the place with his heart beating. 

The candle at the same time getting brighter, he saw it was the figureof a woman. 

Another step with his knees knocking together. 

IT WAS MARGARET BRANDT. 

 (1) Beat down Satan under our feet. 

 (2) Up, hearts!

 (3) O God our refuge and strength. 

 (4) O Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world, have mercy upon me!

 (5) O Holy Trinity, one God, have mercy upon us. 

 (6) From the assaults of demons--from the wrath to come-- from everlasting damnation, deliver us, O Lord!

 (7) See the English collect, St. , Michael and all Angels. 

 (8) Of whom may we seek succour but of Thee, O Lord, who for our sins art justly displeased (and that torrent of prayer, the following verse). 

 (9) Dr. Dickson, author of Fallacies of the Faculty, etc. 

 (10) It is related of a mediaeval hermit, that being offered a garment made of cats' skins, he rejected it, saying, "I have heard of a lamb of God but I never heard of a cat of God. "

CHAPTER XCIV

HER attitude was one to excite pity rather than terror, in eyes notblinded by a preconceived notion. Her bosom was fluttering like a bird, and the red and white coming and going in her cheeks, and she had herhand against the wall by the instinct of timid things, she trembledso; and the marvellous mixed gaze of love, and pious awe, and pity, andtender memories, those purple eyes cast on the emaciated and glaringhermit, was an event in nature. 

"Aha!" he cried. "Thou art come at last in flesh and blood; come to meas thou camest to holy Anthony. But I am ware of thee. I thought thywiles were not exhausted. I am armed. " With this he snatched up hissmall crucifix and held it out at her, astonished, and the candle in theother hand, both crucifix and candle shaking violently. "Exorcizo te. "

"Ah, no!" cried she piteously; and put out two pretty deprecating palms. "Alas! work me no ill! It is Margaret. "

"Liar!" shouted the hermit. "Margaret was fair, but not so supernaturalfair as thou. Thou didst shrink at that sacred name, thou subtlehypocrite. In Nomine Dei exorcizo vos. "

"Ah, Jesu!" gasped Margaret, in extremity of terror, "curse me not! Iwill go home. I thought I might come. For very manhood be-Latin me not!Oh, Gerard, is it thus you and I meet after all, after all?"

And she cowered almost to her knees and sobbed with superstitious fearand wounded affection. 

Impregnated as he was with Satanophobia he might perhaps have doubtedstill whether this distressed creature, all woman and nature, wasnot all art and fiend. But her spontaneous appeal to that sacred namedissolved his chimera; and let him see with his eyes, and hear with hisears. 

He uttered a cry of self-reproach, and tried to raise her but what withfasts, what with the overpowering emotion of a long solitude so broken, he could not. "What, " he gasped, shaking over her, "and is it thou? Andhave I met thee with hard words? Alas!" And they were both choked withemotion and could not speak for a while. 

"I heed it not much, " said Margaret bravely, struggling with her tears;"you took me for another: for a devil; oh! oh! oh! oh! oh!"

"Forgive me, sweet soul!" And as soon as he could speak more than a wordat a time, he said, "I have been much beset by the evil one since I camehere. "

Margaret looked round with a shudder. "Like enow. Then oh take my hand, and let me lead thee from this foul place. "

He gazed at her with astonishment. 

"What, desert my cell; and go into the world again? Is it for that thouhast come to me?" said he sadly and reproachfully. 

"Ay, Gerard, I am come to take thee to thy pretty vicarage: art vicarof Gouda, thanks to Heaven and thy good brother Giles; and mother andI have made it so neat for thee, Gerard. 'Tis well enow in winter Ipromise thee. But bide a bit till the hawthorn bloom, and anon thywalls put on their kirtle of brave roses, and sweet woodbine, Have weforgotten thee, and the foolish things thou lovest? And, dear Gerard, thy mother is waiting; and 'tis late for her to be out of her bed:prithee, prithee, come! And the moment we are out of this foul hole I'llshow thee a treasure thou hast gotten, and knowest nought on't, or surehadst never fled from us so. Alas! what is to do? What have I ignorantlysaid, to be regarded thus?"

For he had drawn himself all up into a heap, and was looking at her witha strange gaze of fear and suspicion blended. 

"Unhappy girl, " said he solemnly, yet deeply agitated, "would you haveme risk my soul and yours for a miserable vicarage and the flowers thatgrow on it? But this is not thy doing: the bowelless fiend sends thee, poor simple girl, to me with this bait. But oh, cunning fiend, I willunmask thee even to this thine instrument, and she shall see thee, andabhor thee as I do, Margaret, my lost love, why am I here? Because Ilove thee. "

"Oh! no, Gerard, you love me not or you would not have hidden from me;there was no need. "

"Let there be no deceit between us twain, that have loved so true; andafter this night, shall meet no more on earth. "

"Now God forbid!" said she. 

"I love thee, and thou hast not forgotten me, or thou hadst married erethis, and hadst not been the one to find me, buried here from sight ofman. I am a priest, a monk: what but folly or sin can come of you andme living neighbours, and feeding a passion innocent once, but now (soHeaven wills it) impious and unholy? No, though my heart break I must befirm. 'Tis I that am the man, 'tis I that am the priest. You and I mustmeet no more, till I am schooled by solitude, and thou art wedded toanother. "

"I consent to my doom but not to thine. I would ten times liever die;yet I will marry, ay, wed misery itself sooner than let thee lie inthis foul dismal place, with yon sweet manse awaiting for thee. " Clementgroaned; at each word she spoke out stood clearer and clearer twothings--his duty, and the agony it must cost. 

"My beloved, " said he, with a strange mixture of tenderness and doggedresolution, "I bless thee for giving me one more sight of thy sweetface, and may God forgive thee, and bless thee, for destroying in aminute the holy peace it hath taken six months of solitude to build. Nomatter. A year of penance will, Dei gratia, restore me to my calm. Mypoor Margaret, I seem cruel: yet I am kind: 'tis best we part; ay, thismoment. "

"Part, Gerard? Never: we have seen what comes of parting. Part? Why, youhave not heard half my story; no, nor the tithe, 'Tis not for thy merecomfort I take thee to Gouda manse. Hear me!"

"I may not. Thy very voice is a temptation with its music, memory'sdelight. "

"But I say you shall hear me, Gerard, for forth this place I go notunheard. "

"Then must we part by other means, " said Clement sadly. 

"Alack! what other means? Wouldst put me to thine own door, being thestronger?"

"Nay, Margaret, well thou knowest I would suffer many deaths rather thanput force on thee; thy sweet body is dearer to me than my own; but amillion times dearer to me are our immortal souls, both thine and mine. I have withstood this direst temptation of all long enow. Now I must flyit: farewell! farewell!"

He made to the door, and had actually opened it and got half out, whenshe darted after and caught him by the arm. 

"Nay, then another must speak for me. I thought to reward thee foryielding to me; but unkind that thou art, I need his help I find; turnthen this way one moment. "

"Nay, nay. "

"But I say ay! And then turn thy back on us an thou canst. " She somewhatrelaxed her grasp, thinking he would never deny her so small a favour. But at this he saw his opportunity and seized it. 

"Fly, Clement, fly!" he almost shrieked; and his religious enthusiasmgiving him for a moment his old strength, he burst wildly away from her, and after a few steps bounded over the little stream and ran beside it, but finding he was not followed stopped, and looked back. 

She was lying on her face, with her hands spread out. 

Yes, without meaning it, he had thrown her down and hurt her. 

When he saw that, he groaned and turned back a step; but suddenly, byanother impulse flung himself into the icy water instead. 

"There, kill my body!" he cried, "but save my soul!"

Whilst he stood there, up to his throat in liquid ice, so to speak, Margaret uttered one long, piteous moan, and rose to her knees. 

He saw her as plain almost as in midday. Saw her pale face and her eyesglistening; and then in the still night he heard these words:

"Oh, God! Thou that knowest all, Thou seest how I am used. Forgive methen! For I will not live another day. " With this she suddenly startedto her feet, and flew like some wild creature, wounded to death, close by his miserable hiding-place, shrieking:

"CRUEL!--CRUEL!--CRUEL!--CRUEL!"

What manifold anguish may burst from a human heart in a single syllable. There were wounded love, and wounded pride, and despair, and comingmadness all in that piteous cry. Clement heard, and it froze his heartwith terror and remorse, worse than the icy water chilled the marrow ofhis bones. 

He felt he had driven her from him for ever, and in the midst ofhis dismal triumph, the greatest he had won, there came an almostincontrollable impulse to curse the Church, to curse religion itself, for exacting such savage cruelty from mortal man. At last he crawledhalf dead out of the water, and staggered to his den. "I am safe here, "he groaned; "she will never come near me again; unmanly, ungratefulwretch that I am. " And he flung his emaciated, frozen body down on thefloor, not without a secret hope that it might never rise thence alive. 

But presently he saw by the hour-glass that it was past midnight. 

On this, he rose slowly and took off his wet things, and moaning allthe time at the pain he had caused her he loved, put on the old hermit'scilice of bristles, and over that his breastplate. He had never worneither of these before, doubting himself worthy to don the arms of thattried soldier. But now he must give himself every aid; the bristlesmight distract his earthly remorse by bodily pain, and there might beholy virtue in the breastplate. Then he kneeled down and prayed Godhumbly to release him that very night from the burden of the flesh. Thenhe lighted all his candles, and recited his psalter doggedly; each wordseemed to come like a lump of lead from a leaden heart, and to fallleaden to the ground; and in this mechanical office every now and thenhe moaned with all his soul. In the midst of which he suddenly observeda little bundle in the corner he had not seen before in the feeblerlight, and at one end of it something like gold spun into silk. 

He went to see what it could be; and he had no sooner viewed it closer, than he threw up his hands with rapture. "It is a seraph, " he whispered, "a lovely seraph. Heaven hath witnessed my bitter trial, and approvesmy cruelty; and this flower of the skies is sent to cheer me, faintingunder my burden. "

He fell on his knees, and gazed with ecstasy on its golden hair, and itstender skin, and cheeks like a peach. 

"Let me feast my sad eyes on thee ere thou leavest me for thineever-blessed abode, and my cell darkens again at thy parting, as it didat hers. "

With all this, the hermit disturbed the lovely visitor. He opened widetwo eyes, the colour of heaven; and seeing a strange figure kneelingover him, he cried piteously, "MUMMA! MUM-MA!" And the tears began torun down his little cheeks. 

Perhaps, after all, Clement, who for more than six months had not lookedon the human face divine, estimated childish beauty more justly than wecan; and in truth, this fair northern child, with its long golden hair, was far more angelic than any of our imagined angels. But now the spellwas broken. 

Yet not unhappily. Clement it may be remembered, was fond of children, and true monastic life fosters this sentiment. The innocent distress onthe cherubic face, the tears that ran so smoothly from those transparentviolets, his eyes, and his pretty, dismal cry for his only friend, hismother, went through the hermit's heart. He employed all his gentlenessand all his art to soothe him; and as the little soul was wonderfullyintelligent for his age, presently succeeded so far that he ceased tocry out, and wonder took the place of fear; while, in silence, brokenonly in little gulps, he scanned, with great tearful eyes, this strangefigure that looked so wild, but spoke so kindly, and wore armour, yetdid not kill little boys, but coaxed them. Clement was equally perplexedto know how this little human flower came to lie sparkling and bloomingin his gloomy cave. But he remembered he had left the door wide open, and he was driven to conclude that, owing to this negligence, someunfortunate creature of high or low degree had seized this opportunityto get rid of her child for ever. (1). At this his bowels yearned so overthe poor deserted cherub, that the tears of pure tenderness stood inhis eyes, and still, beneath the crime of the mother, he saw the divinegoodness, which had so directed her heartlessness as to comfort Hisservant's breaking heart. 

"Now bless thee, bless thee, bless thee, sweet innocent, I would notchange thee for e'en a cherub in heaven. "

"At's pooty, " replied the infant, ignoring contemptuously, after themanner of infants, all remarks that did not interest him. 

"What is pretty here, my love, besides thee?"

"Ookum-gars, (2) said the boy, pointing to the hermit's breastplate. 

"Quot liberi, tot sententiunculae!" Hector's child screamed at hisfather's glittering casque and nodding crest; and here was a mediaevalbabe charmed with a polished cuirass, and his griefs assuaged. 

"There are prettier things here than that, " said Clement, "there arelittle birds; lovest thou birds?"

"Nay. Ay. En um ittle, ery ittle? Not ike torks. Hate torks um bigger anbaby. "

He then confided, in very broken language, that the storks with theirgreat flapping wings scared him, and were a great trouble and worry tohim, darkening his existence more or less. 

"Ay, but my birds are very little, and good, and oh, so pretty!"

"Den I ikes 'm, " said the child authoritatively, "I ont my mammy. "

"Alas, sweet dove! I doubt I shall have to fill her place as best I may. Hast thou no daddy as well as mammy, sweet one?"

Now not only was this conversation from first to last, the relativeages, situations, and all circumstances of the parties considered, asstrange a one as ever took place between two mortal creatures, but ator within a second or two of the hermit's last question, to turn thestrange into the marvellous, came an unseen witness, to whom everyword that passed carried ten times the force it did to either of thespeakers. 

Since, therefore, it is with her eyes you must now see, and hear withher ears, I go back a step for her. 

Margaret, when she ran past Gerard, was almost mad. She was in thatstate of mind in which affectionate mothers have been known to killtheir children, sometimes along with themselves, sometimes alone, whichlast is certainly maniacal, She ran to Reicht Heynes pale and trembling, and clasped her round the neck, "Oh, Reicht! oh, Reicht!" and could sayno more. 

Reicht kissed her, and began to whimper; and would you believe it, thegreat mastiff uttered one long whine: even his glimmer of sense taughthim grief was afoot. 

"Oh, Reicht!" moaned the despised beauty, as soon as she could utter aword for choking, "see how he has served me!" and she showed her hands, that were bleeding with falling on the stony ground. "He threw me down, he was so eager to fly from me, He took me for a devil; he said I cameto tempt him. Am I the woman to tempt a man? you know me, Reicht. "

"Nay, in sooth, sweet Mistress Margaret, the last i' the world. "

"And he would not look at my child. I'll fling myself and him into theRotter this night. "

"Oh, fie! fie! eh, my sweet woman, speak not so. Is any man thatbreathes worth your child's life?"

"My child! where is he? Why, Reicht, I have left him behind. Oh, shame!is it possible I can love him to that degree as to forget my child? Ah!I am rightly served for it. "

And she sat down, and faithful Reicht beside her, and they sobbed in oneanother's arms. 

After a while Margaret left off sobbing and said doggedly, "let us gohome. "

"Ay, but the bairn?"

"Oh! he is well where he is. My heart is turned against my very child, He cares nought for him; wouldn't see him, nor hear speak of him; and Itook him there so proud, and made his hair so nice, I did, and put hisnew frock and cowl on him. Nay, turn about: it's his child as well asmine; let him keep it awhile: mayhap that will learn him to think moreof its mother and his own. "

"High words off an empty stomach, " said Reicht. 

"Time will show. Come you home. "

They departed, and Time did show quicker than he levels abbeys, for atthe second step Margaret stopped, and could neither go one way nor theother, but stood stock still. 

"Reicht, " said she piteously, "what else have I on earth? I cannot. "

"Whoever said you could? Think you I paid attention? Words are woman'sbreath. Come back for him without more ado; 'tis time we were in ourbeds, much more he. "

Reicht led the way, and Margaret followed readily enough in thatdirection; but as they drew near the cell, she stopped again. 

"Reicht, go you and ask him, will he give me back my boy; for I couldnot bear the sight of him. "

"Alas! mistress, this do seem a sorry ending after all that hath beenbetwixt you twain. Bethink thee now, doth thine heart whisper no excusefor him? dost verily hate him for whom thou hast waited so long? Oh, weary world!"

"Hate him, Reicht? I would not harm a hair of his head for all that isin nature; but look on him I cannot; I have taken a horror of him. Oh!when I think of all I have suffered for him, and what I came here thisnight to do for him, and brought my own darling to kiss him and callhim father. Ah, Luke, my poor chap, my wound showeth me thine. I havethought too little of thy pangs, whose true affection I despised; andnow my own is despised, Reicht, if the poor lad was here now, he wouldhave a good chance. "

"Well, he is not far off, " said Reicht Heynes; but somehow she did notsay it with alacrity. 

"Speak not to me of any man, " said Margaret bitterly; "I hate them all. "

"For the sake of one?"

"Flout me not, but prithee go forward, and get me what is my own, mysole joy in the world. Thou knowest I am on thorns till I have him to mybosom again. "

Reicht went forward; Margaret sat by the roadside and covered her facewith her apron, and rocked herself after the manner of her country, forher soul was full of bitterness and grief. So severe, indeed, was theinternal conflict, that she did not hear Reicht running back to her, andstarted violently when the young woman laid a hand upon her shoulder. 

"Mistress Margaret!" said Reicht quietly, "take a fool's advice thatloves ye. Go softly to yon cave, wi' all the ears and eyes your motherever gave you. "

"Why? Reicht?" stammered Margaret. 

"I thought the cave was afire, 'twas so light inside; and there werevoices. "

"Voices?"

"Ay, not one, but twain, and all unlike--a man's and a little child'stalking as pleasant as you and me. I am no great hand at a keyhole formy part, 'tis paltry work; but if so be voices were a talking in yoncave, and them that owned those voices were so near to me as those areto thee, I'd go on all fours like a fox, and I'd crawl on my belly likea serpent, ere I'd lose one word that passes atwixt those twain. "

"Whisht, Reicht! Bless thee! Bide thou here. Buss me! Pray for me!"

And almost ere the agitated words had left her lips, Margaret was flyingtowards the hermitage as noiselessly as a lapwing. 

Arrived near it, she crouched, and there was something truly serpentinein the gliding, flexible, noiseless movements by which she reached thevery door, and there she found a chink, and listened. And often it costher a struggle not to burst in upon them; but warned by defeat, she wascautious, and resolute, let well alone, And after a while, slowly andnoiselessly she reared her head, like a snake its crest, to where shesaw the broadest chink of all, and looked with all her eyes and soul, aswell as listened. 

The little boy then being asked whether he had no daddy, at first shookhis head, and would say nothing; but being pressed he suddenly seemed toremember something, and said he, "Dad-da ill man; run away and left poormum-ma. "

She who heard this winced. It was as new to her as to Clement. Someinterfering foolish woman had gone and said this to the boy, and now outit came in Gerard's very face. His answer surprised her; he burst out, "The villain! the monster! he must be born without bowels to desertthee, sweet one, Ah! he little knows the joy he has turned his back on. Well, my little dove, I must be father and mother to thee, since the oneruns away, and t'other abandons thee to my care. Now to-morrow I shallask the good people that bring me my food to fetch some nice eggsand milk for thee as well; for bread is good enough for poor oldgood-for-nothing me, but not for thee. And I shall teach thee to read. "

"I can yead, I can yead. "

"Ay, verily, so young? all the better; we will read good books together, and I shall show thee the way to heaven. Heaven is a beautiful place, athousand times fairer and better than earth, and there be little cherubslike thyself, in white, glad to welcome thee and love thee. Wouldst liketo go to heaven one day?"

"Ay, along wi'-my-mammy. "

"What, not without her then?"

"Nay. I ont my mammy. Where is my mammy?"

(Oh! what it cost poor Margaret not to burst in and clasp him to herheart!)

"Well, fret not, sweetheart, mayhap she will come when thou art asleep. Wilt thou be good now and sleep?"

"I not eepy. Ikes to talk. "

"Well, talk we then; tell me thy pretty name. "

"Baby. " And he opened his eyes with amazement at this great hulkingcreature's ignorance. 

"Hast none other?"

"Nay. "

"What shall I do to pleasure thee, baby? Shall I tell thee a story?"

"I ikes tories, " said the boy, clapping his hands. 

"Or sing thee a song?"

"I ikes tongs, " and he became excited. 

"Choose then, a song or a story. "

"Ting I a tong. Nay, tell I a tory. Nay, ting I a tong. Nay--And thecorners of his little mouth turned down and he had half a mind to weepbecause he could not have both, and could not tell which to forego. Suddenly his little face cleared: "Ting I a tory, " said he. 

"Sing thee a story, baby? Well, after all, why not? And wilt thou sit o'my knee and hear it?"

"Yea. "

"Then I must e'en doff this breastplate, 'Tis too hard for thy softcheek. So. And now I must doff this bristly cilice; they would prick thytender skin, perhaps make it bleed, as they have me, I see. So. And nowI put on my best pelisse, in honour of thy worshipful visit. See howsoft and warm it is; bless the good soul that sent it; and now I sitme down; so. And I take thee on my left knee, and put my arm under thylittle head; so, And then the psaltery, and play a little tune; so, nottoo loud. "

"I ikes dat. "

"I am right glad on't. Now list the story. "

He chanted a child's story in a sort of recitative, singing a littlemoral refrain now and then. The boy listened with rapture. 

"I ikes oo, " said he, "Ot is oo? is oo a man?"

"Ay, little heart, and a great sinner to boot. "

"I ikes great tingers. Ting one other tory. "

Story No. 2 was Chanted. 

"I ubbs oo, " cried the child impetuously, "Ot caft(3) is oo?"

"I am a hermit, love. "

"I ubbs vermins. Ting other one. "

But during this final performance, Nature suddenly held out her leadensceptre over the youthful eyelids. "I is not eepy, " whined he veryfaintly, and succumbed. 

Clement laid down his psaltery softly and began to rock his new treasurein his arms, and to crone over him a little lullaby well known inTergou, with which his own mother had often sent him off. 

And the child sank into a profound sleep upon his arm. And he stoppedcroning and gazed on him with infinite tenderness, yet sadness; for atthat moment he could not help thinking what might have been but for apiece of paper with a lie in it. 

He sighed deeply. 

The next moment the moonlight burst into his cell, and with it, and init, and almost as swift as it, Margaret Brandt was down at his knee witha timorous hand upon his shoulder. 

"GERARD, YOU DO NOT REJECT US, YOU CANNOT. "

 (1) More than one hermit had received a present of this kind. 

 (2) Query, "looking glass. "

 (3) Craft. He means trade or profession. 

CHAPTER XCV

The startled hermit glared from his nurseling to Margaret, and fromher to him, in amazement, equalled only by his agitation at her sounexpected return. The child lay asleep on his left arm, and she wasat his right knee; no longer the pale, scared, panting girl he hadoverpowered so easily an hour or two ago, but an imperial beauty, withblushing cheeks and sparkling eyes, and lips sweetly parted in triumph, and her whole face radiant with a look he could not quite read; for hehad never yet seen it on her: maternal pride. 

He stared and stared from the child to her, in throbbing amazement. 

"Us?" he gasped at last. And still his wonder-stricken eyes turned toand fro. 

Margaret was surprised in her turn, It was an age of impressions notfacts, "What!" she cried, "doth not a father know his own child? and aman of God, too? Fie, Gerard, to pretend! nay, thou art too wise, toogood, not to have--why, I watched thee; and e'en now look at you twain!'Tis thine own flesh and blood thou holdest to thine heart. "

Clement trembled, "What words are these, " he stammered, "this angelmine?"

"Whose else? since he is mine. "

Clement turned on the sleeping child, with a look beyond the power ofthe pen to describe, and trembled all over, as his eyes seemed to absorbthe little love. 

Margaret's eyes followed his. "He is not a bit like me, " said sheproudly; "but oh, at whiles he is thy very image in little; and see thisgolden hair. Thine was the very colour at his age; ask mother else. Andsee this mole on his little finger; now look at thine own; there! 'Twasthy mother let me weet thou wast marked so before him; and oh, Gerard, 'twas this our child found thee for me; for by that little mark on thyfinger I knew thee for his father, when I watched above thy window andsaw thee feed the birds. " Here she seized the child's hand, and kissedit eagerly, and got half of it into her mouth, Heaven knows how, "Ah!bless thee, thou didst find thy poor daddy for her, and now thou hastmade us friends again after our little quarrel; the first, the last. Wast very cruel to me but now, my poor Gerard, and I forgive thee; forloving of thy child. "

"Ah! ah! ah! ah! ah!" sobbed Clement, choking. And lowered by fasts, and unnerved by solitude, the once strong man was hysterical, and nearlyfainting. 

Margaret was alarmed, but having experience, her pity was greater thanher fear. "Nay, take not on so, " she murmured soothingly, and put agentle hand upon his brow. "Be brave! So, so. Dear heart, thou art notthe first man that hath gone abroad and come back richer by a lovelylittle self than he went forth. Being a man of God, take courage, andsay He sends thee this to comfort thee for what thou hast lost in me;and that is not so very much, my lamb; for sure the better part of loveshall ne'er cool here to thee; though it may in thine, and ought, beinga priest, and parson of Gouda. "

"I? priest of Gouda? Never!" murmured Clement in a faint voice; "I ama friar of St. Dominic: yet speak on, sweet music, tell me all that hashappened thee, before we are parted again. "

Now some would on this have exclaimed against parting at all, and raisedthe true question in dispute. But such women as Margaret do not repeattheir mistakes. It is very hard to defeat them twice, where their heartsare set on a thing. 

She assented, and turned her back on Gouda manse as a thing not tobe recurred to; and she told him her tale, dwelling above all on thekindness to her of his parents; and while she related her troubles, hishand stole to hers, and often she felt him wince and tremble with ire, and often press her hand, sympathizing with her in every vein. 

"Oh, piteous tale of a true heart battling alone against such bitterodds, " said he. 

"It all seems small, when I see thee here again, and nursing my boy. Wehave had a warning, Gerard. True friends like you and me are rare, andthey are mad to part, ere death divideth them. "

"And that is true, " said Clement, off his guard. 

And then she would have him tell her what he had suffered for her, andhe begged her to excuse him, and she consented; but by questions quietlyrevoked her consent and elicited it all; and many a sigh she heaved forhim, and more than once she hid her face in her hands with terror at hisperils, though past. And to console him for all he had gone through, she kneeled down and put her arms under the little boy, and lifted himgently up. "Kiss him softly, " she whispered. "Again, again kiss thy fillif thou canst; he is sound. 'Tis all I can do to comfort thee till thouart out of this foul den and in thy sweet manse yonder. "

Clement shook his head. 

"Well, " said she, "let that pass. Know that I have been sore affrontedfor want of my lines. "

"Who hath dared affront thee?"

"No matter, those that will do it again if thou hast lost them, whichthe saints forbid. "

"I lose them? nay, there they lie, close to thy hand. "

"Where, where, oh, where?"

Clement hung his head. "Look in the Vulgate. Heaven forgive me: Ithought thou wert dead, and a saint in heaven. "

She looked, and on the blank leaves of the poor soul's Vulgate she foundher marriage lines. 

"Thank God!" she cried, "thank God! Oh, bless thee, Gerard, bless thee!Why, what is here, Gerard?"

On the other leaves were pinned every scrap of paper she had ever senthim, and their two names she had once written together in sport, andthe lock of her hair she had given him, and half a silver coin she hadbroken with him, and a straw she had sucked her soup with the first dayhe ever saw her. 

When Margaret saw these proofs of love and signs of a gentle heartbereaved, even her exultation at getting back her marriage lines wasoverpowered by gushing tenderness. She almost staggered, and her handwent to her bosom, and she leaned her brow against the stone cell andwept so silently that he did not see she was weeping; indeed she wouldnot let him, for she felt that to befriend him now she must be thestronger; and emotion weakens. 

"Gerard, " said she, "I know you are wise and good. You must have areason for what you are doing, let it seem ever so unreasonable. Talk welike old friends. Why are you buried alive?"

"Margaret, to escape temptation. My impious ire against those two hadits root in the heart; that heart then I must deaden, and, Dei gratia, Ishall. Shall I, a servant of Christ and of the Church, court temptation?Shall I pray daily to be led out on't, and walk into it with open eyes?"

"That is good sense anyway, " said Margaret, with a consummateaffectation of candour. 

"'Tis unanswerable, " said Clement, with a sigh. 

"We shall see. Tell me, have you escaped temptation here? Why I askis, when I am alone, my thoughts are far more wild and foolish than incompany. Nay, speak sooth; come!"

"I must needs own I have been worse tempted here with evil imaginationsthan in the world. "

"There now. "

"Ay, but so were Anthony and Jerome, Macarius and Hilarion, Benedict, Bernard, and all the saints. 'Twill wear off. "

"How do you know?"

"I feel sure it will. "

"Guessing against knowledge. Here 'tis men folk are sillier than us thatbe but women. Wise in their own conceits, they will not let themselvessee; their stomachs are too high to be taught by their eyes. A woman, ifshe went into a hole in a bank to escape temptation, and there found it, would just lift her farthingale and out on't, and not e'en know how wiseshe was, till she watched a man in like plight. "

"Nay, I grant humility and a teachable spirit are the roads to wisdom;but when all is said, here I wrestle but with imagination. At Gouda sheI love as no priest or monk must love any but the angels, she will tempta weak soul, unwilling, yet not loth to be tempted. "

"Ay, that is another matter; I should tempt thee then? to what, i' God'sname?"

"Who knows? The flesh is weak. "

"Speak for yourself, my lad. Why, you are thinking of some otherMargaret, not Margaret a Peter. Was ever my mind turned to folly andfrailty? Stay, is it because you were my husband once, as these linesavouch? Think you the road to folly is beaten for you more than another?Oh! how shallow are the wise, and how little able are you to read me, who can read you so well from top to toe, Come, learn thine A B C. Werea stranger to proffer me unchaste love, I should shrink a bit, no doubt, and feel sore, but I should defend myself without making a coil; formen, I know, are so, the best of them sometimes. But if you, that havebeen my husband, and are my child's father, were to offer to humble meso in mine own eyes, and thine, and his, either I should spit in thyface, Gerard, or, as I am not a downright vulgar woman, I should snatchthe first weapon at hand and strike thee dead. "

And Margaret's eyes flashed fire, and her nostrils expanded, that it wasglorious to see; and no one that did see her could doubt her sincerity. 

"I had not the sense to see that, " said Gerard quietly. And he pondered. 

Margaret eyed him in silence, and soon recovered her composure. 

"Let not you and I dispute, " said she gently; "speak we of other things. Ask me of thy folk. "

"My father?"

"Well, and warms to thee and me. Poor soul, a drew glaive on those twainthat day, but Jorian Ketel and I we mastered him, and he drove themforth his house for ever. "

"That may not be; he must take them back. "

"That he will never do for us. You know the man; he is dour as iron; yetwould he do it for one word from one that will not speak it. "

"Who?"

"The vicar of Gouda, The old man will be at the manse to-morrow, Ihear. "

"How you come back to that. "

"Forgive me: I am but a woman. It is us for nagging; shouldst keep mefrom it wi' questioning of me. "

"My sister Kate?"

"Alas!"

"What, hath ill befallen e'en that sweet lily? Out and alas!"

"Be calm, sweetheart, no harm hath her befallen. Oh, nay, nay, far fro'that. " Then Margaret forced herself to be composed, and in a low, sweet, gentle voice she murmured to him thus:

"My poor Gerard, Kate hath left her trouble behind her. For the manneron't, 'twas like the rest. Ah, such as she saw never thirty, nor evershall while earth shall last. She smiled in pain too. A well, then, thus'twas: she was took wi' a languor and a loss of all her pains. "

"A loss of her pains? I understand you not. "

"Ay, you are not experienced; indeed, e'en thy mother almost blindedherself and said, ''Tis maybe a change for the better. ' But Joan Ketel, which is an understanding woman, she looked at her and said, 'Down sun, down wind!' And the gossips sided and said, 'Be brave, you that are hermother, for she is half way to the saints. ' And thy mother wept sore, but Kate would not let her; and one very ancient woman, she said to thymother, 'She will die as easy as she lived hard. ' And she lay painlessbest part of three days, a sipping of heaven afore-hand, And, my dear, when she was just parting, she asked for 'Gerard's little boy, ' andI brought him and set him on the bed, and the little thing behaved aspeaceably as he does now. But by this time she was past speaking; butshe pointed to a drawer, and her mother knew what to look for: it wastwo gold angels thou hadst given her years ago. Poor soul! she had keptthen, till thou shouldst come home. And she nodded towards the littleboy, and looked anxious; but we understood her, and put the pieces inhis two hands, and when his little fingers closed on them, she smiledcontent. And so she gave her little earthly treasures to her favourite'schild--for you were her favourite--and her immortal jewel to God, and passed so sweetly we none of us knew justly when she left us. Well-a-day, well-a-day!"

Gerard wept. 

"She hath not left her like on earth, " he sobbed. "Oh, how theaffections of earth curl softly round my heart! I cannot help it; Godmade them after all. Speak on, sweet Margaret at thy voice the pastrolls its tides back upon me; the loves and the hopes of youth come fairand gliding into my dark cell, and darker bosom, on waves of memory andmusic. "

"Gerard, I am loth to grieve you, but Kate cried a little when she firsttook ill at you not being there to close her eyes. "

Gerard sighed. 

"You were within a league, but hid your face from her. "

He groaned. 

"There, forgive me for nagging; I am but a woman; you would not havebeen so cruel to your own flesh and blood knowingly, would you?"

"Oh, no. "

"Well, then, know that thy brother Sybrandt lies in my charge with abroken back, fruit of thy curse. "

"Mea culpa! mea culpa!"

"He is very penitent; be yourself and forgive him this night. "

"I have forgiven him long ago. "

"Think you he can believe that from any mouth but yours? Come! he is butabout two butts' length hence. "

"So near? Why, where?"

"At Gouda manse. I took him there yestreen. For I know you, the cursewas scarce cold on your lips when you repented it" (Gerard noddedassent), "and I said to myself, Gerard will thank me for taking Sybrandtto die under his roof; he will not beat his breast and cry mea culpa, yet grudge three footsteps to quiet a withered brother on his last bed. He may have a bee in his bonnet, but he is not a hypocrite, a thing allpious words and uncharitable deeds. "

Gerard literally staggered where he sat at this tremendous thrust. 

"Forgive me for nagging, " said she. "Thy mother too is waiting for thee. Is it well done to keep her on thorns so long She will not sleep thisnight, Bethink thee, Gerard, she is all to thee that I am to this sweetchild. Ah, I think so much more of mothers since I had my little Gerard. She suffered for thee, and nursed thee, and tended thee from boy to man. Priest monk, hermit, call thyself what thou wilt, to her thou art butone thing; her child. "

"Where is she?" murmured Gerard, in a quavering voice. 

"At Gouda manse, wearing the night in prayer and care. "

Then Margaret saw the time was come for that appeal to his reason shehad purposely reserved till persuasion should have paved the way forconviction. So the smith first softens the iron by fire, and then bringsdown the sledge hammer. 

She showed him, but in her own good straightforward Dutch, that hispresent life was only a higher kind of selfishness, spiritual egotism;whereas a priest had no more right to care only for his own soul thanonly for his own body. That was not his path to heaven. "But, " said she, "whoever yet lost his soul by saving the souls of others! the Almightyloves him who thinks of others; and when He shall see thee caring forthe souls of the folk the duke hath put into thine hand, He will careten times more for thy soul than He does now. "

Gerard was struck by this remark. "Art shrewd in dispute, " said he. 

"Far from it, " was the reply, "only my eyes are not bandaged withconceit. (1) So long as Satan walks the whole earth, tempting men, andso long as the sons of Belial do never lock themselves in caves, but runlike ants to and fro corrupting others, the good man that skulks apartplays the devil's game, or at least gives him the odds: thou a soldierof Christ? ask thy Comrade Denys, who is but a soldier of the duke, askhim if ever he skulked in a hole and shunned the battle because forsoothin battle is danger as well as glory and duty. For thy sole excuse isfear; thou makest no secret on't, Go to, no duke nor king hath suchcowardly soldiers as Christ hath. What was that you said in the churchat Rotterdam about the man in the parable that buried his talent in theearth, and so offended the giver? Thy wonderful gift for preaching, isit not a talent, and a gift from thy Creator?"

"Certes; such as it is. "

"And hast thou laid it out? or buried it? To whom hast thou preachedthese seven months? to bats and owls? Hast buried it in one hole withthyself and thy once good wits?

"The Dominicans are the friars preachers. 'Tis for preaching they werefounded, so thou art false to Dominic as well as to his Master. 

"Do you remember, Gerard, when we were young together, which now are oldbefore our time, as we walked handed in the fields, did you but see asheep cast, ay, three fields off, you would leave your sweetheart (byher good will) and run and lift the sheep for charity? Well, then, atGouda is not one sheep in evil plight, but a whole flock; some cast, some strayed, some sick, some tainted, some a being devoured, and allfor the want of a shepherd. Where is their shepherd? lurking in a denlike a wolf, a den in his own parish; out fie! out fie!

"I scented thee out, in part, by thy kindness to the little birds. Takenote, you Gerard Eliassoen must love something, 'tis in your blood; youwere born to't. Shunning man, you do but seek earthly affection a peglower than man. "

Gerard interrupted her. "The birds are God's creatures, His innocentcreatures, and I do well to love them, being God's creatures. "

"What, are they creatures of the same God that we are, that he is wholies upon thy knee?"

"You know they are. "

"Then what pretence for shunning us and being kind to them? Sith manis one of the animals, why pick him out to shun? Is't because he is ofanimals the paragon? What, you court the young of birds, and abandonyour own young? Birds need but bodily food, and having wings, deservescant pity if they cannot fly and find it. But that sweet dove upon thyknee, he needeth not carnal only, but spiritual food. He is thine aswell as mine; and I have done my share. He will soon be too much for me, and I look to Gouda's parson to teach him true piety and useful lore. Ishe not of more value than many sparrows?"

Gerard started and stammered an affirmation. For she waited for hisreply. 

"You wonder, " continued she, "to hear me quote holy writ so glib. I havepored over it this four years, and why? Not because God wrote it, butbecause I saw it often in thy hands ere thou didst leave me. Heavenforgive me, I am but a woman. What thinkest thou of this sentence? 'Letyour work so shine before men that they may see your good works andglorify your Father which is in heaven!' What is a saint in a sinkbetter than 'a light under a bushel!'

"Therefore, since the sheep committed to thy charge bleat for thee andcry, 'Oh desert us no longer, but come to Gouda manse;' since I, whoknow thee ten times better than thou knowest thyself, do pledge my soulit is for thy soul's weal to go to Gouda manse--since duty to thy child, too long abandoned, calls thee to Gouda manse--since thy sovereign, whomholy writ again bids thee honour, sends thee to Gouda manse--since thePope, whom the Church teaches thee to revere hath absolved thee of thymonkish vows, and orders thee to Gouda manse--"

"Ah!"

"Since thy grey-haired mother watches for thee in dole and care, andturneth oft the hour-glass and sigheth sore that thou comest so slow toher at Gouda manse--since thy brother, withered by thy curse, awaits thyforgiveness and thy prayers for his soul, now lingering in his body, atGouda manse--take thou in thine arms the sweet bird wi' crest of goldthat nestles to thy bosom, and give me thy hand; thy sweetheart erst andwife, and now thy friend, the truest friend to thee this night that ereman had, and come with me to Gouda manse!"

"IT IS THE VOICE OF AN ANGEL!" cried Clement loudly. 

"Then hearken it, and come forth to Gouda manse!"

The battle was won. 

Margaret lingered behind, cast her eye rapidly round the furniture, andselected the Vulgate and the psaltery. The rest she sighed at, and letit lie. The breastplate and the cilice of bristles she took and dashedwith feeble ferocity on the floor. 

Then seeing Gerard watch her with surprise from the outside, she coloured and said, "I am but a woman: 'little' will still be'spiteful. '"

"Why encumber thyself with those? They are safe. "

"Oh, she had a reason. "

And with this they took the road to Gouda parsonage, The moon and starswere so bright, it seemed almost as light as day. 

Suddenly Gerard stopped. "My poor little birds!"

"What of them?"

"They will miss their food. I feed them every day. "

"The child hath a piece of bread in his cowl, Take that, and feed themnow against the morn. "

"I will. Nay, I will not, He is as innocent, and nearer to me and tothee. "

Margaret drew a long breath, "'Tis well, Hadst taken it, I might havehated thee; I am but a woman. "

When they had gone about a quarter of a mile, Gerard sighed. 

"Margaret, " said he, "I must e'en rest; he is too heavy for me. "

"Then give him me, and take thou these. Alas! alas! I mind when thouwouldst have run with the child on one shoulder, and the mother ont'other. "

And Margaret carried the boy. 

"I trow, " said Gerard, looking down, "overmuch fasting is not good for aman. "

"A many die of it each year, winter time, " replied Margaret. 

Gerard pondered these simple words, and eyed her askant, carrying thechild with perfect ease. When they had gone nearly a mile he said withconsiderable surprise, "You thought it was but two butts' length. "

"Not I. "

"Why, you said so. "

"That is another matter. " She then turned on him the face of a Madonna. "I lied, " said she sweetly. "And to save your soul and body, I'd maybetell a worse lie than that, at need. I am but a woman, Ah, well, it isbut two butts' length from here at any rate. "

"Without a lie?"

"Humph! Three, without a lie. "

And sure enough, in a few minutes they came up to the manse. 

A candle was burning in the vicar's parlour. "She is waking still, "whispered Margaret. 

"Beautiful! beautiful!" said Clement, and stopped to look at it. 

"What, in Heaven's name?"

"That little candle, seen through the window at night. Look an it benot like some fair star of size prodigious: it delighteth the eyes, andwarmeth the heart of those outside. "

"Come, and I'll show thee something better, " said Margaret, and led himon tiptoe to the window. 

They looked in, and there was Catherine kneeling on the hassock, withher "hours" before her. 

"Folk can pray out of a cave, " whispered Margaret. "Ay and hit heavenwith their prayers; for 'tis for a sight of thee she prayeth, and thouart here. Now, Gerard, be prepared; she is not the woman you knew her;her children's troubles have greatly broken the brisk, light-heartedsoul. And I see she has been weeping e'en now; she will have given theeup, being so late. "

"Let me get to her, " said Clement hastily, trembling all over. 

"That door! I will bide here. "

When Gerard was gone to the door, Margaret, fearing the sudden surprise, gave one sharp tap at the window and cried, "Mother!" in a loud, expressive voice that Catherine read at once. She clasped her handstogether and had half risen from her kneeling posture when the doorburst open and Clement flung himself wildly on his knees at her knees, with his arms out to embrace her. She uttered a cry such as only amother could, "Ah! my darling, my darling!" and clung sobbing round hisneck. And true it was, she saw neither a hermit, a priest, nor a monk, but just her child, lost, and despaired of, and in her arms, And after alittle while Margaret came in, with wet eyes and cheeks, and a holy calmof affection settled by degrees on these sore troubled ones. Andthey sat all three together, hand in hand, murmuring sweet and lovingconverse; and he who sat in the middle drank right and left their trueaffection and their humble but genuine wisdom, and was forced to eat agood nourishing meal, and at daybreak was packed off to a snowy bed, and by and by awoke, as from a hideous dream, friar and hermit no more, Clement no more, but Gerard Eliassoen, parson of Gouda. 

 (1) I think she means prejudice. 

CHAPTER XCVI

Margaret went back to Rotterdam long ere Gerard awoke, and actually lefther boy behind her. She sent the faithful, sturdy Reicht off to Goudadirectly with a vicar's grey frock and large felt hat, and with minuteinstructions how to govern her new master. 

Then she went to Jorian Ketel; for she said to herself, "he is theclosest I ever met, so he is the man for me, " and in concert with himshe did two mortal sly things; yet not, in my opinion, virulent, thoughshe thought they were; but if I am asked what were these deeds withouta name, the answer is, that as she, who was, 'but a woman, ' kept themsecret till her dying day, I, who am a man--"Verbum non amplius addam. "

She kept away from Gouda parsonage. 

Things that pass little noticed in the heat of argument sometimes rankleafterwards; and when she came to go over all that had passed, she wasoffended at Gerard thinking she could ever forget the priest in the sometime lover, "For what did he take me?" said she. And this raised a greatshyness which really she would not otherwise have felt, being downrightinnocent, And pride sided with modesty, and whispered, "Go no more toGouda parsonage. "

She left little Gerard there to complete the conquest her maternal heartascribed to him, not to her own eloquence and sagacity, and to anchorhis father for ever to humanity. 

But this generous stroke of policy cost her heart dear. She had neveryet been parted from her boy an hour, and she felt sadly strange as wellas desolate without him. After the first day it became intolerable; andwhat does the poor soul do, but creep at dark up to Gouda parsonage, andlurk about the premises like a thief till she saw Reicht Heynes in thekitchen alone, Then she tapped softly at the window and said, "Reicht, for pity's sake bring him out to me unbeknown. " With Margaret the personwho occupied her thoughts at the time ceased to have a name, and sank toa pronoun. 

Reicht soon found an excuse for taking little Gerard out, and there wasa scene of mutual rapture, followed by mutual tears when mother and boyparted again. 

And it was arranged that Reicht should take him half way to Rotterdamevery day, at a set hour, and Margaret meet them. And at these meetings, after the raptures, and after mother and child had gambolled togetherlike a young cat and her first kitten, the boy would sometimes amusehimself alone at their feet, and the two women generally seized thisopportunity to talk very seriously about Luke Peterson, This began thus:

"Reicht, " said Margaret, "I as good as promised him to marry LukePeterson. 'Say you the word, ' quoth I, 'and I'll wed him. '"

"Poor Luke!"

"Prithee, why poor Luke?"

"To be bandied about so, atwixt yea and nay. "

"Why, Reicht, you have not ever been so simple as to cast an eye ofaffection on the boy, that you take his part?"

"Me?" said Reicht, with a toss of the head. 

"Oh, I ask your pardon. Well, then, you can do me a good turn. "

"Whisht! whisper! that little darling is listening to every word, andeyes like saucers. "

On this both their heads would have gone under one cap. 

Two women plotting against one boy? Oh, you great cowardly serpents!

But when these stolen meetings had gone on for about five days Margaretbegan to feel the injustice of it, and to be irritated as well asunhappy. 

And she was crying about it when a cart came to her door, and in it, clean as a new penny, his beard close shaved, his hands white as snow, and a little colour in his pale face, sat the Vicar of Gouda in the greyfrock and large felt hat she had sent him. 

She ran upstairs directly, and washed away all traces of her tears, and put on a cap, which being just taken out of the drawer was cleaner, theoretically, than the one she had on, and came down to him. 

He seized both her hands and kissed them, and a tear fell upon them. Sheturned her head away at that to hide her own which started. 

"My sweet Margaret, " he cried, "why is this? Why hold you aloof fromyour own good deed? we have been waiting for you every day, and noMargaret. "

"You said things. "

"What! when I was a hermit, and a donkey. "

"Ay! no matter, you said things. And you had no reason. "

"Forget all I said there. Who hearkens the ravings of a maniac? for Isee now that in a few months more I should have been a gibbering idiot;yet no mortal could have persuaded me away but you. Oh what an outlay ofwit and goodness was yours! But it is not here I can thank and blessyou as I ought. No, it is in the home you have given me, among the sheepwhose shepherd you have made me; already I love them dearly; there itis I must thank 'the truest friend ever man had. ' So now I say to you aserst you said to me, come to Gouda manse. "

"Humph! we will see about that. "

"Why, Margaret, think you I had ever kept the dear child so long, butthat I made sure you would be back to him from day to day? Oh he curlsround my very heartstrings, but what is my title to him compared tothine? Confess now, thou hast had hard thoughts of me for this. "

"Nay, nay, not I. Ah! thou art thyself again; wast ever thoughtful ofothers. I have half a mind to go to Gouda manse, for your saying that. "

"Come then, with half thy mind, 'tis worth the whole of other folk's. "

"Well, I dare say I will; but there is no such mighty hurry, " said shecoolly (she was literally burning to go). "Tell me first how you agreewith your folk. "

"Why, already my poor have taken root in my heart. "

"I thought as much. "

"And there are such good creatures among them; simple and rough, andsuperstitious, but wonderfully good. "

"Oh I leave you alone for seeing a grain of good among a bushel of ill. "

"Whisht! whisht! And Margaret, two of them have been ill friends forfour years, and came to the manse each to get on my blind side. But givethe glory to God I got on their bright side, and made them friends, andlaugh at themselves for their folly. "

"But are you in very deed their vicar? answer me that. "

"Certes; have I not been to the bishop and taken the oath, and rung thechurch bell, and touched the altar, the missal, and the holy cup beforethe church-wardens? And they have handed me the parish seal; see, hereit is. Nay, 'tis a real vicar inviting a true friend to Gouda manse. "

"Then my mind is at ease. Tell me oceans more. "

"Well, sweet one, nearest to me of all my parish is a poor cripple thatmy guardian angel and his (her name thou knowest even by this turning ofthy head away) hath placed beneath my roof. Sybrandt and I are that wenever were till now, brothers. 'Twould gladden thee, yet sadden thee tohear how we kissed and forgave one another. He is full of thy praises, and wholly in a pious mind; he says he is happier since his trouble thane'er he was in the days of his strength. Oh! out of my house he ne'ershall go to any place but heaven. "

"Tell me somewhat that happened thyself, poor soul! All this is good, but yet no tidings to me. Do I not know thee of old?"

"Well, let me see. At first I was much dazzled by the sun-light, and could not go abroad (owl!), but that is passed; and good ReichtHeynes--humph!"

"What of her?"

"This to thine ear only, for she is a diamond. Her voice goes throughme like a knife, and all voices seem loud but thine, which is so mellowsweet. Stay, now I'll fit ye with tidings; I spake yesterday with an oldman that conceits he is ill-tempered, and sweats to pass for such withothers, but oh! so threadbare, and the best good heart beneath. "

"Why, 'tis a parish of angels, " said Margaret ironically. 

"Then why dost thou keep out on't?" retorted Gerard. "Well, he wastelling me there was no parish in Holland where the devil hath suchpower as at Gouda; and among his instances, says he, 'We had a hermit, the holiest in Holland; but being Gouda, the devil came for him thisweek, and took him, bag and baggage; not a ha'porth of him left but agoodish piece of his skin, just for all the world like a hedgehog's, anda piece o' old iron furbished up. '"

Margaret smiled. 

"Ay, but, " continued Gerard, "the strange thing is, the cave has verilyfallen in; and had I been so perverse as resist thee, it had assuredlyburied me dead there where I had buried myself alive. Therefore inthis I see the finger of Providence, condemning my late, approving mypresent, way of life. What sayest thou?"

"Nay, can I pierce the like mysteries? I am but a woman. "

"Somewhat more, methinks. This very tale proves thee my guardian angel, and all else avouches it, so come to Gouda manse. "

"Well, go you on, I'll follow. "

"Nay, in the cart with me. "

"Not so. "

"Why?"

"Can I tell why and wherefore, being a woman? All I know is I seem--tofeel--to wish--to come alone. "

"So be it then. I leave thee the cart, being, as thou sayest, a woman, and I'll go a-foot, being a man again, with the joyful tidings of thycoming. "

When Margaret reached the manse the first thing she saw was the twoGerards together, the son performing his capriccios on the plot, and thefather slouching on a chair, in his great hat, with pencil and paper, trying very patiently to sketch him. 

After a warm welcome he showed her his attempts. "But in vain I striveto fix him, " said he, "for he is incarnate quick silver, Yet do but notehis changes, infinite, but none ungracious; all is supple and easy; andhow he melteth from one posture to another, " He added presently, "Woe toilluminators I looking on thee, sir baby, I see what awkward, lopsided, ungainly toads I and my fellows painted missals with, and called themcherubs and seraphs, " Finally he threw the paper away in despair, andMargaret conveyed it secretly into her bosom. 

At night when they sat round the peat fire he bade them observe howbeautiful the brass candlesticks and other glittering metals were inthe glow from the hearth. Catherine's eyes sparkled at this observation, "And oh the sheets I lie in here, " said he, "often my consciencepricketh me, and saith, 'Who art thou to lie in lint like web of snow?'Dives was ne'er so flaxed as I. And to think that there are folk inthe world that have all the beautiful things which I have here yet notcontent. Let them pass six months in a hermit's cell, seeing no face ofman, then will they find how lovely and pleasant this wicked world is, and eke that men and women are God's fairest creatures. Margaret wasalways fair, but never to my eye so bright as now. " Margaret shook herhead incredulously, Gerard continued, "My mother was ever good and kind, but I noted not her exceeding comeliness till now. "

"Nor I neither, " said Catherine; "a score years ago I might pass in acrowd, but not now. "

Gerard declared to her that each age had its beauty. "See this mild greyeye, " said he, "that hath looked motherly love upon so many of us, all that love hath left its shadow, and that shadow is a beauty whichdefieth Time. See this delicate lip, these pure white teeth. See thiswell-shaped brow, where comliness Just passeth into reverence. Artbeautiful in my eyes, mother dear. "

"And that is enough for me, my darling, 'Tis time you were in bed, child. Ye have to preach the morn. "

And Reicht Heynes and Catherine interchanged a look which said, "We twohave an amiable maniac to superintend; calls everything beautiful. "

The next day was Sunday, and they heard him preach in his own church. Itwas crammed with persons, who came curious, but remained devout. Neverwas his wonderful gift displayed more powerfully; he was himself deeplymoved by the first sight of all his people, and his bowels yearned overthis flock he had so long neglected. In a single sermon, which lastedtwo hours and seemed to last but twenty minutes, he declared the wholescripture: he terrified the impenitent and thoughtless, confirmed thewavering, consoled the bereaved and the afflicted, uplifted the heartof the poor, and when he ended, left the multitude standing rapt, andunwilling to believe the divine music of his voice and soul had ceased. 

Need I say that two poor women in a corner sat entranced, with streamingeyes. 

"Wherever gat he it all?" whispered Catherine, with her apron to hereyes. "By our Lady not from me. "

As soon as they were by themselves Margaret threw her arms roundCatherine's neck and kissed her. 

"Mother, mother, I am not quite a happy woman, but oh I am a proud one. "

And she vowed on her knees never by word or deed to let her love comebetween this young saint and Heaven. 

Reader, did you ever stand by the seashore after a storm, when the windhappens to have gone down suddenly? The waves cannot cease with theircause; indeed, they seem at first to the ear to lash the sounding shoremore fiercely than while the wind blew. Still we are conscious thatinevitable calm has begun, and is now but rocking them to sleep. So itwas with those true and tempest-tossed lovers from that eventful nightwhen they went hand in hand beneath the stars from Gouda hermitage toGouda manse. 

At times a loud wave would every now and then come roaring, but it wasonly memory's echo of the tempest that had swept their lives; the stormitself was over, and the boiling waters began from that moment to godown, down, down, gently, but inevitably. 

This image is to supply the place of interminable details that would betedious and tame. What best merits attention at present is the generalsituation, and the strange complication of feeling that arose from it. History itself, though a far more daring story-teller than romance, presents few things so strange(1) as the footing on which Gerard andMargaret now lived for many years. United by present affection, pastfamiliarity, and a marriage irregular but legal; separated by HolyChurch and by their own consciences, which sided unreservedly withHoly Church; separated by the Church, but united by a living pledge ofaffection, lawful in every sense at its date. 

And living but a few miles from one another, and she calling his mother"mother, " For some years she always took her boy to Gouda on Sunday, returning home at dark, Go when she would, it was always fete at Goudamanse, and she was received like a little queen. Catherine in these dayswas nearly always with her, and Eli very often, Tergou had so little totempt them compared with Rotterdam; and at last they left it altogether, and set up in the capital. 

And thus the years glided; so barren now of striking incidents, so voidof great hopes, and free from great fears, and so like one another, that without the help of dates I could scarcely indicate the progress oftime. 

However, early next year, 1471, the Duchess of Burgundy, with the opendissent, but secret connivance of the Duke, raised forces to enable herdethroned brother, Edward the Fourth of England, to invade that kingdom;our old friend Denys thus enlisted, and passing through Rotterdam to theships, heard on his way that Gerard was a priest, and Margaret alone. Onthis he told Margaret that marriage was not a habit of his, but that ashis comrade had put it out of his own power to keep troth, he felt boundto offer to keep it for him; "for a comrade's honour is dear to us asour own, " said he. 

She stared, then smiled, "I choose rather to be still thy she-comrade, "said she; "closer acquainted, we might not agree so well, " And in hercharacter of she-comrade she equipped him with a new sword of Antwerpmake, and a double handful of silver. "I give thee no gold, " said she, "for 'tis thrown away as quick as silver, and harder to win back. Heavensend thee safe out of all thy perils; there be famous fair women yonderto beguile thee, with their faces, as well as men to hash thee withtheir axes. "

He was hurried on board at La Vere, and never saw Gerard at that time. 

In 1473 Sybrandt began to fail. His pitiable existence had beensweetened by his brother's inventive tenderness and his own contentedspirit, which, his antecedents considered, was truly remarkable, As forGerard, the day never passed that he did not devote two hours to him;reading or singing to him, praying with him, and drawing him about in asoft carriage Margaret and he had made between them. When the poor soulfound his end near, he begged Margaret might be sent for. She cameat once, and almost with his last breath he sought once more thatforgiveness she had long ago accorded. She remained by him till thelast; and he died, blessing and blessed, in the arms of the two truelovers he had parted for life. Tantum religio scit suadere boni. 

1474 there was a wedding in Margaret's house, Luke Peterson and ReichtHeynes. 

This may seem less strange if I give the purport of the dialogueinterrupted some time back. 

Margaret went on to say, "Then in that case you can easily make himfancy you, and for my sake you must, for my conscience it pricketh me, and I must needs fit him with a wife, the best I know. " Margaret theninstructed Reicht to be always kind and good-humoured to Luke; and shewould be a model of peevishness to him, "But be not thou so simple asrun me down, " said she, "Leave that to me. Make thou excuses for me; Iwill make myself black enow. "

Reicht received these instructions like an order to sweep a room, andobeyed them punctually. 

When they had subjected poor Luke to this double artillery for a coupleof years, he got to look upon Margaret as his fog and wind, and Reichtas his sunshine; and his affections transferred themselves, he scarceknew how or when. 

On the wedding day Reicht embraced Margaret, and thanked her almostwith tears. "He was always my fancy, " said she, "from the first hour Iclapped eyes on him. "

"Heyday, you never told me that. What, Reicht, are you as sly as therest?"

"Nay, nay, " said Reicht eagerly; "but I never thought you would reallypart with him to me. In my country the mistress looks to be servedbefore the maid. "

Margaret settled them in her shop, and gave them half the profits. 

1476 and 7 were years of great trouble to Gerard, whose consciencecompelled him to oppose the Pope. His Holiness, siding with the GreyFriars in their determination to swamp every palpable distinctionbetween the Virgin Mary and her Son, bribed the Christian world into hiscrotchet by proffering pardon of all sins to such as would add tothe Ave Mary this clause: "and blessed be thy Mother Anna, from whom, without blot of sin, proceeded thy virgin flesh. "

Gerard, in common with many of the northern clergy, held this sentenceto be flat heresy. He not only refused to utter it in his church, butwarned his parishioners against using it in private; and he refused tocelebrate the new feast the Pope invented at the same time, viz. , "thefeast of the miraculous conception of the Virgin. "

But this drew upon him the bitter enmity of the Franciscans, and theywere strong enough to put him into more than one serious difficulty, andinflict many a little mortification on him. In emergencies he consultedMargaret, and she always did one of two things, either she said, "I donot see my way, " and refused to guess; or else she gave him advice thatproved wonderfully sagacious. He had genius, but she had marvelloustact. 

And where affection came in and annihilated the woman's judgment, hestepped in his turn to her aid. Thus though she knew she was spoilinglittle Gerard, and Catherine was ruining him for life, she would notpart with him, but kept him at home, and his abilities uncultivated. Andthere was a shrewd boy of nine years, instead of learning to workand obey, playing about and learning selfishness from their infiniteunselfishness, and tyrannizing with a rod of iron over two women, bothof them sagacious and spirited, but reduced by their fondness for him tothe exact level of idiots. 

Gerard saw this with pain, and interfered with mild but firmremonstrance; and after a considerable struggle prevailed, and gotlittle Gerard sent to the best school in Europe, kept by one Haaghe atDeventer: this was in 1477. Many tears were shed, but the great progressthe boy made at that famous school reconciled Margaret in some degree, and the fidelity of Reicht Heynes, now her partner in business, enabledher to spend weeks at a time hovering over her boy at Deventer. 

And so the years glided; and these two persons, subjected to as strongand constant a temptation as can well be conceived, were each other'sguardian angels, and not each other's tempters. 

To be sure the well-greased morality of the next century, which taughtthat solemn vows to God are sacred in proportion as they are reasonable, had at that time entered no single mind; and the alternative to thesetwo minds was self-denial or sacrilege. 

It was a strange thing to hear them talk with unrestrained tenderness toone another of their boy, and an icy barrier between themselves all thetime. 

Eight years had now passed thus, and Gerard, fairly compared with men ingeneral, was happy. 

But Margaret was not. 

The habitual expression of her face was a sweet pensiveness, butsometimes she was irritable and a little petulant. She even snappedGerard now and then. And when she went to see him, if a monk was withhim she would turn her back and go home. She hated the monks for havingparted Gerard and her, and she inoculated her boy with a contempt forthem which lasted him till his dying day. 

Gerard bore with her like an angel. He knew her heart of gold, and hopedthis ill gust would blow over. 

He himself being now the right man in the right place this many years, loving his parishioners, and beloved by them, and occupied from morntill night in good works, recovered the natural cheerfulness of hisdisposition. To tell the truth, a part of his jocoseness was a blind; hewas the greatest peace-maker, except Mr. Harmony in the play, that everwas born. He reconciled more enemies in ten years than his predecessorshad done in three hundred; and one of his manoeuvres in the peacemakingart was to make the quarrellers laugh at the cause of quarrel. So didhe undermine the demon of discord. But independently of that, he reallyloved a harmless joke. He was a wonderful tamer of animals, squirrels, bares, fawns, etc. So half in jest a parishioner who had a mule supposedto be possessed with a devil gave it him and said, "Tame this vagabone, parson, if ye can. " Well, in about six months, Heaven knows how, henot only tamed Jack, but won his affections to such a degree, that Jackwould come running to his whistle like a dog. 

One day, having taken shelter from a shower on the stone settle outsidea certain public-house, he heard a toper inside, a stranger, boasting hecould take more at a draught than any man in Gouda. He instantly marchedin and said, "What, lads, do none of ye take him up for the honour ofGouda? Shall it be said that there came hither one from another parish agreater sot than any of us? Nay, then, I your parson do take him up. Go to, I'll find thee a parishioner shall drink more at a draught thanthou. "

A bet was made; Gerard whistled; in clattered Jack--for he was taughtto come into a room with the utmost composure--and put his nose into hisbacker's hand. 

"A pair of buckets!" shouted Gerard, "and let us see which of these twosons of asses can drink most at a draught. "

On another occasion two farmers had a dispute whose hay was the best. Failing to convince each other, they said, "We'll ask parson;" for bythis time he was their referee in every mortal thing. 

"How lucky you thought of me!" said Gerard, "Why, I have got one stayingwith me who is the best judge of hay in Holland. Bring me a doublehandful apiece. "

So when they came, he had them into the parlour, and put each bundle ona chair. Then he whistled, and in walked Jack. 

"Lord a mercy!" said one of the farmers. 

"Jack, " said the parson, in the tone of conversation, "just tell uswhich is the best hay of these two. "

Jack sniffed them both, and made his choice directly, proving hissincerity by eating every morsel. The farmers slapped their thighs, andscratched their heads. "To think of we not thinking o' that, " And theyeach sent Jack a truss. 

So Gerard got to be called the merry parson of Gouda. But Margaret, wholike most loving women had no more sense of humour than a turtle-dove, took this very ill. "What!" said she to herself, "is there nothing soreat the bottom of his heart that he can go about playing the zany?" Shecould understand pious resignation and content, but not mirth, in truelovers parted. And whilst her woman's nature was perturbed by thisgust (and women seem more subject to gusts than men) came that terribleanimal, a busybody, to work upon her. Catherine saw she was not happy, and said to her, "Your boy is gone from you. I would not live alone allmy days if I were you. "

"He is more alone than I, " sighed Margaret. 

"Oh, a man is a man, but a woman is a woman. You must not think all ofhim and none of yourself. Near is your kirtle, but nearer is your smock. Besides, he is a priest, and can do no better. But you are not a priest. He has got his parish, and his heart is in that. Bethink thee! Timeflies; overstay not thy market. Wouldst not like to have three or fourmore little darlings about thy knee now they have robbed thee of poorlittle Gerard, and sent him to yon nasty school?" And so she worked upona mind already irritated. 

Margaret had many suitors ready to marry her at a word or even alook, and among them two merchants of the better class, Van Schelt andOostwagen. "Take one of those two, " said Catherine. 

"Well, I will ask Gerard if I may, " said Margaret one day, with a floodof tears; "for I cannot go on the way I am. "

"Why, you would never be so simple as ask him?"

"Think you I would be so wicked as marry without his leave?"

Accordingly she actually went to Gouda, and after hanging her head, andblushing, and crying, and saying she was miserable, told him his motherwished her to marry one of those two; and if he approved of her marryingat all, would he use his wisdom, and tell her which he thought would bethe kindest to the little Gerard of those two; for herself, she did notcare what became of her. 

Gerard felt as if she had put a soft hand into his body and torn hisheart out with it. But the priest with a mighty effort mastered the man. In a voice scarcely audible he declined this responsibility. "I am not asaint or a prophet, " said he; "I might advise thee ill. I shall read themarriage service for thee, " faltered he; "it is my right. No other wouldpray for thee as I should. But thou must choose for thyself; and oh! letme see thee happy. This four months past thou hast not been happy. "

"A discontented mind is never happy, " said Margaret. 

She left him, and he fell on his knees, and prayed for help from above. 

Margaret went home pale and agitated. "Mother, " said she, "never mentionit to me again, or we shall quarrel. "

"He forbade you? Well, more shame for him, that is all. "

"He forbid me? He did not condescend so far. He was as noble as Iwas paltry. He would not choose for me for fear of choosing me an illhusband. But he would read the service for my groom and me; that was hisright. Oh, mother, what a heartless creature I was!"

"Well, I thought not he had that much sense. "

"Ah, you go by the poor soul's words, but I rate words as air whenthe face speaketh to mine eye. I saw the priest and the true lovera-fighting in his dear face, and his cheek pale with the strife, and oh!his poor lip trembled as he said the stout-hearted words--Oh! oh! oh!oh! oh! oh! oh!" And Margaret burst into a violent passion of tears. 

Catherine groaned. "There, give it up without more ado, " said she. "Youtwo are chained together for life; and if God is merciful, that won't befor long; for what are you neither maid, wife, nor widow. "

"Give it up?" said Margaret; "that was done long ago. All I think of nowis comforting him; for now I have been and made him unhappy too, wretchand monster that I am. "

So the next day they both went to Gouda. And Gerard, who had beenpraying for resignation all this time, received her with peculiartenderness as a treasure he was to lose; but she was agitated and eagerto let him see without words that she would never marry, and she fawnedon him like a little dog to be forgiven. And as she was going away shemurmured, "Forgive! and forget! I am but a woman. "

He misunderstood her, and said, "All I bargain for is, let me see theecontent; for pity's sake, let me not see thee unhappy as I have thiswhile. "

"My darling, you never shall again, " said Margaret, with streaming eyes, and kissed his hand. 

He misunderstood this too at first; but when month after monthpassed, and he heard no more of her marriage, and she came to Goudacomparatively cheerful, and was even civil to Father Ambrose, a mildbenevolent monk from the Dominican convent hard by--then he understoodher; and one day he invited her to walk alone with him in the sacredpaddock; and before I relate what passed between them, I must give itshistory. 

When Gerard had been four or five days at the manse, looking out ofwindow he uttered an exclamation of joy. "Mother, Margaret, here is oneof my birds: another, another: four, six, nine. A miracle! a miracle!"

"Why, how can you tell your birds from their fellows?" said Catherine. 

"I know every feather in their wings. And see; there is the littledarling whose claw I gilt, bless it!"

And presently his rapture took a serious turn, and he saw Heaven'sapprobation in this conduct of the birds as he did in the fall of thecave. This wonderfully kept alive his friendship for animals; and heenclosed a paddock, and drove all the sons of Cain from it with threatsof excommunication, "On this little spot of earth we'll have no murder, "said he. He tamed leverets and partridges, and little birds, and hares, and roe-deer. He found a squirrel with a broken leg; he set it withinfinite difficulty and patience; and during the cure showed itrepositories of acorns, nuts, chestnuts, etc. And this squirrel got welland went off, but visited him in hard weather, and brought a mate, andnext year little squirrels were found to have imbibed their parents'sentiments, and of all these animals each generation was tamer than thelast. This set the good parson thinking, and gave him the true clue tothe great successes of mediaeval hermits in taming wild animals. 

He kept the key of this paddock, and never let any man but himselfenter it; nor would he even let little Gerard go there without him orMargaret. "Children are all little Cains, " said he. In this oasis, then, he spoke to Margaret, and said, "Dear Margaret, I have thought more thanever of thee of late, and have asked myself why I am content, and thouunhappy. "

"Because thou art better, wiser, holier than I; that is all, " saidMargaret promptly. 

"Our lives tell another tale, " said Gerard thoughtfully. "I know thygoodness and thy wisdom too well to reason thus perversely. Also I knowthat I love thee as dear as thou, I think, lovest me. Yet am I happierthan thou. Why is this so?"

"Dear Gerard, I am as happy as a woman can hope to be this side of thegrave. "

"Not so happy as I. Now for the reason. First, then, I am a priest, andthis, the one great trial and disappointment God giveth me along with somany joys, why, I share it with a multitude. For alas! I am not the onlypriest by thousands that must never hope for entire earthly happiness. Here, then, thy lot is harder than mine. "

"But Gerard, I have my child to love. Thou canst not fill thy heart withhim as his mother can, So you may set this against you. "

"And I have ta'en him from thee; it was cruel; but he would have brokenthy heart one day if I had not. Well then, sweet one, I come to wherethe shoe pincheth, methinks. I have my parish, and it keeps my heartin a glow from morn till night. There is scarce an emotion that my folkstir not up in me many times a day. Often their sorrows make me weep, sometimes their perversity kindles a little wrath, and their absurditymakes me laugh, and sometimes their flashes of unexpected goodness doset me all of a glow, and I could hug 'em. Meantime thou, poor soul, sittest with heart--

"Of lead, Gerard; of very lead. "

"See now how unkind thy lot compared with mine, Now how if thou couldstbe persuaded to warm thyself at the fire that warmeth me. "

"Ah, if I could?"

"Hast but to will it. Come among my folk. Take in thine hand the alms Iset aside, and give it with kind words; hear their sorrows: they shallshow you life is full of troubles, and as thou sayest truly, no man orwoman without their thorn this side the grave. Indoors I have a map ofGouda parish. Not to o'erburden thee at first, I will put twenty housenunder thee with their folk. What sayest thou? but for thy wisdom I haddied a dirty maniac, ' and ne'er seen Gouda manse, nor pious peace. Wiltprofit in turn by what little wisdom I have to soften her lot to whom Ido owe all?"

Margaret assented warmly, and a happy thing it was for the littledistrict assigned to her; it was as if an angel had descended on them. Her fingers were never tired of knitting or cutting for them, herheart of sympathizing with them. And that heart expanded and waved itsdrooping wings; and the glow of good and gentle deed began to spreadover it; and she was rewarded in another way by being brought into morecontact with Gerard, and also with his spirit. All this time malicioustongues had not been idle. "If there is nought between them more thanmeets the eye, why doth she not marry?" etc. And I am sorry to say ourold friend Joan Ketel was one of these coarse sceptics. And now onewinter evening she got on a hot scent. She saw Margaret and Gerardtalking earnestly together on the Boulevard. She whipped behind a tree. "Now I'll hear something, " said she; and so she did. It was winter;there had been one of those tremendous floods followed by a sharpfrost, and Gerard in despair as to where he should lodge forty or fiftyhouseless folk out of the piercing cold. And now it was, "Oh, dear, dearMargaret, what shall I do? The manse is full of them, and a sharp frostcoming on this night. "

Margaret reflected, and Joan listened. 

"You must lodge them in the church, " said Margaret quietly. 

"In the church? Profanation. "

"No; charity profanes nothing, not even a church; soils nought, not evena church. To-day is but Tuesday. Go save their lives, for a bitter nightis coming. Take thy stove into the church, and there house them. We willdispose of them here and there ere the lord's day. "

"And I could not think of that; bless thee, sweet Margaret, thy mind isstronger than mine, and readier. "

"Nay, nay, a woman looks but a little way, therefore she sees clear. I'll come over myself to-morrow. "

And on this they parted with mutual blessings. 

Joan glided home remorseful. 

And after that she used to check all surmises to their discredit. "Beware, " she would say, "lest some angel should blister thy tongue. Gerard and Margaret paramours? I tell ye they are two saints which meetin secret to plot charity to the poor. "

In the summer of 1481 Gerard determined to provide against similardisasters recurring to his poor. Accordingly he made a great hole in hisincome, and bled his friends (zealous parsons always do that) to build alarge Xenodochium to receive the victims of flood or fire. Giles and allhis friends were kind, but all was not enough; when lo! the Dominicanmonks of Gouda to whom his parlour and heart had been open for years, came out nobly, and put down a handsome sum to aid the charitable vicar. 

"The dear good souls, " said Margaret; "who would have thought it?"

"Any one who knows them, " said Gerard, "Who more charitable than monks?"

"Go to! They do but give the laity back a pig of their own sow. "

"And what more do I? What more doth the duke?"

Then the ambitious vicar must build almshouses for decayed true men intheir old age close to the manse, that he might keep and feed them, aswell as lodge them. And his money being gone, he asked Margaret for afew thousand bricks and just took off his coat and turned builder; andas he had a good head, and the strength of a Hercules, with the zeal ofan artist, up rose a couple of almshouses parson built. 

And at this work Margaret would sometimes bring him his dinner, andadd a good bottle of Rhenish. And once seeing him run up a plank with awheelbarrow full of bricks which really most bricklayers would havegone staggering under, she said, "Times are changed since I had to carrylittle Gerard for thee. "

"Ay, dear one, thanks to thee. "

When the first home was finished, the question was who they should putinto it; and being fastidious over it like a new toy, there was muchhesitation. But an old friend arrived in time to settle this question. 

As Gerard was passing a public-house in Rotterdam one day, he heard awell-known voice, He looked up, and there was Denys of Burgundy, butsadly changed; his beard stained with grey, and his clothes worn andragged; he had a cuirass still, and gauntlets, but a staff instead of anarbalest, To the company he appeared to be bragging and boasting, but inreality he was giving a true relation of Edward the Fourth's invasion ofan armed kingdom with 2000 men, and his march through the country witharmies capable of swallowing him looking on, his battles at Tewkesburyand Barnet, and reoccupation of his capital and kingdom in three monthsafter landing at the Humber with a mixed handful of Dutch, English, andBurgundians. 

In this, the greatest feat of arms the century had seen, Denys hadshone; and whilst sneering at the warlike pretensions of Charles theBold, a duke with an itch but no talent for fighting, and proclaimingthe English king the first captain of the age, did not forget to exalthimself. 

Gerard listened with eyes glittering affection and fun. "And now, " saidDenys, "after all these feats, patted on the back by the gallant youngPrince of Gloucester, and smiled on by the great captain himself, hereI am lamed for life; by what? by the kick of a horse, and this night Iknow not where I shall lay my tired bones. I had a comrade once in theseparts that would not have let me lie far from him; but he turned priestand deserted his sweetheart, so 'tis not likely he would remember hiscomrade. And ten years play sad havoc with our hearts, and limbs, andall. " Poor Denys sighed, and Gerard's bowels yearned over him. 

"What words are these?" he said, with a great gulp in his throat. "Whogrudges a brave soldier supper and bed? Come home with me!"

"Much obliged, but I am no lover of priests. "

"Nor I of soldiers; but what is supper and bed between two true men?"

"Not much to you, but something to me. I will come. "

"In one hour, " said Gerard, and went in high spirits to Margaret, andtold her the treat in store, and she must come and share it. She mustdrive his mother in his little carriage up to the manse with all speed, and make ready an excellent supper. Then he himself borrowed a cart, anddrove Denys up rather slowly, to give the women time. 

On the road Denys found out this priest was a kind soul, so told him histrouble, and confessed his heart was pretty near broken. "The great useour stout hearts, and arms, and lives till we are worn out, and thenfling us away like broken tools. " He sighed deeply, and it cost Gerarda great struggle not to hug him then and there, and tell him. But hewanted to do it all like a story book. Who has not had this fancy oncein his life? Why Joseph had it; all the better for us. 

They landed at the little house. It was as clean as a penny, the hearthblazing, and supper set. 

Denys brightened up. "Is this your house, reverend sir?"

"Well, 'tis my work, and with these hands, but 'tis your house. "

"Ah, no such luck, " said Denys, with a sigh. 

"But I say ay, " shouted Gerard. "And what is more I--" (gulp) "say--"(gulp) "COURAGE, CAMARADE, LE DIABLE EST MORT!"

Denys started, and almost staggered. "Why, what?" he stammered, "w-wh-who art thou, that bringest me back the merry words and merry daysof my youth?" and he was greatly agitated. 

"My poor Denys, I am one whose face is changed, but nought else; to myheart, dear, trusty comrade, to my heart, " And he opened his arms, withthe tears in his eyes. But Denys came close to him, and peered in hisface, and devoured every feature; and when he was sure it was reallyGerard, he uttered a cry so vehement it brought the women running fromthe house, and fell upon Gerard's neck, and kissed him again and again, and sank on his knees, and laughed and sobbed with joy so terribly, that Gerard mourned his folly in doing dramas. But the women with theirgentle soothing ways soon composed the brave fellow, and he sat smiling, and holding Margaret's hand and Gerard's, And they all supped together, and went to their beds with hearts warm as a toast; and the brokensoldier was at peace, and in his own house, and under his comrade'swing. 

His natural gaiety returned, and he resumed his consigne after eightyears' disuse, and hobbled about the place enlivening it; but offendedthe parish mortally by calling the adored vicar comrade, and nothing butcomrade. 

When they made a fuss about this to Gerard, he just looked in theirfaces and said, "What does it matter? Break him of swearing, and youshall have my thanks. "

This year Margaret went to a lawyer to make her will, for without this, she was told, her boy might have trouble some day to get his own, notbeing born in lawful wedlock. The lawyer, however, in conversation, expressed a different opinion. 

"This is the babble of churchmen, " said he, "Yours is a perfectmarriage, though an irregular one. "

He then informed her that throughout Europe, excepting only the southernpart of Britain, there were three irregular marriages, the highest ofwhich was hers, viz. , a betrothal before witnesses, "This, " said he, "ifnot followed by matrimonial intercourse, is a marriage complete in form, but incomplete in substance. A person so betrothed can forbid any otherbanns to all eternity. It has, however, been set aside where a partyso betrothed contrived to get married regularly, and children were bornthereafter. But such a decision was for the sake of the offspring, and of doubtful justice. However, in your case the birth of yourchild closes that door, and your marriage is complete both in form andsubstance. Your course, therefore, is to sue for your conjugal rights;it will be the prettiest case of the century. The law is all on ourside, the Church all on theirs. If you come to that, the old Batavianlaw, which compelled the clergy to marry, hath fallen into disuse, butwas never formally repealed. "

Margaret was quite puzzled. "What are you driving at, sir? Who am I togo to law with?"

"Who is the defendant? Why, the vicar of Gouda. "

"Alas, poor soul! And for what shall I law him?"

"Why, to make him take you into his house, and share bed and board withyou, to be sure. "

Margaret turned red as fire, "Gramercy for your rede, " said she, "What, is yon a woman's part? Constrain a man to be hers by force? That ismen's way of wooing, not ours. Say I were so ill a woman as ye think me, I should set myself to beguile him, not to law him;" and she departed, crimson with shame and indignation. 

"There is an impracticable fool for you, " said the man of art. 

Margaret had her will drawn elsewhere, and made her boy safe frompoverty, marriage or no marriage. 

These are the principal incidents that in ten whole years befell twopeaceful lives, which in a much shorter period had been so thronged withadventures and emotions. 

Their general tenor was now peace, piety, the mild content that lasts, not the fierce bliss ever on tiptoe to depart, and above all, Christiancharity. 

On this sacred ground these two true lovers met with an uniformity anda kindness of sentiment which went far to soothe the wound in their ownhearts, To pity the same bereaved; to hunt in couples all the illsin Gouda, and contrive and scheme together to remedy all that wereremediable; to use the rare insight into troubled hearts which theirown troubles had given them, and use it to make others happier thanthemselves--this was their daily practice. And in this blessed causetheir passions for one another cooled a little, but their affectionincreased. 

From this time Margaret entered heart and soul into Gerard's piouscharities, that affection purged itself of all mortal dross. And asit had now long out-lived scandal and misapprehension, one would havethought that so bright an example of pure self-denying affection was toremain long before the world, to show men how nearly religious faith, even when not quite reasonable, and religious charity, which is alwaysreasonable, could raise two true lovers' hearts to the loving heartsof the angels of heaven. But the great Disposer of events orderedotherwise. 

Little Gerard rejoiced both his parents' hearts by the extraordinaryprogress he made at Alexander Haaghe's famous school at Deventer. 

The last time Margaret returned from visiting him, she came to Gerardflushed with pride. "Oh, Gerard, he will be a great man one day, thanksto thy wisdom in taking him from us silly women. A great scholar, oneZinthius, came to see the school and judge the scholars, and didn't ourGerard stand up, and not a line in Horace or Terence could Zinthius citebut the boy would follow him with the rest. 'Why, 'tis a prodigy, ' saysthat great scholar; and there was his poor mother stood by and heard it. And he took our Gerard in his arms, and kissed him; and what think youhe said?"

"Nay, I know not. "

"'Holland will hear of thee one day; and not Holland only, but all theworld, ' Why what a sad brow!"

"Sweet one, I am as glad as thou, yet am I uneasy to hear the child iswise before his time, I love him dear; but he is thine idol, and Heavendoth often break our idols. "

"Make thy mind easy, " said Margaret. "Heaven will never rob me of mychild. What I was to suffer in this world I have suffered, For if anyill happened my child or thee, I should not live a week. The Lord Heknows this, and He will leave me my boy. "

A month had elapsed after this; but Margaret's words were yet ringing inhis ears, when, going on his daily round of visits to his poor, he wastold quite incidentally, and as mere gossip, that the plague was atDeventer, carried thither by two sailors from Hamburgh. 

His heart turned cold within him. News did not gallop in those days. Thefatal disease must have been there a long time before the tidings wouldreach Gouda. He sent a line by a messenger to Margaret, telling her thathe was gone to fetch little Gerard to stay at the manse a little while, and would she see a bed prepared, for he should be back next day. And sohe hoped she would not hear a word of the danger till it was all happilyover. He borrowed a good horse, and scarce drew rein till he reachedDeventer, quite late in the afternoon. He went at once to the school. The boy had been taken away. 

As he left the school he caught sight of Margaret's face at the windowof a neighbouring house she always lodged at when she came to Deventer. 

He ran hastily to scold her and pack both her and the boy out of theplace. 

To his surprise the servant told him with some hesitation that Margarethad been there, but was gone. 

"Gone, woman?" said Gerard indignantly, "art not ashamed to say so? Why, I saw her but now at the window. "

"Oh, if you saw her--"

A sweet voice above said, "Stay him not, let him enter. " It wasMargaret. 

Gerard ran up the stairs to her, and went to take her hand, She drewback hastily. 

He looked astounded. 

"I am displeased, " she said coldly. "What makes you here? Know you notthe plague is in the town?"

"Ay, dear Margaret; and came straightway to take our boy away. "

"What, had he no mother?"

"How you speak to me! I hoped you knew not. "

"What, think you I leave my boy unwatched? I pay a trusty woman thatnotes every change in his cheek when I am not here, and lets me know, Iam his mother. "

"Where is he?"

"In Rotterdam, I hope, ere this. "

"Thank Heaven! And why are you not there?"

"I am not fit for the journey; never heed me; go you home on theinstant; I'll follow. For shame of you to come here risking yourprecious life. "

"It is not so precious as thine, " said Gerard. "But let that pass; wewill go home together, and on the instant. "

"Nay, I have some matters to do in the town. Go thou at once, and I willfollow forthwith. "

"Leave thee alone in a plague-stricken town? To whom speak you, dearMargaret?"

"Nay, then, we shall quarrel, Gerard. "

"Methinks I see Margaret and Gerard quarrelling! Why, it takes two toquarrel, and we are but one. "

With this Gerard smiled on her sweetly. But there was no kind responsiveglance. She looked cold, gloomy, and troubled. 

He sighed, and sat patiently down opposite her with his face all puzzledand saddened. He said nothing, for he felt sure she would explain hercapricious conduct, or it would explain itself. 

Presently she rose hastily, and tried to reach her bedroom, but on theway she staggered and put out her hand. He ran to her with a cry ofalarm. She swooned in his arms. He laid her gently on the ground, andbeat her cold hands, and ran to her bedroom, and fetched water, andsprinkled her pale face. His own was scarce less pale, for in a basin hehad seen water stained with blood; it alarmed him, he knew not why. She was a long time ere she revived, and when she did she found Gerardholding her hand, and bending over her with a look of infinite concernand tenderness. She seemed at first as if she responded to it, but thenext moment her eyes dilated, and she cried--"Ah, wretch, leave my hand;how dare you touch me?"

"Heaven help her!" said Gerard. "She is not herself. "

"You will not leave me, then, Gerard?" said she faintly. "Alas! why do Iask? Would I leave thee if thou wert--At least touch me not, and then Iwill let thee bide, and see the last of poor Margaret. She ne'er spokeharsh to thee before, sweetheart, and she never will again. "

"Alas! what mean these dark words, these wild and troubled looks?" saidGerard, clasping his hands. 

"My poor Gerard, " said Margaret, "forgive me that I spoke so to thee. Iam but a woman, and would have spared thee a sight will make thee weep. "She burst into tears. "Ah, me!" she cried, weeping, "that I cannot keepgrief from thee; there is a great sorrow before my darling, and thistime I shall not be able to come and dry his eyes. "

"Let it come, Margaret, so it touch not thee, " said Gerard, trembling. 

"Dearest, " said Margaret solemnly, "call now religion to thine aid andmine. I must have died before thee one day, or else outlived thee and sodied of grief. "

"Died? thou die? I will never let thee die. Where is thy pain? What isthy trouble?"

"The plague, " she said calmly. Gerard uttered a cry of horror, andstarted to his feet; she read his thought. "Useless, " said she quietly. "My nose hath bled; none ever yet survived to whom that came along withthe plague. Bring no fools hither to babble over the body they cannotsave. I am but a woman; I love not to be stared at; let none see me diebut thee. "

And even with this a convulsion seized her, and she remained sensiblebut speechless a long time. 

And now for the first time Gerard began to realize the frightful truth, and he ran wildly to and fro, and cried to Heaven for help, as drowningmen cry to their fellow-creatures. She raised herself on her arm, andset herself to quiet him. 

She told him she had known the torture of hopes and fears, and wasresolved to spare him that agony. "I let my mind dwell too much on thedanger, " said she, "and so opened my brain to it, through which doorwhen this subtle venom enters it makes short work. I shall not bespotted or loathsome, my poor darling; God is good, and spares theethat; but in twelve hours I shall be a dead woman. Ah, look not so, butbe a man; be a priest! Waste not one precious minute over my body! it isdoomed; but comfort my parting soul. "

Gerard, sick and cold at heart, kneeled down, and prayed for help fromHeaven to do his duty. 

When he rose from his knees his face was pale and old, but deadly calmand patient. He went softly and brought her bed into the room, and laidher gently down and supported her head with pillows. Then he prayed byher side the prayers for the dying, and she said Amen to each prayer. Then for some hours she wandered, but when the fell disease had quitemade sure of its prey, her mind cleared, and she begged Gerard to shriveher. "For oh, my conscience it is laden, " she said sadly. 

"Confess thy sins to me, my daughter: let there be no reserve. "

"My father, " said she sadly, "I have one great sin on my breast thismany years. E'en now that death is at my heart I can scarce own it. Butthe Lord is debonair; if thou wilt pray to Him, perchance He may forgiveme. "

"Confess it first, my daughter. "

"I--alas!"

"Confess it!"

"I deceived thee. This many years I have deceived thee. "

Here tears interrupted her speech. 

"Courage, my daughter, courage, " said Gerard kindly, overpowering thelover in the priest. 

She hid her face in her hands, and with many sighs told him it was shewho had broken down the hermit's cave with the help of Jorian Ketel, "I, shallow, did it but to hinder thy return thither; but when thou sawesttherein the finger of God, I played the traitress, and said, 'While hethinks so, he will ne'er leave Gouda manse;' and I held my tongue. Oh, false heart. "

"Courage, my daughter; thou dost exaggerate a trivial fault. "

"Ah, but 'tis not all, The birds. "

"Well?"

"They followed thee not to Gouda by miracle, but by my treason. I said, he will ne'er be quite happy without his birds that visited him in hiscell; and I was jealous of them, and cried, and said, these foul littlethings, they are my child's rivals. And I bought loaves of bread, andJorian and me we put crumbs at the cave door, and thence went sprinklingthem all the way to the manse, and there a heap. And my wiles succeeded, and they came, and thou wast glad, and I was pleased to see theeglad; and when thou sawest in my guile the finger of Heaven, wicked, deceitful, I did hold my tongue. But die deceiving thee? ah, no, I couldnot. Forgive me if thou canst; I was but a woman; I knew no better atthe time. 'Twas writ in my bosom with a very sunbeam. ''Tis good for himto bide at Gouda manse. '"

"Forgive thee, sweet innocent?" sobbed Gerard; "what have I to forgive?Thou hadst a foolish froward child to guide to his own weal, anddidst all this for the best, I thank thee and bless thee. But as thyconfessor, all deceit is ill in Heaven's pure eyes. Therefore thouhast done well to confess and report it; and even on thy confessionand penitence the Church through me absolves thee. Pass to thy graverfaults. "

"My graver faults? Alas! alas! Why, what have I done to compare? I amnot an ill woman, not a very ill one. If He can forgive me deceivingthee, He can well forgive me all the rest ever I did. "

Being gently pressed, she said she was to blame not to have done moregood in the world. "I have just begun to do a little, " she said, "andnow I must go. But I repine not, since 'tis Heaven's will, only I am soafeard thou wilt miss me. " And at this she could not restrain her tears, though she tried hard. 

Gerard struggled with his as well as he could; and knowing her life ofpiety, purity, and charity, and seeing that she could not in herpresent state realise any sin but her having deceived him, gave herfull absolution, Then he put the crucifix in her hand, and while heconsecrated the oil, bade her fix her mind neither on her merits nor herdemerits, but on Him who died for her on the tree. 

She obeyed him with a look of confiding love and submission. 

And he touched her eyes with the consecrated oil, and prayed aloudbeside her. 

Soon after she dosed. 

He watched beside her, more dead than alive himself. 

When the day broke she awoke, and seemed to acquire some energy. Shebegged him to look in her box for her marriage lines and for a picture, and bring them both to her. He did so. She then entreated him by allthey had suffered for each other, to ease her mind by making a solemnvow to execute her dying requests. 

He vowed to obey them to the letter. 

"Then, Gerard, let no creature come here to lay me out. I could not bearto be stared at; my very corpse would blush. Also I would not be madea monster of for the worms to sneer at as well as feed on. Also my veryclothes are tainted, and shall to earth with me. I am a physician'sdaughter; and ill becomes me kill folk, being dead, which did so littlegood to men in the days of health; wherefore lap me in lead, the way Iam, and bury me deep! yet not so deep but what one day thou mayst findthe way, and lay thy bones by mine. 

"Whiles I lived I went to Gouda but once or twice a week. It cost me notto go each day. Let me gain this by dying, to be always at dear Gouda, in the green kirkyard. 

"Also they do say the spirit hovers where the body lies; I would have myspirit hover near thee, and the kirkyard is not far from the manse. I amso afeard some ill will happen thee, Margaret being gone. 

"And see, with mine own hands I place my marriage lines in my bosom. Letno living hand move them, on pain of thy curse and mine. Then when theangel comes for me at the last day, he shall say, this is an honestwoman, she hath her marriage lines (for you know I am your lawful wife, though Holy Church hath come between us), and he will set me where thehonest women be. I will not sit among ill women, no, not in heavenfor their mind is not my mind, nor their soul my soul. I have stood, unbeknown, at my window, and heard their talk. "

For some time she was unable to say any more, but made signs to him thatshe had not done. 

At last she recovered her breath, and bade him look at the picture. 

It was the portrait he had made of her when they were young together, and little thought to part so soon. He held it in his hands and lookedat it, but could scarce see it. He had left it in fragments, but now itwas whole. 

"They cut it to pieces, Gerard; but see, Love mocked at their knives. 

"I implore thee with my dying breath, let this picture hang ever inthine eye. 

"I have heard that such as die of the plague, unspotted, yet after deathspots have been known to come out; and oh, I could not bear thy lastmemory of me to be so. Therefore, as soon as the breath is out of mybody, cover my face with this handkerchief, and look at me no more tillwe meet again, 'twill not be so very long. O promise. "

"I promise, " said Gerard, sobbing. 

"But look on this picture instead. Forgive me; I am but a woman. I couldnot bear my face to lie a foul thing in thy memory. Nay, I must havethee still think me as fair as I was true. Hast called me an angel onceor twice; but be just! did I not still tell thee I was no angel, butonly a poor simple woman, that whiles saw clearer than thou because shelooked but a little way, and that loves thee dearly, and never loved butthee, and now with her dying breath prays thee indulge her in this, thouthat art a man. "

"I will, I will. Each word, each wish, is sacred. "

"Bless thee! Bless thee! So then the eyes that now can scarce see thee, they are so troubled by the pest, and the lips that shall not touch theeto taint thee, will still be before thee as they were when we were youngand thou didst love me. "

"When I did love thee, Margaret! Oh, never loved I thee as now. "

"Hast not told me so of late. "

"Alas! hath love no voice but words? I was a priest; I had charge ofthy soul; the sweet offices of a pure love were lawful; words of loveimprudent at the least. But now the good fight is won, ah me! Oh mylove, if thou hast lived doubting of thy Gerard's heart, die not so; fornever was woman loved so tenderly as thou this ten years past. "

"Calm thyself, dear one, " said the dying woman, with a heavenly smile. "I know it; only being but a woman, I could not die happy till I hadheard thee say so. Ah! I have pined ten years for those sweet words. Hast said them, and this is the happiest hour of my life. I had to dieto get them; well, I grudge not the price. "

From this moment a gentle complacency rested on her fading features. Butshe did not speak. 

Then Gerard, who had loved her soul so many years, feared lest sheshould expire with a mind too fixed on earthly affection. 

"Oh my daughter, " he cried, "my dear daughter, if indeed thou lovest meas I love thee, give me not the pain of seeing thee die with thy pioussoul fixed on mortal things. 

"Dearest lamb of all my fold, for whose soul I must answer, oh think notnow of mortal love, but of His who died for thee on the tree. Oh, letthy last look be heavenwards, thy last word a word of prayer. "

She turned a look of gratitude and obedience on him. "What saint?"she murmured: meaning doubtless, "what saint should she invoke as anintercessor. "

"He to whom the saints themselves do pray. "

She turned on him one more sweet look of love and submission, and puther pretty hands together in a prayer like a child. 

"Jesu!"

This blessed word was her last. She lay with her eyes heavenwards, andher hands put together. 

Gerard prayed fervently for her passing spirit. And when he had prayed along time with his head averted, not to see her last breath, all seemedunnaturally still. He turned his head fearfully. It was so. 

She was gone. 

Nothing left him now but the earthly shell of as constant, pure, andloving a spirit as eve' adorned the earth. 

 (1) Let me not be understood to apply this to the bare outline of the relation. Many bishops and priests, and not a few popes, had wives and children as laymen; and entering orders were parted from the wives and not from the children. But in the case before the reader are the additional features of a strong surviving attachment on both sides, and of neighbourhood, besides that here the man had been led into holy orders by a false statement of the woman's death. On a summary of all the essential features, the situation was, to the best of my belief, unique. 

CHAPTER XCVII

A priest is never more thoroughly a priest than in the chamber of death, Gerard did the last offices of the Church for the departed, just ashe should have done them for his smallest parishioner. He did thismechanically, then sat down stupefied by the sudden and tremendous blow, and not yet realizing the pangs of bereavement. Then in a transport ofreligious enthusiasm he kneeled and thanked Heaven for her Christianend. 

And then all his thought was to take her away from strangers, and layher in his own churchyard. That very evening a covered cart with onehorse started for Gouda, and in it was a coffin, and a broken-heartedman lying with his arms and chin resting on it. 

The mourner's short-lived energy had exhausted itself in the necessarypreparations, and now he lay crushed, clinging to the cold lead thatheld her. 

The man of whom the cart was hired walked by the horse's head and didnot speak to him, and when he baited the horse spoke but in a whisperrespecting that mute agony. But when he stopped for the night, he andthe landlord made a well-meaning attempt to get the mourner away to takesome rest and food. But Gerard repulsed them, and when they persisted, almost snarled at them, like a faithful dog, and clung to the cold leadall night. So then they drew a cloak over him, and left him in peace. 

And at noon the sorrowful cart came up to the manse, and there werefull a score of parishioners collected with one little paltry trouble oranother. They had missed the parson already. And when they saw what itwas, and saw their healer so stricken down, they raised a loud wail ofgrief, and it roused him from his lethargy of woe, and he saw where hewas, and their faces, and tried to speak to them, "Oh, my children! mychildren!" he cried; but choked with anguish, could say no more. 

Yet the next day, spite of all remonstrances, he buried her himself, and read the service with a voice that only trembled now and then, Manytears fell upon her grave. And when the service ended he stayed therestanding like a statue, and the people left the churchyard out ofrespect. 

He stood like one in a dream till the sexton, who was, as most men are, a fool, began to fill in the grave without giving him due warning. 

But at the sound of earth falling on her Gerard uttered a piercingscream. 

The sexton forbore. 

Gerard staggered and put his hand to his breast. The sexton supportedhim, and called for help. 

Jorian Ketel, who lingered near mourning his benefactress, ran into thechurchyard, and the two supported Gerard into the manse. 

"Ah, Jorian! good Jorian!" said he, "something snapped within me; Ifelt it, and I heard it; here, Jorian, here;" and he put his hand to hisbreast. 

CHAPTER XCVIII

A fortnight after this a pale bowed figure entered the Dominican conventin the suburbs of Gouda, and sought speech with Brother Ambrose, whogoverned the convent as deputy, the prior having lately died, and hissuccessor, though appointed, not having arrived. 

The sick man was Gerard, come to end life as he began it. 

He entered as a novice, on probation; but the truth was, he was afailing man, and knew it, and came there to die in peace, near kind andgentle Ambrose, his friend, and the other monks to whom his house andheart had always been open. 

His manse was more than he could bear; it was too full of reminiscencesof her. 

Ambrose, who knew his value, and his sorrow, was not without a kindlyhope of curing him, and restoring him to his parish. With this view heput him in a comfortable cell over the gateway, and forbade him to fastor practice any austerities. 

But in a few days the new prior arrived, and proved a very Tartar. At first he was absorbed in curing abuses, and tightening the generaldiscipline; but one day hearing the vicar of Gouda had entered theconvent as a novice, he said, "'Tis well; let him first give up hisvicarage then, or go; I'll no fat parsons in my house. " The prior thensent for Gerard, and he went to him; and the moment they saw one anotherthey both started. 

"Clement!"

"Jerome!"

CHAPTER XCIX

Jerome was as morose as ever in his general character, but he hadsomewhat softened towards Gerard. All the time he was in England hehad missed him more then he thought possible, and since then had oftenwondered what had become of him. What he heard in Gouda raised hisfeeble brother in his good opinion; above all, that he had withstoodthe Pope and the Minorites on "the infernal heresy of the immaculateconception, " as he called it. But when one of his young monks told himwith tears in his eyes the Cause of Gerard's illness, all his contemptrevived. "Dying for a woman?"

He determined to avert this scandal; he visited Clement twice a dayin his cell, and tried all his old influence and all his eloquence toinduce him to shake off this unspiritual despondency, and not rob thechurch of his piety and his eloquence at so critical a period. 

Gerard heard him, approved his reasoning, admired his strength, confessed his own weakness, and continued visibly to wear away to theland of the leal. One day Jerome told him he had heard his story, andheard it with pride. "But now, " said he, "you spoil it all, Clement; forthis is the triumph of earthly passion. Better have yielded to it andrepented, than resist it while she lived, and succumb under it now, bodyand soul. "

"Dear Jerome, " said Clement, so sweetly as to rob his remonstrance ofthe tone of remonstrance, "here, I think, you do me some injustice. Passion there is none; but a deep affection, for which I will not blushhere, since I shall not blush for it in heaven. Bethink thee, Jerome, the poor dog that dies of grief on his master's grave, is he guilty ofpassion? Neither am I. Passion had saved my life, and lost my soul, Shewas my good angel; she sustained me in my duty and charity; her faceencouraged me in the pulpit; her lips soothed me under ingratitude. Sheintertwined herself with all that was good in my life; and after leaningon her so long, I could not go on alone. And, dear Jerome, believe meI am no rebel against Heaven. It is God's will to release me. When theythrew the earth upon her poor coffin, something snapped within my bosomhere that mended may not be. I heard it, and I felt it. And from thattime, Jerome, no food that I put in my mouth had any savour. With myeyes bandaged now I could not tell thee which was bread, and which wasflesh, by eating of it. "

"Holy saints!"

"And again, from that same hour my deep dejection left me, and I smiledagain. I often smile--why? I read it thus: He in whose hands are theissues of life and death gave me that minute the great summons; 'twassome cord of life snapped in me. He is very pitiful. I should have livedunhappy; but He said, 'No; enough is done, enough is suffered; poorfeeble, loving servant, thy shortcomings are forgiven, thy sorrows touchthine end; come thou to thy rest!' I come, Lord, I come!"

Jerome groaned. "The Church had ever her holy but feeble servants, " hesaid. "Now would I give ten years of my life to save thine. But I see itmay not be. Die in peace. "

And so it was that in a few days more Gerard lay a-dying in a frameof mind so holy and happy, that more than one aged saint was there togarner his dying words. In the evening he had seen Giles, and begged himnot to let poor Jack starve; and to see that little Gerard's trusteesdid their duty, and to kiss his parents for him, and to send Denysto his friends in Burgundy: "Poor thing, he will feel so strange herewithout his comrade. " And after that he had an interview with Jeromealone. What passed between them was never distinctly known; but it musthave been something remarkable, for Jerome went from the door with hishands crossed on his breast, his high head lowered, and sighing as hewent. 

The two monks that watched with him till matins related that all throughthe night he broke out from time to time in pious ejaculations, andpraises, and thanksgivings; only once they said he wandered, and thoughthe saw her walking in green meadows with other spirits clad in white, and beckoning him; and they all smiled and beckoned him. And both thesemonks said (but it might have been fancy) that just before dawn therecame three light taps against the wall, one after another, very slow;and the dying man heard them, and said. 

"I come, love, I come. "

This much is certain, that Gerard did utter these words, and preparefor his departure, having uttered them. He sent for all the monks who atthat hour were keeping vigil. They came, and hovered like gentle spiritsround him with holy words. Some prayed in silence for him with theirfaces touching the ground, others tenderly supported his head. But whenone of them said something about his life of self-denial and charity, hestopped him, and addressing them all said, "My dear brethren, take notethat he who here dies so happy holds not these new-fangled doctrines ofman's merit. Oh, what a miserable hour were this to me an if I did!Nay, but I hold, with the Apostles, and their pupils in the Church, theancient fathers, that we are justified not by our own wisdom, or piety, or the works we have done in holiness of heart, but by faith. '"(1)

Then there was silence, and the monks looked at one anothersignificantly. 

"Please you sweep the floor, " said the dying Christian, in a voice towhich all its clearance and force seemed supernaturally restored. 

They instantly obeyed, not without a sentiment of awe and curiosity. 

"Make me a great cross with wood ashes. "

They strewed the ashes in form of a great Cross upon the floor. 

"Now lay me down on it, for so will I die. "

And they took him gently from his bed, and laid him on the cross of woodashes. 

"Shall we spread out thine arms, dear brother?"

"Now God forbid! Am I worthy of that?"

He lay silent, but with his eyes raised in ecstasy. 

Presently he spoke half to them, half to himself, "Oh, " he said, witha subdued but concentrated rapture, "I feel it buoyant. It lifts mefloating in the sky whence my merits had sunk me like lead. "

Day broke; and displayed his face cast upward in silent rapture, and hishands together; like Margaret's. 

And just about the hour she died he spoke his last word in this world. 

"Jesu!"

And even with that word--he fell asleep. 

They laid him out for his last resting-place. 

Under his linen they found a horse-hair shirt. 

"Ah!" cried the young monks, "behold a saint!"

Under the hair cloth they found a long thick tress of auburn hair. 

They started, and were horrified; and a babel of voices arose, somecondemning, some excusing. 

In the midst of which Jerome came in, and hearing the dispute, turned toan ardent young monk called Basil, who was crying scandal the loudest, "Basil, " said he, "is she alive or dead that owned this hair?"

"How may I know, father?"

"Then for aught you know it may be the relic of a saint?"

"Certes it may be, " said Basil sceptically. 

"You have then broken our rule, which saith, 'Put ill construction on noact done by a brother which can be construed innocently. ' Who are youto judge such a man as this was? go to your cell, and stir not out for aweek by way of penance. "

He then carried off the lock of hair. 

And when the coffin was to be closed, he cleared the cell: and put thetress upon the dead man's bosom. "There, Clement, " said he to the deadface. And set himself a penance for doing it; and nailed the coffin uphimself. 

The next day Gerard was buried in Gouda churchyard. The monks followedhim in procession from the convent. Jerome, who was evidently carryingout the wishes of the deceased, read the service. The grave was a deepone, and at the bottom of it was a lead coffin. Poor Gerard's, light asa feather (so wasted was he), was lowered, and placed by the side of it. 

After the service Jerome said a few words to the crowd of parishionersthat had come to take the last look at their best friend. When he spokeof the virtues of the departed loud wailing and weeping burst forth, andtears fell upon the coffin like rain. 

The monks went home. Jerome collected them in the refectory and spoke tothem thus: "We have this day laid a saint in the earth. The convent willkeep his trentals, but will feast, not fast; for our good brother isfreed from the burden of the flesh; his labours are over, and he hasentered into his joyful rest. I alone shall fast, and do penance; for tomy shame I say it, I was unjust to him, and knew not his worth till itwas too late. And you, young monks, be not curious to inquire whether alock he bore on his bosom was a token of pure affection or the relic ofa saint; but remember the heart he wore beneath: most of all, fix youreyes upon his life and conversation, and follow them an ye may: for hewas a holy man. "

Thus after life's fitful fever these true lovers were at peace. 

The grave, kinder to them than the Church, united them for ever; and nowa man of another age and nation, touched with their fate, has labouredto build their tombstone, and rescue them from long and unmeritedoblivion. 

He asks for them your sympathy, but not your pity. 

No, put this story to a wholesome use. 

Fiction must often give false views of life and death. Here as ithappens, curbed by history, she gives you true ones. Let the barrierthat kept these true lovers apart prepare you for this, that here onearth there will nearly always be some obstacle or other to your perfecthappiness; to their early death apply your Reason and your Faith, byway of exercise and preparation. For if you cannot bear to be told thatthese died young, who had they lived a hundred years would still bedead, how shall you bear to see the gentle, the loving, and the trueglide from your own bosom to the grave, and fly from your house toheaven?

Yet this is in store for you. In every age the Master of life and death, who is kinder as well as wiser than we are, has transplanted to heaven, young, earth's sweetest flowers. 

I ask your sympathy, then, for their rare constancy and pure affection, and their cruel separation by a vile heresy(2) in the bosom of theChurch; but not your pity for their early but happy end. 

'Beati sunt qui in Domino moriuntur. 

 (1) He was citing from Clement of Rome--

 {ou di eautwn dikaioumetha oude dia tys ymeteras sophias, y eusebeias y ergwn wn kateirgasametha en osioteeti karthias, alla dia tys pistews}. --Epist. Ad Corinth, i. 32. 

(2) Celibacy of the clergy, an invention truly fiendish. 

CHAPTER C

In compliance with a Custom I despise, but have not the spirit toresist, I linger on the stage to pick up the smaller fragments ofhumanity I have scattered about; i. E. Some of them, for the waysidecharacters have no claim on me; they have served their turn if they havepersuaded the reader that Gerard travelled from Holland to Rome throughhuman beings, and not through a population of dolls. 

Eli and Catherine lived to a great age: lived so long, that both Gerardand Margaret grew to be dim memories. Giles also was longaevous; he wentto the court of Bavaria, and was alive there at ninety, but had somehowturned into bones and leather, trumpet toned. 

Cornelis, free from all rivals, and forgiven long ago by his mother, whoclung to him more and more now all her brood was scattered, waited andwaited and waited for his parents' decease. But Catherine's shrewd wordcame true; ere she and her mate wore out, this worthy rusted away. Atsixty-five he lay dying of old age in his mother's arms, a hale womanof eighty-six. He had lain unconscious a while, but came to himselfin articulo mortis, and seeing her near him, told her how he wouldtransform the shop and premises as soon as they should be his. "Yes, mydarling, " said the poor old woman soothingly, and in another minute hewas clay, and that clay was followed to the grave by all the feet whoseshoes he had waited for. 

Denys, broken-hearted at his comrade's death, was glad to return toBurgundy, and there a small pension the court allowed him kept him untilunexpectedly he inherited a considerable sum from a relation. He wasknown in his native place for many years as a crusty old soldier, who could tell good stories of war when he chose, and a bitter raileragainst women. 

Jerome, disgusted with northern laxity, retired to Italy, and havinghigh connections became at seventy a mitred abbot. He put on the screwof discipline; his monks revered and hated him. He ruled with iron rodten years. And one night he died, alone; for he had not found the way toa single heart. The Vulgate was on his pillow, and the crucifix in hishand, and on his lips something more like a smile than was ever seenthere while he lived; so that, methinks, at that awful hour he was notquite alone. Requiescat in pace. The Master he served has many servants, and they have many minds, and now and then a faithful one will be asurly one, as it is in these our mortal mansions. 

The yellow-haired laddie, Gerard Gerardson, belongs not to Fiction butto History. She has recorded his birth in other terms than mine. Overthe tailor's house in the Brede Kirk Straet she has inscribed:

"HAEC EST PARVA DOMUS NATUS QUA MAGNUS ERASMUS, "

and she has written half-a-dozen lives of him. But there is somethingleft for her yet to do. She has no more comprehended magnum Erasmum, than any other pigmy comprehends a giant, or partisan a judge. 

First scholar and divine of his epoch, he was also the heaven-borndramatist of his century. Some of the best scenes in this new book arefrom his mediaeval pen, and illumine the pages where they come; for thewords of a genius so high as his are not born to die: their immediatework upon mankind fulfilled, they may seem to lie torpid; but at eachfresh shower of intelligence Time pours upon their students, they provetheir immortal race: they revive, they spring from the dust of greatlibraries; they bud, they flower, they fruit, they seed, from generationto generation, and from age to age.