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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5ac89ff --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #69438 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69438) diff --git a/old/69438-0.txt b/old/69438-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 9192489..0000000 --- a/old/69438-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,3547 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Tedious brief tales of Granta and -Gramarye, by Arthur Gray - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Tedious brief tales of Granta and Gramarye - -Author: Arthur Gray - -Release Date: November 28, 2022 [eBook #69438] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Emmanuel Ackerman and the Online Distributed Proofreading - Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from - images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF GRANTA -AND GRAMARYE *** - - - - - - TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF GRANTA - AND GRAMARYE. - - [Illustration: - - E. Joyce Shillington Scales - 1919. - - _Entrance Gateway, Jesus College._] - - - - - TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF - GRANTA AND GRAMARYE - - BY - - “INGULPHUS” - (ARTHUR GRAY, Master of Jesus College) - - - _With illustrations by_ - E. JOYCE SHILLINGTON SCALES - - - “Merry and tragical, tedious and brief: - That is hot ice and wondrous strange snow.” - - _A Midsummer Night’s Dream._ - - - CAMBRIDGE: - W. HEFFER & SONS LTD. - LONDON: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO. LTD. - - - - - FIRST PUBLISHED, DECEMBER, 1919. - - -For permission to reprint these tales, which originally appeared in -_The Cambridge Review_, _The Gownsman_ and _Chanticlere_ (the Jesus -College Magazine), the writer thanks the editors and proprietors of -those papers. - - - - - Contents - - - PAGE - - I. TO TWO CAMBRIDGE MAGICIANS viii - - II. THE EVERLASTING CLUB 1 - - III. THE TREASURE OF JOHN BADCOKE 9 - - IV. THE TRUE HISTORY OF ANTHONY FFRYAR 19 - - V. THE NECROMANCER 28 - - VI. BROTHER JOHN’S BEQUEST 37 - - VII. THE BURDEN OF DEAD BOOKS 48 - - VIII. THANKFULL THOMAS 67 - - IX. THE PALLADIUM 76 - - X. THE SACRIST OF SAINT RADEGUND 84 - - - - - List of Illustrations - - - I. ENTRANCE GATEWAY, JESUS COLLEGE _Frontispiece_ - - II. DOORWAY, COW LANE 5 - - III. ORIEL WINDOW OF HALL AND ENTRANCE TO “K” STAIRCASE 11 - - IV. OLD HALL, MASTER’S LODGE 17 - - V. NORTH-WEST CORNER OF CLOISTERS 20 - - VI. THE MASTER’S STALL 23 - - VII. MAIN GATEWAY AND PORTER’S LODGE 31 - - VIII. ON “A” STAIRCASE 33 - - IX. FIREPLACE IN MASTER’S LODGE 41 - - X. A CORNER OF THE LIBRARY 51 - - XI. CHAPEL DOORWAY IN MASTER’S GARDEN 57 - - XII. NORMAN GALLERY, NORTH TRANSEPT 71 - - XIII. SOUTH-WEST PIER OF TOWER 74 - - XIV. IN THE FENS 83 - - XV. ENTRANCE TO CHAPTER HOUSE 87 - - XVI. THE CHANCEL SQUINT 90 - - - - - To Two Cambridge Magicians - - - In London lanes, uncanonized, untold - By letter’d brass or stone, apart they lie, - Dead and unreck’d of by the passer-by. - Here still they seem together, as of old, - To breathe our air, to walk our Cambridge ground, - Here still to after learners to impart - Hints of the magic that gave Faustus art - To make blind Homer sing “with ravishing sound - To his melodious harp” of Oenon, dead - For Alexander’s love; that framed the spell - Of him who, in the Friar’s “secret cell,” - Made the great marvel of the Brazen Head. - Marlowe and Greene, on you a Cambridge hand - Sprinkles these pious particles of sand. - - - - - The Everlasting Club - - -There is a chamber in Jesus College the existence of which is probably -known to few who are now resident, and fewer still have penetrated into -it or even seen its interior. It is on the right hand of the landing on -the top floor of the precipitous staircase in the angle of the cloister -next the Hall--a staircase which for some forgotten story connected -with it is traditionally called “Cow Lane.” The padlock which secures -its massive oaken door is very rarely unfastened, for the room is bare -and unfurnished. Once it served as a place of deposit for superfluous -kitchen ware, but even that ignominious use has passed from it, and it -is now left to undisturbed solitude and darkness. For I should say that -it is entirely cut off from the light of the outer day by the walling -up, some time in the eighteenth century, of its single window, and such -light as ever reaches it comes from the door, when rare occasion causes -it to be opened. - -Yet at no extraordinarily remote day this chamber has evidently been -tenanted, and, before it was given up to darkness, was comfortably -fitted, according to the standard of comfort which was known in college -in the days of George II. There is still a roomy fireplace before which -legs have been stretched and wine and gossip have circulated in the -days of wigs and brocade. For the room is spacious and, when it was -lighted by the window looking eastward over the fields and common, it -must have been a cheerful place for a sociable don. - -Let me state in brief, prosaic outline the circumstances which account -for the gloom and solitude in which this room has remained now for -nearly a century and a half. - -In the second quarter of the eighteenth century the University -possessed a great variety of clubs of a social kind. There were -clubs in college parlours and clubs in private rooms, or in inns -and coffee-houses: clubs flavoured with politics, clubs clerical, -clubs purporting to be learned and literary. Whatever their professed -particularity, the aim of each was convivial. Some of them, which -included undergraduates as well as seniors, were dissipated enough, and -in their limited provincial way aped the profligacy of such clubs as -the Hell Fire Club of London notoriety. - -Among these last was one which was at once more select and of more evil -fame than any of its fellows. By a singular accident, presently to be -explained, the Minute Book of this Club, including the years from 1738 -to 1766, came into the hands of a Master of Jesus College, and though, -so far as I am aware, it is no longer extant, I have before me a -transcript of it which, though it is in a recent handwriting, presents -in a bald shape such a singular array of facts that I must ask you to -accept them as veracious. The original book is described as a stout -duodecimo volume bound in red leather and fastened with red silken -strings. The writing in it occupied some 40 pages, and ended with the -date November 2, 1766. - -The Club in question was called the Everlasting Club--a name -sufficiently explained by its rules, set forth in the pocket-book. Its -number was limited to seven, and it would seem that its members were -all young men, between 22 and 30. One of them was a Fellow-Commoner of -Trinity: three of them were Fellows of Colleges, among whom I should -specially mention a Fellow of Jesus, named Charles Bellasis: another -was a landed proprietor in the county, and the sixth was a young -Cambridge physician. The Founder and President of the Club was the -Honourable Alan Dermot, who, as the son of an Irish peer, had obtained -a nobleman’s degree in the University, and lived in idleness in the -town. Very little is known of his life and character, but that little -is highly in his disfavour. He was killed in a duel at Paris in the -year 1743, under circumstances which I need not particularise, but -which point to an exceptional degree of cruelty and wickedness in the -slain man. - -I will quote from the first pages of the Minute Book some of the laws -of the Club, which will explain its constitution:-- - -“1. This Society consisteth of seven Everlastings, who may be Corporeal -or Incorporeal, as Destiny shall determine. - -2. The rules of the Society, as herein written, are immutable and -Everlasting. - -3. None shall hereafter be chosen into the Society and none shall cease -to be members. - -4. The Honourable Alan Dermot is the Everlasting President of the -Society. - -5. The Senior Corporeal Everlasting, not being the President, shall be -the Secretary of the Society, and in this Book of Minutes shall record -its transactions, the date at which any Everlasting shall cease to -be Corporeal, and all fines due to the Society. And when such Senior -Everlasting shall cease to be Corporeal he shall, either in person or -by some sure hand, deliver this Book of Minutes to him who shall be -next Senior and at the time Corporeal, and he shall in like manner -record the transactions therein and transmit it to the next Senior. The -neglect of these provisions shall be visited by the President with fine -or punishment according to his discretion. - -6. On the second day of November in every year, being the Feast of All -Souls, at ten o’clock _post meridiem_, the Everlastings shall meet -at supper in the place of residence of that Corporeal member of the -Society to whom it shall fall in order of rotation to entertain them, -and they shall all subscribe in this Book of Minutes their names and -present place of abode. - -7. It shall be the obligation of every Everlasting to be present at the -yearly entertainment of the Society, and none shall allege for excuse -that he has not been invited thereto. If any Everlasting shall fail -to attend the yearly meeting, or in his turn shall fail to provide -entertainment for the Society, he shall be mulcted at the discretion of -the President. - -8. Nevertheless, if in any year, in the month of October and not less -than seven days before the Feast of All Souls, the major part of the -Society, that is to say, four at the least, shall meet and record in -writing in these Minutes that it is their desire that no entertainment -be given in that year, then, notwithstanding the two rules last -rehearsed, there shall be no entertainment in that year, and no -Everlasting shall be mulcted on the ground of his absence.” - -The rest of the rules are either too profane or too puerile to be -quoted here. They indicate the extraordinary levity with which the -members entered on their preposterous obligations. In particular, to -the omission of any regulation as to the transmission of the Minute -Book after the last Everlasting ceased to be “Corporeal,” we owe the -accident that it fell into the hands of one who was not a member of the -society, and the consequent preservation of its contents to the present -day. - -Low as was the standard of morals in all classes of the University in -the first half of the eighteenth century, the flagrant defiance of -public decorum by the members of the Everlasting Society brought upon -it the stern censure of the authorities, and after a few years it was -practically dissolved and its members banished from the University. -Charles Bellasis, for instance, was obliged to leave the college, -and, though he retained his fellowship, he remained absent from it -for nearly twenty years. But the minutes of the society reveal a more -terrible reason for its virtual extinction. - -Between the years 1738 and 1743 the minutes record many meetings of -the Club, for it met on other occasions besides that of All Souls -Day. Apart from a great deal of impious jocularity on the part of the -writers, they are limited to the formal record of the attendance of -the members, fines inflicted, and so forth. The meeting on November -2nd in the latter year is the first about which there is any departure -from the stereotyped forms. The supper was given in the house of the -physician. One member, Henry Davenport, the former Fellow-Commoner of -Trinity, was absent from the entertainment, as he was then serving -in Germany, in the Dettingen campaign. The minutes contain an entry, -“Mulctatus propter absentiam per Presidentem, Hen. Davenport.” An entry -on the next page of the book runs, “Henry Davenport by a Cannon-shot -became an Incorporeal Member, November 3, 1743.” - -[Illustration: _Doorway, Cow Lane._] - -The minutes give in their own handwriting, under date November 2, the -names and addresses of the six other members. First in the list, in -a large bold hand, is the autograph of “Alan Dermot, President, at -the Court of His Royal Highness.” Now in October Dermot had certainly -been in attendance on the Young Pretender at Paris, and doubtless -the address which he gave was understood at the time by the other -Everlastings to refer to the fact. But on October 28, five days -_before_ the meeting of the Club, he was killed, as I have already -mentioned, in a duel. The news of his death cannot have reached -Cambridge on November 2, for the Secretary’s record of it is placed -below that of Davenport, and with the date November 10: “this day was -reported that the President was become an Incorporeal by the hands of -a french chevalier.” And in a sudden ebullition, which is in glaring -contrast with his previous profanities, he has dashed down “The Good -God shield us from ill.” - -The tidings of the President’s death scattered the Everlastings like -a thunderbolt. They left Cambridge and buried themselves in widely -parted regions. But the Club did not cease to exist. The Secretary -was still bound to his hateful records: the five survivors did not -dare to neglect their fatal obligations. Horror of the presence of the -President made the November gathering once and for ever impossible: -but horror, too, forbade them to neglect the precaution of meeting -in October of every year to put in writing their objection to the -celebration. For five years five names are appended to that entry in -the minutes, and that is all the business of the Club. Then another -member died, who was not the Secretary. - -For eighteen more years four miserable men met once each year to -deliver the same formal protest. During those years we gather from -the signatures that Charles Bellasis returned to Cambridge, now, to -appearance, chastened and decorous. He occupied the rooms which I have -described on the staircase in the corner of the cloister. - -Then in 1766 comes a new handwriting and an altered minute: “Jan. 27, -on this day Francis Witherington, Secretary, became an Incorporeal -Member. The same day this Book was delivered to me, James Harvey.” -Harvey lived only a month, and a similar entry on March 7 states that -the book has descended, with the same mysterious celerity, to William -Catherston. Then, on May 18, Charles Bellasis writes that on that day, -being the date of Catherston’s decease, the Minute Book has come to -him as the last surviving Corporeal of the Club. - -As it is my purpose to record fact only I shall not attempt to describe -the feelings of the unhappy Secretary when he penned that fatal -record. When Witherington died it must have come home to the three -survivors that after twenty-three years’ intermission the ghastly -entertainment must be annually renewed, with the addition of fresh -incorporeal guests, or that they must undergo the pitiless censure of -the President. I think it likely that the terror of the alternative, -coupled with the mysterious delivery of the Minute Book, was -answerable for the speedy decease of the two first successors to the -Secretaryship. Now that the alternative was offered to Bellasis alone, -he was firmly resolved to bear the consequences, whatever they might -be, of an infringement of the Club rules. - -The graceless days of George II. had passed away from the University. -They were succeeded by times of outward respectability, when religion -and morals were no longer publicly challenged. With Bellasis, too, the -petulance of youth had passed: he was discreet, perhaps exemplary. The -scandal of his early conduct was unknown to most of the new generation, -condoned by the few survivors who had witnessed it. - -On the night of November 2nd, 1766, a terrible event revived in the -older inhabitants of the College the memory of those evil days. From -ten o’clock to midnight a hideous uproar went on in the chamber of -Bellasis. Who were his companions none knew. Blasphemous outcries and -ribald songs, such as had not been heard for twenty years past, aroused -from sleep or study the occupants of the court; but among the voices -was not that of Bellasis. At twelve a sudden silence fell upon the -cloisters. But the Master lay awake all night, troubled at the relapse -of a respected colleague and the horrible example of libertinism set to -his pupils. - -In the morning all remained quiet about Bellasis’ chamber. When his -door was opened, soon after daybreak, the early light creeping through -the drawn curtains revealed a strange scene. About the table were drawn -seven chairs, but some of them had been overthrown, and the furniture -was in chaotic disorder, as after some wild orgy. In the chair at the -foot of the table sat the lifeless figure of the Secretary, his head -bent over his folded arms, as though he would shield his eyes from -some horrible sight. Before him on the table lay pen, ink and the red -Minute Book. On the last inscribed page, under the date of November -2nd, were written, for the first time since 1742, the autographs of -the seven members of the Everlasting Club, but without address. In the -same strong hand in which the President’s name was written there was -appended below the signatures the note, “Mulctatus per Presidentem -propter neglectum obsonii, Car. Bellasis.” - -The Minute Book was secured by the Master of the College, and I believe -that he alone was acquainted with the nature of its contents. The -scandal reflected on the College by the circumstances revealed in it -caused him to keep the knowledge rigidly to himself. But some suspicion -of the nature of the occurrences must have percolated to students and -servants, for there was a long-abiding belief in the College that -annually on the night of November 2 sounds of unholy revelry were -heard to issue from the chamber of Bellasis. I cannot learn that the -occupants of the adjoining rooms have ever been disturbed by them. -Indeed, it is plain from the minutes that owing to their improvident -drafting no provision was made for the perpetuation of the All Souls -entertainment after the last Everlasting ceased to be Corporeal. Such -superstitious belief must be treated with contemptuous incredulity. -But whether for that cause or another the rooms were shut up, and have -remained tenantless from that day to this. - -[Illustration] - - - - - The Treasure of John Badcoke - - -As this narrative of an occurrence in the history of Jesus College -may appear to verge on the domain of romance, I think it proper to -state by way of preface, that for some of its details I am indebted to -documentary evidence which is accessible and veracious. Other portions -of the story are supplied from sources the credibility of which my -readers will be able to estimate. - -On the 8th of November, 1538, the Priory of St. Giles and St. Andrew, -Barnwell, was surrendered to King Henry VIII. by John Badcoke, the -Prior, and the convent of that house. The surrender was sealed with the -common seal, subscribed by the Prior and six canons, and acknowledged -on the same day in the Chapter House of the Priory, before Thomas Legh, -Doctor of Laws.[1] - -Dr. Legh and his fellows, who had been deputed by Cromwell to visit the -monasteries, had too frequent occasion to deplore the frowardness of -religious households in opposing the King’s will in the matter of their -dissolution. Among many such reports I need only cite the case of the -Prior of Christ Church, Canterbury, mentioned in a letter to Cromwell -from one of his agents, Christopher Leyghton.[2] He tells Cromwell -that in an inventory exhibited by the Prior to Dr. Leyghton, the -King’s visitor, the Prior had “wilfullye left owte a remembraunce of -certayne parcells of silver, gold and stone to the value of thowsandys -of poundys”; that it was not to be doubted that he would “eloyne owt -of the same howse into the handys of his secret fryndys thowsandes of -poundes, which is well knowne he hathe, to hys comfort hereafter”; and -that it was common report in the monastery that any monk who should -open the matter to the King’s advisers “shalbe poysenyde or murtheryde, -as he hath murthredde diverse others.” - -Far different from the truculent attitude of this murderous Prior -was the conduct on the like occasion of Prior John Badcoke. Dr. Legh -reported him to be “honest and conformable.” He furnished an exact -inventory of the possessions of his house, and quietly retired on the -pittance allowed to him by the King. He prevailed upon the other canons -to shew the same submission to the royal will, and they peaceably -dispersed, some to country incumbencies, others to resume in the -Colleges the studies commenced in earlier life. - -John Badcoke settled in Jesus College. The Bursar’s Rental of 1538-39 -shows that his residence there began in the autumn of the earlier year, -immediately after the surrender of the monastery. Divorced from the -Priory he was still attached to Barnwell, and took up the duties of -Vicar of the small parish church of St. Andrew, which stood close to -the Priory gate. So long as Henry VIII. lived, and the rites of the old -religion were tolerated, he seems to have ministered faithfully to the -spiritual needs of his parishioners, unsuspected and unmolested. - -More than twelve months elapsed before the demolition of the canons’ -house was taken in hand, and, for so long, in the empty church the -Prior still offered mass on ceremonial days for the repose of the souls -of the Peverels and Peches who had built and endowed the house in long -bygone days, and were buried beside the High Altar. In the porter’s -lodge remained the only occupant of the monastery--a former servant of -the house, who, from the circumstance that in his secular profession he -was a mason, had the name of Adam Waller. Occasional intruders on the -solitude of the cloister or the monastic garden sometimes lighted on -the ex-Prior pacing the grass-grown walks, as of old, and generally in -company with a younger priest. - -[Illustration: Oriel Window of Hall & Entrance to ‘K’ Staircase] - -This companion was named Richard Harrison. He was not one of the -dispossessed canons, but came from the Priory of Christ Church, -Canterbury, of which mention has been made. He was the youngest and -latest professed of the monks there, a nephew of the Prior, as also of -John Badcoke. He had not been present at the time of Dr. Leyghton’s -visitation, as he happened then to be visiting his uncle at Barnwell. -As the Canterbury monks were ejected in his absence he had remained -at Barnwell, and there he shared his uncle’s parochial duties. He, -too, became a resident at Jesus, and he occupied rooms in the College -immediately beneath those of Badcoke. - -Late in the year 1539 the demolition of Barnwell Priory was begun. Adam -Waller was engaged in the work. One incident, which apparently passed -almost unnoticed at the time, may be mentioned in connection with this -business. The keys of the church were in the keeping of Waller, who -had been in the habit of surrendering them to the two ecclesiastics -whenever they performed the divine offices there. On the morning when -the demolition was to begin, it was found that the stone covering -the altar-tomb of Pain Peverel, crusader and founder of the Priory, -had been dislodged, and that the earth within it had been recently -disturbed. Waller professed to know nothing of the matter. - -The account rolls of the College Bursars in the reigns of Henry -VIII. and Edward VI. fortunately tell us exactly the situation of -the rooms occupied by Badcoke and Harrison, and as, for the proper -understanding of subsequent events, it is necessary that we should -realise their condition and relation to the rest of the College, I -shall not scruple to be particular. They were on the left-hand side of -the staircase now called K, in the eastern range of the College, and -at the northern end of what had once been the dormitory of the Nuns of -St. Radegund. Badcoke’s chamber, which was on the highest floor, was -one of the largest in the College, and for that reason the Statutes -prescribed that it should be reserved “for more venerable persons -resorting to the College”; and Badcoke, being neither a Fellow nor a -graduate, was regarded as belonging to this class. Below his chamber -was that of Harrison, and on the ground-floor was the “cool-house,” -where the College fuel was kept. Between this ground-floor room and L -staircase--which did not then exist--there is seen at the present day a -rarely opened door. Inside the door a flight of some half-dozen steps -descends to a narrow space, which might be deemed a passage, save that -it has no outlet at the farther end. On either side it is flanked, to -the height of two floors of K staircase, by walls of ancient monastic -masonry; the third and highest floor is carried over it. Here, in the -times of Henry VIII. and the Nunnery days before them, ran or stagnated -a Stygian stream, known as “the kytchynge sinke ditch,” foul with scum -from the College offices. Northward from Badcoke’s staircase was “the -wood-yard,” on the site of the present L staircase. It communicated by -a door in its outward, eastern wall with a green close which in the old -days had been the Nunnery graveyard. In Badcoke’s times it was still -uneven with the hillocks which marked the resting-places of nameless, -unrecorded Nuns. The old graveyard was intersected by a cart-track -leading from Jesus Lane to the wood-yard door. The Bursar’s books show -that Badcoke controlled the wood-yard and coal-house, perhaps in the -capacity of Promus, or Steward. - -Now when Badcoke and Harrison came to occupy their chambers on K -staircase, Jesus, like other Colleges in those troublous times, had -fallen on evil days. Its occupants comprised only the Master, some -eight Fellows, a few servants, and about half-a-dozen “disciples.” -Nearly half the rooms in College were empty, and the records show -that many were tenantless, _propter defectum reparacionis_; that is, -because walls, roofs and floors were decayed and ruinous. Badcoke, -being a man of means, paid a handsome rent for his chambers, not less -than ten shillings by the year, in consideration of which the College -put it in tenantable repair; and, as a circumstance which has some -significance in relation to this narrative, it is to be noted that the -Bursar--the accounts of the year are no longer extant--recorded that -in 1539 he paid a sum of three shillings and fourpence “to Adam Waller -for layyinge of new brick in yᵉ cupboard of Mr. Badcoke’s chamber.” -The cupboard in question was seemingly a small recessed space, still -recognisable in a gyp-room belonging to the chambers which were -Badcoke’s. The rooms on the side of the staircase opposite to those of -Badcoke and Harrison were evidently unoccupied; the Bursar took no -rent from them. The other inmates of the College dwelt in the cloister -court. - -In this comparative isolation Badcoke and Harrison lived until the -death of Henry VIII. in 1546. In course of time Harrison became a -Fellow of the College; but Badcoke preferred to retain the exceptional -status of its honoured guest. To the Master, Dr. Reston, and the -Fellows, whose religious sympathies were with the old order of things, -their company was inoffensive and even welcome. But trouble came upon -the College in 1549, when it was visited by King Edward’s Protestant -Commissioners. It stands on record, that on May 26th “they commanded -six altars to be pulled down in the church,” and in a chamber, which -may have been Badcoke’s, “caused certayn images to be broken.” Mr. -Badcoke “had an excommunicacion sette uppe for him,” and was dismissed -from the office, whatever it was, that he held in the College. Worse -still for his happiness, his companion of many years, Richard Harrison, -was “expulsed his felowshippe” on some supposition of trafficking with -the court of Rome.[3] He went overseas, as it was understood, to the -Catholic University of Louvain in Flanders. - -In 1549 Badcoke must have been, as age went in the sixteenth century, -an old man. His deprivation of office, the loss of his friend, and -the abandonment of long treasured hopes for the restitution of the -religious system to which his life had been devoted, plunged him in -a settled despondency. The Fellows, who showed for him such sympathy -as they dared, understood that between him and Harrison there passed -a secret correspondence. But in course of years this source of -consolation dried up. Harrison was dead, or he had travelled away -from Louvain. With the other members of the College Badcoke wholly -parted company, and lived a recluse in his unneighboured room. By the -wood-yard gate, of which he still had a key, he could let himself -out beyond the College walls, and sometimes by day, oftener after -nightfall, he was to be seen wandering beneath his window in the Nuns’ -graveyard, his old feet, like Friar Laurence’s, “stumbling at graves.” -An occasional visitor, who was known to be his pensioner, was Adam -Waller. But, though Waller was still at times employed in the service -of the College, his character and condition had deteriorated with -years. He was a sturdy beggar, a drunkard, sullen and dangerous in his -cups, and Badcoke was heard to hint some terror of his presence. At -last the Master learnt from the ex-Prior that he was about to quit the -College, and none doubted that he would follow Harrison to Louvain. - -Shortly after this became known, Badcoke disappeared from College. He -had lived in such seclusion that for a day or two it was not noticed -that his door remained closed, and that he had not been seen in his -customary walks. When the door was at last forced it was discovered -that he had indeed gone, but, strangely, he had left behind him the -whole of his effects. Adam Waller was the last person who was known to -have entered his chamber, and, being questioned, he said that Badcoke -had informed him of his intention to depart three days previously, -but, for some unexplained reason, had desired him to keep his purpose -secret, and had not imparted his destination. Badcoke’s life of -seclusion, and his known connection with English Catholics beyond sea, -gave colour to Waller’s story, and, so far as I am aware, no enquiries -were made as to the subsequent fate of the ex-Prior. But a strange fact -was commented on--that the floor of the so-called cupboard was strewn -with bricks, and that in the place from which they had been dislodged -was an arched recess of considerable size, which must have been made -during Badcoke’s tenancy of the room. There was nothing in the recess. -Another circumstance there was which called for no notice in the then -dilapidated state of half the College rooms. Two boards were loose in -the floor of the larger chamber. Thirty feet below the gap which their -removal exposed, lay the dark impurities of the “kytchynge sinke ditch.” - -Adam Waller died a beggar as he had lived. - -A century after these occurrences--in the year 1642--the attention of -the College was drawn by a severe visitation of plague to a much-needed -sanitary reform. The black ditch which ran under K staircase was -“cast,” that is, its bed was effectually cleaned out, and its channel -was stopped; and so it came about that from that day to this it has -presented a clean and dry floor of gravel. Beneath the settled slime of -centuries was discovered a complete skeleton. How it came there nobody -knew, and nobody enquired. Probably it was guessed to be a relic of -some dim and grim monastic mystery. - -Now whether Adam Waller knew or suspected the existence of a treasure -hidden in the wall-recess of Badcoke’s chamber, and murdered the -ex-Prior when he was about to remove it to Louvain, I cannot say. -One thing is certain--that he did not find the treasure there. When -Badcoke disappeared he left his will, with his other belongings, in -his chamber. After a decent interval, when it seemed improbable that -he would return, probate was obtained by the Master and Fellows, to -whom he had bequeathed the chief part of his effects. In 1858 the wills -proved in the University court were removed to Peterborough, and there, -for aught I know, his will may yet be seen. The property bequeathed -consisted principally of books of theology. Among them was Stephanus’ -Latin Vulgate Bible of 1528 in two volumes folio. This he devised “of -my heartie good wylle to my trustie felow and frynde, Richard Harrison, -if he shal returne to Cambrege aftyr the tyme of my decesse.” Richard -Harrison never returned to Cambridge, and the Bible, with the other -books, found its way to the College Library. - -Now there are still in the Library two volumes of this Vulgate Bible. -There is nothing in either of them to identify them with the books -mentioned in Badcoke’s will, for they have lost the fly-leaves which -might have revealed the owner’s autograph. Here and there in the -margins are annotations in a sixteenth-century handwriting; and in the -same handwriting on one of the lost leaves was a curious inscription, -which suggests that the writer’s mind was running on some treasure -which was not spiritual. First at the top of the page, in clear -and large letters, was copied a passage from Psalm 55: “Cor meum -conturbatum est in me: et formido mortis cecidit super me. Et dixi, -Quis dabit pennas mihi sicut columbae, et volabo et requiescam.” (My -heart is disquieted within me: and the fear of death is fallen upon -me. And I said, O that I had wings like a dove: for then would I fly -away, and be at rest.) Then, in lettering of the same kind, came a -portion of Deuteronomy xxviii. 12: “Aperiet dominus thesaurum suum, -benedicetque cunctis operibus tuis.” (The Lord will disclose his -treasure, and will bless all the works of thy hands.) Under this, in -smaller letters, were the words, “Vide super hoc Ezechielis cap. xl.” - -[Illustration: Old Hall, Master’s Lodge.] - -If in the same volume the chapter in question is referred to, a -singular fact discloses itself. Certain words in the text are -underscored in red pencil, and fingers, inked in the margin, are -directed to the lines in which they occur. Taken in their consecutive -order these words run: “Ecce murus forinsecus ... ad portam quae -respiciebat viam orientalem ... mensus est a facie portae extrinsecus -ad orientem et aquilonem quinque cubitorum ... hoc est gazophylacium.” -This may be taken to mean, “Look at the outside wall ... at the gate -facing towards the eastern road ... he measured from the gate outwards -five cubits (7¹⁄₂ feet) towards the north-east ... there is the -treasure.” - -The outer wall of the College, the wood-yard gate and the road through -the Nuns’ cemetery must at once have suggested themselves to Richard -Harrison, had he lived to see his friend’s bequest, and he must have -taken it as an instruction from the testator that a treasure known -to both parties was hidden in the spot indicated, close to Badcoke’s -chamber. And the first text cited must have conveyed to him that his -friend, in some deadly terror, had transferred the treasure thither -from the place where the two friends had originally laid it. But -the message never reached Harrison, and it is quite certain that no -treasure has been sought or found in that spot. If the Canterbury or -any other treasure was deposited there by Badcoke it rests there still. - -To those who are curious to know more of this matter I would say: -first, ascertain minutely from Loggan’s seventeenth-century plan of the -College the position of the wood-yard gate; and, secondly, which indeed -should be firstly, make absolutely certain that John Badcoke was not -mystifying posterity by an elaborate jest. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1] Cooper, _Annals_, I., p. 393. - -[2] _The Suppression of the Monasteries_ (Camden Society’s -Publications), p. 90. - -[3] Cooper, _Annals_, II. p. 29. - - - - - The True History of Anthony Ffryar - - -The world, it is said, knows nothing of its greatest men. In our -Cambridge microcosm it may be doubted whether we are better informed -concerning some of the departed great ones who once walked the confines -of our Colleges. Which of us has heard of Anthony Ffryar of Jesus? -History is dumb respecting him. Yet but for the unhappy event recorded -in this unadorned chronicle his fame might have stood with that of -Bacon of Trinity, or Harvey of Caius. _They_ lived to be old men: -Ffryar died before he was thirty--his work unfinished, his fame unknown -even to his contemporaries. - -So meagre is the record of his life’s work that it is contained in a -few bare notices in the College Bursar’s Books, in the Grace Books -which date his matriculation and degrees, and in the entry of his -burial in the register of All Saints’ Parish. These simple annals I -have ventured to supplement with details of a more or less hypothetical -character which will serve to show what humanity lost by his early -death. Readers will be able to judge for themselves the degree of care -which I have taken not to import into the story anything which may -savour of the improbable or romantic. - -Anthony Ffryar matriculated in the year 1541-2, his age being then -probably 15 or 16. He took his B.A. degree in 1545, his M.A. in 1548. -He became a Fellow about the end of 1547, and died in the summer of -1551. Such are the documentary facts relating to him. Dr. Reston was -Master of the College during the whole of his tenure of a Fellowship -and died in the same year as Ffryar. The chamber which Ffryar occupied -as a Fellow was on the first floor of the staircase at the west end -of the Chapel. The staircase has since been absorbed in the Master’s -Lodge, but the doorway through which it was approached from the -cloister may still be seen. At the time when Ffryar lived there the -nave of the Chapel was used as a parish church, and his windows -overlooked the graveyard, then called “Jesus churchyard,” which is now -a part of the Master’s garden. - -[Illustration: _North West Corner of Cloisters._] - -Ffryar was of course a priest, as were nearly all the Fellows in his -day. But I do not gather that he was a theologian, or complied more -than formally with the obligation of his orders. He came to Cambridge -when the Six Articles and the suppression of the monasteries were of -fresh and burning import: he became a Fellow in the harsh Protestant -days of Protector Somerset: and in all his time the Master and the -Fellows were in scarcely disavowed sympathy with the rites and beliefs -of the Old Religion. Yet in the battle of creeds I imagine that he -took no part and no interest. I should suppose that he was a somewhat -solitary man, an insatiable student of Nature, and that his sympathies -with humanity were starved by his absorption in the New Science which -dawned on Cambridge at the Reformation. - -When I say that he was an alchemist do not suppose that in the middle -of the sixteenth century the name of alchemy carried with it any -associations with credulity or imposture. It was a real science and -a subject of University study then, as its god-children, Physics and -Chemistry, are now. If the aims of its professors were transcendental -its methods were genuinely based on research. Ffryar was no visionary, -but a man of sense, hard and practical. To the study of alchemy he was -drawn by no hopes of gain, not even of fame, and still less by any -desire to benefit mankind. He was actuated solely by an unquenchable -passion for enquiry, a passion sterilizing to all other feeling. To -the somnambulisms of the less scientific disciples of his school, such -as the philosopher’s stone and the elixir of life, he showed himself a -chill agnostic. All his thought and energies were concentrated on the -discovery of the _magisterium_, the master-cure of all human ailments. - -For four years in his laboratory in the cloister he had toiled at -this pursuit. More than once, when it had seemed most near, it had -eluded his grasp; more than once he had been tempted to abandon it as -a mystery insoluble. In the summer of 1551 the discovery waited at his -door. He was sure, certain of success, which only experiment could -prove. And with the certainty arose a new passion in his heart--to make -the name of Ffryar glorious in the healing profession as that of Galen -or Hippocrates. In a few days, even within a few hours, the fame of his -discovery would go out into all the world. - -The summer of 1551 was a sad time in Cambridge. It was marked by a more -than usually fatal outbreak of the epidemic called “the sweat,” when, -as Fuller says, “patients ended or mended in twenty-four hours.” It -had smouldered some time in the town before it appeared with sudden -and dreadful violence in Jesus College. The first to go was little -Gregory Graunge, schoolboy and chorister, who was lodged in the College -school in the outer court. He was barely thirteen years old, and known -by sight to Anthony Ffryar. He died on July 31, and was buried the -same day in Jesus churchyard. The service for his burial was held in -the Chapel and at night, as was customary in those days. Funerals in -College were no uncommon events in the sixteenth century. But in the -death of the poor child, among strangers, there was something to move -even the cold heart of Ffryar. And not the pity of it only impressed -him. The dim Chapel, the Master and Fellows obscurely ranged in their -stalls and shrouded in their hoods, the long-drawn miserable chanting -and the childish trebles of the boys who had been Gregory’s fellows -struck a chill into him which was not to be shaken off. - -Three days passed and another chorister died. The College gates were -barred and guarded, and, except by a selected messenger, communication -with the town was cut off. The precaution was unavailing, and the boys’ -usher, Mr. Stevenson, died on August 5. One of the junior Fellows, -sir Stayner--“sir” being the equivalent of B.A.--followed on August -7. The Master, Dr. Reston, died the next day. A gaunt, severe man was -Dr. Reston, whom his Fellows feared. The death of a Master of Arts on -August 9 for a time completed the melancholy list. - -Before this the frightened Fellows had taken action. The scholars were -dismissed to their homes on August 6. Some of the Fellows abandoned the -College at the same time. The rest--a terrified conclave--met on August -8 and decreed that the College should be closed until the pestilence -should have abated. Until that time it was to be occupied by a certain -Robert Laycock, who was a College servant, and his only communication -with the outside world was to be through his son, who lived in Jesus -Lane. The decree was perhaps the result of the Master’s death, for he -was not present at the meeting. - -Goodman Laycock, as he was commonly called, might have been the sole -tenant of the College but for the unalterable decision of Ffryar -to remain there. At all hazards his research, now on the eve of -realisation, must proceed; without the aid of his laboratory in College -it would miserably hang fire. Besides, he had an absolute assurance of -his own immunity if the experiment answered his confident expectations, -and his fancy was elated with the thought of standing, like another -Aaron, between the living and the dead, and staying the pestilence with -the potent _magisterium_. Until then he would bar his door even against -Laycock, and his supplies of food should be left on the staircase -landing. Solitude for him was neither unfamiliar nor terrible. - -[Illustration: _The Master’s Stall._] - -So for three days Ffryar and Laycock inhabited the cloister, solitary -and separate. For three days, in the absorption of his research, -Ffryar forgot fear, forgot the pestilence-stricken world beyond the -gate, almost forgot to consume the daily dole of food laid outside his -door. August 12 was the day, so fateful to humanity, when his labours -were to be crowned with victory: before midnight the secret of the -_magisterium_ would be solved. - -Evening began to close in before he could begin the experiment which -was to be his last. It must of necessity be a labour of some hours, -and, before it began, he bethought him that he had not tasted food -since early morning. He unbarred his door and looked for the expected -portion. It was not there. Vexed at the remissness of Laycock he waited -for a while and listened for his approaching footsteps. At last he took -courage and descended to the cloister. He called for Laycock, but heard -no response. He resolved to go as far as the Buttery door and knock. -Laycock lived and slept in the Buttery. - -At the Buttery door he beat and cried on Laycock; but in answer he -heard only the sound of scurrying rats. He went to the window, by the -hatch, where he knew that the old man’s bed lay, and called to him -again. Still there was silence. At last he resolved to force himself -through the unglazed window and take what food he could find. In the -deep gloom within he stumbled and almost fell over a low object, which -he made out to be a truckle-bed. There was light enough from the window -to distinguish, stretched upon it, the form of Goodman Laycock, stark -and dead. - -Sickened and alarmed Ffryar hurried back to his chamber. More than ever -he must hasten the great experiment. When it was ended his danger would -be past, and he could go out into the town to call the buryers for the -old man. With trembling hands he lit the brazier which he used for his -experiments, laid it on his hearth and placed thereon the alembic which -was to distil the _magisterium_. - -Then he sat down to wait. Gradually the darkness thickened and the -sole illuminant of the chamber was the wavering flame of the brazier. -He felt feverish and possessed with a nameless uneasiness which, for -all his assurance, he was glad to construe as fear: better that than -sickness. In the college and the town without was a deathly silence, -stirred only by the sweltering of the distilment, and, as the hours -struck, by the beating of the Chapel clock, last wound by Laycock. It -was as though the dead man spoke. But the repetition of the hours told -him that the time of his emancipation was drawing close. - -Whether he slept I do not know. He was aroused to vivid consciousness -by the clock sounding _one_. The time when his experiment should have -ended was ten, and he started up with a horrible fear that it had been -ruined by his neglect. But it was not so. The fire burnt, the liquid -simmered quietly, and so far all was well. - -Again the College bell boomed a solitary stroke: then a pause and -another. He opened, or seemed to open, his door and listened. Again -the knell was repeated. His mind went back to the night when he had -attended the obsequies of the boy-chorister. This must be a funeral -tolling. For whom? He thought with a shudder of the dead man in the -Buttery. - -He groped his way cautiously down the stairs. It was a still, windless -night, and the cloister was dark as death. Arrived at the further side -of the court he turned towards the Chapel. Its panes were faintly -lighted from within. The door stood open and he entered. - -In the place familiar to him at the chancel door one candle flickered -on a bracket. Close to it--his face cast in deep shade by the light -from behind--stood the ringer, in a gown of black, silent and absorbed -in his melancholy task. Fear had almost given way to wonder in the -heart of Ffryar, and, as he passed the sombre figure on his way to the -chancel door, he looked him resolutely in the face. The ringer was -Goodman Laycock. - -Ffryar passed into the choir and quietly made his way to his accustomed -stall. Four candles burnt in the central walk about a figure laid on -trestles and draped in a pall of black. Two choristers--one on either -side--stood by it. In the dimness he could distinguish four figures, -erect in the stalls on either side of the Chapel. Their faces were -concealed by their hoods, but in the tall form which occupied the -Master’s seat it was not difficult to recognise Dr. Reston. - -The bell ceased and the service began. With some faint wonder Ffryar -noted that it was the proscribed Roman Mass for the Dead. The solemn -introit was uttered in the tones of Reston, and in the deep responses -of the nearest cowled figure he recognised the voice of Stevenson, the -usher. None of the mourners seemed to notice Ffryar’s presence. - -The dreary ceremony drew to a close. The four occupants of the -stalls descended and gathered round the palled figure in the aisle. -With a mechanical impulse, devoid of fear or curiosity, and with a -half-prescience of what he should see, Anthony Ffryar drew near and -uncovered the dead man’s face. He saw--himself. - -At the same moment the last wailing notes of the office for the dead -broke from the band of mourners, and, one by one, the choristers -extinguished the four tapers. - -“Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine,” chanted the hooded four: and one -candle went out. - -“Et lux perpetua luceat ei,” was the shrill response of the two -choristers: and a second was extinguished. - -“Cum sanctis tuis in aeternum,” answered the four: and one taper only -remained. - -The Master threw back his hood, and turned his dreadful eyes straight -upon the living Anthony Ffryar: he threw his hand across the bier -and held him tight. “Cras tu eris mecum,”[4] he muttered, as if in -antiphonal reply to the dirge-chanters. - -With a hiss and a sputter the last candle expired. - - * * * * * - -The hiss and the sputter and a sudden sense of gloom recalled Ffryar -to the waking world. Alas for labouring science, alas for the fame -of Ffryar, alas for humanity, dying and doomed to die! The vessel -containing the wonderful brew which should have redeemed the world had -fallen over and dislodged its contents on the fire below. An accident -reparable, surely, within a few hours; but not by Anthony Ffryar. -How the night passed with him no mortal can tell. All that is known -further of him is written in the register of All Saints’ parish. If -you can discover the ancient volume containing the records of the -year 1551--and I am not positive that it now exists--you will find it -written: - - “Die Augusti xiii - Buryalls in Jhesus churchyarde - Goodman Laycock } - Anthony Ffryar } of yᵉ sicknesse” - -Whether he really died of “the sweat” I cannot say. But that the living -man was sung to his grave by the dead, who were his sole companions -in Jesus College, on the night of August 12, 1551, is as certain and -indisputable as any other of the facts which are here set forth in the -history of Anthony Ffryar. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[4] Samuel xxvii. 19. - - - - - The Necromancer - - -This is a story of Jesus College, and it relates to the year 1643. In -that year Cambridge town was garrisoned for the Parliament by Colonel -Cromwell and the troops of the Eastern Counties’ Association. Soldiers -were billeted in all the colleges, and contemporary records testify -to their violent behaviour and the damage which they committed in -the chambers which they occupied. In the previous year the Master of -Jesus College, Doctor Sterne, was arrested by Cromwell when he was -leaving the chapel, conveyed to London, and there imprisoned in the -Tower. Before the summer of 1643 fourteen of the sixteen Fellows were -expelled, and during the whole of that year there were, besides the -soldiers, only some ten or twelve occupants of the college. The names -of the two Fellows who were not ejected were John Boyleston and Thomas -Allen. - -With Mr. Boyleston this history is only concerned for the part which -he took on the occasion of the visit to the college of the notorious -fanatic, William Dowsing. Dowsing came to Cambridge in December, 1642, -armed with powers to put in execution the ordinance of Parliament -for the reformation of churches and chapels. Among the devastations -committed by this ignorant clown, and faithfully recorded by him in his -diary, it stands on record that on December 28, in the presence and -perhaps with the approval of John Boyleston, he “digg’d up the steps -(_i.e._ of the altar) and brake down Superstitions and Angels, 120 -at the least.” Dowsing’s account of his proceedings is supplemented -by the Latin History of the college, written in the reign of Charles -II. by one of the Fellows, a certain Doctor John Sherman. Sherman -records, but Dowsing does not, that there was a second witness of -the desecration--Thomas Allen. Of the two he somewhat enigmatically -remarks: “The one (_i.e._ Boyleston) stood behind a curtain to witness -the evil work: the other, afflicted to behold the exequies of his Alma -Mater, made his life a filial offering at her grave, and, to escape the -hands of wicked rebels, laid violent hands on himself.” - -That Thomas Allen committed suicide seems a fairly certain fact: -and that remorse for the part which he had unwillingly taken in -the sacrilege of December 28 prompted his act we may accept on the -testimony of Sherman. But there is something more to tell which Sherman -either did not know or did not think fit to record. His book deals -only with the college and its society. He had no occasion to remember -Adoniram Byfield. - -Byfield was a chaplain attached to the Parliamentary forces in -Cambridge, and quarters were assigned to him in Jesus College, in the -first floor room above the gate of entrance. Below his chamber was -the Porter’s lodge, which at that time served as the armoury of the -troopers who occupied the college. Above it, on the highest floor of -the gate-tower “kept” Thomas Allen. These were the only rooms on the -staircase. At the beginning of the Long Vacation of 1643 Allen was the -only member of the college who continued to reside. - -Some light is thrown on the character of Byfield and his connection -with this story by a pudgy volume of old sermons of the Commonwealth -period which is contained in the library of the college. Among the -sermons which are bound up in it is one which bears the date 1643 and -is designated on the title page: - - A FAITHFUL ADMONICION of the Baalite sin of _Enchanters & Stargazers_, - preacht to the Colonel Cromwell’s Souldiers in Saint Pulcher’s - (_i.e._ Saint Sepulchre’s) church, in Cambridge, by the fruitfull - Minister, _Adoniram Byfield_, late departed unto God, in the yeare - 1643, touching that of _Acts_ the seventh, verse 43, _Ye took up the - Tabernacle of Moloch, the Star of your god Remphan, figures which ye - made to worship them; & I will carrie you away beyond Babylon_. - -The discourse, in its title as in its contents, reveals its author -as one of the fanatics who wrought on the ignorance and prejudice -against “carnal” learning which actuated the Cromwellian soldiers in -their brutal usage of the University “scholars” in 1643. All Byfield’s -learning was contained in one book--_the_ Book. For him the revelation -which gave it sufficed for its interpretation. What needed Greek to the -man who spoke mysteries in unknown tongues, or the light of comment to -him who was carried in the spirit into the radiance of the third heaven? - -Now Allen, too, was an enthusiast, lost in mystic speculation. His -speculation was in the then novel science of mathematics and astronomy. -Even to minds not darkened by the religious mania that possessed -Byfield that science was clouded with suspicion in the middle of the -seventeenth century. Anglican, Puritan, and Catholic were agreed in -regarding its great exponent, Descartes, as an atheist. Mathematicians -were looked upon as necromancers, and Thomas Hobbes says that in his -days at Oxford the study was considered to be “smutched with the black -art,” and fathers, from an apprehension of its malign influence, -refrained from sending their sons to that University. How deep the -prejudice had sunk into the soul of Adoniram his sermon shows. -The occasion which suggested it was this. A pious cornet, leaving -a prayer-meeting at night, fell down one of the steep, unlighted -staircases of the college and broke his neck. Two or three of the -troopers were taken with a dangerous attack of dysentery. There was -talk of these misadventures among the soldiers, who somehow connected -them with Allen and his studies. The floating gossip gathered into a -settled conviction in the mind of Adoniram. - -For Allen was a mysterious person. Whether it was because he was -engrossed in his studies, or that he shrank from exposing himself -to the insults of the soldiers, he seldom showed himself outside -his chamber. Perhaps he was tied to it by the melancholy to which -Sherman ascribed his violent end. In his three months’ sojourn on -Allen’s staircase Byfield had not seen him a dozen times, and the -mystery of his closed door awakened the most fantastic speculations -in the chaplain’s mind. For hours together, in the room above, he -could hear the mumbled tones of Allen’s voice, rising and falling in -ceaseless flow. No answer came, and no word that the listener could -catch conveyed to his mind any intelligible sense. Once the voice -was raised in a high key and Byfield distinctly heard the ominous -ejaculation, “Avaunt, Sathanas, avaunt!” Once through his partly open -door he had caught sight of him standing before a board chalked with -figures and symbols which the imagination of Byfield interpreted -as magical. At night, from the court below, he would watch the -astrologer’s lighted window, and when Allen turned his perspective -glass upon the stars the conviction became rooted in his watcher’s mind -that he was living in perilous neighbourhood to one of the peeping and -muttering wizards of whom the Holy Book spoke. - -[Illustration: _Main Gateway & Porter’s Lodge._] - -An unusual occurrence strengthened the suspicions of Byfield. One -night he heard Allen creep softly down the staircase past his room; -and, opening his door, he saw him disappear round the staircase foot, -candle in hand. Silently, in the dark, Byfield followed him and saw -him pass into the Porter’s lodge. The soldiers were in bed and the -armoury was unguarded. Through the lighted pane he saw Allen take down -a horse-pistol from a rack on the wall. He examined it closely, tried -the lock, poised it as if to take aim, then replaced it and, leaving -the lodge, disappeared up the staircase with his candle. A world of -suspicions rushed on Byfield’s mind, and they were not allayed when the -soldiers reported in the morning that the pistols were intact. But one -of the sick soldiers died that week. - -Brooding on this incident Adoniram became more than ever convinced of -the Satanic purposes and powers of his neighbour, and his suspicions -were confirmed by another mysterious circumstance. As the weeks passed -he became aware that at a late hour of night Allen’s door was quietly -opened. There followed a patter of scampering feet down the staircase, -succeeded by silence. In an hour or two the sound came back. The -patter went up the stairs to Allen’s chamber, and then the door was -closed. To lie awake waiting for this ghostly sound became a horror to -Byfield’s diseased imagination. In his bed he prayed and sang psalms to -be relieved of it. Then he abandoned thoughts of sleep and would sit -up waiting if he might surprise and detect this walking terror of the -night. At first in the darkness of the stairs it eluded him. One night, -light in hand, he managed to get a glimpse of it as it disappeared at -the foot of the stairs. It was shaped like a large black cat. - -Far from allaying his terrors, the discovery awakened new questionings -in the heart of Byfield. Quietly he made his way up to Allen’s door. -It stood open and a candle burnt within. From where he stood he could -see each corner of the room. There was the board scribbled with -hieroglyphs: there were the magical books open on the table: there were -the necromancer’s instruments of unknown purpose. But there was no live -thing in the room, and no sound save the rustling of papers disturbed -by the night air from the open window. - -A horrible certitude seized on the chaplain’s mind. This Thing that he -had caught sight of was no cat. It was the Evil One himself, or it was -the wizard translated into animal shape. On what foul errand was he -bent? Who was to be his new victim? With a flash there came upon his -mind the story how Phinehas had executed judgment on the men that were -joined to Baal-peor, and had stayed the plague from the congregation of -Israel. He would be the minister of the Lord’s vengeance on the wicked -one, and it should be counted unto him for righteousness unto all -generations for evermore. - -He went down to the armoury in the Porter’s lodge. Six pistols, he -knew, were in the rack on the wall. Strange that to-night there were -only five--a fresh proof of the justice of his fears. One of the five -he selected, primed, loaded and cocked it in readiness for the wizard’s -return. He took his stand in the shadow of the wall, at the entrance of -the staircase. That his aim might be surer he left his candle burning -at the stair-foot. - -[Illustration: _On ‘A’ Staircase._] - -In solemn stillness the minutes drew themselves out into hours while -Adoniram waited and prayed to himself. Then in the poring darkness he -became sensible of a moving presence, noiseless and unseen. For a -moment it appeared in the light of the candle, not two paces distant. -It was the returning cat. A triumphant exclamation sprang to Byfield’s -lips, “God shall shoot at them, suddenly shall they be wounded”--and he -fired. - -With the report of the pistol there rang through the court a dismal -outcry, not human nor animal, but resembling, as it seemed to the -excited imagination of the chaplain, that of a lost soul in torment. -With a scurry the creature disappeared in the darkness of the court, -and Byfield did not pursue it. The deed was done--that he felt sure -of--and as he replaced the pistol in the rack a gush of religious -exaltation filled his heart. That night there was no return of the -pattering steps outside his door, and he slept well. - - * * * * * - -Next day the body of Thomas Allen was discovered in the grove which -girds the college--his breast pierced by a bullet. It was surmised -that he had dragged himself thither from the court. There were tracks -of blood from the staircase foot, where it was conjectured that he had -shot himself, and a pistol was missing from the armoury. Some of the -inmates of the court had been aroused by the discharge of the weapon. -The general conclusion was that recorded by Sherman--that the fatal act -was prompted by brooding melancholy. - -Of his part in the night’s transactions Byfield said nothing. The grim -intelligence, succeeding the religious excitation of the night, brought -to him questioning, dread, horror. Whatever others might surmise, he -was fatally convinced that it was by his hand that Allen had died. Pity -for the dead man had no place in the dark cabin of his soul. But how -was it with himself? How should his action be weighed before the awful -Throne? His lurid thought pictured the Great Judgment as already begun, -the Book opened, the Accuser of the Brethren standing to resist him, -and the dreadful sentence of Cain pronounced upon him, “Now art thou -cursed from the earth.” - -In the evening he heard them bring the dead man to the chamber above -his own. They laid him on his bed, and, closing the door, left him and -descended the stairs. The sound of their footsteps died away and left -a dreadful silence. As the darkness grew the horror of the stillness -became insupportable. How he yearned that he might hear again the -familiar muffled voice in the room above! And in an access of fervour -he prayed aloud that the terrible present might pass from him, that -the hours might go back, as on the dial of Ahaz, and all might be as -yesterday. - -Suddenly, as the prayer died on his lips, the silence was broken. He -could not be mistaken. Very quietly he heard Allen’s door open, and -the old, pattering steps crept softly down the stairs. They passed his -door. They were gone before he could rise from his knees to open it. A -momentary flash lighted the gloom in Byfield’s soul. What if his prayer -was heard, if Allen was not dead, if the events of the past twenty-four -hours were only a dream and a delusion of the Wicked One? Then the -horror returned intensified. Allen was assuredly dead. This creeping -Thing--what might it be? - -For an hour in his room Byfield sat in agonised dread. Most the thought -of the open door possessed him like a nightmare. Somehow it must be -closed before the foul Thing returned. Somehow the mangled shape within -must be barred up from the wicked powers that might possess it. The -fancy gripped and stuck to his delirious mind. It was horrible, but it -must be done. In a cold terror he opened his door and looked out. - -A flickering light played on the landing above. Byfield hesitated. -But the thought that the cat might return at any moment gave him a -desperate courage. He mounted the stairs to Allen’s door. Precisely -as yesternight it stood wide open. Inside the room the books, the -instruments, the magical figures were unchanged, and a candle, exposed -to the night wind from the casement, threw wavering shadows on the -walls and floor. At a glance he saw it all, and he saw the bed where, -a few hours ago, the poor remains of Allen had been laid. The coverlet -lay smooth upon it. The dead necromancer was not there. - -Then as he stood, footbound, at the door a wandering breath from the -window caught the taper, and with a gasp the flame went out. In the -black silence he became conscious of a moving sound. Nearer, up the -stairs, they drew--the soft creeping steps--and in panic he shrank -backwards into Allen’s room before their advance. Already they were -on the last flight of the stairs; and then in the doorway the darkness -parted and Byfield saw. In a ring of pallid light that seemed to -emanate from its body he beheld the cat--horrible, gory, its foreparts -hanging in ragged collops from its neck. Slowly it crept into the room, -and its eyes, smoking with dull malevolence, were fastened on Byfield. -Further he backed into the room, to the corner where the bed was laid. -The creature followed. It crouched to spring upon him. He dropped -in a sitting posture on the bed and as he saw it launch itself upon -him, he closed his eyes and found speech in a gush of prayer, “O my -God, make haste for my help.” In an agony he collapsed upon the couch -and clutched its covering with both hands. Beneath it he gripped the -stiffened limbs of the dead necromancer, and, when he opened his eyes, -the darkness had returned and the spectral cat was gone. - - - - - Brother John’s Bequest - - -On a certain morning in the summer of the year 1510 John Eccleston, -Doctor in Divinity and Master of Jesus College in Cambridge, stood -at the door of his lodge looking into the cloister court. There -was a faint odour of extinguished candles in the air, and a bell -automatically clanked in unison with its bearer’s step. It was -carried by a young acolyte, who lagged in the rear of a small band -of white-robed figures who were just disappearing from sight at the -corner of the passage leading to the entrance court. They were the five -Fellows of the newly-constituted College. - -As they disappeared, the Master, with much deliberation, spat into the -cloister walk. - -To spit behind a man’s back might be accounted a mark of disgust, -contempt, malice--at least of disapproval. Such were not the feelings -of Dr. Eccleston. - -It is a fact known all over the world, Christian and heathen, that -visitants from the unseen realm cannot endure to be spat at. The -Master’s action was prophylactic. For supernatural visitings of the -transitory, curable kind the rites of the Church are, no doubt, -efficacious. In inveterate cases it is well to leave no remedy untried. - -With bell, book and candle the Master and Fellows had just completed -a lustration of the lodge. The bell had clanked in the Founder’s -Chamber and in the Master’s oratory. The Master’s bedchamber had been -well soused with holy water. The candle had explored dark places in -cupboards and under the stairs. If It was there before it was almost -inconceivable that It remained there now. But one cannot be too careful. - -Two days previously a funeral had taken place in the College. It -was a shabby affair. The deceased, John Baldwin, late a brother of -the dissolved Hospital of Saint John, was put away in an obscure -part of the College churchyard--now the Master’s garden--behind some -elder bushes which grew in the corner bounded by the street and the -“chimney.” The mourners were the grave-digger, the sexton and the -parson of All Saints’ Church. Though brother John had died in a college -chamber the society of Jesus marked its reprobation of his manner of -living by absenting themselves from his obsequies. - -Brother John had been a disappointment: uncharitable persons might say -he was a fraud. He had got into the College by false pretences. In life -he had disgraced it by his excesses, and, when he was dead, he had -perpetrated a mean practical joke on the society. It is not well for a -man in religious orders to joke when he is dead. - -How did it come that brother John Baldwin, late Granger of the -Augustinian Hospital of Saint John, died in Jesus College? - -The Hospital of Saint John was dissolved in the year 1510, to make -room for the new college designed by the Lady Margaret. Bishops of -Ely for three centuries and more had been its patrons and visitors, -and dissolute James Stanley, bishop in 1510, fought stoutly for its -maintenance. But circumstances were too strong for the bishop. The -ancient Hospital was hopelessly bankrupt. The buildings were ruinous: -there was not a doit in the treasury chest: the household goods were -pawned to creditors in the town. The Master, William Tomlyn, had -disappeared, none knew whither, and only two brethren were left in the -place. One of them was John Baldwin: the other was the Infirmarer, a -certain Bartholomew Aspelon. - -On the eve of the dissolution, bishop Stanley wrote a letter to the -Master and Fellows of the other Cambridge society of which he was -visitor, namely, Jesus College. He commended to their charitable -care brother John Baldwin, an aged man of godly conversation who was -disposed to bestow his worldly goods for the comfort and sustenance of -the Master and Fellows in consideration of their maintenance of him in -College during the remaining years of his earthly pilgrimage. It was -a not uncommon practice in those days for monasteries and colleges to -accept as inmates persons, clerical or lay, who wished to withdraw -from the world and were willing, either during life or by testamentary -arrangements, to guarantee their hosts against pecuniary loss. - -Report said that, though the Hospital was penniless, brother John in -his private circumstances was well-to-do and even affluent. It did not -befit the Master and Fellows to enquire how he had come by his wealth. -They were wretchedly poor, and the bishop’s certificate of character -was all that could be desired. They thanked the bishop for his -prudent care for their interests and covenanted to give the religious -man a domicile in the College with allowance for victuals, barber, -laundress, wine, wax and all other things necessary for celebrating -Divine service, as to any Fellow of the College. Brother John promptly -transferred himself to his new quarters, which were in a room called -“the loft,” on the top floor above the Founder’s Chamber in the -Master’s lodge. - -The Master and Fellows were disappointed in brother John’s luggage. It -consisted simply of two brass-bound boxes, heavy but unquestionably -small, even for a man of religion. An encouraging feature about them -was that they bore the monogram of Saint John’s Hospital. Brother John -and his former co-mate of the Hospital, Bartholomew Aspelon, constantly -affirmed that the missing Master, William Tomlyn, had decamped with -the contents of the Hospital treasury. But the society of Jesus hoped -that they were not telling the truth. Brother John kept the two boxes -under his bed. They were always carefully locked, but brother John -threw out vague hints that their contents were destined for a princely -benefaction to his hospitable entertainers. - -In other respects brother John’s equipment was not such as would -betoken a man of wealth. Rather it savoured of monastical austerity. -His only suit of clothing was ancient, and even greasy. It was never -changed, night or day. Brother John was apparently under a religious -obligation to abstain from washing. - -As a man of godly conversation brother John was unfortunate in his -personal appearance. It was presumably a stroke of paralysis which had -drawn up one side of his face and correspondingly depressed the other. -His mouth was a diagonal compromise with the rest of his features. One -eye was closed, and the other was bleared and watery. His nose was red, -but the rest of his face was of a parchment colour. - -Brother John was an elderly person, and continued ill health -unfortunately confined him to his chamber, above the Master’s. He -expressed a deep regret that he could not share the society of the -Fellows in the Hall at their meals of oatmeal porridge, salt fish, and -thin ale. His distressing ailments necessitated a sustaining diet of -capons and oysters, supplied to him in his chamber by the College. He -was equally debarred from attending services in the Chapel, but the -wine with which the society had covenanted to supply him was punctually -consumed at the private offices which he performed in his chamber. A -suitable pecuniary compensation was made to him on the ground that his -domestic arrangements rendered the services of the College laundress -unnecessary. - -Bartholomew Aspelon, who lodged in an alehouse in the town, was the -constant and affectionate attendant at brother John’s sick bed: for, -indeed, he seldom got out of it. From a neighbouring tavern he brought -to him abundant supplies of the ypocras and malmsey wine which were -requisite for the maintenance of the invalid’s failing strength. -Brother Bartholomew was an individual of a merry countenance and gifted -with cheerful song. In the sick room the Fellows would often hear him -trolling a drinking catch, to which the invalid joined a quavering -note. So constant and familiar was the lay that John Bale, one of the -Fellows, remembered it thirty years afterwards, and put it in the mouth -of a roystering monk whom he introduced as one of the characters in his -play, _King Johan_. The words ran thus: - - Wassayle, wassayle, out of the mylke payle, - Wassayle, wassayle, as whyte as my nayle, - Wassayle, wassayle, in snow, frost and hayle, - Wassayle, wassayle, with partriche and rayle, - Wassayle, wassayle, that much doth avayle, - Wassayle, wassayle, that never wyll fayle. - -The invasion of the college silences by this unusual concert was marked -by the Fellows with growing disapproval: and they were not comforted -when they discovered that the new robe which they had contracted to -supply to their guest had been pledged to the host of the Sarazin’s -Head in part payment of an account rendered. But they possessed their -souls in patience as they noted that the health of their venerable -guest was declining with obvious rapidity. With some insistence they -pointed out to the Master the desirability of having a prompt and clear -understanding about brother John’s testamentary dispositions. Dr. -Eccleston was entirely of the Fellows’ mind in the matter. - -[Illustration: _Fireplace in Master’s Lodge._] - -One evening in June, some three months after brother John had begun -his residence in the College, it seemed to Dr. Eccleston that the time -had come to sound him about his intentions. The patient was very low, -and brother Bartholomew was much depressed. With inkhorn and pen the -Master went upstairs to the sick man’s chamber. Nuncupatory wills were -in those days accepted as legal obligations, and the Master was minded -that he would not leave brother John until he had obtained, from his -dictation, a statement of his intentions as to the disposal of his -goods. - -Obviously brother John’s mind was wandering when the Master entered the -room, for he greeted his arrival with a snatch of the old scurvy tune, - - Wassayle, wassayle, that never wyll fayle, - -and feebly added “Art there, bully Bartholomew? Bear me thy hand to the -bottle, for I am dry.” - -“Brother John, brother John,” said the Master, “bestir thee, and think -of thy state. It is time for thee to consider of thy world’s gear and -how thou wilt bestow it according to thy promise to our poor company, -for their tendance of thee.” Brother John raised himself in his bed -and opened his serviceable eye. Something like a grin puckered up his -sloping mouth. “Art thou of that counsel, goodman Doctor?” said he: -“then have with thee. I were a knave if I did not thank you for your -kindness, and, trust me, ye shall not be the losers for your pains. -Take quill and write. I will dictate my will in two fillings of thy -pen. Write”: and the Master wrote. - -“To the Master and Fellows of Jesus College I give and bequeath that -chest that lieth beneath my bed and is marked with a great letter A, -and all that is in it. To brother Bartholomew Aspelon, late of the -Hospital of Saint John, in like manner I bequeath that other chest that -is marked B.” - -“Is that all?” asked the Master. “Gogswouns, it is all I have,” said -brother John. “Yet stay, good Master. Nothing for nothing is a safe -text. Thou shalt write it as a condition, on pain of forfeiting my -bequest, that ye shall bury me in the aisle of your church, immediately -before the High Altar: that ye shall keep my obit, or anniversary, -with _placebo_ and _dirige_ and mass of requiem; and that once each -week a Fellow that is a priest shall pray and sing for the soul of -John Baldwin, the benefactor of the College. Is it rehearsed, master -doctor?” “It is written,” said the Master. “_Ite, missa est_,” said -the invalid, “and fetch me a stoup of small ale, good Master.” - - * * * * * - -A few days later John Baldwin made his unimproving, unregretted end. -Brother Bartholomew carried off his portion of the legacy. The other -chest was deposited on the table in the Founder’s Chamber and opened by -the Master before the assembled Fellows. - -It contained half a dozen bricks, a fair quantity of straw and -shavings, and nothing else--nothing except a small scrap of torn and -dirty paper at the bottom of the box. With one voice the Master and -Fellows decreed that their unworthy guest should be buried in the least -respectable portion of the churchyard. Which thing was done, as I have -already mentioned. - -Of course the dirty paper under the straw was scrutinized by the -Master and Fellows. But it was of no importance. It looked like a deed -or a will, in which the deceased, in return for nursing in sickness, -proposed to give some unspecified property to his disreputable -friend, Aspelon, and apparently stipulated that he should be buried -in the choir of the Hospital chapel. But it was not witnessed: it had -obviously been torn up, and all that was left of it was the part on the -scribe’s right hand. It ran thus: - - ego Johannes Baldewyn nuper frat - rigiam do lego et confirmo domino - u pro mea in egritudine relevaci - domino Bartolomeo Aspelon confrat - ne quod habeat uter prior invener - am in tumulo sepultus subter quen - parte chori in sacello Hospitalis - theshede - -The last word, if rightly read, was unintelligible. - -But the College had by no means done with brother John. On the evening -after his burial, as the Master and Fellows were leaving the Chapel, -their steps were suddenly arrested as they heard the familiar Wassail -stave raised in a thin and tuneless voice. It came from the open -window of the deceased brother, and unquestionably the voice was not -Aspelon’s. In consternation they listened till it died ineffectually -away in an attempted chorus strain. After brief deliberation they -resolved to visit the “loft” in a body--Master, Fellows, “disciples” -and servants--and see what this thing might mean. They found the place -as blank and silent as it remained when the deceased had been taken out -to his burial. But before they reached the stair-foot in their descent -the thin piping strain fell on their ears again, and this time none -were bold enough to go back. After that, at all times of night and -day, the interminable ditty was fitfully renewed, and panic held the -College. At night the “disciples” huddled in one room, and the Fellows -lay two in a bed. - -Unfortunately for Dr. Eccleston, he was condemned to the solitude of -the lodge, deserted even by his _famulus_, the sizar who attended -him. He sat up all night and studied works of divinity, in the hope -that theology, if it did not put the songster to rout, would at least -distract his own thoughts from the devilish roundelay in the garret -above his head. On the second night he began to congratulate himself on -the success of his experiment, for the singer relapsed into silence. In -his exhaustion he might even have slept, but that the door of his study -had a gusty habit of flying open unexpectedly and closing with a bang. -He had actually begun to drowse over his folio when a sharp pressure -on his right shoulder aroused him. Hastily turning his head he saw -the papery countenance of the dead brother gazing on him with all the -affection that one eye could testify, the chin planted on the Master’s -shoulder, and the mouth slewed into a simulation of innocent mirth. Dr. -Eccleston read no more divinity that night. - -Early next morning a College meeting was summoned by the Master. It -was resolved by the unanimous voice of the society that brother John’s -remains should be exhumed and re-interred in the middle of the chancel -aisle, in accordance with the stipulation of the deceased: and there -was no delay in carrying the resolution into effect. The Master also -insisted that the whole society should help in the purgation of his -lodge and the loft above it, in accordance with the ritual of the -Church in that case applying: and this too was incontinently done, as -I have already described. The consideration of the performance of the -rest of the contract entered into by the Master with the late brother -was deferred until it should be ascertained how far the deceased was -satisfied with the measures already adopted. - -Whether John Baldwin acquiesced in this somewhat lame execution of -his wishes, or whether his perturbed spirit was laid to rest by the -rites of exorcism it is impossible to say. It is quite certain that he -troubled the College no more. - -But in the afternoon following his re-interment an incident happened -which possibly had some connection with the placation of his shade. -Bartholomew Aspelon had not attended brother John’s funeral in the -churchyard. In truth, he was filled with a moral resentment at his late -friend’s lack of feeling and good taste which was only equalled by -that of the society of Jesus: and the motive was the same. On opening -the treasure chest bequeathed to him he had found it filled with -bricks and straw, just like the other. If the Fellows were indignant -Bartholomew was more so: for, from private sources of information which -he possessed as a member of the dissolved Hospital, he was assured -that brother John had prospered in its service to the extent of £200, -at the least, and he was profoundly convinced that the whole sum had -gone into the treasury of Jesus College. Under the straw he had found -a morsel of paper, which was, indeed, too fragmentary to give any -connected clue to its drift, but which, nevertheless, rather plainly -indicated on the part of the deceased an intention of bequeathing to -the College a certain treasure, the whereabouts of which, owing to the -imperfection of the document, were not stated. He was confirmed in his -interpretation of the manuscript by the honourable interment given to -brother John’s remains in the Chapel. - -Filled with resentment at the ingratitude of the patient whom he had so -tenderly nursed and at the duplicity of the “dons” who had robbed him -of the reward of his devoted service, Bartholomew sought the Master’s -lodge. He used no language of studied courtesy in representing to Dr. -Eccleston the nature of his grievance: and the Master, whose temper -was severely tried by want of sleep and the disagreeable nature of -the interment ceremony in which he had just unwillingly participated, -replied with equal vehemence. - -“Ye are robbers all,” cried Bartholomew: “you cheated him in his -weakness into signing his property away from the friend who smoothed -his pillow in his dying hours.” - -“Thou naughty knave,” retorted the Master, “talk not to me of bricks -and straw. It was gold that was contained in thy box, and the devil -knows by what scurvy arts thou didst cozen us of our promised reward. -His own paper convicts thee of the fraudulent attempt to get him to -will his goods to thee. See what he left in the bottom of our box.” And -the Master threw the scrap above-transcribed upon the table. “Take it -and never let me see thy rogue’s face again.” - -Brother Bartholomew leaped in his skin as he grabbed the document. He -made no ceremony of leave-taking, but bolted down the stairs. When he -got into the cloister outside he took from his pouch a dingy scrap of -paper, which was the fellow of that which the Master had thrown to him. -What he read on it was this: - - Sciant omnes presentes et futuri quod - er Hospitalis Divi Johannis apud Canteb - doctori Ecclyston et sociis Collegii Jes - one equaliter inter se dividendum aut - ri meo in antedicto Hospitali ea racio - it totum thesaurum meum ita ut extat cl - dam lapidem iacentem in septentrionali - eiusdem cuius istud signum extat a dea - -Then brother Bartholomew put the two pieces together, and it was thus -that he translated the continuous lines: - - Know all men present and to come that | I, John Baldwin, late a broth - er of the Hospital of Saint John at Camb | ridge, give, grant and bequeath to master - doctor Eccleston and the fellows of the College of Jes | u for my relief during sick - ness, equally to be divided among them, or | to master Bartholomew Aspelon, a brother - of mine in the aforesaid Hospital, provid | ed that he shall have it who is first fin - der, all my treasure as it now lies pri | vily buried in a tomb under a cert - ain stone lying on the northern | side of the choir in the chapel of the Hospital - aforesaid, of which this is the sign, a dea | th’s head. - -Of what further pertains to brother John Baldwin and his bequest I -have no more to say than that his name is not included in the Form -for the Commemoration of Benefactors of Jesus College. Also that for -twenty years after the events here recorded a cheerful individual, in -a lay habit, might be seen, seated of custom on the ale-bench at the -Sarazin’s Head. He drank of the best, paid in cash and never lacked for -money. He could tell a good tale and he sang a good song. His Wassail -song was always in request at the Sarazin’s Head. - - - - - The Burden of Dead Books - - -By its air of reverend quiet, its redolence of dusty death, in the -marshalled lines of its sleeping occupants, and in the labels that -briefly name the dead author and his work, an ancient repository of -books, such as a college library, suggests the, perhaps, hackneyed -similitude of a great cemetery. Here and there, among the vast -majority of the undistinguished dead, we detect names that are still -familiar. Here and there are the monuments of men who have at least -been the ancestors of a surviving family of scholars and scientists. -Some names will awake memories, not for the individual achievement of -their bearers, but for the cause in which they worked. Royalist and -Republican, Anglican, Romanist and Puritan here have laid down the -arms which they bore against each other, and together sleep the sleep -from which there is no rising. Though the issues for which these men -fought are dead things now, their spirit is with us and their works -follow them. But with the majority it is not so. Outnumbering all -others are the hand-labourers of whose names the catalogue has no -record. Their daywork, paid or unpaid, was commanded by more ambitious -masters, who absorbed whatever temporary measure of credit attended -the collaboration. Over the ashes of these unnamed toilers we waste -no regrets: they sleep well. It is the fallen ambitions, the wasted -energies, the mistaken aims of the master-craftsmen in letters that are -food for ironical contemplation. - -I do not know that in such a cemetery of small and great, the servant -and his master, a more dismal corner exists than that which is reserved -for the stillborn. They are a great host, and they are mostly of the -family of Theology. Of one such product of fruitless travail I have -to speak. It has rested undisturbed in the library of Jesus College -for over 300 years, and in all that time, perhaps, no human being, -except the official who transcribed its title in the catalogue, has -ever had occasion to recall its existence. Its author was one Matthew -Makepeace, S.T.P., a Fellow of the College in the last quarter of the -sixteenth century. Its elaborate title is: “Speculum Archimagiae, sive -Straguli Babyloniaci Direptio, necnon Offuciarum et Praestigiarum -Romano-papisticarum Apocalypsis liberrima”: from which I conclude that -the Pope received some hard knocks in it, and that the Babylonian -lady of the Book of Revelation was left in pitiful disarray by the -learned doctor’s assault. The title-page informs us that the book was -printed at London by Melchisedeck Bradwell, for John Bill, in the year -1604: furthermore, that it had been “perused and approved by publike -authoritie.” That it was ever perused I do not believe. Only in the -most cursory way I have perused it myself, and I do not think that -any other man has done as much. To our patient ancestors a book was -a book, let it be ever so dull. They glossed it, annotated it, added -their approving or inimical comments. But nobody has been at the pains -to add his marginal notes to the text of Matthew Makepeace. Its cover -is unworn, its pages as clean as on the day when it first saw light. -This only: on a loose scrap of paper, contained between its pages, I -have discovered a name written in Greek characters and a short Greek -quotation. - -Let me get done with this dull book as fast as I can. It is, of course, -written in Latin, and its style does not suggest that the author had -a facile Latinity. The extensive list of authors cited indicates that -he had read widely, but digested little of what he read, in Patristic -and Rabbinical literature. The purpose of the book is to discredit the -claim of the Roman Church to the possession of supernatural gifts. The -subjects dealt with are naturally the Roman sacraments and hagiology. -The learned author arrives at the conclusion, on grounds which I -have not had the patience to investigate, that the human exercise of -miraculous powers ceased at the precise date, A.D. 430. - -Of the writer, Doctor Makepeace, I can find little more information -than is supplied in the History of Jesus College, written by John -Sherman in the reign of Charles II. This work, composed in the fulsome -Latin which was esteemed elegant in the seventeenth century, gives -brief biographical notes of each of the Fellows from the date of the -foundation of the College. There are various manuscript versions of the -History, some ampler than others, and if you wish to read the original -Latin, of which I subjoin a translation, you must search out the single -copy which contains the full note of his life and work. It may be -rendered: - -“Matthew Makepeace, S.T.P., of the county of Northumberland, succeeded -to a fellowship in 1565: a most learned investigator of theological -matters (_rei theologicae indagator_), especially of the writings of -the Fathers: a chastiser of the Pope (_Papomastix_): he illuminated by -his knowledge the College and the University, most fearlessly attacking -the unclean practices of the Babylonian harlot. He had one much-loved -pupil, Marmaduke Dacre, first-born son of the lord baron Dacre, of the -county of Cumberland. The same having disappeared from the College in -a fashion as yet unknown (_modo adhuc inscibili_) the old man, seized -with a phrenetic malady, gradually declined (_contabuit_), often -asserting that he was that same pupil whom he had lost. Dying at the -age of sixty years, he was buried in the chapel, September 8th, 1604.” - -To the information given by Sherman I can only add the evidence of a -blue flagstone--unhappily removed in the course of chapel restoration, -in 1863--which lay in the floor of the south transept. Its simple -inscription was: “_Matthaeus Makepeace, S.T.P., decessit, 1604_.” - -With the evidence as to the date of the death of Dr. Makepeace, -furnished by Sherman and the old gravestone, it is difficult to -reconcile a curious entry in the register of burials in All Saints’ -Parish Churchyard. The entry is dated April 13, 1654, and it runs:-- - -“Matthew Makepeace, an oldman yᵗ lodged with yᵉ widow Pearson in Jesus -Lane, of yᵉ age of about three score years and ten. He was burried in -Poorman’s Corner, by yᵉ parish.” - -The date, the age of the deceased, the place of burial, the fact that -this Makepeace was evidently a pauper and a stranger to Cambridge, all -would seem to make it certain that he could not be the same man who is -mentioned by Sherman. Nevertheless, I have my doubts, and the story -which I have to unfold will explain the reason. - -[Illustration: _A Corner of the Library._] - -The story begins on August 16th, 1604, the very day on which the -learned _Speculum_ made its first appearance, bound and complete, on -the table of Matthew Makepeace. The doctor’s chamber was on an upper -floor of the staircase at the western end of the chapel nave, and it -overlooked what was then called Fair Yard, a plot of ground since -annexed to the Master’s garden. August 16th happened to be the last of -the three days of Garlick Fair, the ancient fair which, since the days -of King Stephen, had been associated with the Church of Saint Radegund, -and took place under the chapel walls. - -Matthew Makepeace was alone. It was Long Vacation, and his sole pupil, -Marmaduke Dacre, who shared his chamber, had been allowed a day’s -outing. Heavy books of divinity lined the walls of the chamber, which -had little of comfort about it and no elegance. The doctor’s high bed, -with curtains of faded say, the pupil’s truckle-bed, a hanging cupboard -for clothes, a rough deal stand on which was set an ewer and basin of -coarse earthenware, a chair, two stools and a large oaken table in -the middle of the room--these were the doctor’s principal household -effects. There was but one window, of bottle-green glass, and its -lattice was open to admit the air and sunlight of the August afternoon. - -On the table lay the doctor’s new book, brave in its stamped leather -and gilded label: but it was unopened. It was the outcome of five and -twenty years of incessant study, and the single offspring of Matthew’s -lucubration. And now that it was brought to birth he was in a mood to -stifle it. It had been begun in the white heat of the controversies -with Rome and Spain, and it lingered in parturition until the fire -had burnt low, and the readers who should have applauded it were in -their graves. Its author was not very sure that its contentions were -true, and he was very sure that they were addressed to deaf ears. -Had he gone out into the world he might have learnt what the world -was interested in--what battles remained to fight, what causes were -already finished. But Matthew’s world consisted of books, and his books -were out of date. Of recent political developments, of the growth of -scientific knowledge, of the blossoming of a native literature he had -no more knowledge than a child. The work which had been begun with -enthusiasm had been completed in mechanical drudgery, and too late he -was conscious of the fact. - -How well he recollected the enthusiasms of 1579! How ardent his friends -were that his immense learning should signalise itself in the great -national strife with the powers of darkness! If he could only live his -life again with the old enthusiasm and the added knowledge of a life -that should combine learning and action! The boy, Dacre, blessed with -genius, wealth, high birth and noble aspirations--how wide the horizon -that opened before him! For Matthew Makepeace it rested only to be -forgotten before he died. - -It was a strange bird of passage that had dropped the seed from which -Matthew’s book grew. Alessandro Galiani was a medical doctor of Padua -University when he came to Cambridge, and for a few months resided in -Jesus College. Why he came nobody precisely knew; but he claimed to be -a Protestant refugee, and he was certainly profoundly learned in many -languages, as well as in medicine. He brought letters of introduction -from the Chancellor, Lord Burleigh, and it was surmised that he was an -agent of the Government, engaged to report on the University. But his -talk and conduct were so equivocal that the suspicion presently arose -that his Protestantism was simulated, and that he was a papal spy. The -sentiments to which he gave expression were certainly Macchiavellian in -the highest degree--intolerable to English ears. Wherefore his sojourn -at Cambridge ended abruptly after a few months, and he passed away into -the same mysterious spaces from which he had come. He was a man of -extraordinary powers of observation and suggestion, and from a chance -hint that he once let fall Makepeace got the idea of writing his book. -It was Galiani who directed his attention to the Jewish and Arabic -authors whom he consulted. But how little of the force and insight of -the Italian entered into the completed book, Makepeace knew only too -well. - -So the book lay on the table and Matthew had no heart to open it. -Through the window came sounds of merriment from the Fair Yard without. -Regularly as August came round Makepeace had heard those sounds for -forty years past, but until to-day he had regarded them only as a -troublesome distraction, and closed his casement against them. To-day -a profound lassitude made him draw his stool from the table, where lay -the slighted volume, to the open window. His attention was especially -drawn by a strident voice which came from near his chamber. Looking out -on the Fair Yard he saw a platform of a few planks, mounted on casks, -immediately beneath his window. On it a vagabond charlatan was loudly -advertising to a group of gaping rustics the merits of a wonderful -heal-all. - -“Come buy, my masters, come buy,” he cried. “Buy the infallible salve -of the famous doctor Pinchbeck, the ointment that heals the ague, the -rheum, the palsy, the serpigo. Let him that goes on one leg but buy, -and with thrice laying on he shall go on two. Let him that goes with -crutches buy, and he shall dance home in a coranto. One groat only for -the learned doctor’s ointment that shall quit you of the cramp, the -gout, the quotidian and the tertian. An it rid you not in two days come -again and Pinchbeck shall restore you fourfold.” - -From time to time an ague-ridden swain mounted the platform, haggled -with the quack, reluctantly parted with his groat and departed, dubious -of his purchase. On the whole, Dr. Pinchbeck seemed to be doing a -fair trade, when, late in the afternoon, an old man, bent double with -rheumatism, raised a loud expostulation. He affirmed that he had -purchased a box of the ointment on the first day of the fair, and had -applied it thrice without the promised result. - -He demanded the fourfold restitution of his money, and the mountebank -stoutly resisted the claim. Angry cries arose from the bystanders, -and it might have gone ill with the empiric, had not a diversion -been effected by one of the crowd. This was a tall middle-aged man -of somewhat dark complexion and foreign appearance, whose dress -distinguished him as a gentleman and possibly a practiser of medicine. -He stepped on the platform, spoke a few words to the ointment-vendor, -and then, beckoning the old man to him, made him sit on a stool. He -gazed fixedly for a few moments in the patient’s eyes, made some -mysterious motions of the hands before his face, whispered in his ear, -and then, with a few more passes of his hands, bade him stand. The old -fellow stood erect without effort; then, at the stranger’s bidding, -walked a few easy steps, and with a pleased and puzzled look descended -to join his friends in the crowd. Loud applause greeted the wonderful -cure, and patients crowded to receive the stranger’s ministrations. -The same operations in each case were attended with the same result. -Never had there been seen such a wonder at the fair. - -Most of all it wrought wonder in Matthew Makepeace. This unknown -individual--was he possessed of those miraculous gifts of healing which -Makepeace in 400 quarto pages had proved to be extinct? He would accost -him and, if possible, learn from his lips whether what he had seen were -the operation of nature or of the magic art. Descending in the majesty -of his doctor’s robes he mingled in the crowd, and mildly laid his hand -on the stranger’s arm. “Pardon, learned sir,” said he, “the curiosity -of a scholar--alas! too ignorant of books and all unskilled in the -manual acts of healing. I would fain question with you of these same -cures that by chance I have witnessed from my chamber.” The stranger -was engaged in giving parting words of counsel to some of his patients. -He turned at the touch of the doctor’s hand, surveyed him up and down -for a moment, and said, “Anon, Master Makepeace, anon: I will be with -you presently.” - -Dr. Makepeace started to hear his name and threw a sharp look on the -speaker. No; he was a complete stranger, and his accent betrayed him -as a foreigner. Dr. Makepeace had certainly never seen him in his life -before. He began to explain where his chamber was to be found. - -“I know it,” interrupted the stranger, “I know it. Bear with me for a -moment and I will seek you there.” - -Makepeace was a little ruffled that the speaker, knowing his name, did -not give him his academic title. “_Doctor_ Makepeace,” he said; “ask -for _Doctor_ Makepeace.” - -“Surely, surely,” replied the stranger carelessly: “yet _Master_ -Makepeace, methinks, served you then.” - -More than ever perplexed the doctor sought his room. Only a few minutes -had passed when he heard his visitor mounting with no faltering step to -his door, and Makepeace opened to him before he knocked. The stranger -glanced rapidly round. He seemed to find something familiar in each -article of furniture. He ran his eye, with a look of some amused -contempt, over the array of worn volumes that lined the walls. “Old -books, doctor Makepeace,” he said, “old books. I think you have not -changed one these thirty years.” - -“Old books are old friends,” said the doctor with a touch of resentment -at his tone: “I would not change them.” - -“Old friends die, doctor,” observed the stranger, “they die, and then -we have no use for them but to bury them.” - -“Sir,” said the doctor with a quick reminiscence of his wasted studies, -“I _have_ buried my friends: but I love them still. But,” he went on, -“it is not of old notions that I have to speak with you. You have shown -me this afternoon something newer and,” he added sadly, “it may be, -something better than all that old books tell. I ask you to impart -to me no secret that might hurt you by the telling. Until now I have -maintained that nothing exists in this present world that is not of -natural course. If it be an honest mystery that you exercise, tell me, -the humblest and poorest of scholars, whether it be the miraculous -working of God’s power in human hands or simply the exercise of human -art.” - -The stranger seated himself, uninvited, in the doctor’s chair, and the -doctor took a stool. “Everything,” said the stranger, “is miracle to -him who does not know.” - -“Great heavens,” cried Makepeace, “that is the beginning of my -quotation from the learned Theodorus Gazophylacius. I never heard of -the great Gazophylacius until Galiani told me of him: nobody that I -know had heard of him. A marvellous scholar, truly, was Gazophylacius, -but a pagan at heart, albeit a Byzantine Christian--and sadly drowned -in superstition. Shall I show you the passage in the original Greek.” -And he feverishly turned the pages of the _Speculum_ to find it? - -“You may spare yourself that trouble,” said the stranger composedly. -“Shall I finish the quotation? Shall I write it for you?” And he -unceremoniously tore a corner from one of the immaculate leaves, took -a quill and wrote. “There,” said he, “there, I have written in Greek -what follows in your quotation, and I have added my name that you may -remember the writer.” - -[Illustration: _Chapel Doorway in Master’s Garden._] - -The doctor took it and read the delicate Greek characters: “Demetrius -Commagenus. All things are possible to him who knows and wills with -earnestness.” - -Makepeace was stupified. “Commagenus,” he said: “that is a Greek -name, I take it. And yet I would have sworn that the handwriting was -Galiani’s, and Galiani was an Italian. Besides, Galiani is dead, or he -is sixty years old, less or more, by now: and you--I cannot think that -you are past forty.” - -Indifferently the self-styled Commagenus replied: “Galiani or -Commagenus--what matters? What I wrote then I write now; and always I -am your humble servant and the poor scholar who drew wisdom from the -lips of the divine Gazophylacius.” - -“We talk in dreams,” said Matthew: “Galiani told me--_you_ told me, if -you are he--that Gazophylacius died at Rome, ten years after the Turks -entered Constantinople: and that was a hundred and fifty years ago.” - -“Yes,” answered Commagenus, “he died--the more is the pity; for he -might have lived, had he chosen to use his own wisdom. Instead of that -he imparted it on his death-bed to me. What care had he to live, an -outcast in strange lands? But this world lost its wisest man; for I am -no Gazophylacius. Only I am always learning.” - -“Why, this is as strange a maze as ever man trod,” cried Makepeace. -“You tell me that your master died a hundred and forty years ago, and -that you, Galiani, were with him at the time.” - -“Not Galiani, but Commagenus,” said the stranger in complacent -amusement at the doctor’s bewilderment: “that was my name then. I was a -youth, twenty years old, when I first came to Constantinople from the -country which gave me my name--three years before the siege. There I -became the favourite pupil of the great student of natural and medical -science, Theodorus Gazophylacius.” - -“Why, that makes you a hundred and seventy years old,” feebly -remonstrated Makepeace. “Are you then the Wandering Jew?” - -“Doctor, I am shocked,” said Commagenus. “Are such fables the stuff -of which the _Speculum_ is made? I tell you there is nothing in this -world that is not natural. That was my master’s constant teaching: -also that to know and to will makes man master of nature. That much I -learnt from him while he taught at Constantinople, and it was in my -noviciate that I gathered from him the art to work such simple cures as -you saw this afternoon. To prolong mere existence by keeping disease at -bay--that he esteemed a vulgar art. To live long and die old, feeble -and foolish--what gain is that to the man or his fellow-men? To live -always, always to be young, always eager, always to be growing in -wisdom and power--that was the secret for which he spent a lifetime’s -search, and with his dying breath he told me that he had sought it in -vain. Death, the last disease, is incurable: there is a stronger will -than man’s. But he told me of a door of escape. In his last moments -he was possessed with a dread that his discovery would perish in the -general eclipse of learning which he foresaw as the result of the -disappearance of the Byzantine schools, and, with solemn admonition -as to its use, he imparted it to me. Death, the mere accident of the -flesh, is transferable with the flesh. With will and knowledge, the -spirit--all that you call character, intelligence, consciousness, -memory--may pass from form to form, unchanged in the transition and -always capable of growth and ripening. Alas, that I have not made -better use of my master’s prescriptions! But it has been my evil fate. -Another might do better.” - -“These are heathen imaginings--snares and delusions of Satan,” cried -Makepeace. “What talk is this of tampering with the divine in us? Man, -are you a Christian?” - -“I am what I am,” replied Commagenus: “but that this is waking fact -and no delusion my history shall show you. After my beloved master’s -death I set up in medical practice in a certain city of Dalmatia. The -fame of my unusual healing powers spread in all the neighbourhood. -Unfortunately it reached the ears of the bishop of the diocese. He was -a sincere, well-meaning man, kind in all his relations with the laity -of his diocese, but a trifle superstitious. He concluded that I was a -necromancer and condemned me to be burnt alive. Until the moment when -I found myself in a dungeon and on the eve of execution I had never -thought to avail myself of the secret communicated to me by my master, -and had even questioned its efficacy. The prospect of burning was so -extremely repugnant to my feelings that I resolved to make practical -trial of it. Shall I show you how it is done? No, you need not shrink -from me. I have no wish to pass into simple old Matthew Makepeace. I -can do better. Be assured that the will goes not with the act.” - -Commagenus rose and fastened his gaze on Matthew. As he did so it -seemed to the doctor that he grew and grew to a bulk and stature -ineffable and dim. But that, he reasoned with himself, was an illusion -of the sense, and for the moments when the fascinating glare was fixed -on him he retained his consciousness. Slowly, deliberately, that -Matthew might follow every movement in succession, he moved his hands -and arms in gyrations and waves more intricate than any that Matthew -had witnessed when the Greek stood on the mountebank’s platform that -afternoon. Then he stooped over the table, and with extraordinary -distinctness of articulation whispered in his ear one word. What that -word was I do not know. Matthew Makepeace remembered it once, and -forgot it for all the years that he lived afterwards. - -The Greek took up his tale again. “My excellent master had informed me -that, whether the subject were waking or asleep, the will and the word -had equal effect. My gaoler slept in the condemned cell with me and the -occasion seemed to me a particularly happy one for testing the accuracy -of my master’s conclusions. Though I did not doubt the intensity of my -will, in prospect of such an undesirable event as being burnt alive, -I confess that I was surprised and more than gratified by the issue -of the experiment. I had the satisfaction of leading my gaoler to the -stake on the following morning.” - -“What,” cried Makepeace: “do you tell me that the man was burnt? -True,” he added, as a mitigating consideration suggested itself to his -bewildered brain, “he was a papist. But, after all, what were you?” - -Commagenus answered with the resignation of a parent satisfying an -inquisitive child. “Yes, Matthew Makepeace, when your raiment is past -your own use you make a gift of it to some humble dependent. When -_he_ has worn it threadbare, what happens? It is burnt. You do not -burn it: I did not burn him. Besides, this common man in ages to come -will be held in reverence--in another name, I admit--as a martyr to -medical science. Nevertheless I was little pleased, as you may think, -with the integument which my brutal gaoler had left me. In my new and -humble sphere of life I had few opportunities of self-improvement, -and, taking the first that offered, I installed myself in the person -of a Dominican friar. I am disposed to doubt whether I really bettered -myself by my change of profession. I found that it required much -ingenuity to sustain the part of crass ignorance which was associated -with my new character, and the man’s companions were deplorable -people. An accident, which had nearly proved fatal, relieved me of -the disagreeable situation. In the course of my professional duties -I was directed to take ship for Spain, where the Dominican order had -an especial interest in the Office of the Holy Inquisition. On the -voyage we fell in with a vessel belonging to a respectable merchant -of Marseilles. The merchant, who was likewise the ship’s captain, was -in the habit, when occasion offered, of diversifying the routine of -commerce by piratical enterprise. With his crew he boarded and took -possession of our vessel, informing us that we were his prisoners. As -he had a reputation for probity to sustain at Marseilles, he judged -it prudent to throw the whole of the crew and passengers of our -vessel into the waves. However, learning that there was a clergyman -on board, he seized the opportunity of making confession first and -receiving plenary absolution from him of an outstanding balance of -prior delinquencies. It was natural to avail myself of the opportunity -for transferring myself into his person. It was pleasant to see him -flounder in the sea with the rest, and I returned--if that is the right -word--to Marseilles, in circumstances sufficiently ample to warrant -retirement from a profession the ambiguous character of which offended -my moral sense. But my experiences in the three careers of life which -my destiny had recently forced upon me gave me an indelible prejudice -against the Western Church. On the whole I am a Protestant. - -“I need not detain you with my subsequent transmigrations. The merchant -was elderly and so oppressively respectable that I was glad to exchange -into the superior rank of a French marquisate. Since then, from -Trebizond to Tarifa, I have studied men and manners in many capacities. -Perhaps the time which was pleasantest to me, as a man of science, was -spent in Peru with Pizarro, whom I attended as a captain of cavalry. -But a fatal wound, inflicted by a poisoned arrow, compelled my return -to Spain in the office of a ship’s boatswain. After all my wanderings -my conscience reproached me with my culpable neglect of the art in -whose elements I had been grounded by the ever-revered Gazophylacius. -I resumed the medical studies which I was convinced were best suited -to my bent and upbringing, by adopting the features and the status -of a freshman in the University of Padua. As the freshman, under no -possible circumstances, could have passed his examinations you will see -that I conferred on him no small obligation by the assistance which I -rendered. In my first year I obtained advancement to the person and -professorial chair of Galiani. I am grieved to tell you that I left -him seriously unwell at Salerno, ten years ago; and his decease, which -followed almost immediately after, proved to me how wise had been my -course in transferring myself into the healthy frame of the brother -professor who attended him in the earlier phases of his malady. Come, -doctor, you have let me chatter on with these tiresome details till I -see you are three parts asleep.” - -“Asleep!” roared Makepeace, who had been filled with rage, disgust and -hatred by the shameless recital. “Asleep! Wretch, thief, assassin, -defiler of the sanctuary of man! Begone, skirr, fly! Would that I could -crush your basilisk head on the floor as I stand! But stay. I will -fetch the University bedel. He shall clap you in the lowest hold of the -Castle gaol.” - -“Marry, good words, master doctor,” said the imperturbable stranger. -“Your bedel, possibly, is a family man; and conscience forbids that, -except in the last resort, I should lay a father of a family in a -dungeon for crimes that, you are pleased to assert, are of my doing: -and, except that I do not propose myself for the office of bedel, it -were an easy thing for me to do so. But hearken, my honest friend. -I wish you well--no man better. Getting old is a sad affair, sadder -even than dying. I think that you are sixty, and I don’t think that -just now you are quite in your best health. Has the world gone very -well with you? In five years, ten years, will it go better? You have -written a silly book that nobody will read, and you are ashamed of it. -You have wasted your years of manhood in twisting ropes of sand. And -the solitude, Matthew! My heart bleeds to think what your solitude -will be. What friend have you to smooth the downhill course? Who cares -for the friend of dead books? Altogether, you have very little use now -for Matthew Makepeace. Who is it that should sleep in yonder bed?” he -asked, pointing to the truckle used by Marmaduke Dacre. “Is he young? -Is he comely? Has he friends to love him and be loved? Is he of a quick -spirit and a high hope? Matthew Makepeace, you know the acts and the -word. The door lies open to you. Take wisdom, and be young.” - -“The door lies open to _you_,” shouted Makepeace, throwing it open as -he spoke. “Pass out of it, and avoid the chamber of a Christian man: -and the foul fiend fly away with you and your abominable suggestions!” - -“Doctor Makepeace, I wish you a very good evening,” said his visitor. - - * * * * * - -The night was far advanced, and Matthew Makepeace had no mind for bed. -A dim rush candle, set on a stool in a corner of the apartment, cast -flickering shadows on the walls and floor. In an opposite dark corner -his pupil slept. But for the dread of awaking him, Makepeace would have -paced the room in his perplexity. As it was, he sat bent double on the -stool by the window. - -One thing was clear enough. If what he had seen and heard was not a -fiction or the delusion of his senses, the _Speculum_ was a colossal -stupidity. Even if the rejuvenations of Commagenus were as much in the -course of nature as he affirmed them to be, did they not warrant the -Pope’s most arrogant pretensions? But it was with himself that he was -most concerned. Was it not the fact that, as Commagenus had declared, -his life had been most miserably wasted? And the mistake was past -repair. If only his youth had known! And his mind went back to a short, -happy time, just after he had taken his degree, when he had served as -chaplain in his far-away northern country, at the ancestral castle -of the Dacres. His pupil then had been the present Lord, Marmaduke’s -father; and the pupil had had so much to teach his master about hawks -and horses and hounds that the master had little leisure to repay it -in Greek and Latin. Those were happy days when they had roamed the -Cumbrian fells together. And now this Lord Dacre was great in the -councils of his sovereign, the wise and respected ruler of a barony -that was almost a kingdom in itself. And in his trusting confidence he -had committed his son to the care of his old master at Cambridge; and -that son in course of years would naturally succeed to his father’s -station. - -Had Commagenus indeed sat in that chamber, only a few hours since, -and unfolded to him the secret of perpetual youth? Yes: there was the -evidence of the written scrap lying on the open page of the _Speculum_. -True, Commagenus had made a detestable use of his wonderful power. But -with Makepeace it would be different. He was conscious of his sobriety -and virtue, and there were the noble traditions of the house of Dacre -to keep him in the right way. He had abilities, if only he had youth -and opportunity to use them, and the experience of sixty years was a -better guarantee for their proper employment than any that a callow -youth could offer. Clearer, louder than the voices of conscience or -calculation there came back to him, like the drumming burden of an -iterated song, the words “The door is open. Be young.” Was it fancy -that a door seemed to open in the dark book-press opposite, and that -through it he looked out on a sunny haze enveloping blue hills and -waters and the towers of Dacre Castle? And cool breaths from heathery -heights took up the refrain, and whispered to him “Be young.” - -Matthew Makepeace crept quietly to the dark corner where his pupil lay. -His will was intense as he had never known it before. He took care that -his shadow should not fall on the sleeper’s face and arouse him. He -made the wonderful passes--with what extraordinary clearness they were -printed on his recollection! He stooped and whispered in his pupil’s -ear the mysterious word. - -If Matthew had expected a flash of lightning, the apparition of the -Evil One, the jubilations of triumphant fiends on the success of -his experiment, he was agreeably disappointed. Nothing of the kind -happened. Only in the dim light of the candle he saw a grey shadow -of weary age steal over his pupil’s face, and he felt the vigour and -vitality of youth invade his own limbs as with the intoxication of -wine. Then the wick suddenly flickered in the candle-socket and went -out. He heard Marmaduke turn over in his bed with an uneasy sigh. - -Then Makepeace woke to reason and a horrible dread. He dared not -relight the candle for fear of rousing the sleeper. In the dark, before -he was discovered, he must repeat the process which should restore each -to his own person. In the dark, as nearly as he could, he went through -the magical passes, and with extraordinary vehemence he willed himself -back into Matthew Makepeace. But the word! Great heavens! It had passed -from him as suddenly and completely as the light of the extinguished -candle. In vain he racked his memory of every language, living or dead. -It had no meaning in any language, living or dead: of that he felt -sure, and he was sure of nothing else. For an hour, by his pupil’s -bedside, he tore his hair in desperate efforts to recall it. For an -hour he alternately cursed Commagenus and prayed that he might return -before day to give him the forgotten word. Then the grey morning light -began to creep through the casement, and the birds woke and sang. - -There could be no shadow of doubt about it. There lay Matthew Makepeace -before him, and the old man was drowsily stirring his limbs as the -light broadened into day. And young Dacre, in a doctor’s gown, was -looking down upon him, tortured with horrible thoughts. One thing was -certain. He could never pass himself off as Marmaduke. Conscience, -gratitude, affection forbade it. Besides, the thing was impossible. -He, the torpid pedant, could never play the part of the young and -chivalrous heir of the Dacres: and there would be Marmaduke to convict -the imposture. Before his pupil woke, before the discovery was made, he -must disappear from Cambridge. Quietly and in haste he took down his -pupil’s clothes from the closet where they hung, and exchanged for them -his doctor’s robes. Then he descended his stairs and stepped out into -the cool shadows of the August morning. The porter was just opening the -gate. He nodded familiarly to young Dacre as he passed. That was the -last which any soul in Jesus College saw of Matthew Makepeace. - -Unless, indeed, it were that same Matthew Makepeace who, with the -homing instinct of a dying animal, crept back to Cambridge in poverty -and wretchedness, and died in widow Pearson’s house in 1654. In any -case the flagstone in the chapel transept told a lie: it was Marmaduke -Dacre that lay beneath it. - -One thing further I have to mention. When I first took down the -_Speculum_ from its shelf in the college library I found it in the same -virgin condition in which it had lain on the table of Matthew Makepeace -on that fatal afternoon in August, 1604. No living soul had disturbed -its repose for over 300 years. It was evidently the same copy: perhaps -no other was ever issued. As I turned its pages a scrap of paper -fluttered to the floor. It had been torn from the bottom corner of -pages 273-4. On it was written in minute Greek letters an inscription -which I translate: - -“Demetrius Commagenus. All things are possible to him who knows and -wills with earnestness.” - - - - - Thankfull Thomas - - -A passage in the lately edited _Diary of George Evans_, 1649-1658, has -called my attention to a singular and, I believe, unrecorded episode in -the history of Jesus College. - -With Mr. Evans himself the story is not concerned. It is sufficient -to say that he was appointed to a fellowship at Jesus in 1650 by the -Committee for Reforming the Universities, in place of an expelled -Presbyterian. He was, as his name suggests, a Welshman, of the county -of Radnor, and, of course, an Independent. He vacated his fellowship, -on his marriage, in 1654, and retired to the living of Marston Monceux, -co. Salop. He held the incumbency until his death, in 1672, having -conformed at the Restoration. - -The portion of his diary which has awaked my interest relates to the -date June 11, 1652. For its explanation it is necessary to state that -ten years previously, just before the outbreak of the Civil War, -the College had taken a quantity of its plate from the Treasury and -delivered it to a certain Mr. John Poley, by him to be conveyed to His -Majesty, who was then at Nottingham. As the whole society was under -menace of expulsion before the end of 1642, they took the precaution, -before quitting the College, of concealing the rest of the plate, as -well as the chapel organ. This organ had been introduced in 1634 by -the Master, Richard Sterne, who was Archbishop Laud’s chaplain, and -had actively promoted his plans for the re-organisation of church -ritual in the University. It was a small chamber instrument, easily -transportable. When the new society, consisting of Presbyterians -introduced by the Earl of Manchester, entered the College in January, -1643, they noted in the Treasury Book that they could only discover -three pieces of plate. Entries in the Bursar’s Book in the year 1652 -record that the rest of the plate was discovered in that year, and at a -rather later date the organ was brought to light. - -Some further notes respecting the Chapel in Commonwealth days will -serve to explain certain points in the history which I have been able -to unravel. The older of the two existing bells in the tower was cast -by Christopher Gray in 1659. It took the place of another which was -of pre-Reformation date and had probably served the Nunnery of Saint -Radegund. This was a heavy tenor bell, and had apparently belonged to a -set of four, named after the evangelists. It bore the emblem of Saint -Mark, a lion, and the inscription in ancient lettering-- - - =Celorvm Marce resonet tvvs ympnvs in Arce.= - -This bell, for many years previous to 1652, had been disused owing to -the weakness of its frame and of the supporting floor. - -The passage, above referred to, in George Evans’ diary runs as follows: - - “June 11 [1652]. Present yᵉ Master, Mr. Woodcocke and Mr. Machin, - fellows, with Mr. Thomas Buck, Thankfull Thomas and Robert Hitchcock - digging, we digged up yᵉ treasury plate hidd in yᵉ Masters orchard. - In all were seventeen peeces (then follows a list). Searched till - prayers. But Quaerendm whether there be not yit other peeces and yᵉ - treasure hidd by yᵉ former societie. Thomas saith Mr. Germyn cld - avouch for more.” - -On reading this extract, the name--for such it seemed to be--Thankfull -Thomas, at once arrested my attention. It reminded me of a partially -obliterated inscription on a flat gravestone which lies at the crossing -of the transepts, close to the south-west pier of the tower--that one -which is distinguished from the other piers by a dog-tooth moulding. -The letters are so worn by treading that they can only be distinguished -in certain lights, and indeed have altogether disappeared on the side -of the stone which is furthest from the pier-base. What remains is to -be read:-- - - =nkfull - mas= - -followed by a date of which the figures =652= are legible. - -I have searched the Register of the College for such a name, but, -though it is complete for the years preceding 1652, I have been unable -to find it. But in the College Order Book I have found, among other -appointments of the year 1650, an entry, “Thomas constitutus est Custos -Templi.” From which it would seem that Thomas was the surname of the -Independent official corresponding to a verger or chapel-clerk. It is -singular that he should have been buried, among Masters and Fellows, in -such a conspicuous place in the Chapel. - -The discovery of the plate in the Master’s orchard--brought about -through the agency of Mr. Thomas Buck, of Catharine Hall, who was -one of the Esquire Bedells--was matter for disappointment as much -as congratulation to the Master and Fellows. They had a convinced -belief that a much larger quantity of treasure remained concealed in -some quarter of the College, and, as the passage in the diary shows, -Thankfull Thomas suggested that Mr. Germyn probably knew something of -the matter. Of him it is necessary to say a few words. - -Gervase Germyn, of the county of Huntingdon, was admitted to the -College in 1621, and in 1652 must have been a man of middle age. He -was a Master of Arts, unmarried, and resided in Cambridge. He was not -one of the expelled Fellows. He had acted as organist and choir-master -in the mastership of Richard Sterne, and was passionately devoted to -church music. After the removal of the organ and the installation of -the new Master and Fellows, in 1643, his connection with the College -ceased. He was miserably poor and supported himself by teaching music. -His small, spare figure was ordinarily dressed in a thread-bare garb of -semi-clerical appearance, and he had a quaintness of manner and speech -which induced the belief that he was not of ordinary sanity. - -Thankfull Thomas particularly disliked him. Gervase had a tone of -superiority in addressing him which was the more galling because what -he said was only remotely intelligible to the sexton; and he had a -disagreeable habit of meddling with what he considered to be the duties -and prerogatives of his office. Germyn must have possessed a key to the -Chapel, for he was constantly presenting himself there at unexpected -times, often late in the evening. He had a distracting habit of roaming -about the building, and, as Thomas thought, spying on his actions from -unseen quarters. Thomas had seen him looking down on him from the Nuns’ -gallery in the north transept, or high up in the tower arcade. - -Thomas took note of these circumstances and kept his knowledge to -himself. His cupidity was aroused by the thought of the hidden -treasure, and he was perfectly convinced that the clue to its discovery -lay with Germyn. As it was useless to question him directly he resorted -to a system of counter-espial. - -His attention was particularly drawn to the Chapel tower, where he had -more than once detected Germyn’s presence. The arcaded storey beneath -the belfry is reached by a dark, winding stair in the wall at the -north-east angle of the north transept. The staircase emerges, at a -considerable height, on a Norman gallery, which, at the time of which -I am speaking, was not protected on the transept side by a railing. -Thomas was a timid man, and he made this alarming passage clutching -each pillar as he passed it. Then another stair in the tower pier led -up to the arcaded gallery, and there the inner communication stopped. A -door in the north arcade opened on the roof of the transept, from which -a dizzy ladder ascended to the belfry window. The ladder gave Thomas -pause. It was old, weather-worn and crazy, and, unless by the light -figure of Germyn, had perhaps never been scaled for a generation. The -silent belfry above, encompassed by wheeling jackdaws, was a terror -to his weak nerves. Even from the floor below he could see the gaping -rottenness of its rafters: so he let it alone. - -Secure on the Chapel floor he began his researches. In his vacant -moments he roamed about chancel, transepts and nave, beating the walls -and trampling the flags, if perchance he might light on some recess -wherein the treasure was contained. At first his curiosity was excited -by certain crosses graved on the nave floor. He did not know that they -marked the processional path of the Saint Radegund nuns. But he could -detect no sound of hollowness beneath them. Finally, he fastened his -mind on a large, unmarked stone, next the south-west pier of the tower. -Here, and in no other part of the Chapel, there was distinct evidence -that a vault of some kind existed. Above it the disused bell-rope was -attached to the pier. - -[Illustration: _Norman Gallery, North Transept._] - -Often, when the Chapel was closed after service hours, he scrutinised -this stone. It had no mark of recent disturbance, but in ten years it -was likely that any such indication had been obliterated. One summer -evening in 1652 he was so engaged, and kneeling on the stone, when he -was startled by the sudden falling of a shadow. He sprang to his feet -and beheld Gervase Germyn. - -“Good evening, friend,” said Germyn. “You work late. I was visiting -some old friends that lie under the stones here, having a word with -him or him that I have known, a remembered jest with one, a snatch of -old song with another--who knows what? And here are you at the like -business. And who, pray, is your friend?” - -“Master Germyn,” replied Thomas stiffly, “an idle man may talk to dead -men, if he will: a sexton has other business with them. How often am I -to bid you not to meddle in my affairs?” - -“You are very right,” said Germyn, “and now I perceive this is no man’s -grave--yet. Perhaps the sexton is looking to make it one. And which, -pray, of my friends, the new Fellows, has gone to his audit? Or is it -to be mine, perhaps, or thine: and I think it be thine indeed, for I -find thee lying on it. But you don’t know the Prince of Denmark: else -I should ask you the clown’s riddle, ‘What is he that builds stronger -than either the mason, the ship-wright, or the carpenter?’ It is a -pretty riddle to ask within walls that are five hundred years old.” - -“I make no graves,” answered Thomas, “and I have no time or patience -for your riddles. I only ask you to begone.” - -“Is the trade then so slack, friend Thomas, and is there none to give -the sexton employment?--none of all that dig for death as for hid -treasure, and some, perhaps, who dig for treasure and find death.” - -Thomas was startled at the hint that his purpose was detected. He -looked dubiously on the speaker, and the thought dawned on him that -perhaps Germyn was offering himself as a confederate. “Treasure,” he -said slowly; “yes, if you talk of treasure there is more sense in you -than I thought. I don’t know but what we might find it together; and -a poor man, such as you, might have his fair share, and none be the -wiser.” - -“You are wholly mistaken,” said Germyn, “if you think that I know -anything of the treasure that you are looking for: and, if I knew, God -forbid that I should rob the dead of their trust. No, let them keep it -until the day of restitution, when their friends claim it of them. You -are a bold man, Thomas, to think of the dead as if they had no sense of -what happens to-day. For my part, though we talk as old friends, I have -a dreadful awe of them: they can do so much, and I can’t hurt them, if -I would. It is a marvel to me that you can walk and work at such an -hour in a place that is so full of voices and presences. A holy man you -should be! Do you know how Goodman Deane, the last man who held your -office, died?” - -“They tell me he died distracted. But I don’t trouble myself with -fancies.” - -“It was in August, two years since. What had he seen? What had he -heard? They say that in his wanderings he often repeated ‘I should have -rung, I should have rung.’ And I think I see his meaning. It is an old -belief--God knows what of truth there is in it--that at the ringing of -the church bell the congregations of the dead break up and give place -to the living. Poor Deane! Mark could not speak for him: he has been -dumb these twenty years, though one day, please God, he will speak -again for his friends--of whom you are not one. And there is another -old fancy that belongs to this church, and perhaps had something to do -with Deane’s matter. It used to be told among the old society, that -are scattered or dead now, that the festival of the Name of Jesus was -a great day with the old dead folk. Each year at midnight on that day, -which is the seventh of August, they assemble--men or women, I know not -which--here in the church to observe the hour of Lauds. It was said -that you could hear them trooping down from their chambers outside by a -stair that does not exist, and they came through the church wall by a -door that is unseen. Then, each in order, they rank themselves on the -crosses that mark this pavement, and go round the church in darkness, -for they need no lights. Their singing has been often heard, but I do -not know that living eye has seen their procession, unless it were -Deane’s, and, it seems, he did not live long after.” - -“It is a curious fancy, truly,” said Thomas, “if one could credit it. -But I don’t know why you tell it me, as I never visit the church after -nightfall. And little as I believe your tale, I believe you less when -you tell me that you know nothing of this treasure. But I spoke of it -at a venture, and it is none of my business. So I leave you to your -ghosts.” - - * * * * * - -Thankfull Thomas was not courageous, but his fears were not of a -sentimental order. He was more than ever convinced that Germyn knew -the secret of the hidden treasure, and that his story was a device to -prevent him from continuing his search for it; and he had made up his -mind that it lay under the stone where Germyn had interrupted him. At -night he would be secure from his interference, and would have time to -lift the stone and replace it in such a manner as to leave no trace of -its disturbance. And as the date which Germyn had mentioned had passed -out of his mind, it so happened that August 7 was the night which he -chose for his enterprise. - -[Illustration: _South West Pier of Tower._] - -It was past eleven when he entered the church with lantern and tools. -The stone was heavy, and it took a considerable time to dislodge and -lift it. Beneath it he saw a vault, some five feet deep. He lowered his -lamp into it. Great was his disappointment to find it blankly empty. He -had so fastened his expectations on this particular spot that hardly -yet could he think himself mistaken. He let himself down into the vault -that he might explore for some recess in its walls or floor. - -He was still groping in semi-gloom when, above his head, he caught the -sound of quiet treading, and then a waft of strange music. He was too -unskilled to tell what the instrument might be, but the sound of it was -soft and pleasant. It rose, and died away, and rose again in fitful -strains. Then it went on in a continuous melody and was taken up by a -voice peculiarly sweet and clear--so clear that the words were plainly -distinguishable. “When the Lord turned again the captivity of Sion then -were we like unto them that dream.” - -Thomas listened in amazement till the psalm ended and silence returned. -Then he heard the shuffling of descending steps, and with a sudden -horror he remembered the story of the dead men’s staircase and the -phantom procession. He heard a door softly open in the dark transept, -and he sprang wildly to the bell-rope above his head. One frightful -clang: Mark spoke again after twenty years of silence: a rumble and -a roar: the heavy bell splintered itself on the floor beneath, and -Thankfull Thomas, in a pool of blood, lay in the grave of his own -making. - - * * * * * - -In a corner of the belfry, where the floor was not broken by the -falling bell, they discovered the organ, which had been hidden there -since 1642. - - * * * * * - -The Restoration brought back a few survivors of the expelled Society -of 1642, and with them Gervase Germyn. But in 1664 I find that George -Loosemore was master of the College choristers, and Germyn was dead. -At what precise date he died I cannot say. But one thing is known. -The Chapel, after long neglect and misappropriation, was repaired, -decorated and restored to Anglican usage about the year 1663. The -reconciliation of the Church was marked by a choral service, and Germyn -occupied his old seat at the organ. Among the psalms chosen for the -service was the 126th, _In convertendo captivitatem Sion_. The singers -had reached the last verse--“He that now goeth on his way weeping and -beareth forth good seed: shall doubtless come again with joy and bring -his sheaves with him.” There the organ accompaniment faltered, failed, -died, and left the choir to chant the _Gloria_ unassisted. The grey -head of Gervase Germyn lay on the key-board, and the College had to -seek a new organist. - - - - -The Palladium - - -On an unspecified morning in the year 1026, in the reign of Cnut, king, -of happy memory, Aethelstan, abbat of Ramsey, delivered to the monks of -his Benedictine household, in chapter assembled, an address which had -notable consequences. - -The reverend father took as the text of his discourse the verse, _in -libro Regum tertio_, which in our Authorised Version is expressed--Know -ye not that Ramoth in Gilead is ours, and we be still, and take it not -out of the hand of the King of Syria? - -With the ghostly lessons to be drawn from this passage we need not -concern ourselves: indeed they were but lightly touched upon by the -abbat. He turned almost directly to practical matters. - -He dwelt feelingly on the palpable evidences of the poverty of their -household--the bell-tower of their church, which had fallen in sudden -ruin, and which the means of their household did not permit them -to rebuild: the indecent sordidness of their chapter-house, within -whose mud-built walls they were then assembled: the meagreness of the -monastic diet, of which his brethren were the last to complain, but -which reflected unfavourably on the coldness of Christian charity in -the laity of the neighbourhood. And incidentally he contrasted these -conditions with the splendour of the new temple, adorned with goodly -stones and gifts, which their beloved friends at Ely had erected since -the Danish wars had ended: the ephods of purple and scarlet affected -by the ministers in Saint Etheldreda’s church: and the proverbial -magnificence of Ely feasts. - -He asked himself the cause of this contrast, and with humility he -confessed that it lay in the remissness of himself and his venerable -predecessors in the abbatial seat of Ramsey. He commended to the -attention of his hearers a text, _in fine libri Josue_, in which it -was recorded that the children of Israel had brought up the bones -of Joseph with them from Egypt, and that the said bones had become -the inheritance of the children of Joseph: and he enlarged on the -advantages, pecuniary as well as spiritual, which undoubtedly rewarded -those children. - -What had Ramsey done to emulate an example so worthy? Nothing, or next -to nothing. At a cost relatively small they had, indeed, procured -from an ignorant rustic, who had dug them up at the town of Slepe, -some bones which competent authority declared to be those of the -Persian bishop, Saint Yvo. But, whether or not the cause lay in some -lack of orthodoxy in this oriental prelate, it must be confessed -that his remains had not been so miraculously effectual in procuring -the liberality of the laity as had been anticipated. He ventured to -suggest that the relics of a local saint might be more successful. He -casually drew their attention in this matter to the example of the holy -brethren of Ely. Not content with their heritage of the bones of Saint -Etheldreda and the virgins, her relatives, they had recently forcibly -detained and appropriated a consignment of the remains of Aednoth, -bishop of Dorchester, addressed to Ramsey Abbey and belonging of right -to it. While he did not defend the methods of their Ely brethren, he -must applaud their conspicuous and practical piety. - -The abbat deplored the circumstance that the vicinity of their abbey -had produced no saint of such eminent merits as to transmit to his -remains the powers that should evoke the faith and the funds so -necessary to their present needs. As an illustration of the spirit -which he would like to find among his own brethren he again invited -their attention to the religious activity of their friends at Ely, -who had despatched a naval and military force as far as Dereham, in -Norfolk, and with tumult of war had abstracted from the church there -the shrine and body of Saint Withburga, virgin. In fact the pious -solicitude of their friends had sometimes carried them to lengths -which, making the widest allowance for the purity of their motives, -the abbat could not regard as otherwise than regrettable. In the -recent Danish troubles the brethren of Saint Alban’s had committed to -the safe keeping of the Ely monks the shrine containing the relics of -the great Protomartyr of Britain. At the restoration of peace the Ely -people had, indeed, returned the chest, but they afterwards maintained -that they had substituted in it the remains of a less sacred person and -had kept Saint Alban in their church. The Saint Alban’s brotherhood -on their part asserted that, from a conscientious regard for the -sanctity of their trust, they had thought well not to part with the -veritable person of their tutelar saint, but to employ the pardonable -stratagem of enclosing an inferior substitute in the shrine despatched -to Ely. But the point in dispute was immaterial, inasmuch as the Ely -relics, to whomsoever they had originally appertained, had contributed -largely to the prosperity of that household, while the event proved -that the proprietary interests of Saint Alban’s had been in no degree -prejudiced. Blind Isaac bestowed the same blessing of earth’s fatness -on supplanting Jacob and on first-born Esau. Charity and prudence -alike dictated that, in the hearing of the giver, there should be no -contention between brotherly households about a birth-right which, for -all practical uses, each of them possessed in its integrity. - -To what did the abbat’s observations tend? At the obscure church of -Soham, Cambs., unworthy receptacle of so divine a treasure, rested -what had been mortal of Saint Felix, bishop and evangelist of the East -Angles. The bishop of the diocese in which Ramsey was situated, at -the abbat’s instance, had procured royal letters patent authorising -the Ramsey monks to transfer the sacred remains to their conventual -church. Far be it from him to suggest such violent courses as had, in -some measure, clouded the effulgent zeal of their Ely neighbours. The -Soham folk, if properly approached, would, no doubt, show themselves -compliant to the King’s will, and would be eager to collaborate in a -work so happily inspired. He requested the chapter to express its views -as to the proper methods of attaining their pious object of putting the -bell-tower in a condition of permanent stability. - -Prior Alfwin rose and, protesting veneration for his Superior, ventured -to offer some remarks which, he trusted, would not be regarded as -derogating from the respect due to the abbatial chair. Fraternal -affection had, in his opinion, betrayed the Lord Abbat into an estimate -of the character of the Ely people which was not warranted by the -facts. The prior regarded them as sons of Belial. By what instinct of -the Devil the holy father, Saint Aethelwold, had induced King Edgar to -endow their monastery with wealth so disproportioned to their merits -it was not for him to surmise. Among the estates so granted was the -manor of Soham. There could be no doubt that, if they got wind of the -proposed translation of their saint, the Soham men would fight. It -would ill become their sacred calling to employ the carnal weapons to -which the Ely brigands had resorted. “Let us rather,” said the prior, -“attain our ends by friendly gifts and such arts as are permissible to -our peaceful profession--wine, for instance, or beer.” The rest of the -prior’s observations were directed to a discussion of the properties of -poppy, mandragora and other soporific herbs. - -After general discussion it was agreed that a letter should be -despatched to the reeve of Soham, announcing the intention of the abbat -and prior of paying their observance at the shrine of Saint Felix on -an appointed day: that the abbey boat-carls should be in attendance to -convey those officials thither from Erith hithe in the household barge: -and that the cellarer should make such provision for the entertainment -of the residents in Soham as might seem to his prudence expedient. - -Brother Brihtmer, lately professed, added the observation that he knew -a man or two--servants or tenants of the Abbey--Oswi, the miller, for -instance, who carried off the ram for wrestling at Bury fair. With a -few such at Erith he thought that he might be trusted to discuss the -situation with the Ely men, if they got so far. He would also provide -ten stout carls to row the barge from Erith to Soham and to undertake -what else might be required of them at the latter place. - - * * * * * - -It was a notable day in the annals of the little town of Soham when the -Ramsey barge, propelled by ten rowers, five a side, clad in the abbey -uniform of bare arms and legs and a loose gown of green falding, was -sighted on the far side of Soham mere. Quite a considerable throng of -the principal inhabitants watched it from the wooden jetty, to which -were moored the cobbles of the Soham fishermen. The reeve, in a murrey -coat and blue hood, was an important figure in the group, and was -accompanied by a select party of the leading sokemen. The local clergy -were in attendance with a hastily improvised band of thurifers and -choristers. These, with some of the better class of artificers, smiled -with conscious importance, as specially nominated guests at the feast -which the Ramsey monks brought with them for their entertainment in the -parish gild-hall. The rest of the crowd, consisting of mariners and -farm churls, were curious rather than enthusiastic, and more suspicious -than curious: for Ramsey is far from Soham, and ancient adage told -them that _fýnd synt feorbúend_--far-dwellers are enemies. At the -first landing of the venerable passengers a temporary disturbance was -caused by Grim, the fisherman of Ely monastery, who provocatively bit -his thumb at the starboard bow oar of the abbat’s crew. When this -difference had been adjusted by the intervention of the district -hundred-man the procession was started for the church. At the tail of -it, behind the boat-carls, stalked a black-avised monk of Ely, Peter by -name, who pointedly withdrew from an official part in the ceremonies. - -The banquet in the gild-hall was altogether a splendid affair. In the -whole of their official experience the reeve, the hundred-man, and the -local clergy had never received so warm a welcome or participated in -such royal cheer. No thin English vintage this that was passed to them -in the loving cup, fresh from dignified and consecrated lips, but rich -old wine, warmed by Greek suns and cooled in the caverns of Ramsey -cellars. The cottars who were admitted at the lower board had never -known what it was to have so much ale, and so good, as the monastic -vats supplied. Brother Peter of Ely looked on from the door, but took -no part in the entertainment. He remarked that the Ramsey dignitaries -were modest drinkers, and that the boat-carls looked at their blisters -and passed the can to their Soham neighbours with the merest pretence -of absorption. - -As the liquor in the wassail bowls ebbed a gradual silence crept on -the festal party. One after other, official and reverend heads declined -upon the board: rustic bodies dropped from their benches on the floor, -and stertorous slumber filled the hall. Only the abbat and prior sat -erect and looked about them with ferret eyes, and the boat-carls spat -on their hands and inspected their blisters. Brother Peter withdrew to -the mere-strand, and by the lapping waters mused on the weakness of -human heads and the shocking aspect of intemperance in which one has -not participated. - -What is this spectacle which presents itself to Brother Peter, -meditative on the muddy margin of Soham mere, at the grey hour when -country cocks do crow and bells do toll? A procession, silent but -solid, actual not ghostly, of ten men bearing a coffer strung upon -poles. Two dignified figures, their heads wrapt from the raw air in -their hoods, bring up the rear. So our friends are making an early and -unannounced departure! This is no time to ask the wherefore. Brother -Peter tucks up his frock and runs his fleetest to the church. When he -looks back from the porch he sees a vessel launched on the shimmering -lake, with a broadening track of broken water in its wake. - -The abbat and his men are two miles away over the mere when a strange -clamour reaches their ears. Horns are blown; a church bell clangs; -cries of “Haro” echo over the water; lights flash upon the strand. The -boat-carls rest upon their oars; the abbat smiles; the prior chuckles. -“Two miles: impossible!” says he; “and, as lay-brother Oswald was so -prudent as to hide the oars of the Ely boat in the church tower, they -won’t get started in a hurry.” - -The prior sits in the sternage and directs the vessel’s course. Between -him and the abbat Saint Felix reposes in his box. As they quit the mere -and enter the narrow channel which connects it with the Ouse the abbat -suggests a psalm and raises _Jubilate Deo_. The bow oars respond with a -three-man glee in the fen-men’s fashion. - -Sleeping Barway they pass, well out of hearing of their pursuers, and -then they take the right hand fork of the river, and follow the Ouse -stream which we now call the West River. Here they find themselves in -a maze of willow-fringed islets and wandering channels which quit and -re-enter the main stream. The sopping, gurgling freshets that drain -the shallow meres on either hand, as the tidal waters drop, warn them -of the perils of a divergence from the river’s course. But prior Alfwin -knows what he is about, and holds on in the channel that in ten miles -will bring them to Erith bank. Nevertheless their transit, impeded by -snags and shallows and fallen trees, is of necessity slow. Under such -circumstances one must think it an unwarranted security that induced -some of the boat-carls to open a spare beer jar and beguile their toil -with ill-timed refreshment. Three comatose bodies under the thwarts -impose a severe addition of labour on the more self-respecting members -of the crew. - -It is the hour of prime, and alas! brother Alfwin, where are we now? -Indubitably we are stuck in the mud, and the water is falling. We -land on soggy banks, and with labour the boat-carls lift and pole the -barge into deeper waters. The operation is repeated several times. -Faint cries of “Haro” are borne by the breeze over the fens, and the -Lord Abbat shudders with cold and fright. Praised be the saints, at -last we are back in the main stream. But what is this? Is not this the -identical snag on which we nearly wrecked ourselves the best part of an -hour ago? _Deus in adjutorium!_ Here is the black prow of the Ely barge -rounding the corner, not a hundred yards away, and Monk Peter stands -in the bows, raucously shouting and shaking his fist at us! Half-naked -figures start up out of the fen and run, hopping from tuft to tuft, on -the bank, cheering and waving as they run--friends, foes, or simple -spectators, who knows? - -The long sweeps of the boat-carls churn the water into oozy froth as -they bend themselves with frenzied energy to their task. Foot by foot -the Ely men gain upon their predecessors. The game is up unless, as the -stroke oars suggest, they lighten ship by heaving Saint Felix into the -river. Rather a muddy death than so! Courage! We are less than a mile -from Erith. - -Lauded be the good Saint Felix, who miraculously interposes for our -salvation from the jaws of destruction. Sudden, mysterious, a blanket -of white fog rises from the fens and envelopes the river banks. -Blotted out are the runners: they cry and wave no more. The Ely prow -is swallowed up in vacuous whiteness: the swish of the Ely oars is -silenced, and Monk Peter’s voice is raised in objurgation. They have -run upon that willow that grows aslant the brook, and it is to be -doubted that their bows are staved in. Were it not a Christian act -to hail them with a loud _Benedicite_ in parting? And here is Erith -strand and Brother Brihtmer and the Ramsey men. Brother Alfwin, it will -be proper for you to give direction to the kitchener for a suitable -congratulation for the brethren at supper to-night. To-morrow we will -deliberate on the matter of the bell-tower. - -“Candid reader,” says the Ramsey chronicler, “this is a queer tale. -The authority for it is ancient but shaky--_fluctuans veterum nobis -tradidit relatio_. I by no means require you to believe it, provided -only that in any case you have unhesitating faith that the relics of -Saint Felix were translated from the aforesaid town of Soham to Ramsey -church, and that there the saint confers inestimable benefits on his -worshippers.” Ramsey abbey is gone: the shrine of Saint Felix is gone. -The tale of the boat race remains. I ask you to believe it, if you can. - -[Illustration: _In the Fens._] - - - - - The Sacrist of Saint Radegund - - -On a certain day in mid June in the year 1431 the tolling of the bell -in St. Radegund’s church tower announced to the neighbours of the -Priory that a nun was to be buried that day. - -In an interval between church services the nuns wander in the garden, -which is also the graveyard of St Radegund’s, and lies sequestered -next the chancel walls. To-day they are drawn thither by a new-made -empty grave; for a funeral is a mildly exciting incident in conventual -routine. But three sisters sit in the cloister on the stone bench next -the chapter door. Also a small novice is curled up on the paved floor -with her back against the bench. The day is warm, and the church wall -casts a grateful shadow where they sit. And, because labour and silence -are enjoined in the cloister, they rest, and two of them gossip, and -Agnes Senclowe, the novice, listens and lays to heart. - -The two who gossip are Joan Sudbury, succentrix, and Elizabeth Daveys, -who is older than Joan, and holds no office in the monastery. With them -sits, and half dozes, Emma Denton, who is very old and very infirm. She -does not gossip, for she has hardly spoken a word of sense these forty -years past. She is a heavy affliction to the cloister society. She -lives mainly in the infirmary, and does not attend church. She knows -when it is the hour for a meal, and she knows very little else. If she -speaks an intelligible word, it is about something that happened forty -years ago. She remembers the great pestilence in 1390. - -What ailed poor sister Emma to bring her to this sad pass? When she -was young she was something of a religious enthusiast, and because -enthusiasm was rare in the cloister, she was promoted by her sisters to -high station. When they made her Sacrist she had her one and dearest -wish. To have the charge of the beautiful church, of the books, -vestments and jewels of the sanctuary, to live in the holy place, -with holy thoughts for companions, and in the unfailing round of holy -duties--was not that a happy lot? Dignified too the office was; for in -the little cloister world the Prioress herself was scarcely a greater -lady than the Sacrist. The Sacrist did not sleep with the other nuns in -the dormitory; her constant duties did not allow her ordinarily to take -her meals in the refectory. Like the Prioress, she had her own servant -to attend her, her own house to dwell in. Her habitation was built -against the northern chancel wall, and consisted of two chambers. From -the upper room, through a hole pierced in the wall, she watched the -never-dying light that hung before the High Altar. - -But it was not good to be Sacrist for long. The unvarying routine of -duty produces torpidity; holy thoughts uncommunicated end in cessation -of thought; the solitude was deadly. The office was not coveted by the -sisterhood, and was seldom held for more than a year or two together. -Wherefore they rejoiced when Emma Denton held it for nine years. For -nine years she trimmed the sacred lamp. During nine years her own light -dwindled out, and at last the world became dark to sister Emma. - -The crazy belfry rocked with the swaying of the bell, which, being -cracked, was doubly dolorous. The sound of it roused old sister Emma -to a dim consciousness of what was passing, and she spoke to nobody in -particular. - -“The bell,” she said, “the bell again! Last week it tolled, and we -buried two. Now there are two more in the dead-house.” - -“The saints protect us!” said sister Joan; “she is at her old talk of -the pestilence year.” - -“It was Assumption Day,” continued the old nun, “when we buried them. -We had no Mass that day. To-day it is the cellaress and sister Margery -Cailly--God pardon her for a sinful woman. No; Margery is sick, not -dead; and I forget, I forget.” - -“Margery Cailly,” cried Joan Sudbury, “what quoth she of Margery -Cailly, that goes to her grave to-day? Margery Cailly, that has been -our most religious Sacrist ever since yonder poor thing fell beside her -wits.” - -“Religious you may call her,” said Elizabeth Daveys, “but God knows, -and sister Emma knows, that of her which we know not. Thirty years have -I lived in St Radegund’s, and I remember not the time when any but -Margery was our Sacrist, and well I know that the sacristy has been her -prison all those days. But I have heard sister Emma say in her dull way -that Margery once knew the convent prison too.” - -“Well, twelve years I have spent here, and never had speech with the -Sacrist. Once I was alone in the church when it was dark, and the -daylight only lingered aloft in the roof, and of a sudden I lighted on -her in the chancel, busied in her office. Her pale face in her black -hood showed like a spirit’s, and I thought it was the blessed Radegund -that had come down from her window, and I was horribly afraid.” - -“I think that from the sacristy window her eye followed me about the -garden as I walked there,” said Elizabeth. “It follows me still, and it -makes my flesh creep. What good woman would shun her sisters so? Heaven -rest her soul, for be sure she has much to answer for. If she has -confessed herself, it is not to our confessor or the Prioress, for I -think she has hardly spoken these many years to any but Alice Portress -that waits on her.” - -“Yes, Alice was with her at the end. It was Alice that dug the grave; -Alice rings the knell; Alice laid her out in her Sacrist’s chamber, and -she has placed two white roses on the dead woman’s breast.” - -“Roses?” said Elizabeth Daveys; “roses are not for dead nuns. Whence -got she roses?” - -“That I can tell you,” said the novice, glad to take her part in -the conversation, “for Alice told me herself. She got them from the -churchyard of St Peter’s on the hill.” - - * * * * * - -The office for the dead was said, the empty grave was filled, and Alice -the Portress was closeted with the Prioress. - -“To you, lady Prioress--not to the Nuns in Chapter--I confess the sin -of my youth; not to them, nor yet to you while sister Margery lived. -She is gone, and why should I remain? Forty years we shared the -secret. She is past censure or forgiveness. On me let the blame rest. I -ask no pardon, but only to be dismissed from the house of St Radegund, -that I have so unworthily served. - -[Illustration: _Entrance to Chapter House._] - -“There is none but myself and poor sister Emma that remembers St -Radegund’s before the pestilence year. I was but a child then, and my -mother was Portress before me. My mother often brought me to the lodge, -and I used to play with the novices, or sit at the gate when my mother -was away. Margery had but lately come to St Radegund’s--seventeen, -perhaps, or eighteen years of age she was. Hers was a proud family--the -Caillys of Trumpington, and they were rich, and good to St Radegund’s. -They are gone and forgotten now, but often have I heard old Thomas -Key tell of them, for he was a Trumpington man, and he knew the De -Freviles of Shelford too. There are De Freviles at Shelford yet, but I -think that none there remembers young Nicholas De Frevile that was Sir -Robert’s son. - -“I had a child’s thought--that Margery was the most beautiful creature -in the wide world--most beautiful and best. And because she was young -and fair and gracious in speech even our hard sisters loved her, and -thought it pity of the world when her fair tresses were shorn and she -took the ugly veil. For Margery was not religious. God pardon me for -my sinful words, but I think she was meant for better things than -religion and a cloister. And though she was good and kind to all, -Margery did not take to our sisters. There was some trouble--I know -not what, for she never told--and for some family reason she was sent -to St Radegund’s, and ill she liked it. So she went about her work in -cloister and church, grieving; and there was talk of her among the -sisters. Some thought, some said, that they knew, but Margery said -nothing. - -“It is all forgotten now, for the pestilence wiped out the memory of -those days. Scarcely twelve months had gone since she took the veil -when Margery Cailly disappeared from the Priory. You may think what -babble of tongues there was in our parlour--how they who were wisest -had always known how it would be, and the rest rebuked them for not -telling them beforehand. And so for another twelvemonth she was lost to -us, and some sisters, who were kind, hoped that she would come back, -and some who were kinder, hoped she would not. - -“Then, one day in the year before the pestilence, comes an apparitor -with our lost Margery, and a letter to the Prioress from the Lord -Bishop of Ely. The letter is to say that the Archbishop of Canterbury, -in his visitation of Lincoln diocese, has found Margery there, living -a secular life; and because secular life is sin to those who have -entered the religious order, he commits her to his brother of Ely, in -order that the lost sheep may be restored to the fold where she was -professed. And his Lordship of Ely--Heaven help him for a blundering -bachelor!--directs that she shall be committed to the convent -prison-house until she repents of her wickedness, and when she is -loosed from it, shall make public confession in Chapter, and implore -the pardon of the sisters for her enormities. - -“Our Prioress was kinder to Margery than the Bishop meant--who -could not be kind to her? Her prison life was no longer than would -satisfy the Bishop’s enquiries, and as for the confession in the -Chapter-house--it never happened. There were some, though they liked -not confession for themselves, who thought an opportunity was missed, -and blamed the Prioress; for cloister talk is dull if we know not one -another’s failings. Still, the sisters were kind to Margery, and very -kind when they wanted to get the secret from her. But she said never -a word about it, unless it were to the Prioress. Beautiful she was -as ever, but grief and humiliation were on her, heavy as death, and -because she confided in none, she lost the friendship of the sisters. -To me, who was but a child, she would talk, but scarcely to another, -and her talk with me was never about herself. - -“One other there was with whom sometimes she had speech, and that was -old Thomas Key, maltster and trusty servant in general matters of the -Priory. Him she had known in happier days when he was a tenant of the -Caillys at Trumpington. Her family was too proud and too pious to -remember the disgraced nun, and they never visited her; but from Thomas -she learnt something of home and the outside world. - -“Then came the dreadful year when the pestilence raged in Cambridge -town. The nuns had been used to get leave from the Prioress to go out -into the town, but there was no gadding now. The gate was closely -barred, and none were admitted from outside except Thomas Key. We -carried the Host in procession about the Nuns’ Croft and--laud be to -the saints!--it protected our precincts from the contagion. And while -the sinful world without died like the beasts that perish, we sat -secure, but frightened, in our cloister, and blessed our glorious saint -for extending the protection of her prayers over the pious few who did -her service in St Radegund’s. - -“You have heard how the parish clergy died that year. One, two, -sometimes three died in one parish, and the Bishop found it hard to -provide successors. Boys that had barely taken the tonsure a week -before were sent in haste to anoint the sick and bury the dead in -places where the plague had left an unshepherded flock. Sir John Dekyn, -priest of St Peter’s church on the hill, was one that died, and his -successor did not live a fortnight after him. Then we heard from Thomas -Key that a mere youth had taken the place, one Sir Nicholas of the -Shelford De Frevile family, who had but lately been ordered priest at -Ely. And we were told that he worked with a feverous zeal among the -poor, the sick, and the dying of his parish. - -[Illustration: _The Chancel Squint._] - -“Now when this news was brought to sister Margery by Thomas Key, it -was to her as a summons from death to life. Her eye brightened and -her cheek glowed when she heard of the heroic goodness of this young -priest. While the sisters shuddered and shrank at each morning’s fatal -news, she was consumed with a passionate desire to know what was -passing in the plague-stricken town, and she plied my mother and Thomas -Key with incessant questionings. ‘Who was sick of the townsfolk? Were -any of the clergy visited? How went it with the poor in St Peter’s, -where the pestilence was hottest?’ For some weeks she heard that the -light burned still at night in St Peter’s parsonage, and that the -priest was unscathed, incessant in his ministrations and blessed by his -parishioners. And it seemed as though the sickness was abating. - -“Then, late one afternoon in early August, there came a call for -Margery. Thomas Key brought it, and whether it was his own tidings, or -a message from some other, I cannot say; Margery never told me. But -this I know, that she took me apart in the cloister and spoke to me, -and she was terribly moved and her voice was choked. ‘Little Alice,’ -she said, ‘as you love me, get me the gate-key after Lauds to-night. -It is life or death to me to go out into the town. Only do it, and say -nothing--no, not to your mother.’ Young as I was, I knew how the nuns -were used to humour my mother into letting them pass the gate; but that -was in day-time. At night, in our besieged state, with the death-bells -tolling all around, it seemed a terrible thing to venture. But I asked -no questions. Say it was the recklessness of a girl--say it was the -love that I bore to Margery. I stole the key and gave it to her after -sundown. - -“What happened afterwards I will tell you as it was told to me by -Thomas Key, who waited for her outside the gate. They passed along the -dark, deserted streets. The plague-fires burnt low in the middle of the -roadway, but there were none to tend them, and no living thing they saw -but the starving dogs, herded at barred doors. They crossed the bridge -and mounted to St Peter’s church. The priest’s manse--you know it--is a -low house next the church. A white rose, still in flower, clambered on -its walls, and, half hidden by its sprays, a taper gleamed through the -open window; but there was no sound of life within. They pushed open -the door and entered. - -“Stretched on his pallet, forsaken and untended, lay the young priest -of St Peter’s, the pangs of death upon him. Margery threw herself on -her knees by his bed-side, and Thomas watched and waited. For a time -there was silence, for Margery had no voice to pray. Only at times the -dying man grumbled and wandered in his talk; but little he said that -Thomas understood. - -“Then after a long time, he stirred himself uneasily and uttered one -word, ‘Margery.’ And she--alas the day!--put out her arm and laid it on -his shoulder. In an instant the dying man half raised himself on his -bed and turned his eyes on her, and there was recognition in them. And -one arm he threw about her neck, and felt blindly for the fair locks -that had been shorn long since, and he said heavily and painfully, -‘Margery, _belle amie_, let us go to the pool above the mill, where the -great pike lie, and sun and shadow lie on the deep water.’ So Thomas -knew that they were boy and girl again by the old mill at Trumpington. - -“That was all, and the end came soon. They two laid him decently -beneath his white sheet, and Margery plucked two white roses from the -spray that straggled across his window, and laid them on the dead man’s -breast. So they left him, with the candle still burning out into the -dark. - - * * * * * - -“There was a horrible dread in St Radegund’s when, four days later, -sister Margery sickened of the pestilence; and it was worse when we -learnt soon after that Thomas Key was visited--then that he was dead. -That was the beginning of our sorrows. You have heard, Lady Prioress, -how three sisters died before August was out, how most of the others -deserted the house, and some never returned to it. Our prayers were -unheard, and to us who remained it seemed as if the saints slept, or -God were dead. - -“So it happened that when the plague abated, and the first meeting -was held in St Radegund’s Chapter-house, about St Luke’s day in the -autumn, there were only three to attend it--the Prioress, the Sacrist -(Emma Denton), and Margery Cailly. For--wonderful it seems--Margery, -who least needed to live, was the one spared of those who were taken -with the pestilence. Presently some old sisters returned, and new -ones took the place of the departed. But the sword of the pestilence -cut off the memory of the old days, and the sins and sufferings, the -virtues and the victories of the former sisterhood were a forgotten -dream when the cloister filled again. So when Emma Denton passed into -her lethargy, and Margery Cailly earnestly petitioned to fill her place -in the Sacristy, there was not a sister to question her character and -devoutness. - -“Not yesterday, but forty years ago, Margery Cailly passed out of life; -for you know that, save to me, she has spoken few words since. And -though I have waited on her for most of those years she never breathed -to me the name of Nicholas De Frevile, never hinted at the story of her -unhappy girlhood. But once in the springtime, just after she entered -her Sacrist prison-house, she entreated me to plant a white rose-bush -on the grave of the young priest of St Peter’s. I did so, and have -renewed it since, and one day, by your grace, I shall plant a spray -of the same roses where she lies apart from him. I have confessed my -wrong in stealing the key and bringing death into the cloister. If -you can forgive me, so; if not, all I ask is that you let your sinful -servant depart in peace.” - - * * * * * - -There is a curious aperture in the outer northern wall of the chancel -of the nuns’ church which is now Jesus College Chapel. If it is -examined its purpose is evident. It was the lychnoscope, through which -the Sacrist watched by night the light before the High Altar. It is the -sole abiding memorial of Margery Cailly, Sacrist of St Radegund. - -[Illustration: Prosperum iter facias] - - - - - PRINTED BY - W. HEFFER & SONS LTD. - 104, HILLS ROAD, - CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND. - - - - Transcriber’s Notes - -Errors in punctuation have been fixed. - -Page 63: “My heart bleed” changed to “My heart bleeds” - -Page 78: “pardonable strategem” changed to “pardonable stratagem” - -Page 86: “I thing she” changed to “I think she” - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF GRANTA -AND GRAMARYE *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. 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- margin-right: 10%; -} - - h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; - text-indent: 1em; -} - -.p2 {margin-top: 2em;} -.p4 {margin-top: 4em;} -.p0 {text-indent: 0em;} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 33.5%; - margin-right: 33.5%; - clear: both; -} - -hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} -hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} -@media print { hr.chap {display: none; visibility: hidden;} } - -hr.r5 {width: 5%; margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 47.5%; margin-right: 47.5%;} - -div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} -h2.nobreak {page-break-before: avoid;} - -table { - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; -} -table.autotable { border-collapse: collapse; width: 60%;} -table.autotable td, -table.autotable th { padding: 4px; } -.x-ebookmaker table {width: 95%;} - -.tdl {text-align: left;} -.tdr {text-align: right;} -.page {width: 3em; 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- color: black; - font-size:smaller; - padding:0.5em; - margin-bottom:5em; - font-family:sans-serif, serif; } - -.xbig {font-size: 2em;} -.big {font-size: 1.2em;} -.small {font-size: 0.8em;} - -abbr[title] { - text-decoration: none; -} - - /* ]]> */ </style> -</head> -<body> -<p style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Tedious brief tales of Granta and Gramarye, by Arthur Gray</p> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Tedious brief tales of Granta and Gramarye</p> -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Arthur Gray</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: November 28, 2022 [eBook #69438]</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em; text-align:left'>Produced by: Emmanuel Ackerman and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)</p> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF GRANTA AND GRAMARYE ***</div> - - - - -<h1>TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF GRANTA -AND GRAMARYE.</h1> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img001"> -<img src="images/001.jpg" class="w50" alt="A"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><span class="small">E. Joyce Shillington Scales -1919.</span><br><i>Entrance Gateway, Jesus College.</i></p> - -</div> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> - - -<p class="center xbig"> -TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF<br> -GRANTA AND GRAMARYE<br> -</p> -<p class="center p2"> -<span class="small">BY</span><br> -<br> -<span class="big">“INGULPHUS”<br> -(ARTHUR GRAY, Master of Jesus College)</span><br> -</p> -<p class="center p2"> -<i>With illustrations by</i><br> -E. JOYCE SHILLINGTON SCALES<br> -</p> -<p class="poetry p2"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">“Merry and tragical, tedious and brief:</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That is hot ice and wondrous strange snow.”</span><br> -<br> -<span style="margin-left: 10em;"><i>A Midsummer Night’s Dream.</i></span><br> -</p> -<p class="center p4"> -<span class="smcap">Cambridge:</span><br> -<span class="smcap">W. Heffer & Sons Ltd.</span><br> -<span class="smcap">London</span>: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & <span class="smcap">Co. Ltd.</span><br> -</p> - -</div> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">First Published, December, 1919.</span></p> -</div> -<hr class="r5"> - -<p>For permission to reprint these tales, which originally appeared in -<i>The Cambridge Review</i>, <i>The Gownsman</i> and <i>Chanticlere</i> -(the Jesus College Magazine), the writer thanks the editors and -proprietors of those papers.</p> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="Contents">Contents</h2> -</div> - - -<table class="autotable"> -<tr><th></th><th></th><th class="tdr">PAGE</th></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#To_Two_Cambridge_Magicians">I.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#To_Two_Cambridge_Magicians"><span class="smcap">To Two Cambridge Magicians</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#To_Two_Cambridge_Magicians">viii</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#The_Everlasting_Club">II.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#The_Everlasting_Club"><span class="smcap">The Everlasting Club</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#The_Treasure_of_John_Badcoke">III.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#The_Treasure_of_John_Badcoke"><span class="smcap">The Treasure of John Badcoke</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_9">9</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#The_True_History_of_Anthony_Ffryar">IV.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#The_True_History_of_Anthony_Ffryar"><span class="smcap">The True History of Anthony Ffryar</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_19">19</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#The_Necromancer">V.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#The_Necromancer"><span class="smcap">The Necromancer</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_28">28</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#Brother_Johns_Bequest">VI.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#Brother_Johns_Bequest"><span class="smcap">Brother John’s Bequest</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#The_Burden_of_Dead_Books">VII.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#The_Burden_of_Dead_Books"><span class="smcap">The Burden of Dead Books</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_48">48</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#Thankfull_Thomas">VIII.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#Thankfull_Thomas"><span class="smcap">Thankfull Thomas</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_67">67</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#The_Palladium">IX.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#The_Palladium"><span class="smcap">The Palladium</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_76">76</a></td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#The_Sacrist_of_Saint_Radegund">X.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"> -<a href="#The_Sacrist_of_Saint_Radegund"><span class="smcap">The Sacrist of Saint Radegund</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_84">84</a></td></tr> -</table> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="List_of_Illustrations">List of Illustrations</h2> -</div> - - -<table class="autotable"> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img001">I.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img001"><span class="smcap">Entrance Gateway, Jesus College</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#img001"><i>Frontispiece</i></a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img002">II.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img002"><span class="smcap">Doorway, Cow Lane</span> </a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#img002">5</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img004"> -III.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img004"><span class="smcap">Oriel Window of Hall and Entrance to “K” Staircase</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#img004">11</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img005"> -IV.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img005"><span class="smcap">Old Hall, Master’s Lodge</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_17">17</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img006"> -V.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img006"><span class="smcap">North-West Corner of Cloisters</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_20">20</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img007"> -VI.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img007"><span class="smcap">The Master’s Stall</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_23">23</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img008"> -VII.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img008"><span class="smcap">Main Gateway and Porter’s Lodge</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#img008">31</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img009"> -VIII.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img009"><span class="smcap">On “A” Staircase</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_33">33</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img010"> -IX.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img010"><span class="smcap">Fireplace in Master’s Lodge</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_41">41</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img011"> -X.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img011"><span class="smcap">A Corner of the Library</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_51">51</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img012"> -XI.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img012"><span class="smcap">Chapel Doorway in Master’s Garden</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_57">57</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img013"> -XII.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img013"><span class="smcap">Norman Gallery, North Transept</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_71">71</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img014"> -XIII.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img014"><span class="smcap">South-West Pier of Tower</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_74">74</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img015"> -XIV.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img015"><span class="smcap">In the Fens</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_83">83</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img016"> -XV.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img016"><span class="smcap">Entrance to Chapter House</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_87">87</a> -</td></tr> -<tr><td class="tdr"> -<a href="#img017"> -XVI.</a></td> -<td class="tdl"><a href="#img017"><span class="smcap">The Chancel Squint</span></a></td> -<td class="tdr page"><a href="#Page_90">90</a> -</td></tr> -</table> - - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="To_Two_Cambridge_Magicians">To Two Cambridge Magicians</h2> -</div> - - -<p class="poetry"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In London lanes, uncanonized, untold</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">By letter’d brass or stone, apart they lie,</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Dead and unreck’d of by the passer-by.</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Here still they seem together, as of old,</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To breathe our air, to walk our Cambridge ground,</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Here still to after learners to impart</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Hints of the magic that gave Faustus art</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To make blind Homer sing “with ravishing sound</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To his melodious harp” of Oenon, dead</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For Alexander’s love; that framed the spell</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Of him who, in the Friar’s “secret cell,”</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Made the great marvel of the Brazen Head.</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Marlowe and Greene, on you a Cambridge hand</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Sprinkles these pious particles of sand.</span><br> -</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="The_Everlasting_Club">The Everlasting Club</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_t.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">There</span> is a chamber in Jesus College the existence of which is probably -known to few who are now resident, and fewer still have penetrated into -it or even seen its interior. It is on the right hand of the landing on -the top floor of the precipitous staircase in the angle of the cloister -next the Hall—a staircase which for some forgotten story connected -with it is traditionally called “Cow Lane.” The padlock which secures -its massive oaken door is very rarely unfastened, for the room is bare -and unfurnished. Once it served as a place of deposit for superfluous -kitchen ware, but even that ignominious use has passed from it, and it -is now left to undisturbed solitude and darkness. For I should say that -it is entirely cut off from the light of the outer day by the walling -up, some time in the eighteenth century, of its single window, and such -light as ever reaches it comes from the door, when rare occasion causes -it to be opened.</p> - -<p>Yet at no extraordinarily remote day this chamber has evidently been -tenanted, and, before it was given up to darkness, was comfortably -fitted, according to the standard of comfort which was known in college -in the days of George II. There is still a roomy fireplace before which -legs have been stretched and wine and gossip have circulated in the -days of wigs and brocade. For the room is spacious and, when it was -lighted by the window looking eastward over the fields and common, it -must have been a cheerful place for a sociable don.</p> - -<p>Let me state in brief, prosaic outline the circumstances which account -for the gloom and solitude in which this room has remained now for -nearly a century and a half.</p> - -<p>In the second quarter of the eighteenth century the University -possessed a great variety of clubs of a social kind. There were -clubs in college parlours and clubs in private rooms, or in inns -and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</span> coffee-houses: clubs flavoured with politics, clubs clerical, -clubs purporting to be learned and literary. Whatever their professed -particularity, the aim of each was convivial. Some of them, which -included undergraduates as well as seniors, were dissipated enough, and -in their limited provincial way aped the profligacy of such clubs as -the Hell Fire Club of London notoriety.</p> - -<p>Among these last was one which was at once more select and of more evil -fame than any of its fellows. By a singular accident, presently to be -explained, the Minute Book of this Club, including the years from 1738 -to 1766, came into the hands of a Master of Jesus College, and though, -so far as I am aware, it is no longer extant, I have before me a -transcript of it which, though it is in a recent handwriting, presents -in a bald shape such a singular array of facts that I must ask you to -accept them as veracious. The original book is described as a stout -duodecimo volume bound in red leather and fastened with red silken -strings. The writing in it occupied some 40 pages, and ended with the -date November 2, 1766.</p> - -<p>The Club in question was called the Everlasting Club—a name -sufficiently explained by its rules, set forth in the pocket-book. Its -number was limited to seven, and it would seem that its members were -all young men, between 22 and 30. One of them was a Fellow-Commoner of -Trinity: three of them were Fellows of Colleges, among whom I should -specially mention a Fellow of Jesus, named Charles Bellasis: another -was a landed proprietor in the county, and the sixth was a young -Cambridge physician. The Founder and President of the Club was the -Honourable Alan Dermot, who, as the son of an Irish peer, had obtained -a nobleman’s degree in the University, and lived in idleness in the -town. Very little is known of his life and character, but that little -is highly in his disfavour. He was killed in a duel at Paris in the -year 1743, under circumstances which I need not particularise, but -which point to an exceptional degree of cruelty and wickedness in the -slain man.</p> - -<p>I will quote from the first pages of the Minute Book some of the laws -of the Club, which will explain its constitution:—</p> -<div class="blockquot"> -<p>“1. This Society consisteth of seven Everlastings, who may be Corporeal -or Incorporeal, as Destiny shall determine.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</span></p> - -<p>2. The rules of the Society, as herein written, are immutable and -Everlasting.</p> - -<p>3. None shall hereafter be chosen into the Society and none shall cease -to be members.</p> - -<p>4. The Honourable Alan Dermot is the Everlasting President of the -Society.</p> - -<p>5. The Senior Corporeal Everlasting, not being the President, shall be -the Secretary of the Society, and in this Book of Minutes shall record -its transactions, the date at which any Everlasting shall cease to -be Corporeal, and all fines due to the Society. And when such Senior -Everlasting shall cease to be Corporeal he shall, either in person or -by some sure hand, deliver this Book of Minutes to him who shall be -next Senior and at the time Corporeal, and he shall in like manner -record the transactions therein and transmit it to the next Senior. The -neglect of these provisions shall be visited by the President with fine -or punishment according to his discretion.</p> - -<p>6. On the second day of November in every year, being the Feast of All -Souls, at ten o’clock <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">post meridiem</i>, the Everlastings shall meet -at supper in the place of residence of that Corporeal member of the -Society to whom it shall fall in order of rotation to entertain them, -and they shall all subscribe in this Book of Minutes their names and -present place of abode.</p> - -<p>7. It shall be the obligation of every Everlasting to be present at the -yearly entertainment of the Society, and none shall allege for excuse -that he has not been invited thereto. If any Everlasting shall fail -to attend the yearly meeting, or in his turn shall fail to provide -entertainment for the Society, he shall be mulcted at the discretion of -the President.</p> - -<p>8. Nevertheless, if in any year, in the month of October and not less -than seven days before the Feast of All Souls, the major part of the -Society, that is to say, four at the least, shall meet and record in -writing in these Minutes that it is their desire that no entertainment -be given in that year, then, notwithstanding the two rules last -rehearsed, there shall be no entertainment in that year, and no -Everlasting shall be mulcted on the ground of his absence.”</p> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</span></p> - -<p>The rest of the rules are either too profane or too puerile to be -quoted here. They indicate the extraordinary levity with which the -members entered on their preposterous obligations. In particular, to -the omission of any regulation as to the transmission of the Minute -Book after the last Everlasting ceased to be “Corporeal,” we owe the -accident that it fell into the hands of one who was not a member of the -society, and the consequent preservation of its contents to the present -day.</p> - -<p>Low as was the standard of morals in all classes of the University in -the first half of the eighteenth century, the flagrant defiance of -public decorum by the members of the Everlasting Society brought upon -it the stern censure of the authorities, and after a few years it was -practically dissolved and its members banished from the University. -Charles Bellasis, for instance, was obliged to leave the college, -and, though he retained his fellowship, he remained absent from it -for nearly twenty years. But the minutes of the society reveal a more -terrible reason for its virtual extinction.</p> - -<p>Between the years 1738 and 1743 the minutes record many meetings of -the Club, for it met on other occasions besides that of All Souls -Day. Apart from a great deal of impious jocularity on the part of the -writers, they are limited to the formal record of the attendance of -the members, fines inflicted, and so forth. The meeting on November -2nd in the latter year is the first about which there is any departure -from the stereotyped forms. The supper was given in the house of the -physician. One member, Henry Davenport, the former Fellow-Commoner of -Trinity, was absent from the entertainment, as he was then serving -in Germany, in the Dettingen campaign. The minutes contain an entry, -“Mulctatus propter absentiam per Presidentem, Hen. Davenport.” An entry -on the next page of the book runs, “Henry Davenport by a Cannon-shot -became an Incorporeal Member, November 3, 1743.”</p> -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img002"> -<img src="images/002.jpg" class="w50" alt="Doorway, Cow Lane"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>Doorway, Cow Lane.</i><br></p> - - -<p>The minutes give in their own handwriting, under date November 2, -the names and addresses of the six other members. First in the list, -in a large bold hand, is the autograph of “Alan Dermot, President, -at the Court of His Royal Highness.” Now in October Dermot had -certainly been in attendance on the Young<span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</span> Pretender at Paris, and -doubtless the address which he gave was understood at the time by -the other Everlastings to refer to the fact. But on October 28, five -days <em>before</em> the meeting of the Club, he was killed, as I have -already mentioned, in a duel. The news of his death cannot have reached -Cambridge on November 2, for the Secretary’s record of it is placed -below that of Davenport, and with the date November 10: “this day was -reported that the President was become an Incorporeal by the hands of -a french chevalier.” And in a sudden ebullition, which is in glaring -contrast with his previous profanities, he has dashed down “The Good -God shield us from ill.”</p> - -<p>The tidings of the President’s death scattered the Everlastings like -a thunderbolt. They left Cambridge and buried themselves in widely -parted regions. But the Club did not cease to exist. The Secretary -was still bound to his hateful records: the five survivors did not -dare to neglect their fatal obligations. Horror of the presence of the -President made the November gathering once and for ever impossible: -but horror, too, forbade them to neglect the precaution of meeting -in October of every year to put in writing their objection to the -celebration. For five years five names are appended to that entry in -the minutes, and that is all the business of the Club. Then another -member died, who was not the Secretary.</p> - -<p>For eighteen more years four miserable men met once each year to -deliver the same formal protest. During those years we gather from -the signatures that Charles Bellasis returned to Cambridge, now, to -appearance, chastened and decorous. He occupied the rooms which I have -described on the staircase in the corner of the cloister.</p> - -<p>Then in 1766 comes a new handwriting and an altered minute: “Jan. 27, -on this day Francis Witherington, Secretary, became an Incorporeal -Member. The same day this Book was delivered to me, James Harvey.” -Harvey lived only a month, and a similar entry on March 7 states that -the book has descended, with the same mysterious celerity, to William -Catherston. Then, on May 18, Charles Bellasis writes that on that day, -being the date of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</span> Catherston’s decease, the Minute Book has come to -him as the last surviving Corporeal of the Club.</p> - -<p>As it is my purpose to record fact only I shall not attempt to describe -the feelings of the unhappy Secretary when he penned that fatal -record. When Witherington died it must have come home to the three -survivors that after twenty-three years’ intermission the ghastly -entertainment must be annually renewed, with the addition of fresh -incorporeal guests, or that they must undergo the pitiless censure of -the President. I think it likely that the terror of the alternative, -coupled with the mysterious delivery of the Minute Book, was -answerable for the speedy decease of the two first successors to the -Secretaryship. Now that the alternative was offered to Bellasis alone, -he was firmly resolved to bear the consequences, whatever they might -be, of an infringement of the Club rules.</p> - -<p>The graceless days of George II. had passed away from the University. -They were succeeded by times of outward respectability, when religion -and morals were no longer publicly challenged. With Bellasis, too, the -petulance of youth had passed: he was discreet, perhaps exemplary. The -scandal of his early conduct was unknown to most of the new generation, -condoned by the few survivors who had witnessed it.</p> - -<p>On the night of November 2nd, 1766, a terrible event revived in the -older inhabitants of the College the memory of those evil days. From -ten o’clock to midnight a hideous uproar went on in the chamber of -Bellasis. Who were his companions none knew. Blasphemous outcries and -ribald songs, such as had not been heard for twenty years past, aroused -from sleep or study the occupants of the court; but among the voices -was not that of Bellasis. At twelve a sudden silence fell upon the -cloisters. But the Master lay awake all night, troubled at the relapse -of a respected colleague and the horrible example of libertinism set to -his pupils.</p> - -<p>In the morning all remained quiet about Bellasis’ chamber. When his -door was opened, soon after daybreak, the early light creeping through -the drawn curtains revealed a strange scene. About the table were drawn -seven chairs, but some of them had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</span> been overthrown, and the furniture -was in chaotic disorder, as after some wild orgy. In the chair at the -foot of the table sat the lifeless figure of the Secretary, his head -bent over his folded arms, as though he would shield his eyes from -some horrible sight. Before him on the table lay pen, ink and the red -Minute Book. On the last inscribed page, under the date of November -2nd, were written, for the first time since 1742, the autographs of -the seven members of the Everlasting Club, but without address. In the -same strong hand in which the President’s name was written there was -appended below the signatures the note, “Mulctatus per Presidentem -propter neglectum obsonii, Car. Bellasis.”</p> - -<p>The Minute Book was secured by the Master of the College, and I believe -that he alone was acquainted with the nature of its contents. The -scandal reflected on the College by the circumstances revealed in it -caused him to keep the knowledge rigidly to himself. But some suspicion -of the nature of the occurrences must have percolated to students and -servants, for there was a long-abiding belief in the College that -annually on the night of November 2 sounds of unholy revelry were -heard to issue from the chamber of Bellasis. I cannot learn that the -occupants of the adjoining rooms have ever been disturbed by them. -Indeed, it is plain from the minutes that owing to their improvident -drafting no provision was made for the perpetuation of the All Souls -entertainment after the last Everlasting ceased to be Corporeal. Such -superstitious belief must be treated with contemptuous incredulity. -But whether for that cause or another the rooms were shut up, and have -remained tenantless from that day to this.</p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img003"> -<img src="images/003.jpg" class="w15" alt="Book"> -</span></p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="The_Treasure_of_John_Badcoke">The Treasure of John Badcoke</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_a.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">As</span> this narrative of an occurrence in the history of Jesus College -may appear to verge on the domain of romance, I think it proper to -state by way of preface, that for some of its details I am indebted to -documentary evidence which is accessible and veracious. Other portions -of the story are supplied from sources the credibility of which my -readers will be able to estimate.</p> - -<p>On the 8th of November, 1538, the Priory of <abbr title="saint">St.</abbr> Giles and <abbr title="saint">St.</abbr> Andrew, -Barnwell, was surrendered to King Henry VIII. by John Badcoke, the -Prior, and the convent of that house. The surrender was sealed with the -common seal, subscribed by the Prior and six canons, and acknowledged -on the same day in the Chapter House of the Priory, before Thomas Legh, -Doctor of Laws.<a id="FNanchor_1" href="#Footnote_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> - -<p><abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Legh and his fellows, who had been deputed by Cromwell to visit the -monasteries, had too frequent occasion to deplore the frowardness of -religious households in opposing the King’s will in the matter of their -dissolution. Among many such reports I need only cite the case of the -Prior of Christ Church, Canterbury, mentioned in a letter to Cromwell -from one of his agents, Christopher Leyghton.<a id="FNanchor_2" href="#Footnote_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> He tells Cromwell -that in an inventory exhibited by the Prior to <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Leyghton, the -King’s visitor, the Prior had “wilfullye left owte a remembraunce of -certayne parcells of silver, gold and stone to the value of thowsandys -of poundys”; that it was not to be doubted that he would “eloyne owt -of the same howse into the handys of his secret fryndys thowsandes of -poundes, which is well knowne he hathe, to hys comfort hereafter”; and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</span> -that it was common report in the monastery that any monk who should -open the matter to the King’s advisers “shalbe poysenyde or murtheryde, -as he hath murthredde diverse others.”</p> - -<p>Far different from the truculent attitude of this murderous Prior -was the conduct on the like occasion of Prior John Badcoke. <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Legh -reported him to be “honest and conformable.” He furnished an exact -inventory of the possessions of his house, and quietly retired on the -pittance allowed to him by the King. He prevailed upon the other canons -to shew the same submission to the royal will, and they peaceably -dispersed, some to country incumbencies, others to resume in the -Colleges the studies commenced in earlier life.</p> - -<p>John Badcoke settled in Jesus College. The Bursar’s Rental of 1538-39 -shows that his residence there began in the autumn of the earlier year, -immediately after the surrender of the monastery. Divorced from the -Priory he was still attached to Barnwell, and took up the duties of -Vicar of the small parish church of <abbr title="saint">St.</abbr> Andrew, which stood close to -the Priory gate. So long as Henry VIII. lived, and the rites of the old -religion were tolerated, he seems to have ministered faithfully to the -spiritual needs of his parishioners, unsuspected and unmolested.</p> - -<p>More than twelve months elapsed before the demolition of the canons’ -house was taken in hand, and, for so long, in the empty church the -Prior still offered mass on ceremonial days for the repose of the souls -of the Peverels and Peches who had built and endowed the house in long -bygone days, and were buried beside the High Altar. In the porter’s -lodge remained the only occupant of the monastery—a former servant of -the house, who, from the circumstance that in his secular profession he -was a mason, had the name of Adam Waller. Occasional intruders on the -solitude of the cloister or the monastic garden sometimes lighted on -the ex-Prior pacing the grass-grown walks, as of old, and generally in -company with a younger priest.</p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img004"> -<img src="images/004.jpg" class="w50" alt="Oriel Window of Hall & Entrance to ‘K’ Staircase"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption">Oriel Window of Hall & Entrance to ‘K’ Staircase<br></p> - -<p>This companion was named Richard Harrison. He was not one of the -dispossessed canons, but came from the Priory of Christ Church, -Canterbury, of which mention has been made. He was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</span> the youngest and -latest professed of the monks there, a nephew of the Prior, as also of -John Badcoke. He had not been present at the time of <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Leyghton’s -visitation, as he happened then to be visiting his uncle at Barnwell. -As the Canterbury monks were ejected in his absence he had remained -at Barnwell, and there he shared his uncle’s parochial duties. He, -too, became a resident at Jesus, and he occupied rooms in the College -immediately beneath those of Badcoke.</p> - -<p>Late in the year 1539 the demolition of Barnwell Priory was begun. Adam -Waller was engaged in the work. One incident, which apparently passed -almost unnoticed at the time, may be mentioned in connection with this -business. The keys of the church were in the keeping of Waller, who -had been in the habit of surrendering them to the two ecclesiastics -whenever they performed the divine offices there. On the morning when -the demolition was to begin, it was found that the stone covering -the altar-tomb of Pain Peverel, crusader and founder of the Priory, -had been dislodged, and that the earth within it had been recently -disturbed. Waller professed to know nothing of the matter.</p> - -<p>The account rolls of the College Bursars in the reigns of Henry -VIII. and Edward VI. fortunately tell us exactly the situation of -the rooms occupied by Badcoke and Harrison, and as, for the proper -understanding of subsequent events, it is necessary that we should -realise their condition and relation to the rest of the College, I -shall not scruple to be particular. They were on the left-hand side of -the staircase now called K, in the eastern range of the College, and -at the northern end of what had once been the dormitory of the Nuns of -<abbr title="saint">St.</abbr> Radegund. Badcoke’s chamber, which was on the highest floor, was -one of the largest in the College, and for that reason the Statutes -prescribed that it should be reserved “for more venerable persons -resorting to the College”; and Badcoke, being neither a Fellow nor a -graduate, was regarded as belonging to this class. Below his chamber -was that of Harrison, and on the ground-floor was the “cool-house,” -where the College fuel was kept. Between this ground-floor room and L -staircase—which did not then exist—there is seen at the present day a -rarely opened door. Inside<span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</span> the door a flight of some half-dozen steps -descends to a narrow space, which might be deemed a passage, save that -it has no outlet at the farther end. On either side it is flanked, to -the height of two floors of K staircase, by walls of ancient monastic -masonry; the third and highest floor is carried over it. Here, in the -times of Henry VIII. and the Nunnery days before them, ran or stagnated -a Stygian stream, known as “the kytchynge sinke ditch,” foul with scum -from the College offices. Northward from Badcoke’s staircase was “the -wood-yard,” on the site of the present L staircase. It communicated by -a door in its outward, eastern wall with a green close which in the old -days had been the Nunnery graveyard. In Badcoke’s times it was still -uneven with the hillocks which marked the resting-places of nameless, -unrecorded Nuns. The old graveyard was intersected by a cart-track -leading from Jesus Lane to the wood-yard door. The Bursar’s books show -that Badcoke controlled the wood-yard and coal-house, perhaps in the -capacity of Promus, or Steward.</p> - -<p>Now when Badcoke and Harrison came to occupy their chambers on K -staircase, Jesus, like other Colleges in those troublous times, had -fallen on evil days. Its occupants comprised only the Master, some -eight Fellows, a few servants, and about half-a-dozen “disciples.” -Nearly half the rooms in College were empty, and the records show that -many were tenantless, <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">propter defectum reparacionis</i>; that is, -because walls, roofs and floors were decayed and ruinous. Badcoke, -being a man of means, paid a handsome rent for his chambers, not less -than ten shillings by the year, in consideration of which the College -put it in tenantable repair; and, as a circumstance which has some -significance in relation to this narrative, it is to be noted that the -Bursar—the accounts of the year are no longer extant—recorded that -in 1539 he paid a sum of three shillings and fourpence “to Adam Waller -for layyinge of new brick in yᵉ cupboard of <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Badcoke’s chamber.” -The cupboard in question was seemingly a small recessed space, still -recognisable in a gyp-room belonging to the chambers which were -Badcoke’s. The rooms on the side of the staircase opposite to those of -Badcoke and Harrison were evidently unoccupied; the Bursar<span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</span> took no -rent from them. The other inmates of the College dwelt in the cloister -court.</p> - -<p>In this comparative isolation Badcoke and Harrison lived until the -death of Henry VIII. in 1546. In course of time Harrison became a -Fellow of the College; but Badcoke preferred to retain the exceptional -status of its honoured guest. To the Master, <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Reston, and the -Fellows, whose religious sympathies were with the old order of things, -their company was inoffensive and even welcome. But trouble came upon -the College in 1549, when it was visited by King Edward’s Protestant -Commissioners. It stands on record, that on May 26th “they commanded -six altars to be pulled down in the church,” and in a chamber, which -may have been Badcoke’s, “caused certayn images to be broken.” <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> -Badcoke “had an excommunicacion sette uppe for him,” and was dismissed -from the office, whatever it was, that he held in the College. Worse -still for his happiness, his companion of many years, Richard Harrison, -was “expulsed his felowshippe” on some supposition of trafficking with -the court of Rome.<a id="FNanchor_3" href="#Footnote_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> He went overseas, as it was understood, to the -Catholic University of Louvain in Flanders.</p> - -<p>In 1549 Badcoke must have been, as age went in the sixteenth century, -an old man. His deprivation of office, the loss of his friend, and -the abandonment of long treasured hopes for the restitution of the -religious system to which his life had been devoted, plunged him in -a settled despondency. The Fellows, who showed for him such sympathy -as they dared, understood that between him and Harrison there passed -a secret correspondence. But in course of years this source of -consolation dried up. Harrison was dead, or he had travelled away -from Louvain. With the other members of the College Badcoke wholly -parted company, and lived a recluse in his unneighboured room. By the -wood-yard gate, of which he still had a key, he could let himself -out beyond the College walls, and sometimes by day, oftener after -nightfall, he was to be seen wandering beneath his window in the Nuns’ -graveyard, his old feet, like Friar Laurence’s, “stumbling at graves.” -An occasional visitor, who was known to be his pensioner, was Adam<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</span> -Waller. But, though Waller was still at times employed in the service -of the College, his character and condition had deteriorated with -years. He was a sturdy beggar, a drunkard, sullen and dangerous in his -cups, and Badcoke was heard to hint some terror of his presence. At -last the Master learnt from the ex-Prior that he was about to quit the -College, and none doubted that he would follow Harrison to Louvain.</p> - -<p>Shortly after this became known, Badcoke disappeared from College. He -had lived in such seclusion that for a day or two it was not noticed -that his door remained closed, and that he had not been seen in his -customary walks. When the door was at last forced it was discovered -that he had indeed gone, but, strangely, he had left behind him the -whole of his effects. Adam Waller was the last person who was known to -have entered his chamber, and, being questioned, he said that Badcoke -had informed him of his intention to depart three days previously, -but, for some unexplained reason, had desired him to keep his purpose -secret, and had not imparted his destination. Badcoke’s life of -seclusion, and his known connection with English Catholics beyond sea, -gave colour to Waller’s story, and, so far as I am aware, no enquiries -were made as to the subsequent fate of the ex-Prior. But a strange fact -was commented on—that the floor of the so-called cupboard was strewn -with bricks, and that in the place from which they had been dislodged -was an arched recess of considerable size, which must have been made -during Badcoke’s tenancy of the room. There was nothing in the recess. -Another circumstance there was which called for no notice in the then -dilapidated state of half the College rooms. Two boards were loose in -the floor of the larger chamber. Thirty feet below the gap which their -removal exposed, lay the dark impurities of the “kytchynge sinke ditch.”</p> - -<p>Adam Waller died a beggar as he had lived.</p> - -<p>A century after these occurrences—in the year 1642—the attention of -the College was drawn by a severe visitation of plague to a much-needed -sanitary reform. The black ditch which ran under K staircase was -“cast,” that is, its bed was effectually cleaned out, and its channel -was stopped; and so it came about that from that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</span> day to this it has -presented a clean and dry floor of gravel. Beneath the settled slime of -centuries was discovered a complete skeleton. How it came there nobody -knew, and nobody enquired. Probably it was guessed to be a relic of -some dim and grim monastic mystery.</p> - -<p>Now whether Adam Waller knew or suspected the existence of a treasure -hidden in the wall-recess of Badcoke’s chamber, and murdered the -ex-Prior when he was about to remove it to Louvain, I cannot say. -One thing is certain—that he did not find the treasure there. When -Badcoke disappeared he left his will, with his other belongings, in -his chamber. After a decent interval, when it seemed improbable that -he would return, probate was obtained by the Master and Fellows, to -whom he had bequeathed the chief part of his effects. In 1858 the wills -proved in the University court were removed to Peterborough, and there, -for aught I know, his will may yet be seen. The property bequeathed -consisted principally of books of theology. Among them was Stephanus’ -Latin Vulgate Bible of 1528 in two volumes folio. This he devised “of -my heartie good wylle to my trustie felow and frynde, Richard Harrison, -if he shal returne to Cambrege aftyr the tyme of my decesse.” Richard -Harrison never returned to Cambridge, and the Bible, with the other -books, found its way to the College Library.</p> - -<p>Now there are still in the Library two volumes of this Vulgate Bible. -There is nothing in either of them to identify them with the books -mentioned in Badcoke’s will, for they have lost the fly-leaves which -might have revealed the owner’s autograph. Here and there in the -margins are annotations in a sixteenth-century handwriting; and in the -same handwriting on one of the lost leaves was a curious inscription, -which suggests that the writer’s mind was running on some treasure -which was not spiritual. First at the top of the page, in clear -and large letters, was copied a passage from Psalm 55: “Cor meum -conturbatum est in me: et formido mortis cecidit super me. Et dixi, -Quis dabit pennas mihi sicut columbae, et volabo et requiescam.” (My -heart is disquieted within me: and the fear of death is fallen upon -me. And I said, O that I had wings like a dove: for then would I fly -away, and be at rest.) Then, in lettering of the <span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</span>same kind, came a -portion of Deuteronomy xxviii. 12: “Aperiet<span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</span> dominus thesaurum suum, -benedicetque cunctis operibus tuis.” (The Lord will disclose his -treasure, and will bless all the works of thy hands.) Under this, in -smaller letters, were the words, “Vide super hoc Ezechielis cap. xl.”</p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img005"> -<img src="images/005.jpg" class="w50" alt="Old Hall, Master’s Lodge"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption">Old Hall, Master’s Lodge.<br></p> - - -<p>If in the same volume the chapter in question is referred to, a -singular fact discloses itself. Certain words in the text are -underscored in red pencil, and fingers, inked in the margin, are -directed to the lines in which they occur. Taken in their consecutive -order these words run: “Ecce murus forinsecus ... ad portam quae -respiciebat viam orientalem ... mensus est a facie portae extrinsecus -ad orientem et aquilonem quinque cubitorum ... hoc est gazophylacium.” -This may be taken to mean, “Look at the outside wall ... at the gate -facing towards the eastern road ... he measured from the gate outwards -five cubits (7¹⁄₂ feet) towards the north-east ... there is the -treasure.”</p> - -<p>The outer wall of the College, the wood-yard gate and the road through -the Nuns’ cemetery must at once have suggested themselves to Richard -Harrison, had he lived to see his friend’s bequest, and he must have -taken it as an instruction from the testator that a treasure known -to both parties was hidden in the spot indicated, close to Badcoke’s -chamber. And the first text cited must have conveyed to him that his -friend, in some deadly terror, had transferred the treasure thither -from the place where the two friends had originally laid it. But -the message never reached Harrison, and it is quite certain that no -treasure has been sought or found in that spot. If the Canterbury or -any other treasure was deposited there by Badcoke it rests there still.</p> - -<p>To those who are curious to know more of this matter I would say: -first, ascertain minutely from Loggan’s seventeenth-century plan of the -College the position of the wood-yard gate; and, secondly, which indeed -should be firstly, make absolutely certain that John Badcoke was not -mystifying posterity by an elaborate jest.</p> - - -<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_1" href="#FNanchor_1" class="label">[1]</a> Cooper, <i>Annals</i>, I., p. 393.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_2" href="#FNanchor_2" class="label">[2]</a> <i>The Suppression of the Monasteries</i> (Camden -Society’s Publications), p. 90.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_3" href="#FNanchor_3" class="label">[3]</a> Cooper, <i>Annals</i>, II. p. 29.</p> - -</div> -</div> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="The_True_History_of_Anthony_Ffryar">The True History of Anthony Ffryar</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_t.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">The</span> world, it is said, knows nothing of its greatest men. In our -Cambridge microcosm it may be doubted whether we are better informed -concerning some of the departed great ones who once walked the confines -of our Colleges. Which of us has heard of Anthony Ffryar of Jesus? -History is dumb respecting him. Yet but for the unhappy event recorded -in this unadorned chronicle his fame might have stood with that of -Bacon of Trinity, or Harvey of Caius. <em>They</em> lived to be old men: -Ffryar died before he was thirty—his work unfinished, his fame unknown -even to his contemporaries.</p> - -<p>So meagre is the record of his life’s work that it is contained in a -few bare notices in the College Bursar’s Books, in the Grace Books -which date his matriculation and degrees, and in the entry of his -burial in the register of All Saints’ Parish. These simple annals I -have ventured to supplement with details of a more or less hypothetical -character which will serve to show what humanity lost by his early -death. Readers will be able to judge for themselves the degree of care -which I have taken not to import into the story anything which may -savour of the improbable or romantic.</p> - -<p>Anthony Ffryar matriculated in the year 1541-2, his age being then -probably 15 or 16. He took his B.A. degree in 1545, his M.A. in 1548. -He became a Fellow about the end of 1547, and died in the summer of -1551. Such are the documentary facts relating to him. <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Reston was -Master of the College during the whole of his tenure of a Fellowship -and died in the same year as Ffryar. The chamber which Ffryar occupied -as a Fellow was on the first floor of the staircase at the west end -of the Chapel. The staircase has since been absorbed in the Master’s -Lodge, but the doorway through<span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</span> which it was approached from the -cloister may still be seen. At the time when Ffryar lived there the -nave of the Chapel was used as a parish church, and his windows -overlooked the graveyard, then called “Jesus churchyard,” which is now -a part of the Master’s garden.</p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img006"> -<img src="images/006.jpg" class="w50" alt="North West Corner of Cloisters"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>North West Corner of Cloisters.</i></p> - - -<p>Ffryar was of course a priest, as were nearly all the Fellows in his -day. But I do not gather that he was a theologian, or complied more -than formally with the obligation of his orders. He came to Cambridge -when the Six Articles and the suppression of the monasteries were of -fresh and burning import: he became a Fellow in the harsh Protestant -days of Protector Somerset: and in all his time the Master and the -Fellows were in scarcely disavowed sympathy with the rites and beliefs -of the Old Religion. Yet in the battle of creeds I imagine that he -took no part and no interest. I should suppose that he was a somewhat -solitary man, an insatiable student of Nature, and that his sympathies -with humanity were starved by his absorption in the New Science which -dawned on Cambridge at the Reformation.</p> - -<p>When I say that he was an alchemist do not suppose that in the middle -of the sixteenth century the name of alchemy carried with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</span> it any -associations with credulity or imposture. It was a real science and -a subject of University study then, as its god-children, Physics and -Chemistry, are now. If the aims of its professors were transcendental -its methods were genuinely based on research. Ffryar was no visionary, -but a man of sense, hard and practical. To the study of alchemy he was -drawn by no hopes of gain, not even of fame, and still less by any -desire to benefit mankind. He was actuated solely by an unquenchable -passion for enquiry, a passion sterilizing to all other feeling. To -the somnambulisms of the less scientific disciples of his school, such -as the philosopher’s stone and the elixir of life, he showed himself -a chill agnostic. All his thought and energies were concentrated on -the discovery of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">magisterium</i>, the master-cure of all human -ailments.</p> - -<p>For four years in his laboratory in the cloister he had toiled at -this pursuit. More than once, when it had seemed most near, it had -eluded his grasp; more than once he had been tempted to abandon it as -a mystery insoluble. In the summer of 1551 the discovery waited at his -door. He was sure, certain of success, which only experiment could -prove. And with the certainty arose a new passion in his heart—to make -the name of Ffryar glorious in the healing profession as that of Galen -or Hippocrates. In a few days, even within a few hours, the fame of his -discovery would go out into all the world.</p> - -<p>The summer of 1551 was a sad time in Cambridge. It was marked by a more -than usually fatal outbreak of the epidemic called “the sweat,” when, -as Fuller says, “patients ended or mended in twenty-four hours.” It -had smouldered some time in the town before it appeared with sudden -and dreadful violence in Jesus College. The first to go was little -Gregory Graunge, schoolboy and chorister, who was lodged in the College -school in the outer court. He was barely thirteen years old, and known -by sight to Anthony Ffryar. He died on July 31, and was buried the -same day in Jesus churchyard. The service for his burial was held in -the Chapel and at night, as was customary in those days. Funerals in -College were no uncommon events in the sixteenth century. But in the -death of the poor child, among strangers, there was something<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</span> to move -even the cold heart of Ffryar. And not the pity of it only impressed -him. The dim Chapel, the Master and Fellows obscurely ranged in their -stalls and shrouded in their hoods, the long-drawn miserable chanting -and the childish trebles of the boys who had been Gregory’s fellows -struck a chill into him which was not to be shaken off.</p> - -<p>Three days passed and another chorister died. The College gates were -barred and guarded, and, except by a selected messenger, communication -with the town was cut off. The precaution was unavailing, and the boys’ -usher, <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Stevenson, died on August 5. One of the junior Fellows, -sir Stayner—“sir” being the equivalent of B.A.—followed on August -7. The Master, <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Reston, died the next day. A gaunt, severe man was -<abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Reston, whom his Fellows feared. The death of a Master of Arts on -August 9 for a time completed the melancholy list.</p> - -<p>Before this the frightened Fellows had taken action. The scholars were -dismissed to their homes on August 6. Some of the Fellows abandoned the -College at the same time. The rest—a terrified conclave—met on August -8 and decreed that the College should be closed until the pestilence -should have abated. Until that time it was to be occupied by a certain -Robert Laycock, who was a College servant, and his only communication -with the outside world was to be through his son, who lived in Jesus -Lane. The decree was perhaps the result of the Master’s death, for he -was not present at the meeting.</p> - -<p>Goodman Laycock, as he was commonly called, might have been the sole -tenant of the College but for the unalterable decision of Ffryar -to remain there. At all hazards his research, now on the eve of -realisation, must proceed; without the aid of his laboratory in College -it would miserably hang fire. Besides, he had an absolute assurance of -his own immunity if the experiment answered his confident expectations, -and his fancy was elated with the thought of standing, like another -Aaron, between the living and the dead, and staying the pestilence -with the potent <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">magisterium</i>. Until then he would bar his door -even against Laycock, and his supplies of food should be left on -the staircase landing. Solitude for him was neither unfamiliar nor -terrible.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</span></p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img007"> -<img src="images/007.jpg" class="w50" alt="The Master’s Stall"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>The Master’s Stall.</i></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</span></p> - -<p>So for three days Ffryar and Laycock inhabited the cloister, solitary -and separate. For three days, in the absorption of his research, -Ffryar forgot fear, forgot the pestilence-stricken world beyond the -gate, almost forgot to consume the daily dole of food laid outside his -door. August 12 was the day, so fateful to humanity, when his labours -were to be crowned with victory: before midnight the secret of the -<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">magisterium</i> would be solved.</p> - -<p>Evening began to close in before he could begin the experiment which -was to be his last. It must of necessity be a labour of some hours, -and, before it began, he bethought him that he had not tasted food -since early morning. He unbarred his door and looked for the expected -portion. It was not there. Vexed at the remissness of Laycock he waited -for a while and listened for his approaching footsteps. At last he took -courage and descended to the cloister. He called for Laycock, but heard -no response. He resolved to go as far as the Buttery door and knock. -Laycock lived and slept in the Buttery.</p> - -<p>At the Buttery door he beat and cried on Laycock; but in answer he -heard only the sound of scurrying rats. He went to the window, by the -hatch, where he knew that the old man’s bed lay, and called to him -again. Still there was silence. At last he resolved to force himself -through the unglazed window and take what food he could find. In the -deep gloom within he stumbled and almost fell over a low object, which -he made out to be a truckle-bed. There was light enough from the window -to distinguish, stretched upon it, the form of Goodman Laycock, stark -and dead.</p> - -<p>Sickened and alarmed Ffryar hurried back to his chamber. More than ever -he must hasten the great experiment. When it was ended his danger would -be past, and he could go out into the town to call the buryers for the -old man. With trembling hands he lit the brazier which he used for his -experiments, laid it on his hearth and placed thereon the alembic which -was to distil the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">magisterium</i>.</p> - -<p>Then he sat down to wait. Gradually the darkness thickened and the -sole illuminant of the chamber was the wavering flame of the brazier. -He felt feverish and possessed with a nameless uneasiness which, for -all his assurance, he was glad to construe as fear: better<span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</span> that than -sickness. In the college and the town without was a deathly silence, -stirred only by the sweltering of the distilment, and, as the hours -struck, by the beating of the Chapel clock, last wound by Laycock. It -was as though the dead man spoke. But the repetition of the hours told -him that the time of his emancipation was drawing close.</p> - -<p>Whether he slept I do not know. He was aroused to vivid consciousness -by the clock sounding <em>one</em>. The time when his experiment should -have ended was ten, and he started up with a horrible fear that it had -been ruined by his neglect. But it was not so. The fire burnt, the -liquid simmered quietly, and so far all was well.</p> - -<p>Again the College bell boomed a solitary stroke: then a pause and -another. He opened, or seemed to open, his door and listened. Again -the knell was repeated. His mind went back to the night when he had -attended the obsequies of the boy-chorister. This must be a funeral -tolling. For whom? He thought with a shudder of the dead man in the -Buttery.</p> - -<p>He groped his way cautiously down the stairs. It was a still, windless -night, and the cloister was dark as death. Arrived at the further side -of the court he turned towards the Chapel. Its panes were faintly -lighted from within. The door stood open and he entered.</p> - -<p>In the place familiar to him at the chancel door one candle flickered -on a bracket. Close to it—his face cast in deep shade by the light -from behind—stood the ringer, in a gown of black, silent and absorbed -in his melancholy task. Fear had almost given way to wonder in the -heart of Ffryar, and, as he passed the sombre figure on his way to the -chancel door, he looked him resolutely in the face. The ringer was -Goodman Laycock.</p> - -<p>Ffryar passed into the choir and quietly made his way to his accustomed -stall. Four candles burnt in the central walk about a figure laid on -trestles and draped in a pall of black. Two choristers—one on either -side—stood by it. In the dimness he could distinguish four figures, -erect in the stalls on either side of the Chapel. Their faces were -concealed by their hoods, but in the tall form which<span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</span> occupied the -Master’s seat it was not difficult to recognise <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Reston.</p> - -<p>The bell ceased and the service began. With some faint wonder Ffryar -noted that it was the proscribed Roman Mass for the Dead. The solemn -introit was uttered in the tones of Reston, and in the deep responses -of the nearest cowled figure he recognised the voice of Stevenson, the -usher. None of the mourners seemed to notice Ffryar’s presence.</p> - -<p>The dreary ceremony drew to a close. The four occupants of the -stalls descended and gathered round the palled figure in the aisle. -With a mechanical impulse, devoid of fear or curiosity, and with a -half-prescience of what he should see, Anthony Ffryar drew near and -uncovered the dead man’s face. He saw—himself.</p> - -<p>At the same moment the last wailing notes of the office for the dead -broke from the band of mourners, and, one by one, the choristers -extinguished the four tapers.</p> - -<p>“Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine,” chanted the hooded four: and one -candle went out.</p> - -<p>“Et lux perpetua luceat ei,” was the shrill response of the two -choristers: and a second was extinguished.</p> - -<p>“Cum sanctis tuis in aeternum,” answered the four: and one taper only -remained.</p> - -<p>The Master threw back his hood, and turned his dreadful eyes straight -upon the living Anthony Ffryar: he threw his hand across the bier -and held him tight. “Cras tu eris mecum,”<a id="FNanchor_4" href="#Footnote_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> he muttered, as if in -antiphonal reply to the dirge-chanters.</p> - -<p>With a hiss and a sputter the last candle expired.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>The hiss and the sputter and a sudden sense of gloom recalled Ffryar -to the waking world. Alas for labouring science, alas for the fame -of Ffryar, alas for humanity, dying and doomed to die! The vessel -containing the wonderful brew which should have redeemed the world had -fallen over and dislodged its contents on the fire below. An accident -reparable, surely, within a few hours; but<span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</span> not by Anthony Ffryar. -How the night passed with him no mortal can tell. All that is known -further of him is written in the register of All Saints’ parish. If -you can discover the ancient volume containing the records of the -year 1551—and I am not positive that it now exists—you will find it -written:</p> - -<p class="poetry"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">“Die Augusti xiii</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Buryalls in Jhesus churchyarde</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 5em;">Goodman Laycock  }</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 5em;">Anthony Ffryar  }of yᵉ sicknesse”</span><br> -</p> - -<p>Whether he really died of “the sweat” I cannot say. But that the living -man was sung to his grave by the dead, who were his sole companions -in Jesus College, on the night of August 12, 1551, is as certain and -indisputable as any other of the facts which are here set forth in the -history of Anthony Ffryar.</p> - - -<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_4" href="#FNanchor_4" class="label">[4]</a> Samuel xxvii. 19.</p> - -</div> -</div> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="The_Necromancer">The Necromancer</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_t2.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">This</span> is a story of Jesus College, and it relates to the year 1643. In -that year Cambridge town was garrisoned for the Parliament by Colonel -Cromwell and the troops of the Eastern Counties’ Association. Soldiers -were billeted in all the colleges, and contemporary records testify -to their violent behaviour and the damage which they committed in -the chambers which they occupied. In the previous year the Master of -Jesus College, Doctor Sterne, was arrested by Cromwell when he was -leaving the chapel, conveyed to London, and there imprisoned in the -Tower. Before the summer of 1643 fourteen of the sixteen Fellows were -expelled, and during the whole of that year there were, besides the -soldiers, only some ten or twelve occupants of the college. The names -of the two Fellows who were not ejected were John Boyleston and Thomas -Allen.</p> - -<p>With <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Boyleston this history is only concerned for the part which -he took on the occasion of the visit to the college of the notorious -fanatic, William Dowsing. Dowsing came to Cambridge in December, 1642, -armed with powers to put in execution the ordinance of Parliament -for the reformation of churches and chapels. Among the devastations -committed by this ignorant clown, and faithfully recorded by him in -his diary, it stands on record that on December 28, in the presence -and perhaps with the approval of John Boyleston, he “digg’d up the -steps (<i>i.e.</i> of the altar) and brake down Superstitions and -Angels, 120 at the least.” Dowsing’s account of his proceedings is -supplemented by the Latin History of the college, written in the reign -of Charles II. by one of the Fellows, a certain Doctor John Sherman. -Sherman records, but Dowsing does not, that there was a second witness -of the desecration—Thomas Allen. Of the two he somewhat enigmatically -remarks:<span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</span> “The one (<i>i.e.</i> Boyleston) stood behind a curtain to -witness the evil work: the other, afflicted to behold the exequies of -his Alma Mater, made his life a filial offering at her grave, and, to -escape the hands of wicked rebels, laid violent hands on himself.”</p> - -<p>That Thomas Allen committed suicide seems a fairly certain fact: -and that remorse for the part which he had unwillingly taken in -the sacrilege of December 28 prompted his act we may accept on the -testimony of Sherman. But there is something more to tell which Sherman -either did not know or did not think fit to record. His book deals -only with the college and its society. He had no occasion to remember -Adoniram Byfield.</p> - -<p>Byfield was a chaplain attached to the Parliamentary forces in -Cambridge, and quarters were assigned to him in Jesus College, in the -first floor room above the gate of entrance. Below his chamber was -the Porter’s lodge, which at that time served as the armoury of the -troopers who occupied the college. Above it, on the highest floor of -the gate-tower “kept” Thomas Allen. These were the only rooms on the -staircase. At the beginning of the Long Vacation of 1643 Allen was the -only member of the college who continued to reside.</p> - -<p>Some light is thrown on the character of Byfield and his connection -with this story by a pudgy volume of old sermons of the Commonwealth -period which is contained in the library of the college. Among the -sermons which are bound up in it is one which bears the date 1643 and -is designated on the title page:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p><span class="smcap">A faithful admonicion</span> of the Baalite sin of <i>Enchanters & -Stargazers</i>, preacht to the Colonel Cromwell’s Souldiers in Saint -Pulcher’s (<i>i.e.</i> Saint Sepulchre’s) church, in Cambridge, by the -fruitfull Minister, <i>Adoniram Byfield</i>, late departed unto God, -in the yeare 1643, touching that of <i>Acts</i> the seventh, verse 43, -<i>Ye took up the Tabernacle of Moloch, the Star of your god Remphan, -figures which ye made to worship them; & I will carrie you away beyond -Babylon</i>.</p> -</div> - -<p>The discourse, in its title as in its contents, reveals its author -as one of the fanatics who wrought on the ignorance and prejudice -against “carnal” learning which actuated the Cromwellian soldiers<span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</span> in -their brutal usage of the University “scholars” in 1643. All Byfield’s -learning was contained in one book—<em>the</em> Book. For him the -revelation which gave it sufficed for its interpretation. What needed -Greek to the man who spoke mysteries in unknown tongues, or the light -of comment to him who was carried in the spirit into the radiance of -the third heaven?</p> - -<p>Now Allen, too, was an enthusiast, lost in mystic speculation. His -speculation was in the then novel science of mathematics and astronomy. -Even to minds not darkened by the religious mania that possessed -Byfield that science was clouded with suspicion in the middle of the -seventeenth century. Anglican, Puritan, and Catholic were agreed in -regarding its great exponent, Descartes, as an atheist. Mathematicians -were looked upon as necromancers, and Thomas Hobbes says that in his -days at Oxford the study was considered to be “smutched with the black -art,” and fathers, from an apprehension of its malign influence, -refrained from sending their sons to that University. How deep the -prejudice had sunk into the soul of Adoniram his sermon shows. -The occasion which suggested it was this. A pious cornet, leaving -a prayer-meeting at night, fell down one of the steep, unlighted -staircases of the college and broke his neck. Two or three of the -troopers were taken with a dangerous attack of dysentery. There was -talk of these misadventures among the soldiers, who somehow connected -them with Allen and his studies. The floating gossip gathered into a -settled conviction in the mind of Adoniram.</p> - -<p>For Allen was a mysterious person. Whether it was because he was -engrossed in his studies, or that he shrank from exposing himself -to the insults of the soldiers, he seldom showed himself outside -his chamber. Perhaps he was tied to it by the melancholy to which -Sherman ascribed his violent end. In his three months’ sojourn on -Allen’s staircase Byfield had not seen him a dozen times, and the -mystery of his closed door awakened the most fantastic speculations -in the chaplain’s mind. For hours together, in the room above, he -could hear the mumbled tones of Allen’s voice, rising and falling in -ceaseless flow. No answer came, and no word that the listener could -catch conveyed to his mind any intelligible sense. Once the voice<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</span> -was raised in a high key and Byfield distinctly heard the ominous -ejaculation, “Avaunt, Sathanas, avaunt!” Once through his partly open -door he had caught sight of him standing before a board chalked with -figures and symbols which the imagination of Byfield interpreted -as magical. At night, from the court below, he would watch the -astrologer’s lighted window, and when Allen turned his perspective -glass upon the stars the conviction became rooted in his watcher’s mind -that he was living in perilous neighbourhood to one of the peeping and -muttering wizards of whom the Holy Book spoke.</p> - - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img008"> -<img src="images/008.jpg" class="w50" alt="Main Gateway & Porter’s Lodge"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>Main Gateway & Porter’s Lodge.</i></p> - - -<p>An unusual occurrence strengthened the suspicions of Byfield. One -night he heard Allen creep softly down the staircase past his room; -and, opening his door, he saw him disappear round the staircase foot, -candle in hand. Silently, in the dark, Byfield followed him and saw -him pass into the Porter’s lodge. The soldiers were in bed and the -armoury was unguarded. Through the lighted pane he saw Allen take down -a horse-pistol from a rack on the wall. He examined it closely, tried -the lock, poised it as if to take aim, then replaced it and, leaving -the lodge, disappeared up the staircase with his candle. A world of -suspicions rushed on Byfield’s mind, and they were not allayed when the -soldiers reported in the morning that the pistols were intact. But one -of the sick soldiers died that week.</p> - -<p>Brooding on this incident Adoniram became more than ever convinced of -the Satanic purposes and powers of his neighbour, and his suspicions -were confirmed by another mysterious circumstance. As the weeks passed -he became aware that at a late hour of night Allen’s door was quietly -opened. There followed a patter of scampering feet down the staircase, -succeeded by silence. In an hour or two the sound came back. The -patter went up the stairs to Allen’s chamber, and then the door was -closed. To lie awake waiting for this ghostly sound became a horror to -Byfield’s diseased imagination. In his bed he prayed and sang psalms to -be relieved of it. Then he abandoned thoughts of sleep and would sit -up waiting if he might surprise and detect this walking terror of the -night. At first in the darkness of the stairs it eluded him. One night, -light in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</span> hand, he managed to get a glimpse of it as it disappeared at -the foot of the stairs. It was shaped like a large black cat.</p> - -<p>Far from allaying his terrors, the discovery awakened new questionings -in the heart of Byfield. Quietly he made his way up to Allen’s door. -It stood open and a candle burnt within. From where he stood he could -see each corner of the room. There was the board scribbled with -hieroglyphs: there were the magical books open on the table: there were -the necromancer’s instruments of unknown purpose. But there was no live -thing in the room, and no sound save the rustling of papers disturbed -by the night air from the open window.</p> - -<p>A horrible certitude seized on the chaplain’s mind. This Thing that he -had caught sight of was no cat. It was the Evil One himself, or it was -the wizard translated into animal shape. On what foul errand was he -bent? Who was to be his new victim? With a flash there came upon his -mind the story how Phinehas had executed judgment on the men that were -joined to Baal-peor, and had stayed the plague from the congregation of -Israel. He would be the minister of the Lord’s vengeance on the wicked -one, and it should be counted unto him for righteousness unto all -generations for evermore.</p> - -<p>He went down to the armoury in the Porter’s lodge. Six pistols, he -knew, were in the rack on the wall. Strange that to-night there were -only five—a fresh proof of the justice of his fears. One of the five -he selected, primed, loaded and cocked it in readiness for the wizard’s -return. He took his stand in the shadow of the wall, at the entrance of -the staircase. That his aim might be surer he left his candle burning -at the stair-foot.</p> - - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img009"> -<img src="images/009.jpg" class="w50" alt="On ‘A’ Staircase"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>On ‘A’ Staircase.</i></p> - -<p>In solemn stillness the minutes drew themselves out into hours while -Adoniram waited and prayed to himself. Then in the poring darkness he -became sensible of a moving presence, noiseless and unseen. For<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</span> a -moment it appeared in the light of the candle, not two paces distant. -It was the returning cat. A triumphant exclamation sprang to Byfield’s -lips, “God shall shoot at them, suddenly shall they be wounded”—and he -fired.</p> - -<p>With the report of the pistol there rang through the court a dismal -outcry, not human nor animal, but resembling, as it seemed to the -excited imagination of the chaplain, that of a lost soul in torment. -With a scurry the creature disappeared in the darkness of the court, -and Byfield did not pursue it. The deed was done—that he felt sure -of—and as he replaced the pistol in the rack a gush of religious -exaltation filled his heart. That night there was no return of the -pattering steps outside his door, and he slept well.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>Next day the body of Thomas Allen was discovered in the grove which -girds the college—his breast pierced by a bullet. It was surmised -that he had dragged himself thither from the court. There were tracks -of blood from the staircase foot, where it was conjectured that he had -shot himself, and a pistol was missing from the armoury. Some of the -inmates of the court had been aroused by the discharge of the weapon. -The general conclusion was that recorded by Sherman—that the fatal act -was prompted by brooding melancholy.</p> - -<p>Of his part in the night’s transactions Byfield said nothing. The grim -intelligence, succeeding the religious excitation of the night, brought -to him questioning, dread, horror. Whatever others might surmise, he -was fatally convinced that it was by his hand that Allen had died. Pity -for the dead man had no place in the dark cabin of his soul. But how -was it with himself? How should his action be weighed before the awful -Throne? His lurid thought pictured the Great Judgment as already begun, -the Book opened, the Accuser of the Brethren standing to resist him, -and the dreadful sentence of Cain pronounced upon him, “Now art thou -cursed from the earth.”</p> - -<p>In the evening he heard them bring the dead man to the chamber above -his own. They laid him on his bed, and, closing the door, left him and -descended the stairs. The sound of their footsteps died away and left -a dreadful silence. As the darkness<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</span> grew the horror of the stillness -became insupportable. How he yearned that he might hear again the -familiar muffled voice in the room above! And in an access of fervour -he prayed aloud that the terrible present might pass from him, that -the hours might go back, as on the dial of Ahaz, and all might be as -yesterday.</p> - -<p>Suddenly, as the prayer died on his lips, the silence was broken. He -could not be mistaken. Very quietly he heard Allen’s door open, and -the old, pattering steps crept softly down the stairs. They passed his -door. They were gone before he could rise from his knees to open it. A -momentary flash lighted the gloom in Byfield’s soul. What if his prayer -was heard, if Allen was not dead, if the events of the past twenty-four -hours were only a dream and a delusion of the Wicked One? Then the -horror returned intensified. Allen was assuredly dead. This creeping -Thing—what might it be?</p> - -<p>For an hour in his room Byfield sat in agonised dread. Most the thought -of the open door possessed him like a nightmare. Somehow it must be -closed before the foul Thing returned. Somehow the mangled shape within -must be barred up from the wicked powers that might possess it. The -fancy gripped and stuck to his delirious mind. It was horrible, but it -must be done. In a cold terror he opened his door and looked out.</p> - -<p>A flickering light played on the landing above. Byfield hesitated. -But the thought that the cat might return at any moment gave him a -desperate courage. He mounted the stairs to Allen’s door. Precisely -as yesternight it stood wide open. Inside the room the books, the -instruments, the magical figures were unchanged, and a candle, exposed -to the night wind from the casement, threw wavering shadows on the -walls and floor. At a glance he saw it all, and he saw the bed where, -a few hours ago, the poor remains of Allen had been laid. The coverlet -lay smooth upon it. The dead necromancer was not there.</p> - -<p>Then as he stood, footbound, at the door a wandering breath from the -window caught the taper, and with a gasp the flame went out. In the -black silence he became conscious of a moving sound. Nearer, up the -stairs, they drew—the soft creeping steps—and in panic he shrank -backwards into Allen’s room before their advance.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</span> Already they were -on the last flight of the stairs; and then in the doorway the darkness -parted and Byfield saw. In a ring of pallid light that seemed to -emanate from its body he beheld the cat—horrible, gory, its foreparts -hanging in ragged collops from its neck. Slowly it crept into the room, -and its eyes, smoking with dull malevolence, were fastened on Byfield. -Further he backed into the room, to the corner where the bed was laid. -The creature followed. It crouched to spring upon him. He dropped -in a sitting posture on the bed and as he saw it launch itself upon -him, he closed his eyes and found speech in a gush of prayer, “O my -God, make haste for my help.” In an agony he collapsed upon the couch -and clutched its covering with both hands. Beneath it he gripped the -stiffened limbs of the dead necromancer, and, when he opened his eyes, -the darkness had returned and the spectral cat was gone.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="Brother_Johns_Bequest">Brother John’s Bequest</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_o.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">On</span> a certain morning in the summer of the year 1510 John Eccleston, -Doctor in Divinity and Master of Jesus College in Cambridge, stood -at the door of his lodge looking into the cloister court. There -was a faint odour of extinguished candles in the air, and a bell -automatically clanked in unison with its bearer’s step. It was -carried by a young acolyte, who lagged in the rear of a small band -of white-robed figures who were just disappearing from sight at the -corner of the passage leading to the entrance court. They were the five -Fellows of the newly-constituted College.</p> - -<p>As they disappeared, the Master, with much deliberation, spat into the -cloister walk.</p> - -<p>To spit behind a man’s back might be accounted a mark of disgust, -contempt, malice—at least of disapproval. Such were not the feelings -of <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Eccleston.</p> - -<p>It is a fact known all over the world, Christian and heathen, that -visitants from the unseen realm cannot endure to be spat at. The -Master’s action was prophylactic. For supernatural visitings of the -transitory, curable kind the rites of the Church are, no doubt, -efficacious. In inveterate cases it is well to leave no remedy untried.</p> - -<p>With bell, book and candle the Master and Fellows had just completed -a lustration of the lodge. The bell had clanked in the Founder’s -Chamber and in the Master’s oratory. The Master’s bedchamber had been -well soused with holy water. The candle had explored dark places in -cupboards and under the stairs. If It was there before it was almost -inconceivable that It remained there now. But one cannot be too careful.</p> - -<p>Two days previously a funeral had taken place in the College. It -was a shabby affair. The deceased, John Baldwin, late a brother of -the dissolved Hospital of Saint John, was put away in an obscure<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</span> -part of the College churchyard—now the Master’s garden—behind some -elder bushes which grew in the corner bounded by the street and the -“chimney.” The mourners were the grave-digger, the sexton and the -parson of All Saints’ Church. Though brother John had died in a college -chamber the society of Jesus marked its reprobation of his manner of -living by absenting themselves from his obsequies.</p> - -<p>Brother John had been a disappointment: uncharitable persons might say -he was a fraud. He had got into the College by false pretences. In life -he had disgraced it by his excesses, and, when he was dead, he had -perpetrated a mean practical joke on the society. It is not well for a -man in religious orders to joke when he is dead.</p> - -<p>How did it come that brother John Baldwin, late Granger of the -Augustinian Hospital of Saint John, died in Jesus College?</p> - -<p>The Hospital of Saint John was dissolved in the year 1510, to make -room for the new college designed by the Lady Margaret. Bishops of -Ely for three centuries and more had been its patrons and visitors, -and dissolute James Stanley, bishop in 1510, fought stoutly for its -maintenance. But circumstances were too strong for the bishop. The -ancient Hospital was hopelessly bankrupt. The buildings were ruinous: -there was not a doit in the treasury chest: the household goods were -pawned to creditors in the town. The Master, William Tomlyn, had -disappeared, none knew whither, and only two brethren were left in the -place. One of them was John Baldwin: the other was the Infirmarer, a -certain Bartholomew Aspelon.</p> - -<p>On the eve of the dissolution, bishop Stanley wrote a letter to the -Master and Fellows of the other Cambridge society of which he was -visitor, namely, Jesus College. He commended to their charitable -care brother John Baldwin, an aged man of godly conversation who was -disposed to bestow his worldly goods for the comfort and sustenance of -the Master and Fellows in consideration of their maintenance of him in -College during the remaining years of his earthly pilgrimage. It was -a not uncommon practice in those days for monasteries and colleges to -accept as inmates persons,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</span> clerical or lay, who wished to withdraw -from the world and were willing, either during life or by testamentary -arrangements, to guarantee their hosts against pecuniary loss.</p> - -<p>Report said that, though the Hospital was penniless, brother John in -his private circumstances was well-to-do and even affluent. It did not -befit the Master and Fellows to enquire how he had come by his wealth. -They were wretchedly poor, and the bishop’s certificate of character -was all that could be desired. They thanked the bishop for his -prudent care for their interests and covenanted to give the religious -man a domicile in the College with allowance for victuals, barber, -laundress, wine, wax and all other things necessary for celebrating -Divine service, as to any Fellow of the College. Brother John promptly -transferred himself to his new quarters, which were in a room called -“the loft,” on the top floor above the Founder’s Chamber in the -Master’s lodge.</p> - -<p>The Master and Fellows were disappointed in brother John’s luggage. It -consisted simply of two brass-bound boxes, heavy but unquestionably -small, even for a man of religion. An encouraging feature about them -was that they bore the monogram of Saint John’s Hospital. Brother John -and his former co-mate of the Hospital, Bartholomew Aspelon, constantly -affirmed that the missing Master, William Tomlyn, had decamped with -the contents of the Hospital treasury. But the society of Jesus hoped -that they were not telling the truth. Brother John kept the two boxes -under his bed. They were always carefully locked, but brother John -threw out vague hints that their contents were destined for a princely -benefaction to his hospitable entertainers.</p> - -<p>In other respects brother John’s equipment was not such as would -betoken a man of wealth. Rather it savoured of monastical austerity. -His only suit of clothing was ancient, and even greasy. It was never -changed, night or day. Brother John was apparently under a religious -obligation to abstain from washing.</p> - -<p>As a man of godly conversation brother John was unfortunate in his -personal appearance. It was presumably a stroke of paralysis which had -drawn up one side of his face and correspondingly depressed the other. -His mouth was a diagonal compromise with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</span> the rest of his features. One -eye was closed, and the other was bleared and watery. His nose was red, -but the rest of his face was of a parchment colour.</p> - -<p>Brother John was an elderly person, and continued ill health -unfortunately confined him to his chamber, above the Master’s. He -expressed a deep regret that he could not share the society of the -Fellows in the Hall at their meals of oatmeal porridge, salt fish, and -thin ale. His distressing ailments necessitated a sustaining diet of -capons and oysters, supplied to him in his chamber by the College. He -was equally debarred from attending services in the Chapel, but the -wine with which the society had covenanted to supply him was punctually -consumed at the private offices which he performed in his chamber. A -suitable pecuniary compensation was made to him on the ground that his -domestic arrangements rendered the services of the College laundress -unnecessary.</p> - -<p>Bartholomew Aspelon, who lodged in an alehouse in the town, was the -constant and affectionate attendant at brother John’s sick bed: for, -indeed, he seldom got out of it. From a neighbouring tavern he brought -to him abundant supplies of the ypocras and malmsey wine which were -requisite for the maintenance of the invalid’s failing strength. -Brother Bartholomew was an individual of a merry countenance and gifted -with cheerful song. In the sick room the Fellows would often hear him -trolling a drinking catch, to which the invalid joined a quavering -note. So constant and familiar was the lay that John Bale, one of the -Fellows, remembered it thirty years afterwards, and put it in the mouth -of a roystering monk whom he introduced as one of the characters in his -play, <i>King Johan</i>. The words ran thus:</p> - -<p class="poetry"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wassayle, wassayle, out of the mylke payle,</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wassayle, wassayle, as whyte as my nayle,</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wassayle, wassayle, in snow, frost and hayle,</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wassayle, wassayle, with partriche and rayle,</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wassayle, wassayle, that much doth avayle,</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wassayle, wassayle, that never wyll fayle.</span><br> -</p> - -<p>The invasion of the college silences by this unusual concert was marked -by the Fellows with growing disapproval: and they<span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</span> were not comforted -when they discovered that the new robe which they had contracted to -supply to their guest had been pledged to the host of the Sarazin’s -Head in part payment of an account rendered. But they possessed their -souls in patience as they noted that the health of their venerable -guest was declining with obvious rapidity. With some insistence they -pointed out to the Master the desirability of having a prompt and clear -understanding about brother John’s testamentary dispositions. <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> -Eccleston was entirely of the Fellows’ mind in the matter.</p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img010"> -<img src="images/010.jpg" class="w50" alt="Fireplace in Master’s Lodge"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>Fireplace in Master’s Lodge.</i></p> - -<p>One evening in June, some three months after brother John had begun -his residence in the College, it seemed to <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Eccleston that the time -had come to sound him about his intentions. The patient was very low, -and brother Bartholomew was much depressed.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</span> With inkhorn and pen the -Master went upstairs to the sick man’s chamber. Nuncupatory wills were -in those days accepted as legal obligations, and the Master was minded -that he would not leave brother John until he had obtained, from his -dictation, a statement of his intentions as to the disposal of his -goods.</p> - -<p>Obviously brother John’s mind was wandering when the Master entered the -room, for he greeted his arrival with a snatch of the old scurvy tune,</p> - -<p class="poetry"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wassayle, wassayle, that never wyll fayle,</span><br> -</p> - -<p class="p0">and feebly added “Art there, bully Bartholomew? Bear me thy hand to the -bottle, for I am dry.”</p> - -<p>“Brother John, brother John,” said the Master, “bestir thee, and think -of thy state. It is time for thee to consider of thy world’s gear and -how thou wilt bestow it according to thy promise to our poor company, -for their tendance of thee.” Brother John raised himself in his bed -and opened his serviceable eye. Something like a grin puckered up his -sloping mouth. “Art thou of that counsel, goodman Doctor?” said he: -“then have with thee. I were a knave if I did not thank you for your -kindness, and, trust me, ye shall not be the losers for your pains. -Take quill and write. I will dictate my will in two fillings of thy -pen. Write”: and the Master wrote.</p> - -<p>“To the Master and Fellows of Jesus College I give and bequeath that -chest that lieth beneath my bed and is marked with a great letter A, -and all that is in it. To brother Bartholomew Aspelon, late of the -Hospital of Saint John, in like manner I bequeath that other chest that -is marked B.”</p> - -<p>“Is that all?” asked the Master. “Gogswouns, it is all I have,” said -brother John. “Yet stay, good Master. Nothing for nothing is a safe -text. Thou shalt write it as a condition, on pain of forfeiting my -bequest, that ye shall bury me in the aisle of your church, immediately -before the High Altar: that ye shall keep my obit, or anniversary, with -<i>placebo</i> and <i>dirige</i> and mass of requiem; and that once -each week a Fellow that is a priest shall pray and sing for the soul of -John Baldwin, the benefactor of the College. Is it rehearsed, master -doctor?” “It is written,” said the Master.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</span> “<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Ite, missa est</i>,” -said the invalid, “and fetch me a stoup of small ale, good Master.”</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>A few days later John Baldwin made his unimproving, unregretted end. -Brother Bartholomew carried off his portion of the legacy. The other -chest was deposited on the table in the Founder’s Chamber and opened by -the Master before the assembled Fellows.</p> - -<p>It contained half a dozen bricks, a fair quantity of straw and -shavings, and nothing else—nothing except a small scrap of torn and -dirty paper at the bottom of the box. With one voice the Master and -Fellows decreed that their unworthy guest should be buried in the least -respectable portion of the churchyard. Which thing was done, as I have -already mentioned.</p> - -<p>Of course the dirty paper under the straw was scrutinized by the -Master and Fellows. But it was of no importance. It looked like a deed -or a will, in which the deceased, in return for nursing in sickness, -proposed to give some unspecified property to his disreputable -friend, Aspelon, and apparently stipulated that he should be buried -in the choir of the Hospital chapel. But it was not witnessed: it had -obviously been torn up, and all that was left of it was the part on the -scribe’s right hand. It ran thus:</p> - -<p class="poetry"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">ego Johannes Baldewyn nuper frat</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">rigiam do lego et confirmo domino</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">u pro mea in egritudine relevaci</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">domino Bartolomeo Aspelon confrat</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">ne quod habeat uter prior invener</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">am in tumulo sepultus subter quen</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">parte chori in sacello Hospitalis</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">theshede</span><br> -</p> - -<p>The last word, if rightly read, was unintelligible.</p> - -<p>But the College had by no means done with brother John. On the evening -after his burial, as the Master and Fellows were leaving the Chapel, -their steps were suddenly arrested as they heard the familiar Wassail -stave raised in a thin and tuneless voice. It came from the open -window of the deceased brother, and unquestionably the voice was not -Aspelon’s. In consternation they listened till it died ineffectually -away in an attempted chorus strain.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</span> After brief deliberation they -resolved to visit the “loft” in a body—Master, Fellows, “disciples” -and servants—and see what this thing might mean. They found the place -as blank and silent as it remained when the deceased had been taken out -to his burial. But before they reached the stair-foot in their descent -the thin piping strain fell on their ears again, and this time none -were bold enough to go back. After that, at all times of night and -day, the interminable ditty was fitfully renewed, and panic held the -College. At night the “disciples” huddled in one room, and the Fellows -lay two in a bed.</p> - -<p>Unfortunately for <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Eccleston, he was condemned to the solitude of -the lodge, deserted even by his <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">famulus</i>, the sizar who attended -him. He sat up all night and studied works of divinity, in the hope -that theology, if it did not put the songster to rout, would at least -distract his own thoughts from the devilish roundelay in the garret -above his head. On the second night he began to congratulate himself on -the success of his experiment, for the singer relapsed into silence. In -his exhaustion he might even have slept, but that the door of his study -had a gusty habit of flying open unexpectedly and closing with a bang. -He had actually begun to drowse over his folio when a sharp pressure -on his right shoulder aroused him. Hastily turning his head he saw -the papery countenance of the dead brother gazing on him with all the -affection that one eye could testify, the chin planted on the Master’s -shoulder, and the mouth slewed into a simulation of innocent mirth. <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> -Eccleston read no more divinity that night.</p> - -<p>Early next morning a College meeting was summoned by the Master. It -was resolved by the unanimous voice of the society that brother John’s -remains should be exhumed and re-interred in the middle of the chancel -aisle, in accordance with the stipulation of the deceased: and there -was no delay in carrying the resolution into effect. The Master also -insisted that the whole society should help in the purgation of his -lodge and the loft above it, in accordance with the ritual of the -Church in that case applying: and this too was incontinently done, as -I have already described. The consideration of the performance of the -rest of the contract entered into by the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</span> Master with the late brother -was deferred until it should be ascertained how far the deceased was -satisfied with the measures already adopted.</p> - -<p>Whether John Baldwin acquiesced in this somewhat lame execution of -his wishes, or whether his perturbed spirit was laid to rest by the -rites of exorcism it is impossible to say. It is quite certain that he -troubled the College no more.</p> - -<p>But in the afternoon following his re-interment an incident happened -which possibly had some connection with the placation of his shade. -Bartholomew Aspelon had not attended brother John’s funeral in the -churchyard. In truth, he was filled with a moral resentment at his late -friend’s lack of feeling and good taste which was only equalled by -that of the society of Jesus: and the motive was the same. On opening -the treasure chest bequeathed to him he had found it filled with -bricks and straw, just like the other. If the Fellows were indignant -Bartholomew was more so: for, from private sources of information which -he possessed as a member of the dissolved Hospital, he was assured -that brother John had prospered in its service to the extent of £200, -at the least, and he was profoundly convinced that the whole sum had -gone into the treasury of Jesus College. Under the straw he had found -a morsel of paper, which was, indeed, too fragmentary to give any -connected clue to its drift, but which, nevertheless, rather plainly -indicated on the part of the deceased an intention of bequeathing to -the College a certain treasure, the whereabouts of which, owing to the -imperfection of the document, were not stated. He was confirmed in his -interpretation of the manuscript by the honourable interment given to -brother John’s remains in the Chapel.</p> - -<p>Filled with resentment at the ingratitude of the patient whom he had so -tenderly nursed and at the duplicity of the “dons” who had robbed him -of the reward of his devoted service, Bartholomew sought the Master’s -lodge. He used no language of studied courtesy in representing to <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> -Eccleston the nature of his grievance: and the Master, whose temper -was severely tried by want of sleep and the disagreeable nature of -the interment ceremony in which he had just unwillingly participated, -replied with equal vehemence.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</span></p> - -<p>“Ye are robbers all,” cried Bartholomew: “you cheated him in his -weakness into signing his property away from the friend who smoothed -his pillow in his dying hours.”</p> - -<p>“Thou naughty knave,” retorted the Master, “talk not to me of bricks -and straw. It was gold that was contained in thy box, and the devil -knows by what scurvy arts thou didst cozen us of our promised reward. -His own paper convicts thee of the fraudulent attempt to get him to -will his goods to thee. See what he left in the bottom of our box.” And -the Master threw the scrap above-transcribed upon the table. “Take it -and never let me see thy rogue’s face again.”</p> - -<p>Brother Bartholomew leaped in his skin as he grabbed the document. He -made no ceremony of leave-taking, but bolted down the stairs. When he -got into the cloister outside he took from his pouch a dingy scrap of -paper, which was the fellow of that which the Master had thrown to him. -What he read on it was this:</p> - -<p class="poetry"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Sciant omnes presentes et futuri quod</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">er Hospitalis Divi Johannis apud Canteb</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">doctori Ecclyston et sociis Collegii Jes</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">one equaliter inter se dividendum aut</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">ri meo in antedicto Hospitali ea racio</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">it totum thesaurum meum ita ut extat cl</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">dam lapidem iacentem in septentrionali</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">eiusdem cuius istud signum extat a dea</span><br> -</p> - -<p>Then brother Bartholomew put the two pieces together, and it was thus -that he translated the continuous lines:</p> - -<p class="poetry"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Know all men present and to come that | I, John Baldwin, late a broth</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">er of the Hospital of Saint John at Camb | ridge, give, grant and bequeath to master</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">doctor Eccleston and the fellows of the College of Jes | u for my relief during sick</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">ness, equally to be divided among them, or | to master Bartholomew Aspelon, a brother</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">of mine in the aforesaid Hospital, provid | ed that he shall have it who is first fin</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">der, all my treasure as it now lies pri | vily buried in a tomb under a cert</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">ain stone lying on the northern | side of the choir in the chapel of the Hospital</span><br> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">aforesaid, of which this is the sign, a dea | th’s head.</span><br> -</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</span></p> - -<p>Of what further pertains to brother John Baldwin and his bequest I -have no more to say than that his name is not included in the Form -for the Commemoration of Benefactors of Jesus College. Also that for -twenty years after the events here recorded a cheerful individual, in -a lay habit, might be seen, seated of custom on the ale-bench at the -Sarazin’s Head. He drank of the best, paid in cash and never lacked for -money. He could tell a good tale and he sang a good song. His Wassail -song was always in request at the Sarazin’s Head.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="The_Burden_of_Dead_Books">The Burden of Dead Books</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_b.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">By</span> its air of reverend quiet, its redolence of dusty death, in the -marshalled lines of its sleeping occupants, and in the labels that -briefly name the dead author and his work, an ancient repository of -books, such as a college library, suggests the, perhaps, hackneyed -similitude of a great cemetery. Here and there, among the vast -majority of the undistinguished dead, we detect names that are still -familiar. Here and there are the monuments of men who have at least -been the ancestors of a surviving family of scholars and scientists. -Some names will awake memories, not for the individual achievement of -their bearers, but for the cause in which they worked. Royalist and -Republican, Anglican, Romanist and Puritan here have laid down the -arms which they bore against each other, and together sleep the sleep -from which there is no rising. Though the issues for which these men -fought are dead things now, their spirit is with us and their works -follow them. But with the majority it is not so. Outnumbering all -others are the hand-labourers of whose names the catalogue has no -record. Their daywork, paid or unpaid, was commanded by more ambitious -masters, who absorbed whatever temporary measure of credit attended -the collaboration. Over the ashes of these unnamed toilers we waste -no regrets: they sleep well. It is the fallen ambitions, the wasted -energies, the mistaken aims of the master-craftsmen in letters that are -food for ironical contemplation.</p> - -<p>I do not know that in such a cemetery of small and great, the servant -and his master, a more dismal corner exists than that which is reserved -for the stillborn. They are a great host, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</span> they are mostly of the -family of Theology. Of one such product of fruitless travail I have -to speak. It has rested undisturbed in the library of Jesus College -for over 300 years, and in all that time, perhaps, no human being, -except the official who transcribed its title in the catalogue, has -ever had occasion to recall its existence. Its author was one Matthew -Makepeace, S.T.P., a Fellow of the College in the last quarter of the -sixteenth century. Its elaborate title is: “Speculum Archimagiae, sive -Straguli Babyloniaci Direptio, necnon Offuciarum et Praestigiarum -Romano-papisticarum Apocalypsis liberrima”: from which I conclude that -the Pope received some hard knocks in it, and that the Babylonian -lady of the Book of Revelation was left in pitiful disarray by the -learned doctor’s assault. The title-page informs us that the book was -printed at London by Melchisedeck Bradwell, for John Bill, in the year -1604: furthermore, that it had been “perused and approved by publike -authoritie.” That it was ever perused I do not believe. Only in the -most cursory way I have perused it myself, and I do not think that -any other man has done as much. To our patient ancestors a book was -a book, let it be ever so dull. They glossed it, annotated it, added -their approving or inimical comments. But nobody has been at the pains -to add his marginal notes to the text of Matthew Makepeace. Its cover -is unworn, its pages as clean as on the day when it first saw light. -This only: on a loose scrap of paper, contained between its pages, I -have discovered a name written in Greek characters and a short Greek -quotation.</p> - -<p>Let me get done with this dull book as fast as I can. It is, of course, -written in Latin, and its style does not suggest that the author had -a facile Latinity. The extensive list of authors cited indicates that -he had read widely, but digested little of what he read, in Patristic -and Rabbinical literature. The purpose of the book is to discredit the -claim of the Roman Church to the possession of supernatural gifts. The -subjects dealt with are naturally the Roman sacraments and hagiology. -The learned author arrives at the conclusion, on grounds which I -have not had the patience to investigate, that the human exercise of -miraculous powers ceased at the precise date, <span class="allsmcap">A.D.</span> 430.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</span></p> - -<p>Of the writer, Doctor Makepeace, I can find little more information -than is supplied in the History of Jesus College, written by John -Sherman in the reign of Charles II. This work, composed in the fulsome -Latin which was esteemed elegant in the seventeenth century, gives -brief biographical notes of each of the Fellows from the date of the -foundation of the College. There are various manuscript versions of the -History, some ampler than others, and if you wish to read the original -Latin, of which I subjoin a translation, you must search out the single -copy which contains the full note of his life and work. It may be -rendered:</p> - -<p>“Matthew Makepeace, S.T.P., of the county of Northumberland, succeeded -to a fellowship in 1565: a most learned investigator of theological -matters (<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">rei theologicae indagator</i>), especially of the writings -of the Fathers: a chastiser of the Pope (<i>Papomastix</i>): he -illuminated by his knowledge the College and the University, most -fearlessly attacking the unclean practices of the Babylonian harlot. -He had one much-loved pupil, Marmaduke Dacre, first-born son of -the lord baron Dacre, of the county of Cumberland. The same having -disappeared from the College in a fashion as yet unknown (<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">modo adhuc -inscibili</i>) the old man, seized with a phrenetic malady, gradually -declined (<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">contabuit</i>), often asserting that he was that same -pupil whom he had lost. Dying at the age of sixty years, he was buried -in the chapel, September 8th, 1604.”</p> - -<p>To the information given by Sherman I can only add the evidence of a -blue flagstone—unhappily removed in the course of chapel restoration, -in 1863—which lay in the floor of the south transept. Its simple -inscription was: “<i>Matthaeus Makepeace, S.T.P., decessit, 1604</i>.”</p> - -<p>With the evidence as to the date of the death of <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Makepeace, -furnished by Sherman and the old gravestone, it is difficult to -reconcile a curious entry in the register of burials in All Saints’ -Parish Churchyard. The entry is dated April 13, 1654, and it runs:—</p> - -<p>“Matthew Makepeace, an oldman yᵗ lodged with yᵉ widow Pearson in Jesus -Lane, of yᵉ age of about three score years and ten. He was burried in -Poorman’s Corner, by yᵉ parish.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</span></p> - -<p>The date, the age of the deceased, the place of burial, the fact that -this Makepeace was evidently a pauper and a stranger to Cambridge, all -would seem to make it certain that he could not be the same man who is -mentioned by Sherman. Nevertheless, I have my doubts, and the story -which I have to unfold will explain the reason.</p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img011"> -<img src="images/011.jpg" class="w50" alt="A Corner of the Library"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>A Corner of the Library.</i></p> - -<p>The story begins on August 16th, 1604, the very day on which the -learned <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Speculum</i> made its first appearance, bound and complete, -on the table of Matthew Makepeace. The doctor’s chamber was on an upper -floor of the staircase at the western end of the chapel nave, and it -overlooked what was then called Fair Yard, a plot of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</span> ground since -annexed to the Master’s garden. August 16th happened to be the last of -the three days of Garlick Fair, the ancient fair which, since the days -of King Stephen, had been associated with the Church of Saint Radegund, -and took place under the chapel walls.</p> - -<p>Matthew Makepeace was alone. It was Long Vacation, and his sole pupil, -Marmaduke Dacre, who shared his chamber, had been allowed a day’s -outing. Heavy books of divinity lined the walls of the chamber, which -had little of comfort about it and no elegance. The doctor’s high bed, -with curtains of faded say, the pupil’s truckle-bed, a hanging cupboard -for clothes, a rough deal stand on which was set an ewer and basin of -coarse earthenware, a chair, two stools and a large oaken table in -the middle of the room—these were the doctor’s principal household -effects. There was but one window, of bottle-green glass, and its -lattice was open to admit the air and sunlight of the August afternoon.</p> - -<p>On the table lay the doctor’s new book, brave in its stamped leather -and gilded label: but it was unopened. It was the outcome of five and -twenty years of incessant study, and the single offspring of Matthew’s -lucubration. And now that it was brought to birth he was in a mood to -stifle it. It had been begun in the white heat of the controversies -with Rome and Spain, and it lingered in parturition until the fire -had burnt low, and the readers who should have applauded it were in -their graves. Its author was not very sure that its contentions were -true, and he was very sure that they were addressed to deaf ears. -Had he gone out into the world he might have learnt what the world -was interested in—what battles remained to fight, what causes were -already finished. But Matthew’s world consisted of books, and his books -were out of date. Of recent political developments, of the growth of -scientific knowledge, of the blossoming of a native literature he had -no more knowledge than a child. The work which had been begun with -enthusiasm had been completed in mechanical drudgery, and too late he -was conscious of the fact.</p> - -<p>How well he recollected the enthusiasms of 1579! How ardent his friends -were that his immense learning should signalise itself in the great -national strife with the powers of darkness! If he could<span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</span> only live his -life again with the old enthusiasm and the added knowledge of a life -that should combine learning and action! The boy, Dacre, blessed with -genius, wealth, high birth and noble aspirations—how wide the horizon -that opened before him! For Matthew Makepeace it rested only to be -forgotten before he died.</p> - -<p>It was a strange bird of passage that had dropped the seed from which -Matthew’s book grew. Alessandro Galiani was a medical doctor of Padua -University when he came to Cambridge, and for a few months resided in -Jesus College. Why he came nobody precisely knew; but he claimed to be -a Protestant refugee, and he was certainly profoundly learned in many -languages, as well as in medicine. He brought letters of introduction -from the Chancellor, Lord Burleigh, and it was surmised that he was an -agent of the Government, engaged to report on the University. But his -talk and conduct were so equivocal that the suspicion presently arose -that his Protestantism was simulated, and that he was a papal spy. The -sentiments to which he gave expression were certainly Macchiavellian in -the highest degree—intolerable to English ears. Wherefore his sojourn -at Cambridge ended abruptly after a few months, and he passed away into -the same mysterious spaces from which he had come. He was a man of -extraordinary powers of observation and suggestion, and from a chance -hint that he once let fall Makepeace got the idea of writing his book. -It was Galiani who directed his attention to the Jewish and Arabic -authors whom he consulted. But how little of the force and insight of -the Italian entered into the completed book, Makepeace knew only too -well.</p> - -<p>So the book lay on the table and Matthew had no heart to open it. -Through the window came sounds of merriment from the Fair Yard without. -Regularly as August came round Makepeace had heard those sounds for -forty years past, but until to-day he had regarded them only as a -troublesome distraction, and closed his casement against them. To-day -a profound lassitude made him draw his stool from the table, where lay -the slighted volume, to the open window. His attention was especially -drawn by a strident voice which came from near his chamber. Looking out -on the Fair<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</span> Yard he saw a platform of a few planks, mounted on casks, -immediately beneath his window. On it a vagabond charlatan was loudly -advertising to a group of gaping rustics the merits of a wonderful -heal-all.</p> - -<p>“Come buy, my masters, come buy,” he cried. “Buy the infallible salve -of the famous doctor Pinchbeck, the ointment that heals the ague, the -rheum, the palsy, the serpigo. Let him that goes on one leg but buy, -and with thrice laying on he shall go on two. Let him that goes with -crutches buy, and he shall dance home in a coranto. One groat only for -the learned doctor’s ointment that shall quit you of the cramp, the -gout, the quotidian and the tertian. An it rid you not in two days come -again and Pinchbeck shall restore you fourfold.”</p> - -<p>From time to time an ague-ridden swain mounted the platform, haggled -with the quack, reluctantly parted with his groat and departed, dubious -of his purchase. On the whole, <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Pinchbeck seemed to be doing a -fair trade, when, late in the afternoon, an old man, bent double with -rheumatism, raised a loud expostulation. He affirmed that he had -purchased a box of the ointment on the first day of the fair, and had -applied it thrice without the promised result.</p> - -<p>He demanded the fourfold restitution of his money, and the mountebank -stoutly resisted the claim. Angry cries arose from the bystanders, -and it might have gone ill with the empiric, had not a diversion -been effected by one of the crowd. This was a tall middle-aged man -of somewhat dark complexion and foreign appearance, whose dress -distinguished him as a gentleman and possibly a practiser of medicine. -He stepped on the platform, spoke a few words to the ointment-vendor, -and then, beckoning the old man to him, made him sit on a stool. He -gazed fixedly for a few moments in the patient’s eyes, made some -mysterious motions of the hands before his face, whispered in his ear, -and then, with a few more passes of his hands, bade him stand. The old -fellow stood erect without effort; then, at the stranger’s bidding, -walked a few easy steps, and with a pleased and puzzled look descended -to join his friends in the crowd. Loud applause greeted the wonderful -cure, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</span> patients crowded to receive the stranger’s ministrations. -The same operations in each case were attended with the same result. -Never had there been seen such a wonder at the fair.</p> - -<p>Most of all it wrought wonder in Matthew Makepeace. This unknown -individual—was he possessed of those miraculous gifts of healing which -Makepeace in 400 quarto pages had proved to be extinct? He would accost -him and, if possible, learn from his lips whether what he had seen were -the operation of nature or of the magic art. Descending in the majesty -of his doctor’s robes he mingled in the crowd, and mildly laid his hand -on the stranger’s arm. “Pardon, learned sir,” said he, “the curiosity -of a scholar—alas! too ignorant of books and all unskilled in the -manual acts of healing. I would fain question with you of these same -cures that by chance I have witnessed from my chamber.” The stranger -was engaged in giving parting words of counsel to some of his patients. -He turned at the touch of the doctor’s hand, surveyed him up and down -for a moment, and said, “Anon, Master Makepeace, anon: I will be with -you presently.”</p> - -<p><abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Makepeace started to hear his name and threw a sharp look on the -speaker. No; he was a complete stranger, and his accent betrayed him -as a foreigner. <abbr title="doctor">Dr.</abbr> Makepeace had certainly never seen him in his life -before. He began to explain where his chamber was to be found.</p> - -<p>“I know it,” interrupted the stranger, “I know it. Bear with me for a -moment and I will seek you there.”</p> - -<p>Makepeace was a little ruffled that the speaker, knowing his name, did -not give him his academic title. “<i>Doctor</i> Makepeace,” he said; -“ask for <i>Doctor</i> Makepeace.”</p> - -<p>“Surely, surely,” replied the stranger carelessly: “yet <i>Master</i> -Makepeace, methinks, served you then.”</p> - -<p>More than ever perplexed the doctor sought his room. Only a few minutes -had passed when he heard his visitor mounting with no faltering step to -his door, and Makepeace opened to him before he knocked. The stranger -glanced rapidly round. He seemed to find something familiar in each -article of furniture. He ran his eye, with a look of some amused -contempt, over the array of worn<span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</span> volumes that lined the walls. “Old -books, doctor Makepeace,” he said, “old books. I think you have not -changed one these thirty years.”</p> - -<p>“Old books are old friends,” said the doctor with a touch of resentment -at his tone: “I would not change them.”</p> - -<p>“Old friends die, doctor,” observed the stranger, “they die, and then -we have no use for them but to bury them.”</p> - -<p>“Sir,” said the doctor with a quick reminiscence of his wasted studies, -“I <em>have</em> buried my friends: but I love them still. But,” he went -on, “it is not of old notions that I have to speak with you. You have -shown me this afternoon something newer and,” he added sadly, “it may -be, something better than all that old books tell. I ask you to impart -to me no secret that might hurt you by the telling. Until now I have -maintained that nothing exists in this present world that is not of -natural course. If it be an honest mystery that you exercise, tell me, -the humblest and poorest of scholars, whether it be the miraculous -working of God’s power in human hands or simply the exercise of human -art.”</p> - -<p>The stranger seated himself, uninvited, in the doctor’s chair, and the -doctor took a stool. “Everything,” said the stranger, “is miracle to -him who does not know.”</p> - -<p>“Great heavens,” cried Makepeace, “that is the beginning of my -quotation from the learned Theodorus Gazophylacius. I never heard of -the great Gazophylacius until Galiani told me of him: nobody that I -know had heard of him. A marvellous scholar, truly, was Gazophylacius, -but a pagan at heart, albeit a Byzantine Christian—and sadly drowned -in superstition. Shall I show you the passage in the original Greek?” -And he feverishly turned the pages of the <i>Speculum</i> to find it.</p> - -<p>“You may spare yourself that trouble,” said the stranger composedly. -“Shall I finish the quotation? Shall I write it for you?” And he -unceremoniously tore a corner from one of the immaculate leaves, took -a quill and wrote. “There,” said he, “there, I have written in Greek -what follows in your quotation, and I have added my name that you may -remember the writer.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</span></p> - - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img012"> -<img src="images/012.jpg" class="w50" alt="Chapel Doorway in Master’s Garden"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>Chapel Doorway in Master’s Garden.</i></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</span></p> - -<p>The doctor took it and read the delicate Greek characters: “Demetrius -Commagenus. All things are possible to him who knows and wills with -earnestness.”</p> - -<p>Makepeace was stupified. “Commagenus,” he said: “that is a Greek -name, I take it. And yet I would have sworn that the handwriting was -Galiani’s, and Galiani was an Italian. Besides, Galiani is dead, or he -is sixty years old, less or more, by now: and you—I cannot think that -you are past forty.”</p> - -<p>Indifferently the self-styled Commagenus replied: “Galiani or -Commagenus—what matters? What I wrote then I write now; and always I -am your humble servant and the poor scholar who drew wisdom from the -lips of the divine Gazophylacius.”</p> - -<p>“We talk in dreams,” said Matthew: “Galiani told me—<em>you</em> told -me, if you are he—that Gazophylacius died at Rome, ten years after the -Turks entered Constantinople: and that was a hundred and fifty years -ago.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” answered Commagenus, “he died—the more is the pity; for he -might have lived, had he chosen to use his own wisdom. Instead of that -he imparted it on his death-bed to me. What care had he to live, an -outcast in strange lands? But this world lost its wisest man; for I am -no Gazophylacius. Only I am always learning.”</p> - -<p>“Why, this is as strange a maze as ever man trod,” cried Makepeace. -“You tell me that your master died a hundred and forty years ago, and -that you, Galiani, were with him at the time.”</p> - -<p>“Not Galiani, but Commagenus,” said the stranger in complacent -amusement at the doctor’s bewilderment: “that was my name then. I was a -youth, twenty years old, when I first came to Constantinople from the -country which gave me my name—three years before the siege. There I -became the favourite pupil of the great student of natural and medical -science, Theodorus Gazophylacius.”</p> - -<p>“Why, that makes you a hundred and seventy years old,” feebly -remonstrated Makepeace. “Are you then the Wandering Jew?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</span></p> - -<p>“Doctor, I am shocked,” said Commagenus. “Are such fables the stuff -of which the <i>Speculum</i> is made? I tell you there is nothing in -this world that is not natural. That was my master’s constant teaching: -also that to know and to will makes man master of nature. That much I -learnt from him while he taught at Constantinople, and it was in my -noviciate that I gathered from him the art to work such simple cures as -you saw this afternoon. To prolong mere existence by keeping disease at -bay—that he esteemed a vulgar art. To live long and die old, feeble -and foolish—what gain is that to the man or his fellow-men? To live -always, always to be young, always eager, always to be growing in -wisdom and power—that was the secret for which he spent a lifetime’s -search, and with his dying breath he told me that he had sought it in -vain. Death, the last disease, is incurable: there is a stronger will -than man’s. But he told me of a door of escape. In his last moments -he was possessed with a dread that his discovery would perish in the -general eclipse of learning which he foresaw as the result of the -disappearance of the Byzantine schools, and, with solemn admonition -as to its use, he imparted it to me. Death, the mere accident of the -flesh, is transferable with the flesh. With will and knowledge, the -spirit—all that you call character, intelligence, consciousness, -memory—may pass from form to form, unchanged in the transition and -always capable of growth and ripening. Alas, that I have not made -better use of my master’s prescriptions! But it has been my evil fate. -Another might do better.”</p> - -<p>“These are heathen imaginings—snares and delusions of Satan,” cried -Makepeace. “What talk is this of tampering with the divine in us? Man, -are you a Christian?”</p> - -<p>“I am what I am,” replied Commagenus: “but that this is waking fact -and no delusion my history shall show you. After my beloved master’s -death I set up in medical practice in a certain city of Dalmatia. The -fame of my unusual healing powers spread in all the neighbourhood. -Unfortunately it reached the ears of the bishop of the diocese. He was -a sincere, well-meaning man, kind in all his relations with the laity -of his diocese, but a trifle superstitious. He concluded that I was a -necromancer and condemned<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</span> me to be burnt alive. Until the moment when -I found myself in a dungeon and on the eve of execution I had never -thought to avail myself of the secret communicated to me by my master, -and had even questioned its efficacy. The prospect of burning was so -extremely repugnant to my feelings that I resolved to make practical -trial of it. Shall I show you how it is done? No, you need not shrink -from me. I have no wish to pass into simple old Matthew Makepeace. I -can do better. Be assured that the will goes not with the act.”</p> - -<p>Commagenus rose and fastened his gaze on Matthew. As he did so it -seemed to the doctor that he grew and grew to a bulk and stature -ineffable and dim. But that, he reasoned with himself, was an illusion -of the sense, and for the moments when the fascinating glare was fixed -on him he retained his consciousness. Slowly, deliberately, that -Matthew might follow every movement in succession, he moved his hands -and arms in gyrations and waves more intricate than any that Matthew -had witnessed when the Greek stood on the mountebank’s platform that -afternoon. Then he stooped over the table, and with extraordinary -distinctness of articulation whispered in his ear one word. What that -word was I do not know. Matthew Makepeace remembered it once, and -forgot it for all the years that he lived afterwards.</p> - -<p>The Greek took up his tale again. “My excellent master had informed me -that, whether the subject were waking or asleep, the will and the word -had equal effect. My gaoler slept in the condemned cell with me and the -occasion seemed to me a particularly happy one for testing the accuracy -of my master’s conclusions. Though I did not doubt the intensity of my -will, in prospect of such an undesirable event as being burnt alive, -I confess that I was surprised and more than gratified by the issue -of the experiment. I had the satisfaction of leading my gaoler to the -stake on the following morning.”</p> - -<p>“What,” cried Makepeace: “do you tell me that the man was burnt? -True,” he added, as a mitigating consideration suggested itself to his -bewildered brain, “he was a papist. But, after all, what were you?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</span></p> - -<p>Commagenus answered with the resignation of a parent satisfying an -inquisitive child. “Yes, Matthew Makepeace, when your raiment is past -your own use you make a gift of it to some humble dependent. When -<em>he</em> has worn it threadbare, what happens? It is burnt. You do not -burn it: I did not burn him. Besides, this common man in ages to come -will be held in reverence—in another name, I admit—as a martyr to -medical science. Nevertheless I was little pleased, as you may think, -with the integument which my brutal gaoler had left me. In my new and -humble sphere of life I had few opportunities of self-improvement, -and, taking the first that offered, I installed myself in the person -of a Dominican friar. I am disposed to doubt whether I really bettered -myself by my change of profession. I found that it required much -ingenuity to sustain the part of crass ignorance which was associated -with my new character, and the man’s companions were deplorable -people. An accident, which had nearly proved fatal, relieved me of -the disagreeable situation. In the course of my professional duties -I was directed to take ship for Spain, where the Dominican order had -an especial interest in the Office of the Holy Inquisition. On the -voyage we fell in with a vessel belonging to a respectable merchant -of Marseilles. The merchant, who was likewise the ship’s captain, was -in the habit, when occasion offered, of diversifying the routine of -commerce by piratical enterprise. With his crew he boarded and took -possession of our vessel, informing us that we were his prisoners. As -he had a reputation for probity to sustain at Marseilles, he judged -it prudent to throw the whole of the crew and passengers of our -vessel into the waves. However, learning that there was a clergyman -on board, he seized the opportunity of making confession first and -receiving plenary absolution from him of an outstanding balance of -prior delinquencies. It was natural to avail myself of the opportunity -for transferring myself into his person. It was pleasant to see him -flounder in the sea with the rest, and I returned—if that is the right -word—to Marseilles, in circumstances sufficiently ample to warrant -retirement from a profession the ambiguous character of which offended -my moral sense. But my experiences in the three careers of life which -my destiny had recently forced upon me gave<span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</span> me an indelible prejudice -against the Western Church. On the whole I am a Protestant.</p> - -<p>“I need not detain you with my subsequent transmigrations. The merchant -was elderly and so oppressively respectable that I was glad to exchange -into the superior rank of a French marquisate. Since then, from -Trebizond to Tarifa, I have studied men and manners in many capacities. -Perhaps the time which was pleasantest to me, as a man of science, was -spent in Peru with Pizarro, whom I attended as a captain of cavalry. -But a fatal wound, inflicted by a poisoned arrow, compelled my return -to Spain in the office of a ship’s boatswain. After all my wanderings -my conscience reproached me with my culpable neglect of the art in -whose elements I had been grounded by the ever-revered Gazophylacius. -I resumed the medical studies which I was convinced were best suited -to my bent and upbringing, by adopting the features and the status -of a freshman in the University of Padua. As the freshman, under no -possible circumstances, could have passed his examinations you will see -that I conferred on him no small obligation by the assistance which I -rendered. In my first year I obtained advancement to the person and -professorial chair of Galiani. I am grieved to tell you that I left -him seriously unwell at Salerno, ten years ago; and his decease, which -followed almost immediately after, proved to me how wise had been my -course in transferring myself into the healthy frame of the brother -professor who attended him in the earlier phases of his malady. Come, -doctor, you have let me chatter on with these tiresome details till I -see you are three parts asleep.”</p> - -<p>“Asleep!” roared Makepeace, who had been filled with rage, disgust and -hatred by the shameless recital. “Asleep! Wretch, thief, assassin, -defiler of the sanctuary of man! Begone, skirr, fly! Would that I could -crush your basilisk head on the floor as I stand! But stay. I will -fetch the University bedel. He shall clap you in the lowest hold of the -Castle gaol.”</p> - -<p>“Marry, good words, master doctor,” said the imperturbable stranger. -“Your bedel, possibly, is a family man; and conscience forbids that, -except in the last resort, I should lay a father of a family in a -dungeon for crimes that, you are pleased to assert, are of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</span> my doing: -and, except that I do not propose myself for the office of bedel, it -were an easy thing for me to do so. But hearken, my honest friend. -I wish you well—no man better. Getting old is a sad affair, sadder -even than dying. I think that you are sixty, and I don’t think that -just now you are quite in your best health. Has the world gone very -well with you? In five years, ten years, will it go better? You have -written a silly book that nobody will read, and you are ashamed of it. -You have wasted your years of manhood in twisting ropes of sand. And -the solitude, Matthew! My heart bleeds to think what your solitude -will be. What friend have you to smooth the downhill course? Who cares -for the friend of dead books? Altogether, you have very little use now -for Matthew Makepeace. Who is it that should sleep in yonder bed?” he -asked, pointing to the truckle used by Marmaduke Dacre. “Is he young? -Is he comely? Has he friends to love him and be loved? Is he of a quick -spirit and a high hope? Matthew Makepeace, you know the acts and the -word. The door lies open to you. Take wisdom, and be young.”</p> - -<p>“The door lies open to <em>you</em>,” shouted Makepeace, throwing it open -as he spoke. “Pass out of it, and avoid the chamber of a Christian man: -and the foul fiend fly away with you and your abominable suggestions!”</p> - -<p>“Doctor Makepeace, I wish you a very good evening,” said his visitor.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>The night was far advanced, and Matthew Makepeace had no mind for bed. -A dim rush candle, set on a stool in a corner of the apartment, cast -flickering shadows on the walls and floor. In an opposite dark corner -his pupil slept. But for the dread of awaking him, Makepeace would have -paced the room in his perplexity. As it was, he sat bent double on the -stool by the window.</p> - -<p>One thing was clear enough. If what he had seen and heard was not -a fiction or the delusion of his senses, the <i>Speculum</i> was a -colossal stupidity. Even if the rejuvenations of Commagenus were as -much in the course of nature as he affirmed them to be, did they not -warrant the Pope’s most arrogant pretensions? But it was with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</span> himself -that he was most concerned. Was it not the fact that, as Commagenus had -declared, his life had been most miserably wasted? And the mistake was -past repair. If only his youth had known! And his mind went back to -a short, happy time, just after he had taken his degree, when he had -served as chaplain in his far-away northern country, at the ancestral -castle of the Dacres. His pupil then had been the present Lord, -Marmaduke’s father; and the pupil had had so much to teach his master -about hawks and horses and hounds that the master had little leisure to -repay it in Greek and Latin. Those were happy days when they had roamed -the Cumbrian fells together. And now this Lord Dacre was great in the -councils of his sovereign, the wise and respected ruler of a barony -that was almost a kingdom in itself. And in his trusting confidence he -had committed his son to the care of his old master at Cambridge; and -that son in course of years would naturally succeed to his father’s -station.</p> - -<p>Had Commagenus indeed sat in that chamber, only a few hours since, -and unfolded to him the secret of perpetual youth? Yes: there was -the evidence of the written scrap lying on the open page of the -<i>Speculum</i>. True, Commagenus had made a detestable use of his -wonderful power. But with Makepeace it would be different. He was -conscious of his sobriety and virtue, and there were the noble -traditions of the house of Dacre to keep him in the right way. He had -abilities, if only he had youth and opportunity to use them, and the -experience of sixty years was a better guarantee for their proper -employment than any that a callow youth could offer. Clearer, louder -than the voices of conscience or calculation there came back to him, -like the drumming burden of an iterated song, the words “The door is -open. Be young.” Was it fancy that a door seemed to open in the dark -book-press opposite, and that through it he looked out on a sunny haze -enveloping blue hills and waters and the towers of Dacre Castle? And -cool breaths from heathery heights took up the refrain, and whispered -to him “Be young.”</p> - -<p>Matthew Makepeace crept quietly to the dark corner where his pupil lay. -His will was intense as he had never known it before. He took care that -his shadow should not fall on the sleeper’s face and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</span> arouse him. He -made the wonderful passes—with what extraordinary clearness they were -printed on his recollection! He stooped and whispered in his pupil’s -ear the mysterious word.</p> - -<p>If Matthew had expected a flash of lightning, the apparition of the -Evil One, the jubilations of triumphant fiends on the success of -his experiment, he was agreeably disappointed. Nothing of the kind -happened. Only in the dim light of the candle he saw a grey shadow -of weary age steal over his pupil’s face, and he felt the vigour and -vitality of youth invade his own limbs as with the intoxication of -wine. Then the wick suddenly flickered in the candle-socket and went -out. He heard Marmaduke turn over in his bed with an uneasy sigh.</p> - -<p>Then Makepeace woke to reason and a horrible dread. He dared not -relight the candle for fear of rousing the sleeper. In the dark, before -he was discovered, he must repeat the process which should restore each -to his own person. In the dark, as nearly as he could, he went through -the magical passes, and with extraordinary vehemence he willed himself -back into Matthew Makepeace. But the word! Great heavens! It had passed -from him as suddenly and completely as the light of the extinguished -candle. In vain he racked his memory of every language, living or dead. -It had no meaning in any language, living or dead: of that he felt -sure, and he was sure of nothing else. For an hour, by his pupil’s -bedside, he tore his hair in desperate efforts to recall it. For an -hour he alternately cursed Commagenus and prayed that he might return -before day to give him the forgotten word. Then the grey morning light -began to creep through the casement, and the birds woke and sang.</p> - -<p>There could be no shadow of doubt about it. There lay Matthew Makepeace -before him, and the old man was drowsily stirring his limbs as the -light broadened into day. And young Dacre, in a doctor’s gown, was -looking down upon him, tortured with horrible thoughts. One thing was -certain. He could never pass himself off as Marmaduke. Conscience, -gratitude, affection forbade it. Besides, the thing was impossible. -He, the torpid pedant, could never play the part of the young and -chivalrous heir of the Dacres:<span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</span> and there would be Marmaduke to convict -the imposture. Before his pupil woke, before the discovery was made, he -must disappear from Cambridge. Quietly and in haste he took down his -pupil’s clothes from the closet where they hung, and exchanged for them -his doctor’s robes. Then he descended his stairs and stepped out into -the cool shadows of the August morning. The porter was just opening the -gate. He nodded familiarly to young Dacre as he passed. That was the -last which any soul in Jesus College saw of Matthew Makepeace.</p> - -<p>Unless, indeed, it were that same Matthew Makepeace who, with the -homing instinct of a dying animal, crept back to Cambridge in poverty -and wretchedness, and died in widow Pearson’s house in 1654. In any -case the flagstone in the chapel transept told a lie: it was Marmaduke -Dacre that lay beneath it.</p> - -<p>One thing further I have to mention. When I first took down the -<i>Speculum</i> from its shelf in the college library I found it in -the same virgin condition in which it had lain on the table of Matthew -Makepeace on that fatal afternoon in August, 1604. No living soul had -disturbed its repose for over 300 years. It was evidently the same -copy: perhaps no other was ever issued. As I turned its pages a scrap -of paper fluttered to the floor. It had been torn from the bottom -corner of pages 273-4. On it was written in minute Greek letters an -inscription which I translate:</p> - -<p>“Demetrius Commagenus. All things are possible to him who knows and -wills with earnestness.”</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="Thankfull_Thomas">Thankfull Thomas</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_a2.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">A</span> passage in the lately edited <i>Diary of George Evans</i>, 1649-1658, -has called my attention to a singular and, I believe, unrecorded -episode in the history of Jesus College.</p> - -<p>With <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Evans himself the story is not concerned. It is sufficient -to say that he was appointed to a fellowship at Jesus in 1650 by the -Committee for Reforming the Universities, in place of an expelled -Presbyterian. He was, as his name suggests, a Welshman, of the county -of Radnor, and, of course, an Independent. He vacated his fellowship, -on his marriage, in 1654, and retired to the living of Marston Monceux, -co. Salop. He held the incumbency until his death, in 1672, having -conformed at the Restoration.</p> - -<p>The portion of his diary which has awaked my interest relates to the -date June 11, 1652. For its explanation it is necessary to state that -ten years previously, just before the outbreak of the Civil War, -the College had taken a quantity of its plate from the Treasury and -delivered it to a certain <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> John Poley, by him to be conveyed to His -Majesty, who was then at Nottingham. As the whole society was under -menace of expulsion before the end of 1642, they took the precaution, -before quitting the College, of concealing the rest of the plate, as -well as the chapel organ. This organ had been introduced in 1634 by -the Master, Richard Sterne, who was Archbishop Laud’s chaplain, and -had actively promoted his plans for the re-organisation of church -ritual in the University. It was a small chamber instrument, easily -transportable. When the new society, consisting of Presbyterians -introduced by the Earl of Manchester, entered the College in January, -1643, they noted in the Treasury Book that they could only discover -three pieces of plate. Entries in the Bursar’s Book in the year 1652 -record that the rest of the plate was discovered in that year, and at a -rather later date the organ was brought to light.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</span></p> - -<p>Some further notes respecting the Chapel in Commonwealth days will -serve to explain certain points in the history which I have been able -to unravel. The older of the two existing bells in the tower was cast -by Christopher Gray in 1659. It took the place of another which was -of pre-Reformation date and had probably served the Nunnery of Saint -Radegund. This was a heavy tenor bell, and had apparently belonged to a -set of four, named after the evangelists. It bore the emblem of Saint -Mark, a lion, and the inscription in ancient lettering—</p> - -<p class="poetry"> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><span class="antiqua">Celorvm Marce resonet tvvs ympnvs in Arce.</span></span><br> -</p> - -<p>This bell, for many years previous to 1652, had been disused owing to -the weakness of its frame and of the supporting floor.</p> - -<p>The passage, above referred to, in George Evans’ diary runs as follows:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“June 11 [1652]. Present yᵉ Master, <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Woodcocke and <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Machin, -fellows, with <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Thomas Buck, Thankfull Thomas and Robert Hitchcock -digging, we digged up yᵉ treasury plate hidd in yᵉ Masters orchard. -In all were seventeen peeces (then follows a list). Searched till -prayers. But Quaerendm whether there be not yit other peeces and yᵉ -treasure hidd by yᵉ former societie. Thomas saith <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Germyn cld -avouch for more.”</p> -</div> - -<p>On reading this extract, the name—for such it seemed to be—Thankfull -Thomas, at once arrested my attention. It reminded me of a partially -obliterated inscription on a flat gravestone which lies at the crossing -of the transepts, close to the south-west pier of the tower—that one -which is distinguished from the other piers by a dog-tooth moulding. -The letters are so worn by treading that they can only be distinguished -in certain lights, and indeed have altogether disappeared on the side -of the stone which is furthest from the pier-base. What remains is to -be read:—</p> - -<p class="poetry"><span class="antiqua">nkfull<br> -<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">mas</span></span><br> -</p> - -<p class="p0">followed by a date of which the figures <span class="antiqua">652</span> are legible.</p> - -<p>I have searched the Register of the College for such a name, but, -though it is complete for the years preceding 1652, I have been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</span> unable -to find it. But in the College Order Book I have found, among other -appointments of the year 1650, an entry, “Thomas constitutus est Custos -Templi.” From which it would seem that Thomas was the surname of the -Independent official corresponding to a verger or chapel-clerk. It is -singular that he should have been buried, among Masters and Fellows, in -such a conspicuous place in the Chapel.</p> - -<p>The discovery of the plate in the Master’s orchard—brought about -through the agency of <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Thomas Buck, of Catharine Hall, who was -one of the Esquire Bedells—was matter for disappointment as much -as congratulation to the Master and Fellows. They had a convinced -belief that a much larger quantity of treasure remained concealed in -some quarter of the College, and, as the passage in the diary shows, -Thankfull Thomas suggested that <abbr title="mister">Mr.</abbr> Germyn probably knew something of -the matter. Of him it is necessary to say a few words.</p> - -<p>Gervase Germyn, of the county of Huntingdon, was admitted to the -College in 1621, and in 1652 must have been a man of middle age. He -was a Master of Arts, unmarried, and resided in Cambridge. He was not -one of the expelled Fellows. He had acted as organist and choir-master -in the mastership of Richard Sterne, and was passionately devoted to -church music. After the removal of the organ and the installation of -the new Master and Fellows, in 1643, his connection with the College -ceased. He was miserably poor and supported himself by teaching music. -His small, spare figure was ordinarily dressed in a thread-bare garb of -semi-clerical appearance, and he had a quaintness of manner and speech -which induced the belief that he was not of ordinary sanity.</p> - -<p>Thankfull Thomas particularly disliked him. Gervase had a tone of -superiority in addressing him which was the more galling because what -he said was only remotely intelligible to the sexton; and he had a -disagreeable habit of meddling with what he considered to be the duties -and prerogatives of his office. Germyn must have possessed a key to the -Chapel, for he was constantly presenting himself there at unexpected -times, often late in the evening. He had a distracting habit of roaming -about the building, and, as Thomas<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</span> thought, spying on his actions from -unseen quarters. Thomas had seen him looking down on him from the Nuns’ -gallery in the north transept, or high up in the tower arcade.</p> - -<p>Thomas took note of these circumstances and kept his knowledge to -himself. His cupidity was aroused by the thought of the hidden -treasure, and he was perfectly convinced that the clue to its discovery -lay with Germyn. As it was useless to question him directly he resorted -to a system of counter-espial.</p> - -<p>His attention was particularly drawn to the Chapel tower, where he had -more than once detected Germyn’s presence. The arcaded storey beneath -the belfry is reached by a dark, winding stair in the wall at the -north-east angle of the north transept. The staircase emerges, at a -considerable height, on a Norman gallery, which, at the time of which -I am speaking, was not protected on the transept side by a railing. -Thomas was a timid man, and he made this alarming passage clutching -each pillar as he passed it. Then another stair in the tower pier led -up to the arcaded gallery, and there the inner communication stopped. A -door in the north arcade opened on the roof of the transept, from which -a dizzy ladder ascended to the belfry window. The ladder gave Thomas -pause. It was old, weather-worn and crazy, and, unless by the light -figure of Germyn, had perhaps never been scaled for a generation. The -silent belfry above, encompassed by wheeling jackdaws, was a terror -to his weak nerves. Even from the floor below he could see the gaping -rottenness of its rafters: so he let it alone.</p> - -<p>Secure on the Chapel floor he began his researches. In his vacant -moments he roamed about chancel, transepts and nave, beating the walls -and trampling the flags, if perchance he might light on some recess -wherein the treasure was contained. At first his curiosity was excited -by certain crosses graved on the nave floor. He did not know that they -marked the processional path of the Saint Radegund nuns. But he could -detect no sound of hollowness beneath them. Finally, he fastened his -mind on a large, unmarked stone, next the south-west pier of the tower. -Here, and in no other part of the Chapel, there was distinct evidence -that a vault of some kind existed. Above it the disused bell-rope was -attached to the pier.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</span></p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img013"> -<img src="images/013.jpg" class="w50" alt="Norman Gallery, North Transept"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>Norman Gallery, North Transept.</i></p> - -<p>Often, when the Chapel was closed after service hours, he scrutinised -this stone. It had no mark of recent disturbance, but in ten years it -was likely that any such indication had been obliterated. One summer -evening in 1652 he was so engaged, and kneeling on the stone, when he -was startled by the sudden falling of a shadow. He sprang to his feet -and beheld Gervase Germyn.</p> - -<p>“Good evening, friend,” said Germyn. “You work late. I was visiting -some old friends that lie under the stones here, having a word with -him or him that I have known, a remembered jest with one, a snatch of -old song with another—who knows what? And here are you at the like -business. And who, pray, is your friend?”</p> - -<p>“Master Germyn,” replied Thomas stiffly, “an idle man may talk to dead -men, if he will: a sexton has other business with them. How often am I -to bid you not to meddle in my affairs?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</span></p> - -<p>“You are very right,” said Germyn, “and now I perceive this is no man’s -grave—yet. Perhaps the sexton is looking to make it one. And which, -pray, of my friends, the new Fellows, has gone to his audit? Or is it -to be mine, perhaps, or thine: and I think it be thine indeed, for I -find thee lying on it. But you don’t know the Prince of Denmark: else -I should ask you the clown’s riddle, ‘What is he that builds stronger -than either the mason, the ship-wright, or the carpenter?’ It is a -pretty riddle to ask within walls that are five hundred years old.”</p> - -<p>“I make no graves,” answered Thomas, “and I have no time or patience -for your riddles. I only ask you to begone.”</p> - -<p>“Is the trade then so slack, friend Thomas, and is there none to give -the sexton employment?—none of all that dig for death as for hid -treasure, and some, perhaps, who dig for treasure and find death.”</p> - -<p>Thomas was startled at the hint that his purpose was detected. He -looked dubiously on the speaker, and the thought dawned on him that -perhaps Germyn was offering himself as a confederate. “Treasure,” he -said slowly; “yes, if you talk of treasure there is more sense in you -than I thought. I don’t know but what we might find it together; and -a poor man, such as you, might have his fair share, and none be the -wiser.”</p> - -<p>“You are wholly mistaken,” said Germyn, “if you think that I know -anything of the treasure that you are looking for: and, if I knew, God -forbid that I should rob the dead of their trust. No, let them keep it -until the day of restitution, when their friends claim it of them. You -are a bold man, Thomas, to think of the dead as if they had no sense of -what happens to-day. For my part, though we talk as old friends, I have -a dreadful awe of them: they can do so much, and I can’t hurt them, if -I would. It is a marvel to me that you can walk and work at such an -hour in a place that is so full of voices and presences. A holy man you -should be! Do you know how Goodman Deane, the last man who held your -office, died?”</p> - -<p>“They tell me he died distracted. But I don’t trouble myself with -fancies.”</p> - -<p>“It was in August, two years since. What had he seen?<span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</span> What had he -heard? They say that in his wanderings he often repeated ‘I should have -rung, I should have rung.’ And I think I see his meaning. It is an old -belief—God knows what of truth there is in it—that at the ringing of -the church bell the congregations of the dead break up and give place -to the living. Poor Deane! Mark could not speak for him: he has been -dumb these twenty years, though one day, please God, he will speak -again for his friends—of whom you are not one. And there is another -old fancy that belongs to this church, and perhaps had something to do -with Deane’s matter. It used to be told among the old society, that -are scattered or dead now, that the festival of the Name of Jesus was -a great day with the old dead folk. Each year at midnight on that day, -which is the seventh of August, they assemble—men or women, I know not -which—here in the church to observe the hour of Lauds. It was said -that you could hear them trooping down from their chambers outside by a -stair that does not exist, and they came through the church wall by a -door that is unseen. Then, each in order, they rank themselves on the -crosses that mark this pavement, and go round the church in darkness, -for they need no lights. Their singing has been often heard, but I do -not know that living eye has seen their procession, unless it were -Deane’s, and, it seems, he did not live long after.”</p> - -<p>“It is a curious fancy, truly,” said Thomas, “if one could credit it. -But I don’t know why you tell it me, as I never visit the church after -nightfall. And little as I believe your tale, I believe you less when -you tell me that you know nothing of this treasure. But I spoke of it -at a venture, and it is none of my business. So I leave you to your -ghosts.”</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>Thankfull Thomas was not courageous, but his fears were not of a -sentimental order. He was more than ever convinced that Germyn knew -the secret of the hidden treasure, and that his story was a device to -prevent him from continuing his search for it; and he had made up his -mind that it lay under the stone where Germyn had interrupted him. At -night he would be secure from his interference, and would have time to -lift the stone and replace it in such a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</span> manner as to leave no trace of -its disturbance. And as the date which Germyn had mentioned had passed -out of his mind, it so happened that August 7 was the night which he -chose for his enterprise.</p> - - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img014"> -<img src="images/014.jpg" class="w50" alt="South West Pier of Tower"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>South West Pier of Tower.</i></p> - - -<p>It was past eleven when he entered the church with lantern and tools. -The stone was heavy, and it took a considerable time to dislodge and -lift it. Beneath it he saw a vault, some five feet deep. He lowered his -lamp into it. Great was his disappointment to find it blankly empty. He -had so fastened his expectations on this particular spot that hardly -yet could he think himself mistaken. He let himself down into the vault -that he might explore for some recess in its walls or floor.</p> - -<p>He was still groping in semi-gloom when, above his head, he caught the -sound of quiet treading, and then a waft of strange music. He was too -unskilled to tell what the instrument might be, but the sound of it was -soft and pleasant. It rose, and died away, and rose again in fitful -strains. Then it went on in a continuous melody and was taken up by a -voice peculiarly sweet and clear—so clear that the words were plainly -distinguishable. “When the Lord turned again the captivity of Sion then -were we like unto them that dream.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</span></p> - -<p>Thomas listened in amazement till the psalm ended and silence returned. -Then he heard the shuffling of descending steps, and with a sudden -horror he remembered the story of the dead men’s staircase and the -phantom procession. He heard a door softly open in the dark transept, -and he sprang wildly to the bell-rope above his head. One frightful -clang: Mark spoke again after twenty years of silence: a rumble and -a roar: the heavy bell splintered itself on the floor beneath, and -Thankfull Thomas, in a pool of blood, lay in the grave of his own -making.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>In a corner of the belfry, where the floor was not broken by the -falling bell, they discovered the organ, which had been hidden there -since 1642.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>The Restoration brought back a few survivors of the expelled Society -of 1642, and with them Gervase Germyn. But in 1664 I find that George -Loosemore was master of the College choristers, and Germyn was dead. -At what precise date he died I cannot say. But one thing is known. -The Chapel, after long neglect and misappropriation, was repaired, -decorated and restored to Anglican usage about the year 1663. The -reconciliation of the Church was marked by a choral service, and Germyn -occupied his old seat at the organ. Among the psalms chosen for the -service was the 126th, <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">In convertendo captivitatem Sion</i>. The -singers had reached the last verse—“He that now goeth on his way -weeping and beareth forth good seed: shall doubtless come again with -joy and bring his sheaves with him.” There the organ accompaniment -faltered, failed, died, and left the choir to chant the <i>Gloria</i> -unassisted. The grey head of Gervase Germyn lay on the key-board, and -the College had to seek a new organist.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="The_Palladium">The Palladium</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_o2.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">On</span> an unspecified morning in the year 1026, in the reign of Cnut, king, -of happy memory, Aethelstan, abbat of Ramsey, delivered to the monks of -his Benedictine household, in chapter assembled, an address which had -notable consequences.</p> - -<p>The reverend father took as the text of his discourse the verse, -<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">in libro Regum tertio</i>, which in our Authorised Version is -expressed—Know ye not that Ramoth in Gilead is ours, and we be still, -and take it not out of the hand of the King of Syria?</p> - -<p>With the ghostly lessons to be drawn from this passage we need not -concern ourselves: indeed they were but lightly touched upon by the -abbat. He turned almost directly to practical matters.</p> - -<p>He dwelt feelingly on the palpable evidences of the poverty of their -household—the bell-tower of their church, which had fallen in sudden -ruin, and which the means of their household did not permit them -to rebuild: the indecent sordidness of their chapter-house, within -whose mud-built walls they were then assembled: the meagreness of the -monastic diet, of which his brethren were the last to complain, but -which reflected unfavourably on the coldness of Christian charity in -the laity of the neighbourhood. And incidentally he contrasted these -conditions with the splendour of the new temple, adorned with goodly -stones and gifts, which their beloved friends at Ely had erected since -the Danish wars had ended: the ephods of purple and scarlet affected -by the ministers in Saint Etheldreda’s church: and the proverbial -magnificence of Ely feasts.</p> - -<p>He asked himself the cause of this contrast, and with humility he -confessed that it lay in the remissness of himself and his venerable<span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</span> -predecessors in the abbatial seat of Ramsey. He commended to the -attention of his hearers a text, <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">in fine libri Josue</i>, in which -it was recorded that the children of Israel had brought up the bones -of Joseph with them from Egypt, and that the said bones had become -the inheritance of the children of Joseph: and he enlarged on the -advantages, pecuniary as well as spiritual, which undoubtedly rewarded -those children.</p> - -<p>What had Ramsey done to emulate an example so worthy? Nothing, or next -to nothing. At a cost relatively small they had, indeed, procured -from an ignorant rustic, who had dug them up at the town of Slepe, -some bones which competent authority declared to be those of the -Persian bishop, Saint Yvo. But, whether or not the cause lay in some -lack of orthodoxy in this oriental prelate, it must be confessed -that his remains had not been so miraculously effectual in procuring -the liberality of the laity as had been anticipated. He ventured to -suggest that the relics of a local saint might be more successful. He -casually drew their attention in this matter to the example of the holy -brethren of Ely. Not content with their heritage of the bones of Saint -Etheldreda and the virgins, her relatives, they had recently forcibly -detained and appropriated a consignment of the remains of Aednoth, -bishop of Dorchester, addressed to Ramsey Abbey and belonging of right -to it. While he did not defend the methods of their Ely brethren, he -must applaud their conspicuous and practical piety.</p> - -<p>The abbat deplored the circumstance that the vicinity of their abbey -had produced no saint of such eminent merits as to transmit to his -remains the powers that should evoke the faith and the funds so -necessary to their present needs. As an illustration of the spirit -which he would like to find among his own brethren he again invited -their attention to the religious activity of their friends at Ely, -who had despatched a naval and military force as far as Dereham, in -Norfolk, and with tumult of war had abstracted from the church there -the shrine and body of Saint Withburga, virgin. In fact the pious -solicitude of their friends had sometimes carried them to lengths -which, making the widest allowance for the purity of their motives, -the abbat could not regard as otherwise than regrettable. In the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</span> -recent Danish troubles the brethren of Saint Alban’s had committed to -the safe keeping of the Ely monks the shrine containing the relics of -the great Protomartyr of Britain. At the restoration of peace the Ely -people had, indeed, returned the chest, but they afterwards maintained -that they had substituted in it the remains of a less sacred person and -had kept Saint Alban in their church. The Saint Alban’s brotherhood -on their part asserted that, from a conscientious regard for the -sanctity of their trust, they had thought well not to part with the -veritable person of their tutelar saint, but to employ the pardonable -stratagem of enclosing an inferior substitute in the shrine despatched -to Ely. But the point in dispute was immaterial, inasmuch as the Ely -relics, to whomsoever they had originally appertained, had contributed -largely to the prosperity of that household, while the event proved -that the proprietary interests of Saint Alban’s had been in no degree -prejudiced. Blind Isaac bestowed the same blessing of earth’s fatness -on supplanting Jacob and on first-born Esau. Charity and prudence -alike dictated that, in the hearing of the giver, there should be no -contention between brotherly households about a birth-right which, for -all practical uses, each of them possessed in its integrity.</p> - -<p>To what did the abbat’s observations tend? At the obscure church of -Soham, Cambs., unworthy receptacle of so divine a treasure, rested -what had been mortal of Saint Felix, bishop and evangelist of the East -Angles. The bishop of the diocese in which Ramsey was situated, at -the abbat’s instance, had procured royal letters patent authorising -the Ramsey monks to transfer the sacred remains to their conventual -church. Far be it from him to suggest such violent courses as had, in -some measure, clouded the effulgent zeal of their Ely neighbours. The -Soham folk, if properly approached, would, no doubt, show themselves -compliant to the King’s will, and would be eager to collaborate in a -work so happily inspired. He requested the chapter to express its views -as to the proper methods of attaining their pious object of putting the -bell-tower in a condition of permanent stability.</p> - -<p>Prior Alfwin rose and, protesting veneration for his Superior, ventured -to offer some remarks which, he trusted, would not be regarded<span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</span> as -derogating from the respect due to the abbatial chair. Fraternal -affection had, in his opinion, betrayed the Lord Abbat into an estimate -of the character of the Ely people which was not warranted by the -facts. The prior regarded them as sons of Belial. By what instinct of -the Devil the holy father, Saint Aethelwold, had induced King Edgar to -endow their monastery with wealth so disproportioned to their merits -it was not for him to surmise. Among the estates so granted was the -manor of Soham. There could be no doubt that, if they got wind of the -proposed translation of their saint, the Soham men would fight. It -would ill become their sacred calling to employ the carnal weapons to -which the Ely brigands had resorted. “Let us rather,” said the prior, -“attain our ends by friendly gifts and such arts as are permissible to -our peaceful profession—wine, for instance, or beer.” The rest of the -prior’s observations were directed to a discussion of the properties of -poppy, mandragora and other soporific herbs.</p> - -<p>After general discussion it was agreed that a letter should be -despatched to the reeve of Soham, announcing the intention of the abbat -and prior of paying their observance at the shrine of Saint Felix on -an appointed day: that the abbey boat-carls should be in attendance to -convey those officials thither from Erith hithe in the household barge: -and that the cellarer should make such provision for the entertainment -of the residents in Soham as might seem to his prudence expedient.</p> - -<p>Brother Brihtmer, lately professed, added the observation that he knew -a man or two—servants or tenants of the Abbey—Oswi, the miller, for -instance, who carried off the ram for wrestling at Bury fair. With a -few such at Erith he thought that he might be trusted to discuss the -situation with the Ely men, if they got so far. He would also provide -ten stout carls to row the barge from Erith to Soham and to undertake -what else might be required of them at the latter place.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>It was a notable day in the annals of the little town of Soham when the -Ramsey barge, propelled by ten rowers, five a side, clad in the abbey -uniform of bare arms and legs and a loose gown of green<span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</span> falding, was -sighted on the far side of Soham mere. Quite a considerable throng of -the principal inhabitants watched it from the wooden jetty, to which -were moored the cobbles of the Soham fishermen. The reeve, in a murrey -coat and blue hood, was an important figure in the group, and was -accompanied by a select party of the leading sokemen. The local clergy -were in attendance with a hastily improvised band of thurifers and -choristers. These, with some of the better class of artificers, smiled -with conscious importance, as specially nominated guests at the feast -which the Ramsey monks brought with them for their entertainment in the -parish gild-hall. The rest of the crowd, consisting of mariners and -farm churls, were curious rather than enthusiastic, and more suspicious -than curious: for Ramsey is far from Soham, and ancient adage told -them that <i>fýnd synt feorbúend</i>—far-dwellers are enemies. At -the first landing of the venerable passengers a temporary disturbance -was caused by Grim, the fisherman of Ely monastery, who provocatively -bit his thumb at the starboard bow oar of the abbat’s crew. When this -difference had been adjusted by the intervention of the district -hundred-man the procession was started for the church. At the tail of -it, behind the boat-carls, stalked a black-avised monk of Ely, Peter by -name, who pointedly withdrew from an official part in the ceremonies.</p> - -<p>The banquet in the gild-hall was altogether a splendid affair. In the -whole of their official experience the reeve, the hundred-man, and the -local clergy had never received so warm a welcome or participated in -such royal cheer. No thin English vintage this that was passed to them -in the loving cup, fresh from dignified and consecrated lips, but rich -old wine, warmed by Greek suns and cooled in the caverns of Ramsey -cellars. The cottars who were admitted at the lower board had never -known what it was to have so much ale, and so good, as the monastic -vats supplied. Brother Peter of Ely looked on from the door, but took -no part in the entertainment. He remarked that the Ramsey dignitaries -were modest drinkers, and that the boat-carls looked at their blisters -and passed the can to their Soham neighbours with the merest pretence -of absorption.</p> - -<p>As the liquor in the wassail bowls ebbed a gradual silence crept<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</span> on -the festal party. One after other, official and reverend heads declined -upon the board: rustic bodies dropped from their benches on the floor, -and stertorous slumber filled the hall. Only the abbat and prior sat -erect and looked about them with ferret eyes, and the boat-carls spat -on their hands and inspected their blisters. Brother Peter withdrew to -the mere-strand, and by the lapping waters mused on the weakness of -human heads and the shocking aspect of intemperance in which one has -not participated.</p> - -<p>What is this spectacle which presents itself to Brother Peter, -meditative on the muddy margin of Soham mere, at the grey hour when -country cocks do crow and bells do toll? A procession, silent but -solid, actual not ghostly, of ten men bearing a coffer strung upon -poles. Two dignified figures, their heads wrapt from the raw air in -their hoods, bring up the rear. So our friends are making an early and -unannounced departure! This is no time to ask the wherefore. Brother -Peter tucks up his frock and runs his fleetest to the church. When he -looks back from the porch he sees a vessel launched on the shimmering -lake, with a broadening track of broken water in its wake.</p> - -<p>The abbat and his men are two miles away over the mere when a strange -clamour reaches their ears. Horns are blown; a church bell clangs; -cries of “Haro” echo over the water; lights flash upon the strand. The -boat-carls rest upon their oars; the abbat smiles; the prior chuckles. -“Two miles: impossible!” says he; “and, as lay-brother Oswald was so -prudent as to hide the oars of the Ely boat in the church tower, they -won’t get started in a hurry.”</p> - -<p>The prior sits in the sternage and directs the vessel’s course. Between -him and the abbat Saint Felix reposes in his box. As they quit the mere -and enter the narrow channel which connects it with the Ouse the abbat -suggests a psalm and raises <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Jubilate Deo</i>. The bow oars respond -with a three-man glee in the fen-men’s fashion.</p> - -<p>Sleeping Barway they pass, well out of hearing of their pursuers, and -then they take the right hand fork of the river, and follow the Ouse -stream which we now call the West River. Here they find themselves in -a maze of willow-fringed islets and wandering channels which quit and -re-enter the main stream. The sopping, gurgling<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</span> freshets that drain -the shallow meres on either hand, as the tidal waters drop, warn them -of the perils of a divergence from the river’s course. But prior Alfwin -knows what he is about, and holds on in the channel that in ten miles -will bring them to Erith bank. Nevertheless their transit, impeded by -snags and shallows and fallen trees, is of necessity slow. Under such -circumstances one must think it an unwarranted security that induced -some of the boat-carls to open a spare beer jar and beguile their toil -with ill-timed refreshment. Three comatose bodies under the thwarts -impose a severe addition of labour on the more self-respecting members -of the crew.</p> - -<p>It is the hour of prime, and alas! brother Alfwin, where are we now? -Indubitably we are stuck in the mud, and the water is falling. We -land on soggy banks, and with labour the boat-carls lift and pole the -barge into deeper waters. The operation is repeated several times. -Faint cries of “Haro” are borne by the breeze over the fens, and the -Lord Abbat shudders with cold and fright. Praised be the saints, at -last we are back in the main stream. But what is this? Is not this the -identical snag on which we nearly wrecked ourselves the best part of -an hour ago? <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Deus in adjutorium!</i> Here is the black prow of the -Ely barge rounding the corner, not a hundred yards away, and Monk Peter -stands in the bows, raucously shouting and shaking his fist at us! -Half-naked figures start up out of the fen and run, hopping from tuft -to tuft, on the bank, cheering and waving as they run—friends, foes, -or simple spectators, who knows?</p> - -<p>The long sweeps of the boat-carls churn the water into oozy froth as -they bend themselves with frenzied energy to their task. Foot by foot -the Ely men gain upon their predecessors. The game is up unless, as the -stroke oars suggest, they lighten ship by heaving Saint Felix into the -river. Rather a muddy death than so! Courage! We are less than a mile -from Erith.</p> - -<p>Lauded be the good Saint Felix, who miraculously interposes for our -salvation from the jaws of destruction. Sudden, mysterious, a blanket -of white fog rises from the fens and envelopes the river banks. -Blotted out are the runners: they cry and wave no more. The Ely prow -is swallowed up in vacuous whiteness: the swish of the Ely oars is -silenced, and Monk Peter’s voice is raised in objurgation.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</span> They have -run upon that willow that grows aslant the brook, and it is to be -doubted that their bows are staved in. Were it not a Christian act to -hail them with a loud <i>Benedicite</i> in parting? And here is Erith -strand and Brother Brihtmer and the Ramsey men. Brother Alfwin, it will -be proper for you to give direction to the kitchener for a suitable -congratulation for the brethren at supper to-night. To-morrow we will -deliberate on the matter of the bell-tower.</p> - -<p>“Candid reader,” says the Ramsey chronicler, “this is a queer tale. -The authority for it is ancient but shaky—<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">fluctuans veterum nobis -tradidit relatio</i>. I by no means require you to believe it, provided -only that in any case you have unhesitating faith that the relics of -Saint Felix were translated from the aforesaid town of Soham to Ramsey -church, and that there the saint confers inestimable benefits on his -worshippers.” Ramsey abbey is gone: the shrine of Saint Felix is gone. -The tale of the boat race remains. I ask you to believe it, if you can.</p> - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img015"> -<img src="images/015.jpg" class="w50" alt="In the Fens"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>In the Fens.</i></p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop"> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="The_Sacrist_of_Saint_Radegund">The Sacrist of Saint Radegund</h2> -</div> - - -<div> - <img class="drop-cap" src="images/dc_o3.jpg" width="100" height="113" alt=""> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="upper-case">On</span> a certain day in mid June in the year 1431 the tolling of the bell -in <abbr title="saint">St.</abbr> Radegund’s church tower announced to the neighbours of the -Priory that a nun was to be buried that day.</p> - -<p>In an interval between church services the nuns wander in the garden, -which is also the graveyard of St Radegund’s, and lies sequestered -next the chancel walls. To-day they are drawn thither by a new-made -empty grave; for a funeral is a mildly exciting incident in conventual -routine. But three sisters sit in the cloister on the stone bench next -the chapter door. Also a small novice is curled up on the paved floor -with her back against the bench. The day is warm, and the church wall -casts a grateful shadow where they sit. And, because labour and silence -are enjoined in the cloister, they rest, and two of them gossip, and -Agnes Senclowe, the novice, listens and lays to heart.</p> - -<p>The two who gossip are Joan Sudbury, succentrix, and Elizabeth Daveys, -who is older than Joan, and holds no office in the monastery. With them -sits, and half dozes, Emma Denton, who is very old and very infirm. She -does not gossip, for she has hardly spoken a word of sense these forty -years past. She is a heavy affliction to the cloister society. She -lives mainly in the infirmary, and does not attend church. She knows -when it is the hour for a meal, and she knows very little else. If she -speaks an intelligible word, it is about something that happened forty -years ago. She remembers the great pestilence in 1390.</p> - -<p>What ailed poor sister Emma to bring her to this sad pass? When she -was young she was something of a religious enthusiast, and because -enthusiasm was rare in the cloister, she was promoted by her sisters to -high station. When they made her Sacrist she had her one and dearest -wish. To have the charge of the beautiful<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</span> church, of the books, -vestments and jewels of the sanctuary, to live in the holy place, -with holy thoughts for companions, and in the unfailing round of holy -duties—was not that a happy lot? Dignified too the office was; for in -the little cloister world the Prioress herself was scarcely a greater -lady than the Sacrist. The Sacrist did not sleep with the other nuns in -the dormitory; her constant duties did not allow her ordinarily to take -her meals in the refectory. Like the Prioress, she had her own servant -to attend her, her own house to dwell in. Her habitation was built -against the northern chancel wall, and consisted of two chambers. From -the upper room, through a hole pierced in the wall, she watched the -never-dying light that hung before the High Altar.</p> - -<p>But it was not good to be Sacrist for long. The unvarying routine of -duty produces torpidity; holy thoughts uncommunicated end in cessation -of thought; the solitude was deadly. The office was not coveted by the -sisterhood, and was seldom held for more than a year or two together. -Wherefore they rejoiced when Emma Denton held it for nine years. For -nine years she trimmed the sacred lamp. During nine years her own light -dwindled out, and at last the world became dark to sister Emma.</p> - -<p>The crazy belfry rocked with the swaying of the bell, which, being -cracked, was doubly dolorous. The sound of it roused old sister Emma -to a dim consciousness of what was passing, and she spoke to nobody in -particular.</p> - -<p>“The bell,” she said, “the bell again! Last week it tolled, and we -buried two. Now there are two more in the dead-house.”</p> - -<p>“The saints protect us!” said sister Joan; “she is at her old talk of -the pestilence year.”</p> - -<p>“It was Assumption Day,” continued the old nun, “when we buried them. -We had no Mass that day. To-day it is the cellaress and sister Margery -Cailly—God pardon her for a sinful woman. No; Margery is sick, not -dead; and I forget, I forget.”</p> - -<p>“Margery Cailly,” cried Joan Sudbury, “what quoth she of Margery -Cailly, that goes to her grave to-day? Margery Cailly, that has been -our most religious Sacrist ever since yonder poor thing fell beside her -wits.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</span></p> - -<p>“Religious you may call her,” said Elizabeth Daveys, “but God knows, -and sister Emma knows, that of her which we know not. Thirty years have -I lived in St Radegund’s, and I remember not the time when any but -Margery was our Sacrist, and well I know that the sacristy has been her -prison all those days. But I have heard sister Emma say in her dull way -that Margery once knew the convent prison too.”</p> - -<p>“Well, twelve years I have spent here, and never had speech with the -Sacrist. Once I was alone in the church when it was dark, and the -daylight only lingered aloft in the roof, and of a sudden I lighted on -her in the chancel, busied in her office. Her pale face in her black -hood showed like a spirit’s, and I thought it was the blessed Radegund -that had come down from her window, and I was horribly afraid.”</p> - -<p>“I think that from the sacristy window her eye followed me about the -garden as I walked there,” said Elizabeth. “It follows me still, and it -makes my flesh creep. What good woman would shun her sisters so? Heaven -rest her soul, for be sure she has much to answer for. If she has -confessed herself, it is not to our confessor or the Prioress, for I -think she has hardly spoken these many years to any but Alice Portress -that waits on her.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, Alice was with her at the end. It was Alice that dug the grave; -Alice rings the knell; Alice laid her out in her Sacrist’s chamber, and -she has placed two white roses on the dead woman’s breast.”</p> - -<p>“Roses?” said Elizabeth Daveys; “roses are not for dead nuns. Whence -got she roses?”</p> - -<p>“That I can tell you,” said the novice, glad to take her part in -the conversation, “for Alice told me herself. She got them from the -churchyard of St Peter’s on the hill.”</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>The office for the dead was said, the empty grave was filled, and Alice -the Portress was closeted with the Prioress.</p> - -<p>“To you, lady Prioress—not to the Nuns in Chapter—I confess the sin -of my youth; not to them, nor yet to you while sister Margery lived. -She is gone, and why should I remain? Forty years we<span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</span> shared the -secret. She is past censure or forgiveness. On me let the blame rest. I -ask no pardon, but only to be dismissed from the house of St Radegund, -that I have so unworthily served.</p> - - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img016"> -<img src="images/016.jpg" class="w50" alt="Entrance to Chapter House"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>Entrance to Chapter House.</i></p> - -<p>“There is none but myself and poor sister Emma that remembers St -Radegund’s before the pestilence year. I was but a child then, and my -mother was Portress before me. My mother often brought me to the lodge, -and I used to play with the novices, or sit at the gate when my mother -was away. Margery had but lately come to St Radegund’s—seventeen, -perhaps, or eighteen years of age she was. Hers was a proud family—the -Caillys of Trumpington, and they were<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</span> rich, and good to St Radegund’s. -They are gone and forgotten now, but often have I heard old Thomas -Key tell of them, for he was a Trumpington man, and he knew the De -Freviles of Shelford too. There are De Freviles at Shelford yet, but I -think that none there remembers young Nicholas De Frevile that was Sir -Robert’s son.</p> - -<p>“I had a child’s thought—that Margery was the most beautiful creature -in the wide world—most beautiful and best. And because she was young -and fair and gracious in speech even our hard sisters loved her, and -thought it pity of the world when her fair tresses were shorn and she -took the ugly veil. For Margery was not religious. God pardon me for -my sinful words, but I think she was meant for better things than -religion and a cloister. And though she was good and kind to all, -Margery did not take to our sisters. There was some trouble—I know -not what, for she never told—and for some family reason she was sent -to St Radegund’s, and ill she liked it. So she went about her work in -cloister and church, grieving; and there was talk of her among the -sisters. Some thought, some said, that they knew, but Margery said -nothing.</p> - -<p>“It is all forgotten now, for the pestilence wiped out the memory of -those days. Scarcely twelve months had gone since she took the veil -when Margery Cailly disappeared from the Priory. You may think what -babble of tongues there was in our parlour—how they who were wisest -had always known how it would be, and the rest rebuked them for not -telling them beforehand. And so for another twelvemonth she was lost to -us, and some sisters, who were kind, hoped that she would come back, -and some who were kinder, hoped she would not.</p> - -<p>“Then, one day in the year before the pestilence, comes an apparitor -with our lost Margery, and a letter to the Prioress from the Lord -Bishop of Ely. The letter is to say that the Archbishop of Canterbury, -in his visitation of Lincoln diocese, has found Margery there, living -a secular life; and because secular life is sin to those who have -entered the religious order, he commits her to his brother of Ely, in -order that the lost sheep may be restored to the fold where she was -professed. And his Lordship of Ely—Heaven help<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</span> him for a blundering -bachelor!—directs that she shall be committed to the convent -prison-house until she repents of her wickedness, and when she is -loosed from it, shall make public confession in Chapter, and implore -the pardon of the sisters for her enormities.</p> - -<p>“Our Prioress was kinder to Margery than the Bishop meant—who -could not be kind to her? Her prison life was no longer than would -satisfy the Bishop’s enquiries, and as for the confession in the -Chapter-house—it never happened. There were some, though they liked -not confession for themselves, who thought an opportunity was missed, -and blamed the Prioress; for cloister talk is dull if we know not one -another’s failings. Still, the sisters were kind to Margery, and very -kind when they wanted to get the secret from her. But she said never -a word about it, unless it were to the Prioress. Beautiful she was -as ever, but grief and humiliation were on her, heavy as death, and -because she confided in none, she lost the friendship of the sisters. -To me, who was but a child, she would talk, but scarcely to another, -and her talk with me was never about herself.</p> - -<p>“One other there was with whom sometimes she had speech, and that was -old Thomas Key, maltster and trusty servant in general matters of the -Priory. Him she had known in happier days when he was a tenant of the -Caillys at Trumpington. Her family was too proud and too pious to -remember the disgraced nun, and they never visited her; but from Thomas -she learnt something of home and the outside world.</p> - -<p>“Then came the dreadful year when the pestilence raged in Cambridge -town. The nuns had been used to get leave from the Prioress to go out -into the town, but there was no gadding now. The gate was closely -barred, and none were admitted from outside except Thomas Key. We -carried the Host in procession about the Nuns’ Croft and—laud be to -the saints!—it protected our precincts from the contagion. And while -the sinful world without died like the beasts that perish, we sat -secure, but frightened, in our cloister, and blessed our glorious saint -for extending the protection of her prayers over the pious few who did -her service in St Radegund’s.</p> - -<p>“You have heard how the parish clergy died that year. One,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</span> two, -sometimes three died in one parish, and the Bishop found it hard to -provide successors. Boys that had barely taken the tonsure a week -before were sent in haste to anoint the sick and bury the dead in -places where the plague had left an unshepherded flock. Sir John Dekyn, -priest of St Peter’s church on the hill, was one that died, and his -successor did not live a fortnight after him. Then we heard from Thomas -Key that a mere youth had taken the place, one Sir Nicholas of the -Shelford De Frevile family, who had but lately been ordered priest at -Ely. And we were told that he worked with a feverous zeal among the -poor, the sick, and the dying of his parish.</p> - - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img017"> -<img src="images/017.jpg" class="w50" alt="The Chancel Squint"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption"><i>The Chancel Squint.</i></p> - -<p>“Now when this news was brought to sister Margery by Thomas Key, it -was to her as a summons from death to life. Her eye brightened and -her cheek glowed when she heard of the heroic goodness of this young -priest. While the sisters shuddered and shrank at each morning’s fatal -news, she was consumed with a passionate desire to know what was -passing in the plague-stricken town, and she plied my mother and Thomas -Key with incessant questionings. ‘Who was sick of the townsfolk? Were -any of the clergy visited? How went it with the poor in St Peter’s, -where the pestilence was hottest?’ For some weeks she heard that the -light burned still at night in St Peter’s parsonage, and that the -priest was unscathed, incessant in his ministrations and blessed by his -parishioners. And it seemed as though the sickness was abating.</p> - -<p>“Then, late one afternoon in early August, there came a call for -Margery. Thomas Key brought it, and whether it was his own tidings, or -a message from some other, I cannot say; Margery never told me. But -this I know, that she took me apart in the cloister<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</span> and spoke to me, -and she was terribly moved and her voice was choked. ‘Little Alice,’ -she said, ‘as you love me, get me the gate-key after Lauds to-night. -It is life or death to me to go out into the town. Only do it, and say -nothing—no, not to your mother.’ Young as I was, I knew how the nuns -were used to humour my mother into letting them pass the gate; but that -was in day-time. At night, in our besieged state, with the death-bells -tolling all around, it seemed a terrible thing to venture. But I asked -no questions. Say it was the recklessness of a girl—say it was the -love that I bore to Margery. I stole the key and gave it to her after -sundown.</p> - -<p>“What happened afterwards I will tell you as it was told to me by -Thomas Key, who waited for her outside the gate. They passed along the -dark, deserted streets. The plague-fires burnt low in the middle of the -roadway, but there were none to tend them, and no living thing they saw -but the starving dogs, herded at barred doors. They crossed the bridge -and mounted to St Peter’s church. The priest’s manse—you know it—is a -low house next the church. A white rose, still in flower, clambered on -its walls, and, half hidden by its sprays, a taper gleamed through the -open window; but there was no sound of life within. They pushed open -the door and entered.</p> - -<p>“Stretched on his pallet, forsaken and untended, lay the young priest -of St Peter’s, the pangs of death upon him. Margery threw herself on -her knees by his bed-side, and Thomas watched and waited. For a time -there was silence, for Margery had no voice to pray. Only at times the -dying man grumbled and wandered in his talk; but little he said that -Thomas understood.</p> - -<p>“Then after a long time, he stirred himself uneasily and uttered one -word, ‘Margery.’ And she—alas the day!—put out her arm and laid it on -his shoulder. In an instant the dying man half raised himself on his -bed and turned his eyes on her, and there was recognition in them. And -one arm he threw about her neck, and felt blindly for the fair locks -that had been shorn long since, and he said heavily and painfully, -‘Margery, <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">belle amie</i>, let us go to the pool above the mill, -where the great pike lie, and sun and shadow lie on the deep water.’ -So Thomas knew that they were boy and girl again by the old mill at -Trumpington.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</span></p> - -<p>“That was all, and the end came soon. They two laid him decently -beneath his white sheet, and Margery plucked two white roses from the -spray that straggled across his window, and laid them on the dead man’s -breast. So they left him, with the candle still burning out into the -dark.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>“There was a horrible dread in St Radegund’s when, four days later, -sister Margery sickened of the pestilence; and it was worse when we -learnt soon after that Thomas Key was visited—then that he was dead. -That was the beginning of our sorrows. You have heard, Lady Prioress, -how three sisters died before August was out, how most of the others -deserted the house, and some never returned to it. Our prayers were -unheard, and to us who remained it seemed as if the saints slept, or -God were dead.</p> - -<p>“So it happened that when the plague abated, and the first meeting -was held in St Radegund’s Chapter-house, about St Luke’s day in the -autumn, there were only three to attend it—the Prioress, the Sacrist -(Emma Denton), and Margery Cailly. For—wonderful it seems—Margery, -who least needed to live, was the one spared of those who were taken -with the pestilence. Presently some old sisters returned, and new -ones took the place of the departed. But the sword of the pestilence -cut off the memory of the old days, and the sins and sufferings, the -virtues and the victories of the former sisterhood were a forgotten -dream when the cloister filled again. So when Emma Denton passed into -her lethargy, and Margery Cailly earnestly petitioned to fill her place -in the Sacristy, there was not a sister to question her character and -devoutness.</p> - -<p>“Not yesterday, but forty years ago, Margery Cailly passed out of life; -for you know that, save to me, she has spoken few words since. And -though I have waited on her for most of those years she never breathed -to me the name of Nicholas De Frevile, never hinted at the story of her -unhappy girlhood. But once in the springtime, just after she entered -her Sacrist prison-house, she entreated me to plant a white rose-bush -on the grave of the young priest of St Peter’s. I did so, and have -renewed it since, and one day, by your grace, I shall plant a spray -of the same roses where<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</span> she lies apart from him. I have confessed my -wrong in stealing the key and bringing death into the cloister. If -you can forgive me, so; if not, all I ask is that you let your sinful -servant depart in peace.”</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>There is a curious aperture in the outer northern wall of the chancel -of the nuns’ church which is now Jesus College Chapel. If it is -examined its purpose is evident. It was the lychnoscope, through which -the Sacrist watched by night the light before the High Altar. It is the -sole abiding memorial of Margery Cailly, Sacrist of St Radegund.</p> - - -<p class="center p2"><span class="figcenter" id="img018"> -<img src="images/018.jpg" class="w10" alt="Prosperum iter facias"> -</span></p> -<p class="center caption">Prosperum iter facias</p> - - - - - -<p class="center p4"><span class="smcap">Printed by</span><br> -<span class="smcap">W. Heffer & Sons Ltd.</span><br> -<span class="smcap">104, Hills Road,</span><br> -<span class="smcap">Cambridge, England.</span> -<br> -</p> - -<hr class="x-ebookmaker-drop chap"> -<div class="chapter transnote"> - -<p>Transcriber’s Notes</p> - -<p>Errors in punctuation have been fixed.</p> - -<p><a href="#Page_63">Page 63</a>: “My heart bleed” changed to “My heart bleeds”</p> - -<p><a href="#Page_78">Page 78</a>: “pardonable strategem” changed to “pardonable stratagem”</p> - -<p><a href="#Page_86">Page 86</a>: “I thing she” changed to “I think she”</p> - -</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TEDIOUS BRIEF TALES OF GRANTA AND GRAMARYE ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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