For God and Gold

CHAPTER IV

So passed by the full days of my boyhood; I living, as I have said, chiefly at Ashtead in Harry Waldyve's company.

It was not alone in devouring grammar, and such dry bones of cosmography as Mr. Follet allowed us to pick, that our time was spent. Sir Fulke was not a man to keep boys wholly to such work. Although he had managed to acquire some show of skill in theology when King Henry brought it into fashion at Court, yet even that I soon saw had fallen into sad confusion in his mind, and in no sense was he a scholar.

Yet in all such pastimes and pleasant labours as are used in open places and the daylight, which in respect of peace or war are not only comely and decent, but also very necessary for a courtly gentleman to use—in these he still showed the remains of his former high skill, or at least a happy trick of imparting to us his great knowledge of their mysteries.

Almost every day he would have us out and exercise us under his own eye at riding, running at the ring and tilt, and in playing with weapons, being especially careful of our fence with the sword and spiked target. Like his master King Henry, he had a great love and skill for using the bow. This he taught us to use, and less willingly also the harquebuss.

We had little time for the sea—an element, as my guardian was wont to say, which sorted less with what pertained to a gentleman than the land. Yet he did not forbid it, and whenever he went up to the Court, which was not seldom, we laid aside awhile our courtly exercises, and were continually amongst the marshes and Saltings with Mr. Drake's boys, 'Isti dracones horrendi,' as Mr. Follet was wont to ease his mind by calling them.

After Sir Fulke's returns from Court it was always our scholarship that had the upper hand. For he was wise enough to see how things were changing at Court, and came back overflowing with praises of the young Queen's beauty and learning.

''Slight, lads,' he would say, 'she puts you both to shame, and goes beyond all young gentlemen of her time in the excellency of her learning. I tell you it is a sight to make England weep for joy to see her stand up, so fair and courteous, and make her speech in Latin, or French, or Spanish, or Italian, to the jabbering foreigners that come. And as for the Greek; why, Mr. Roger Ascham tells me she reads more of it with him in a day at Windsor than any prebendary of the church doth Latin in a week; he should know, seeing he had the setting forward of all her most excellent gifts of learning.'

'Then must we be double courtiers, sir,' said Harry, 'and court learning and the Queen as well, if we want to keep the Court, or the Queen shall have but half-courtiers.'

'Half-courtiers or double courtiers,' said Sir Fulke, 'I know that he who is out of learning will soon find himself out of Court.'

'Then is he in an evil case,' laughed Harry, 'for he that is out of Court is out of his suit, and he that is out of his suit shall be shamed unless he quickly suit himself with another. Come, Jasper, let us get Mr. Follet to make us breeches to go to Court with.'

And away he would run to his work, while Sir Fulke laughed at his boy's trick of turning words upside down. For he soon got the ways of that tripping wit which, it must be said, has since come to make far better passwords to places at Court than ever a hard-witted scholar could learn, did he read twice as much Greek as Mr. Ascham himself.

I say not this in envy, though I was too hard-witted ever to come by the trick. Harry's gifts were dearer to me than my own, and, God knows, I loved him for them, and never in my life envied him anything, except once, but for the present time let that pass.

Some three years after my father's death thus passed away before the sad day came when Harry and I were forced to separate, since our paths led diversely. It was high time that I should go to Cambridge, according to my father's wish. Sir Fulke's faith in scholarship was not large enough for him to suffer Harry to do the like. For him a place was found in the household of that most godly and warlike nobleman, Sir Francis Russell, Earl of Bedford, who was godfather to Frank Drake, since his renowned father, the first earl, being very earnest for the Reformation party, had been a good friend of Mr. Drake's when he lived at Tavistock.

Since my father's death I had known no day so sad as that on which I took my departure for Cambridge in company with Mr. Follet, who at my charges was to install me safely in Trinity College.

Harry rode with us as far as Gravesend, where we were to take the river for London. Mr. Drake, too, joined us at Rochester, and, riding by my side on his shaggy cob, beguiled the way with much good advice as to how I should bear myself at the University.

'I am, in a great measure,' said he, 'out of my former opinion against your becoming a scholar, not only because of the excellent parts I can see in you, which it were a sin to swathe in a napkin, but also because you will find that certain stout hearts amongst the godly, to whom I have written concerning you, are fast getting the upper hand at Cambridge. So that, I doubt not, you shall find yourself set amongst many goodly plants, with whom you shall grow to bear fruit medicinable for the purging away of all the clogging papistical humours that still be left to fester in the stomach of Reformation.'

'He were but a bitter tree,' laughed Harry, 'did he bear but purges.'

'A most wrong conclusion, my malapert Hal,' answered Mr. Drake; 'for your bitter pill is a sovereign sweetening of the inwards; and you shall find, moreover, that much fruit which grows at Court, though sweet in the mouth, is, for the most part, most bitter in the belly.'

'Then,' cried Harry, 'have I learnt a most notable piece of science, and can henceforth tell why courtiers' tongues are sweet and scholars' bitter. Still, I will be a courtier with a tongue tuned to sweet courtesy, and leave bitter railing to scholars.'

'Go, thou madcap,' chuckled Mr. Drake, whom Harry could never offend; 'go cry "Words, come and play with me," for surely thou wast born their play-fellow.'

Mr. Drake then fell to tell me, as he had a score of times before, that Trinity was the worthiest college in England, since it was that which his good friend, the renowned Earl of Bedford, had chosen for Frank's godfather, Lord Russell.

So largely did he speak of this and of the shining light that the young Earl had proved himself there, that his talk carried us all the way to Gravesend, where, most sadly, we bade adieu to him and Harry. As the strong flowing tide carried us up the beautiful Thames my spirits grew lighter; for I was not without comfort to soften the grief of my first parting with my brother.

As I never attained to his wit and skill in courtly exercises, being in no way apt thereto either by birth or nature, so I may say, since all men know it, in things pertaining to scholarship he was but a child beside me. I know not if I was unduly proud of all I had attained to under Mr. Follet's guidance, yet of a surety I know he was unduly proud to bring me to Cambridge.

'Were it not unworthy of a scholar, Jasper,' said the worthy man, as we sat in the tilt-boat that was carrying us to London, 'I could bring my heart to envy you the many and great delights that await you whither we are going. Most profitably have you attended to my precepts, and eschewing the light of experience, by which the vulgar walk, have trusted to books, which are the only true guide. Such well-fashioned vessels as I have made you it is now again the delight of Alma Mater to fill with her choicest nectar.'

'Did she, then, once choose other vessels?' asked I.

'Alas, dear discipulus, yes,' answered Mr. Pellet, with a little flush on his wan cheek; 'and then it was that I was cast forth. It was when those Elysian days, whereof the memory is a sweet savour to me still, were ended—the days when it was my happy fortune to find a place amongst that unmatched garland of fellows and scholars with which Dr. Medcalfe crowned St. John's College when he was Master, and afterwards when I was chosen out to be a most unworthy member of the new-founded house of Trinity. It was an honour I had little hoped to win; for (not to speak too much, because of the love I still bear to my old and dear college) this royal Trinity which our glorious King Henry founded, that colonia of St. John's, that matre pulchra filia pulchrior, to which you, I hope most humbly and reverently, are about to belong, I hold, above all foundations, learned or unlearned, that the world has ever seen, to be the most noble, princely, and magnificent.'

'What made you, then, leave so honourable a state?' asked I as he paused, as if lost in musing on the glories of our college.

'That is soon told,' said he sadly. 'The days I speak of ended with the most precious life of our scholar king. It was there, if I may make free with the fine figure of my most worthy friend, Mr. Roger Ascham, that the Hog of Rome passed over the seas into that most fair garden of Cambridge, and set to to root out the fair plants that were growing there, and tread them under his cloven feet. Then the blighting breath of idolatry carried seeds of tares thither, which, taking root, throve most rankly amidst the pollution that beast had made, till ignorance choked out scholarship, and I fled.'

'Surely, sir,' said I, for much talk with Mr. Drake had increased the hot opinions that were born in me; 'surely the breath of the beast of Rome is no better than the vapours from the mouth of hell.'

'Soft and fair, Jasper,' said the old scholar, 'soft and fair. Such words sit ill on a scholar's lips. Carry not the rancour of these present times into the holy shrine whither you go. The memory of the ruin that befell that fair-built fabric did somewhat carry me beyond the terms of good manners. Do not you follow me. As you love learning, help to guard the doors of yonder dear place against the savage turmoil of these shifting times.'

'Must a scholar, then,' said I, 'forget his religion and what he owes to his God?'

'No, not that, lad,' answered Mr. Follet, looking a little pained. 'Your most glorious college was, under the king's grace, as its charter recites, divinely appointed for the purpose of bringing the pure truth of Christianity into the realm, and repelling the nefarious and enormous abuses of the Roman papacy.'

'Then will I strive,' said I, 'with my college to do what King Henry said.'

'That is well, lad,' answered my poor tutor, without losing his troubled look. 'Still there is no need to forget your scholarship in doing parson's work. By learning shall you withstand Rome more than by controversy and railing. Love a scholar when you meet him, though he hate not Rome. Love him for his learning's sake, and forget Rome. Such was the way in the old days, when good Dr. Medcalfe was Master of St. John's.'

I saw how pained he was to think that the cargo he had laden with such care might be wrecked on the stormy seas which he could perceive ahead. So I said no more then, but contented myself with watching the multitudes of swans that came about us and the shipping which we passed, and with asking a hundred questions about the towns and villages on the banks, as well as of the great city which lay before, till by dark our sturdy rowers ceased their work at Paul's Chain, and we landed.

We lay but one night in London, and came to Cambridge on the fourth day. There Mr. Follet at once carried me to Dr. Beaumont, that I might be entered at Trinity.

The Doctor, as I must call him, though at that time he was only admitted B.D., was a man of about forty years of age, of good breeding and presence. In my eyes he seemed a very great person indeed, and my respect for good Mr. Follet was never so great as when I saw with what honour and affection the Master of Trinity received him.

'I have brought you a scholar, Beaumont,' said Mr. Follet, after very hearty commendations had passed between them, 'after my own heart; one who has imbibed the true principles of Aristotle, and is untainted with any new empiric heresy. I have taught him well in our own faith—to love learning, and despise experience as the common school-house of fools.'

'Ah, Follet,' said Dr. Beaumont, laying his hand on my tutor's shoulder fondly, and speaking to him smilingly, as though he had been a child, 'happy are you to have kept your scholarship so pure. Let us hope your scholar will do no worse, though, God knows, these are tainting times, and Cambridge grows so full of railing that ere long, I think, there will be no room left for the gentle disputations of scholars.'

With that he dismissed us to his brother, Mr. John Beaumont, the Vice-Master; who showed me where my lodging was to be in King's Hall, not far from the great gateway of King Edward.

How proud I felt as I sat that afternoon looking out upon the little court, for that was before Dr. Neville had pulled down the old buildings to make the present great court, which is now the envy of every college in Europe!

Cambridge seemed to me a hall of Paradise, and Trinity its daïs. In spite of what Dr. Beaumont had said, I looked forward to dwelling in it as in a realm where the pure quintessence of learning should reign over a quiet band of brothers, who in the impassive contemplation of wisdom should have lost all hate, and fear, and sorrow.

Suddenly my meditation was disturbed by a loud shout, and I saw a number of students surge tumultuously out of an archway into the court. In their midst was an effigy with an ox's skull for a head, clearly made to counterfeit the devil. This they had clothed in a surplice, and crowned with a square cap.

It seemed to delight them beyond measure; for while one held the thing the rest danced round it, laughing and shouting, and singing ribald verselets against it. Gradually they drew near the window of one of the fellows, named Saunderson, who was University Reader in Logic, and fell to crying, 'Fasting Johnnie, Fasting Johnnie, come and welcome your master, who is here to speak with you.'

Therewith Mr. Saunderson ran at them with a cudgel, but they drove him back, so that he could not come at the devil in the surplice.

By this time the uproar had brought a number of students to the gate, and Mr. Saunderson, seeing amongst them a number of King's College men, cried out, 'To me, to me, all lovers of the old faith, and stay this sacrilege.'

There was a rush from the gate at the effigy in answer to his call, and in a few moments I could see my college was being worsted. That was enough for me in the first blush of my pride, and, without thinking, I rushed down and out into the court, just in time to seize the effigy as it was being carried out of the gate.

What followed beyond a wild turmoil, in which I was fighting like the Drake boys themselves, I cannot say, but soon I knew I was standing in the midst of the court with the tattered effigy in my hands and my fellow-students shouting round me as if their lungs must burst.

At every pause in their shouting I could hear the voices of the Vice-Master and Mr. Saunderson railing at each other in a corner of the court with such good will, that every moment I thought it would come to blows.

I was feeling very proud of what I had done, though scarcely knew in the din what to do next, when all at once I saw a grave-looking young man standing in the gateway, which was now shut, and by his side my poor tutor looking at me as though his heart would break.

Then at last it burst upon me what I had done. At one blow the fair fabric I had raised in my day-dreams, the oft-repeated resolution to lead the life of pure scholarship, to soar impassive on the wings of science above the little turmoils of the world—at one blow it was all gone. Ere one sun had set upon my new life I was the hero of a vulgar broil.

In an agony of shame I cast down the detested cause of my grief, and, breaking passionately through the excited throng, fled to my rooms from the reproachful, heart-rending gaze of poor Mr. Follet.

With my head buried in my arms I sat for some minutes sobbing in black despair at my table, when, as I thought, I heard him open my door and come towards me; but the step was young, firm, and resolute, as unlike as it could be to my dear old tutor's shuffle. A strong hand was laid gently on my shoulder, and I heard a deep, full-toned voice speaking to me.

'Be of good heart, Mr. Festing,' it said; 'I know why you weep, and had I not long ago hardened my heart to the battle, I could weep with you.'

I looked up, and saw the same gentleman who had been standing with my tutor in the gateway. He was a somewhat ungainly, ill-favoured young man of some eight and twenty summers, but yet I felt drawn to him, as much by reason of his kindly words as of a look there was in his face of fearless resolution, and pure-strained intellect, which a certain aspect of weary melancholy softened into what was to me a most sweet and lovable expression.

'I am Mr. Thomas Cartwright,' he went on, still looking sorrowfully upon me, 'new-made major-fellow of Trinity, with whom you are to share this lodging. I have brought this about by the kindness of the Master, because Mr. Drake had written to me concerning you, with very hearty commendations.'

'Are you a friend of Mr. Drake's, then?' asked I, feeling greatly comforted.

'Yes, Mr. Festing,' answered he; 'and also of that most high-wrought scholar, Mr. Follet. I know more of you than you know of me, and I know why you grieve. It is not hidden from me that you were minded to make sacrifice to the Lord of the good parts He has given you, and by long hours of patient study to make them worthy His acceptance. Yet rejoice that He has shown you at your very going forth what His will is with you. Rejoice that we can say this day, as surely as Samuel did to Saul, that He has appointed you to go up with us against the Amalekites and destroy them utterly. Such is His will; and while men hearkened to Him the strong tide of Reformation flowed on in full flood under His mighty breath, till its living waters bid fair to fill the length and breadth of Christendom with their cleansing sweetness. But men wearied of the work, and spared the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and of the lambs, and destroyed them not. And now the Lord's ears are vexed with the bleating of the sheep and the lowing of the oxen amongst the people. He turns His face from them, and the tide is fast running back. Rise up, then, and do the work of the Lord. Think not of the treasure you have been laying up for Him; for, behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams!'

'Must I then abandon all scholarship,' I asked, when he had finished, 'to join in the din of these bitter controversies?'

'What could the son of Nicholas Festing wish for better?' Mr. Cartwright replied. 'For what you call bitter controversy is battle under the banner of the Lord of Hosts against the Amalekite. Moreover, you need not lay aside scholarship, but you must labour thereat, even as I have done, to make of it a weapon wherewith at last you shall hew Agag in pieces before the Lord.'

With such words he encouraged me not only then, but daily, till ere a term was half over I was as hot a young Puritan as any in Cambridge. I cannot blame myself that I so quickly made surrender to that remarkable young man, whom St. John's and my college were bidding against each other to possess, and who has since made so great a stir in England, becoming the very head and heart of the Puritan party.

I had not even good Mr. Follet's influence to help me, for he left Cambridge a few days after to take up his place as tutor to Harry and one or two other young gentlemen about the Court, to whom he had been commended by his good friend Mr. Ascham, a man who at that time was the very oracle of the nobility on all such matters.

I was glad enough my tutor was spared any further sight of the ill-conditioned state of his university, and, above all, the hornets' nest which I soon found my unhappy exploit had stirred up.

It was some days after his departure that I was sitting at the window of my lodging pretending to read, but in truth listening to the Vice-Master and Mr. Cartwright, who were talking over Mr. Saunderson's recent expulsion from his fellowship.

'And how think you the Vice-Chancellor will take it?' said Mr. Cartwright thoughtfully.

'Who cares how?' said Mr. Beaumont hotly. 'Who cares what a Romish mule like Baker thinks? If he cannot stomach it, so much the worse for his Cretan belly.'

'And yet I think he is like to take some order in the matter,' said Mr. Cartwright, 'seeing how sturdy a papist Saunderson was.'

'Doubt not he will talk big enough,' answered the Vice-Master. 'He thinks because he is Provost of King's he can lift up his head over Trinity men. Yet let him beware, or he shall find that Pharaoh will lift up the head of the King's Baker from off his shoulders, and good Protestant fowls shall eat the flesh from off him. And besides, what order can he take? For if we cannot expel a fellow for observing fasts and particular days, not to speak of using allegory and citing Plato when publicly discoursing on the Scriptures, we may just as well write ourselves heathen idolaters and Italian atheists at once.'

At this moment I heard the tramp of armed men below the window, and, looking out, I perceived the Proctor with the beadles and his watch in the court below halting at our staircase. At that time the Proctor's watch always went at night harnessed with good morions and corselets, for fear of the Mayor's constable and his men, but it was not common to see them so by day.

Mr. Proctor demanded admittance in the Vice-Chancellor's name, and therewith entered the room with the beadles and two halberdiers, whose bright armour seemed strangely out of place in our dim and dusty lodging.

'I arrest you, John Beaumont,' said the Proctor, 'for brawling and other offences against the peace and dignity of our Lady the Queen and this University.'

'At whose suit?' asked the Vice-Master.

'At Mr. Saunderson's,' he answered. 'Here is the warrant; I pray you come peaceably.'

'Oh, I will come gladly enough!' said Mr. Beaumont, 'if it were only to enjoy the discomfiture it will bring the King's Baker when Sir William Cecil hears of it. Thank God, we have a Chancellor who knows my brother and me for true men, and can make a traitor's ears tingle—ay, and his back too. Let my brother know all, Mr. Cartwright, and pray him write without delay to Sir William.'

The Proctor looked a little troubled at the mention of the great Secretary of State, but still he performed his task, and our Vice-Master was conducted to prison. And there indeed he lay till an answer came down from Sir William, with such a stinging reprimand for Dr. Baker that he was glad enough to release Mr. Beaumont and eat his humble pie, thanking God it was no worse.

Were I to speak at greater length of Cambridge as it was at that time, I should have little else to tell save ringing the changes on what happened to me in the first week of residence. Factions and contentions were our only occupation; and while the seniors quarrelled the students brawled, and grew daily more inordinate and contemptuous of rules for their orderly governance, as well in behaviour as in religion.

As for learning, it was only part and parcel with our manners. Our only philosophy was controversy concerning the ordinances of the English Church; while in grammar we studied nothing so much as how to rail in Ciceronian Latin,—and cunning professors we had, at least for the railing.

Sharing Mr. Cartwright's lodging, I was more fortunate than most. Though very earnest in the controversies, he would not neglect his scholarship nor mine. Every morning he rose between three and four, not allowing himself more than five hours' sleep, whatever happened. I rose with him, out of my love of him and learning; and pushing my trundle-bed under his standing bedstead, to make room for my stool beside him, read with him out of the books we loved so well till nigh ten o'clock, when dinner was served in the Hall.

After that the disputations in the schools began, which I always attended with him, being proud to carry the books of the most brilliant scholar and popular orator in Cambridge.

Between that and supper-time I exercised my body, as I had promised Sir Fulke, chiefly in the fencing-school. For there was newly come to Cambridge at that time an Italian master of fence, to whom all the best gentlemen in the University resorted to learn the new foining rapier play, to the great discomfiture of the teachers of sword and buckler. Moreover, I rode out continually to the artillery butts or the Gog-Magog hills, till Mr. Cartwright persuaded me to abandon the evil company that gathered there daily for pastime.

So things went with me and the University, till in the summer of the year of grace 1564 a great and notable thing for us came to pass.

CHAPTER V

It was after hall one day, in the middle of July, that Mr. Cartwright came up to me with the great news.

'Our time has come at last, Jasper,' said he; 'this day the Vice-Chancellor has received a letter from Mr. Secretary with very sharp orders for the burying of our differences, seeing that the Queen's grace will make progress here early in August.'

'That is news indeed,' said I; 'will there not be great things done for her entertainment?'

'That is the way my content lies,' answered Mr. Cartwright, radiant. 'There will be disputations, great disputations, where we shall pour into her gracious ear the true wisdom of Reformation, and refute our backsliding, halting adversaries.'

'But it is always said,' I replied, 'that the Queen clings to ceremonies and superstitions.'

'So she does,' he said, 'and were it not that that godly man, Lord Robert Dudley, is ever at her side, things might go harder with the faithful than they do.'

'Truly,' said I, 'our High Steward is very earnest for the truth, but how shall we prevail with her better than he?'

'God will give us strength, and words, and wisdom,' he answered excitedly. 'I shall stand forth in His might at the great disputation, and speak words of fire that the Lord shall whisper in my ears. She shall listen and know it is the word of God that she hears; and lo! she shall go forth from Cambridge henceforth thrice blessed, to search out and destroy utterly throughout the length and breadth of the land all that the people have disobediently saved from the destruction of Amalek.'

'But will she surely hearken?' I said, half pitying and half fearing to see him lifting up his voice like one of the prophets.

'Ay, lad!' he cried, growing more and more excited, 'I know she will. She is young and good and wise. She has been surrounded by evil councillors, but the Lord has bidden me go cry to her, that she may see the way of England's, ay, and the world's, salvation.'

It was not until the day after the Queen arrived, when she rode out of her lodgings at King's to visit the colleges, that my eyes were gladdened with the sight of that most sublime Princess.

I took my stand in Trinity, near the door of the hall, to see her ride into it. I shall never forget that sight as she passed on erect upon her horse, in a black velvet gown and hat. It was before the present monstrous fashions had come into use, and her costume so set off the brilliancy of her complexion and the ruddy glow of her hair that she looked radiant as a goddess in the joy of her reception, and the full flush and beauty of youthful womanhood.

As she rode on into the hall I fell upon my knees to worship what seemed to me, who had never spoken to and hardly seen a beautiful woman before, the most lovely sight my eyes had ever beheld.

With all my lungs I shouted 'Vivat Regina Divina.' She heard my cry and smiled down upon me, and I, poor soul, like I know not how many more beside me that day, rose up over ears in love with my Queen.

And why should I not? Could a gentleman have a more worthy love? Some speak of her littlenesses, and mumble over her womanly faults. I, for one, will not listen to them. I did not see them. I worshipped what I saw. What that was all men know.

What witnesses could I call in her defence were she arraigned before a Court of Perfect Womanhood! And those not her own subjects either—it is only natural that they should praise—but foreigners, as any may know who have heard, as I have, Signor Giordano Bruno, the wisest of all who in my time have travelled hither, and my good friend, exhaust his surpassing eloquence in praising her.

'I hold her,' so I have heard him say, 'for a princess without peer or rival, a woman so gifted and favoured of Heaven, that whether for heroism or learning or sagacity, no soldier, or lawyer, or statesman in her kingdom is her equal. I tell you that the wisdom, the dignity, the statesmanship, the wit, the beauty of that most royal lady has won her a throne upon the steps of which must humbly take their place, Semiramis, Dido, Cleopatra, and all princesses of whom the world has boasted hitherto. See where she sits upon her lofty seat, with the eyes of Christendom fixed upon her in astonishment and admiration, wondering to see how, in her beauty and dignity, as by the mere force that shines from her glorious face, she kept back from her beloved kingdom for well-nigh thirty years the storm that surged and roared upon the face of Europe; and, when at last it burst in frantic fury on your shores, hurled it back with one majestic sweep of her arm, and bound it down once more to receive what it was her will to send.'

Happy, happy for the world if thou, my peerless Queen, like the new sun-goddess Aphrodite that thou art, shouldst open thy girdle till it embraced not only England and Ireland, but the whole globe. Then under thy benignant universal rule it should deserve the title thou hast won for thine own realm amongst the wisest of other lands; then should it be named, as they have named England, 'the pattern of perfect monarchy,' 'domicilium quietatis et humanitatis.'

Such, at any rate, was Cambridge while the sun stayed with us; and such indeed was England by the side of other realms. So completely did the fair flowers of scholarship which blossomed in the sunbeams of her presence obscure the thorns beneath, that Cambridge indeed appeared the garden of learning that she thought it.

It was a sight I am proud to have seen when she sat in great St. Mary's Church beneath her canopy, with the Doctors and Bachelors in due order around her upon the great stage that had been erected there for the disputations.

'Surely it is a second Sheba,' whispered Mr. Cartwright to me, as I stood by his side with the books he required for setting forth his arguments. 'She has come from the South to hear the wisdom of Heaven. Pray God he may give me this day some shred of the spirit of Solomon.'

'Would God, sir,' said I, 'you might turn her heart, though I fear the ungodly have sorely hardened it.'

'Why do you say that?' asked he.

'Did she not last night,' I answered, 'listen to a play of Plautus in King's Chapel after evening prayer, and did they not use the rood-loft as a gallery for her women?'

'Better use it for that,' said Mr. Cartwright, 'than for the lewd mockery of God they hold there daily. What wonder the poor Queen is led astray in that pestilent slough of Papacy where she lodges. But peace now, for the Proctor calls on the Respondent to begin the act.'

Mr. Thomas Byng of Peterhouse set forth the questions of the philosophy act. They were two, namely, 'Monarchy is the best form of government;' and secondly, 'The constant changing of the laws is dangerous.'

When his oration was finished the masters who were called to the disputation came forward. Mr. Cartwright's opponent in this was Mr. Thomas Preston of King's, a man of very goodly presence and sufficient wit, though more fit for a courtier than a scholar, and at heart little better Reformation man than the rest of the King's fellows.

He made a speech well wrought enough, and delivered with courtly gesture, and very trippingly, to the great pleasure of the Queen. Yet for fire, learning, persuasion, and all that pertains to true rhetoric and philosophy, it was, to my mind, but the chatter of a jay beside my Mr. Cartwright's speaking.

I could see the Queen was well pleased with what he said. It was like being in paradise with the angels for me to watch her beautiful face, wherein was delicately mirrored all the subtle perceiving qualities of her most polished mind, as each was stirred by the magic of my master's tongue.

As I look back to it now it seems to me like the shining surface of some tropic lake, wherein the great soul of God, that dwells in the trees and flowers and vines, is mirrored each moment more gloriously as the soft breath of heaven from time to time breaks up the reflected image.

I dwell on this because some have said, most wantonly, that Mr. Cartwright was so vexed at the favour the Queen afterwards showed to Mr. Preston that he thenceforward became a bitter enemy of the church she loved. I say it is a wanton lie to speak so. My master was too great a soul to harbour such littleness. His hatred of prelacy and superstitious forms was of older and firmer standing than that. If at that time he changed at all in opinion, it was that he saw too well there was no hope of winning the Queen, and that it was to Parliament and the people he must henceforth look.

He was very silent as we left the church, and in spite of all I could say concerning the Queen's plain pleasure in his speech, I could see the melancholy of his face grow deeper and its resolution sterner. I know that he saw at once that he had failed, and perceived clearly before him the long life of toil and pain and bitterness through which he was thenceforth to fight his way.

I was very glad that evening as we sat together gloomily in our lodging to hear a knocking at the door. I went to open it, and found there a gentleman of the Court, tall of stature, but so wrapped in his cloak and shaded by a large Spanish hat that I could not tell who it was.

'Is Mr. Cartwright within?' said the gentleman.

'Would you have speech with him?' asked I.

'Yes, and alone,' answered the gentleman. I knew not what to do, but Mr. Cartwright, who had started up at the sound of the stranger's voice, cried out at once to me that I should go.

I went out straightway to King's College to see the seniors and Court ladies go in to the play of Dido, which was being presented there that night, wherein Mr. Thomas Preston was playing a chief part.

In an hour's time I returned, but hearing voices still within my lodging, waited outside, where a lamp swung over the door. Very soon the voices ceased, and the gentleman came out. He seemed so occupied with his recent talk with Mr. Cartwright that he took no pains to conceal his face, and as he passed out by the lamp I could see it was none other than Lord Robert Dudley.

'What said Lord Robert about it?' I asked when I went in, thinking he had certainly come from the Queen to speak with my master about his oration.

'How knew you it was Lord Robert?' said he quickly.

'I saw his face by the lamp-light,' said I, surprised at his sharpness.

'Then tell no man what you saw,' he answered. He was silent a moment, and then, as though he thought best to tell me more, since I knew so much, or perhaps for very longing to speak with some one, he went on.

'He came not to speak of the oration,' said he, 'but of deeper matters, of things which nearly concern our Reformation. God grant he be a true man!'

'But is he not surely a true friend of ours?' I asked.

'I know not, lad, I know not,' he said. 'He speaks fair enough, but I doubt there is too much wind under his cap for us to count too much on his steadfastness. Still, better a popinjay at Court than no friend at all. Things look black indeed if all he says be true. God knows what counsel is being breathed in the Queen's ears, but 'tis certain her right hand is held out to Spain. Since peace was made with France, I thought there would be leisure for England to complete the good work within herself; but now this dallying with Spain and the woman of Scotland of which I hear may mar all, and we perhaps shall have to fight the fight again. Heaven send these piracies—of which Mr. Drake writes to us, and of which Lord Robert speaks—may by God's help prosper, till they make a breach between His people and the spawn of antichrist, such as no Queen or King or embassy can heal.'

It surprised me to hear so godly a man as Mr. Cartwright speak of Heaven prospering piracy, but I was wont to believe all he said was right, and held my peace. He went on then to tell me how earnest her Majesty was that Lord Robert should marry the Queen of Scots, and how well she had received the new Spanish ambassador at Richmond, and many other evil signs.

'But surely, sir,' said I, 'in this she deserves the praise of our party, seeing that if the Queen of Scots had so godly a husband as our High Steward, all practices against the cause in Scotland would end, and a true succession be assured.'

'Speak not of it, lad,' Mr. Cartwright replied. 'It is but cozening of the Lord to dally thus with antichrist. England must have no part with the accursed thing. Rome and Reformation, there are these two, and no other; and we must choose between them. Pray, lad, and watch and toil by night and day, by thought and deed, that the choice may be the right. Above all, pray, as I have ever bid you, that we may see the Queen speedily matched to some godly Protestant lord, so that, being blessed with issue, she may keep the succession clear from all fear of Romish taint. Wrestle, lad, with the Lord for that. It is the only hope and safeguard of Reformation in England.'

He uttered no more than we all thought then from the wisest and most wide-seeing to the most ignorant and bigoted. He, I think, saw it more plainly than many, and during the rest of the Queen's visit we spoke of little but these things, till I fully shared his thought that the tide of Rome, which, had begun to flow again, and had already covered so many fair Protestant provinces, was setting hard towards England; and each morn and night my prayers went up with those of all our party, and many a one beside, that the Queen might soon be wed.

So moved was I by all this talk that I could take but little note of the disputations, plays, and pageants with which my university entertained the Queen, the more so as Mr. Cartwright took no more part in them. Still, I saw her every day, and dreamed of her every night, feeling I loved her more and more for the dangers that surrounded her, and that I would spare not even my life to ward her from her enemies.

On the 10th of August, after a morning shower of degrees upon all the Court, the Queen left Cambridge, and I not long afterwards, being troubled with an ague, went home to Longdene.

CHAPTER VI

'Hail! man of learning,' cried Harry to me, as the day after my coming home I rode up to Ashtead. He was standing at the gate about to mount his horse as though for a journey. He had grown a man since I saw him, and looked handsomer and happier than I had ever seen him.

'Hail! man of courts and camps,' I cried him back, 'whither away so fast?'

'No whither, lad,' said he, 'since you are come, and whither I was going I will not tell you, till I hear first where your life-blood has gone. 'Slight, man, you look as pale and dry as a love-lorn stock-fish. What ails you?'

'Nought but a piece of an ague,' said I, feeling the sight of him like medicine to me, 'and perhaps a surfeit of weary wits.'

'Well, save us from universities, then,' answered he. 'Courts and camps have their dangers, they say, but, 'fore heaven, I think your college is a very Castle Perilous beside them!'

'How will you make that good, most sapient brother?'

'Nay, the maxim is good already, without my making. For, look you, in camp a man shall lose at most his life, and at Court his heart; but your college puts his spirits in danger, and to be spiritless is worse a thousand times than to be dead or even in love.'

'Well, I think you may be right, and in any case have enough spirits to share with me.'

'Nay, if you want spirits, come with me whither I was going, and I will show you a man who has enough to set a whole graveyard singing.'

'Why, 'tis a very resurrection of spirits. Come, tell me who is your miracle man?'

'Who is he? Why, who should he be but that man of men, that prince of good companions, Frank Drake?'

'Nay, then I am for you; if it were only to keep peace amongst my members. For my ears have had so much of him that I think my eyes are like to fall out with them from pure jealousy.'

'Well, 'tis a bargain, then; and we both go a-fishing with him in his bark.'

'In his bark? Is he then master already?'

'Ay, that he is. Old Master Death mastered his old master, and now he is his own master and his bark's too. For he got that by the old dog's will.'

'Well, I am right glad to hear it. But tell me, is he all his brothers say?'

'And more, and more, and more again! Why, man, he is my own Lord of Bedford with a Will Somers rolled into him, and who could be more of a man than that? But we can talk of this as we go along. First come within and see my father, while Lashmer gives your horse a bite, that we may ride forward.'

Lashmer, I had better say here, was son to Miles, my steward. He rode with me on this day, and henceforth became my body-servant and most trusty and trusted follower. He was a broad-faced, red-haired lad, but not very hard-featured, though his face was just of that honest Kentish sort that made one feel compelled to laugh by the mere looking at it.

Sir Fulke greeted me boisterously, as usual, with a hearty welcome well peppered with oaths, which, I must say, burnt my palate more them they used to.

'Art going fishing with Harry?' said my guardian, when our greeting was done.

'Yes, sir,' cried Harry; 'we are going to catch Spanish mackerel.'

They both laughed heartily at this, I knew not why; but not having heard of such a fish as he named, I thought it was a jest of Harry's which my scholar's wits were too hard to see.

'Have you brought your snappers with you?' asked Harry.

'Yes,' said I; 'a pretty case of short ones that were my father's, since Miles said the roads were far from safe. But will you shoot these fish?'

'No, lad,' said Harry, and he and Sir Fulke both seemed to be strangling another laugh; 'but, as you say, one meets fellow-travellers now whom it is well to treat at a distance, so every gentleman rides with a brace of dags or so in his saddle.' 'Blame yourselves for it,' said Sir Fulke. 'For since your new Reformation men have sent fish out of fashion, in spite of all Mr. Secretary can do with his acts and ordinances, fishermen have to fish ashore. The hundred of Hoo swarms with such folk, so that a man may hardly come to Gravesend in safety. There is never a lane in Kent which some of the valiant lubbers will not drag once in a week for any fin that's stirring. God knows what will become of the sea-service if gentlemen do not set the fashion for fishing again,' and therewith the old knight chuckled again till his face was redder than a doughty turkey-cock's.

'Come, let us away,' said Harry, 'or Frank Drake will have a rod for me. He is testy as the devil if a man be late.'

'What!' said I, 'will he not bide a gentleman's time?'

'Wait till you see him,' answered Harry. 'The sea, in Frank's company, is a mighty leveller of gentility. Here, take this; we shall be out all night.'

So saying, he tossed me a cloak, and we set out.

The way proved all too short, so much had we to tell each other. Harry was overflowing with the delights of the Court. He seemed able to talk for ever on the pageants and masques, in which, to my sorrow, he had taken a great share; for at Cambridge the men of our party began to look askance at such vanities.

It pleased me better to hear him speak of the grace and beauty of the Court ladies, who seemed to have been very kind to him. He spoke of them in a tone of chivalrous rapture, which made me sometimes long to have his gifts, that I too might please women, and know how to speak with them, and be thought worthy to be their squire. But I tried hard, when he spoke of such things with kindling eyes, to crush my chivalry, having well learnt my lesson that this, too, was a carnal vanity.

Above all, he praised the Queen as one that shone like a ruby amongst pearls, and there I suffered myself to join his song. I think he was as much in love with her as I.

Next to the Queen he spoke most of a little girl, called Anne St. John, who, from what he said, seemed rather his tyrant than his playfellow. She was ever with the Earl, either at Russell House or at Woburn, being a niece of the good Countess Margaret, his beloved wife, who died soon after Harry joined the Earl's household. My lord found great comfort, Harry said, in the child's pretty ways as much as in her beauty, for she had ruddy hair and deep brown eyes, like the Queen.

She was moreover much beloved by her cousins, the Earl's daughters, so that it came about that Harry saw her every day, and became her playfellow and willing servant. He made me laugh to hear him speak of her tyrannous ways and her jealousy.

'I know not what kind of woman she will grow,' he said; 'but now she is the sweetest toy a man could want, and wayward as a haggard. Yet my lord will often curb her in his dry, merry way, and she will be as thoughtful after it as a little Solomon. Were her pretty spirit in a colt I would not care to have his breaking; yet I think that any life which my lord will take in hand will never grow awry.'

So he fell to speaking of his lord, Sir Francis Russell, Earl of Bedford, to whom he seemed as devoted as ever I was to Mr. Cartwright; above all, when he followed him to the north, on his being named Governor of Berwick and Warden of the East Marches, and saw how great a statesman and soldier he was.

'Truly,' said he, 'may I count myself fortunate in thus being able to go in the train of so famous a captain to the best school of arms in the country, as Berwick is held to be, not only because of the passages of arms that continually take place on the Border, but also by reason of the number of skilled and veteran soldiers that are gathered there.'

'Then you had a plenitude of professors,' said I.

'Ay, and a plenitude of practice too,' he answered; 'and that in all military sciences. For my lord's first care was to increase the strength of the defences of the place. So I saw all that craft, besides gunnery and weapon exercise, both in play and earnest. Furthermore, my lord took me for secretary when he rode during the summer with Sir John Foster to settle the limits of the marches, and there I learned much of the conduct of military councils and affairs, together with many other things that a prudent soldier should know and be silent about. Certes, I think I have as much valiant scholarship in six months as many come by in six years.'

'And no wonder,' said I, 'with such a godly and warlike tutor.'

'Ay,' cried Harry, with enthusiasm, 'he is a very pattern of all valour, piety, and gentleness, and rightly called "the mirror of true honour and Christian nobility."'

Indeed, I think he was right. For surely never was royal gift more wisely disposed than the wealth with which King Henry endowed Lord Russell and his father. Would God the whole of what he stripped from the monasteries had fallen into no worse vessels than those two! What a pattern of reformation, then, might England indeed have been to all the world, lifted far above the reach of even Papist sneer and cavil,—in very deed domicilium quietatis et humanitatis!

I could fully share Harry's regret when he told me that he had left Berwick for good and all. But it was needful that he should be a short time with his father before setting forth on his travels into France and Italy—a course which the Earl had himself strongly urged, as being most necessary for the perfect shaping of a gentleman and the building up of a full-grown manhood, wherein, he held, there was no such hindrance either in court or camp or council as in youth to have known no travel.

Talking thus together of the two years in which we had both passed into the dawn of manhood amidst such different scenes, we came to Rochester, where we left our horses in Lashmer's charge and took the boat, which two of Mr. Drake's boys had brought for Harry.

It made a man of me again to be once more on the river, though I did not like to see Harry whisper to the two Drakes and see them nod and grin in reply. But I soon forgot this in chatting, as we did, chiefly of Frank and his boat.

'Look there!' cried the boys at last. 'Was ever such a dainty?'

I looked and saw a smart-looking craft, such as is used in the Zeeland trade, but in better trim than most, lying at moorings close to Mr. Drake's hulk.

The boys gave us a lusty cheer as we ran alongside their home and I sprang on deck. Mr. Drake embraced me with such fervour and smell of tar that I was well-nigh undone, but John and Joseph tore me from him, crying, 'Come and see Frank, come and see Frank!'

Seizing each an arm, they dragged me to the cabin under the poop, where for the first time I saw that prince of captains, Francis Drake.

Ah! how my heart is lifted up when I think of that September afternoon; when I contemplate the condition of two men that day about to enter into a life-long struggle which was to glitter with the most glorious deeds the world has seen: the one a plain rough mariner, in his coarse sailor's slops, sitting in a dingy cabin, intent on a rude map of the Indies, the meanest ship-master of an island queen; the other an emperor in purple and gold, seated on the loftiest throne in Europe, the most powerful monarch in the world, with the crowns of six kingdoms clustered on his brow, and the gold of two worlds pouring into his lap;—the one surrounded by rude fisher lads; the other surfeited with the homage of the most skilful captains, the proudest nobles, the most cunning councillors these modern times have bred.

Surely no more notable example of God's power to humble pride and reward wickedness has ever been seen. Little could I guess then what his lot was to be, though when I looked on the man I might have known there was no task too great for Francis Drake to achieve.

God never made a man, I think, more fitted for the work he was set to do. His stature was low, but though he was then not past twenty years old, his deep broad chest and massive limbs showed the strength that was to be his. His head well matched his body, being hard-looking and round and most pleasant to look on, because of the bright brown locks that curled thick and close all over it, and the round blue eyes that shone full and clear and steadfast from under his thick arched brows. His mouth, which was already slightly fringed with a light-coloured beard, was of a piece with the rest, wide and good-humoured, with full, well-formed, mobile lips, such as we look for in an orator, and withal firm and self-reliant. His colour, moreover, was fresh and fair, as of a man whom no sickness could take hold of; and his whole aspect so well-favoured and full of cheerful resolution as I could not wonder made his family set him up to be their idol.

'I am very glad to see you, Mr. Festing,' said he, rising up as I entered and holding out his hand very frankly. 'I am glad you are come. We want strong hands for our fishing. Jack has told me what kind of blow you can strike.'

'But I have only a scholar's arm now,' I said. 'Once I could pull an oar and tally on a drag-net indifferently well, but I doubt study has softened me.'

Arching his eyebrows still more, he looked at me with that expression which I grew to know so well, and which as much as anything, I think, made him the master of men he was. It was a look half inquisitive, half astonished, yet wholly good-humoured. It seemed to wonder if a man could be so foolish as to try to deceive or thwart him, and to be ready to laugh at the folly of such an attempt rather than to resent it. Though there was plainly something in my speech he did not understand, yet he was soon satisfied, and burst out into a boisterous laugh.

''Fore God,' said he, 'you are a merry wag,' and then laughed on so heartily that no man could help taking the fever, and I laughed too, though I knew no better than the stern-post where the jest was.

'Yes, you may laugh,' said Mr. Drake, who had joined us. 'Frank knows how to fish, so do my boys. They will catch you now bigger fish than any man's sons in all Kent.'

'Where is James?' asked I, not seeing Mr. Drake's fourth son. 'Will he not go with us?'

'Peace,' said Harry, as the preacher turned away, and the laughter was hushed. 'Don't you know?'

'Let me tell him,' said Frank Drake, looking so stern as almost to seem another man. 'You must know, Mr. Festing, nigh a year ago he was 'prenticed in a ship that traded to Spain. We have no certain news of her, but very ugly tidings of what befell a crew that sailed in her company.'

'What tidings were those?' asked I.

'Come away,' said Frank; 'dad forbids us to speak of it. "Avenge it, if you will," says he, "but speak not of it."'

We went apart, and he told me one of those stories of which my ears were soon but too well filled: of a ship's crew seized in a remote port of Spain, and on pretext of some unruly conduct of one or two half-drunken men ashore, first thrown into prison, and then handed over to the officers of the Inquisition.

'Such, we fear, is Jim's fate,' said Drake, as he ended his story. 'It is most like he lies rotting now with his shipmates in some filthy dungeon, if worse has not befallen him at the hands of those hell-hounds. But come, let us not think of it. The tide has turned, and it is time we were away.'

We were soon aboard Frank Drake's boat, which was called the Gazehound. I could not help seeing how trim she was from stem to stern compared with other such craft engaged in the French and Zeeland trade. Nor could I but wonder at the ready despatch with which Frank's crew obeyed his orders. Indeed, we were hardly aboard a minute before we were running fast towards the sea, with a gentle breeze behind us, and the wicked river rushing recklessly along with us.

I know not whether it was some inward warning that made the Medway look so dark and cruel as it curled about our sides, or whether it was the effect on my worn brain of Frank Drake's fearful tale, which he told with fierce earnestness. Yet as the misty darkness deepened and the low waste of marsh on either hand began to be lost in the night, a sort of horror came over me, perhaps a part of my ague. It seemed that we, the river and ourselves, were rushing wildly on to some deed that we must hide from heaven. The curdling river seemed some huge snake, for whose help we had sold our souls. Rejoicing at its work and the folly of its dupe, it seemed to hiss in low laughter like a fiend's about us.

I turned from where I looked over the side to break the spell. Harry and all the boys, with one or two of the crew, were gathered aft around Frank as he sat tiller in hand. I could see them all by the light of the lantern we carried. Frank was telling them another hideous story of Spanish treachery and cruelty to English mariners who had come to trade in the Canaries.

His wide blue eyes were flashing in the excitement of his tale, and Harry and the Drake boys were no less excited than he. Even then I could see he had that wonderful gift of words by which afterwards at his will he could always raise or calm a storm amongst his followers.

Still the night deepened and the river grew darker and more devilish, as hand in hand with it we sped on through the darkness to our work. The flickering lantern cast strange lights and shadows upon the little group at the stern, till they seemed to be rather like some foul spirits than my good friends.

They cried to me to join them, but I said I was weary with a headache because of my sickness, and would sleep. I crept in then below the foredeck, and lay down upon a sail. There was something beneath it which made it an uneasy bed. I raised the canvas to see what it might be, and beheld some half-dozen longbows, quite new, and several sheaves of arrows. I think my sleep would have been easier had I not sought to remove the cause of my uneasiness.

For now I began to guess the meaning of all the jests I had heard, and questioned Harry when soon after he came to lie beside me.

'What fish, Harry,' I asked, 'is this that you bring me to catch with pistols and long-bows?'

'A fish that swims from Antwerp,' answered Harry, laughing. 'Wait and you shall see, if we have luck or judgment.'

There was little laughter in me as I lay there in the dim lantern light, with the sound of the wicked river whispering temptation in my ear. Was it that which seemed to take from me the power to rebuke in him what seemed to me no less than sin; or was it shame lest he should think that Cambridge had so softened and unmanned me that I no longer would follow wherever he led?

Harry must be right, thought I, and Frank Drake too! It must be right, yet would God I were in my trundle bed at Mr. Cartwright's side again! Surely Cambridge was sorely changing me. The great struggle of my life had begun, though I knew it not; the strife for the mastery of me between the inward man-made life of scholarship and vain hurry after God, and the strong, pure, out-o'-door life of England that God Himself had given me for my birthday gift.

Who shall say which is best? Not I, now I am old; but then, as I lay there beside Harry, in my vanity and blindness I said to myself: 'Surely his life is not of God; it is mine that is from heaven, the search after wisdom, the merciless war for truth, the exalting of the spirit and abasement of the body.'

My lips were trembling with a prayer that he might be turned and grow like me, but then I opened my eyes to look at him through the dim lantern light, and my prayer died unborn. Surely that gently-breathing figure, lying so calm and careless there in all its manly beauty, surely that must be all God's work, and what came of it His work as well.

So let me cease to resist, and let the hissing river hurry me on wheresoever it will with him.

CHAPTER VII

It was John Drake's rough voice that aroused me, as the soft morning light glimmered into the cabin where I had been sleeping.

'Rise quickly,' said he; 'the fish is in sight, and Frank says you must bear a hand, as it is a big one.'

So great was that extraordinary man's hold already on me that it never once seemed strange that I should receive orders from him thus. I rose quickly, and buckled on my sword and pistols, well knowing what was coming.

I was not at all surprised to see Harry standing, bow in hand, by Frank, and all the rest armed with bows and pikes.

'Good-morrow, Mr. Festing,' cried Drake. 'Heaven has sent the Antwerpers fortune to-day. Ere another hour or so they will be spared all further trouble for their cargo. See where she lies.'

It was a lovely misty morning, such as one can only see in the Channel on a sunny autumn day. Nothing was in sight but the shadowy form of a good-sized caravel on our larboard bow, heavily laden, and toiling at a snail's pace across our course.

As we drew nearer I could make out that she was at least twice, perhaps three times, our size, though I could see but few men on board her. Still my heart began to beat heavily.

'Steady now, lads,' cried Drake, as some of his brothers began to show signs of excitement; 'steady, or we shall get never a bite. Get up on the forecastle, Jack, and mend a bit of net; and do you, Mr. Waldyve, carol us out a French ditty for a bait. And, look you, not a glint and glimmer of weapon.'

Thus, with nothing to show we were not an ordinary French fishing-boat, we bore towards the caravel so as to pass close under her stern to windward. They, seeing our purpose, and fearing some ill-dealing, no doubt, since those waters were even then winning an evil name, hailed us.

Still we held on without answer, till they hailed again, asking what countrymen we were.

'Now for an English greeting!' cried Drake. 'It would be less than courtesy not to let them know our country since they ask so fairly.'

The words were hardly out of his mouth when our bows twanged and a little cloud of arrows swept over the caravel. With loud derisive cries our crew fitted fresh shafts. Thick and fast they flew, till the crew of the caravel dared not show themselves on deck. Every man hurried below to shelter himself, except him who was at the helm. Bravely he held on in spite of our shafts, till, with a shudder, I saw an arrow strike him under the arm. With a low cry he fell on his face across the tiller.

The caravel hove up into the wind, and I saw the steersman turned helplessly head over ears as the helm swung round—a sickening sight to see.

'Save you for a pretty tumbler!' cried Joe Drake, and all the rest but Frank and Harry laughed loud.

'Steady, lads, steady,' said he; 'look to your pikes, and gentlemen to their swords, or we shall some of us laugh the wrong side.'

As we fell aboard of her I drew my rapier. I can say without pride I was by this time no mean fencer, though a bungler beside Harry; yet so strange did my blade seem, now that for the first time I drew it in earnest, that I felt as though I had never handled one before.

Still, there was no time to think. Frank Drake sprang aboard, Harry after him, I after Harry. No sooner did our feet touch the deck than out of the after-cabin burst a half-dressed cavalier, rapier in hand. Some nine or ten men were at his back, armed with swords and daggers.

With a loud cry they ran upon us, the gentleman straight at me. He seemed mad with fury, for he made no shift to fence, more than to rush on with uplifted blade as though straightway to arrebatar with a wiping sweep, after the method of Carranza. I did but offer him my point di intrare, and he spitted himself or ever he came within his proportion. It was but murder. God forgive me for it when His will is! It made me sick to see my rapier half-hidden in his breast, as his sword-arm dropped, and for a moment he stood gnashing his teeth before he fell backward.

I shut my eyes as the blade drew hard from the wound, and reeled against the bulwarks, feeling dizzy with horror and my sickness. When I opened my eyes again it was well-nigh all over. For, save for two of his servants, no one resisted after the gentleman fell. The rest were poor Dutch mariners who cared little who had the cargo they carried, so long as they kept their skins whole.

The serving-men were quickly overpowered, and the rest of the crew driven within the forecastle. Then Harry came up and slapped me on the back.

'Well done, Jasper,' he said. ''Slight, it was a pretty thrust, a most scholarly imbroccata. Would that Sir Fulke had been here to see what his errant disciple can do! Perhaps he would rail less at your Italian bodkin-play, and would say, I doubt not, that they can teach something beside Latins at Trinity. But what is it, man? You look as if the blade were through you instead of him.'

'Hush, Harry!' I said. 'For God's sake, look to him, for I dare not.'

'Poor lad!' answered my dear brother, who could always feel for me far more than for himself, 'you are too sick for this bloody work. I will do as you bid, though there is little hope for him.'

But there was no need, for as I turned to look upon my work again, I saw Frank Drake leaning over the bleeding Spaniard, and, as tenderly as a woman, trying to staunch the wound.

It filled me with new wonder and love for this man to see how his fierce courage melted to gentleness as soon as the danger was over. I marvelled, too, to see how apt he was at surgery even then, though he had not yet attained to that great skill which afterwards he made it his duty to acquire.

It seemed to make war wondrous gentle to see him, and I was better able to give my help. We soon disposed the wounded man more easily, and went to minister to the helmsman, but, alas! he was stone dead.

Meanwhile the others had bound the crew, and Frank Drake set about questioning them. I don't know whether it made any difference to him, but he was most instant to find out if the cargo were Spanish owned.

While we were thus engaged there was a sudden cry of a sail in sight. Looking up, I could see a tall ship looming through the silver mist, and bearing down straight for us.

'Stand by to cast off, lads,' cried Frank, cool and decided, 'till we see what she is.'

We were all on board the Gazehound in a minute, and sat breathlessly waiting to see what our unwelcome neighbour might be.

Slowly she came down upon, us before the gentle breeze, looking so beautiful in the morning sun that I could hardly believe that she might contain a pirate's death for us all. The strain would have been more than I could have borne had it not been that my senses seemed dulled with horror of my deed.

Afterwards I thought it strange that no one had urged Drake to let go the prize and run for it; but then all seemed to think that the course he had made up his mind to was the only one possible.

Nearer and nearer she drew, till the mist, which was very thick close down on the water and had till now hidden her hull, cleared a little, and we could see, I at least with sinking heart, the sunlight sparkle on the ordnance which protruded from her lofty forecastle, like the teeth of some savage hound.

'Culverins!' whispered Harry to me. 'They have point-blank range of five hundred paces, and we are within that of her already. There is no running now, whatever befalls. Heaven send she is a Queen's ship, and no Spaniard.'

'What matters which,' said I, 'if we are pirates? You know well what grievous complaints they say the Spanish ambassador has made, and what orders the Queen has given the navy.'

'Well, wait a little. See the trumpets on the poop; they are going to hail us.'

On she came, a glorious sight, with the sun glowing on her bulging sails and the perfect lines of her hull, that swept so gracefully from towering poop to lofty forecastle.

Suddenly, as she drew level with us, her trumpets blared forth a loud flourish that rolled merrily away over the misty sea. The boatswain's pipe chirped out, and we could see the sailors stand by to go about.

Again the trumpets brayed a fuller call, and then a mass of red and gold aloft unfolded itself with royal languor, till there flashed in the sunlight, plain to see, the beautiful banner of our island Queen.

A lusty cheer from all our crew greeted the welcome flag. As it died away we could hear the captain of the Queen's ship hailing us to know who we were, and what we did.

'The Gazehound of Chatham—Master Drake,' shouted Frank, springing on the poop,—and then, after a pause, 'aiding a Spanish caravel in distress.'

We could hear a roar of laughter on board the ship at his words, and the captain's voice came rolling back:

'Well met, Master Drake, and a fair voyage.'

We gave her another cheer as we saw her keep on her course. She answered us with her hautboys and other music, which we listened to till it grew faint in the offing, and we were left alone to do our will upon our prize and prisoners.

As we watched her sail away so gallantly, with her gay streamers and gilded poop glittering like some tropic bird in the sun, I asked Drake what she was.

'I know her well enough,' said he, 'but we ask not the names of Queen's ships that find us at this work. Yet I will tell you. It is the Minion, and Captain David Carlet is in command of her. He is bound for Guinea with the John Baptist and Merline, both of London, so I know. They are going to try if they cannot draw a little for the Queen out of the Portugal's wells, like Mr. John Hawkins. Good luck go with them; but now we must to work.'

After what I had seen of Drake's dealing with the cavalier I had so grievously hurt, I had no fear that the crew of the caravel would suffer at his hands any great cruelty, such as I had heard less noble spirits had inflicted in the fury of their revenge against the Inquisition.