We may not want time arrive, and

learned scholars. He has abundance; he is generous. When did a Paston ask Richard Calle for aid that his hand was not open? his help just now; but if the assuredly it may be not far off, that hand would be again stretched out for succour. Come Richard. Calle of gentle or simple, I heed not; he is my own true man, and to him is my faith plighted, for ever and aye."

"Twice in a day, and had her head broke in several places," grumbles the ancient dame.

"Mistress Margery," responds the priest, "you must take your own course. But this is not now a matter for daughter and mother to settle between them. It must before the Lord Bishop. In the name of Holy Church, I prohibit all intercourse by message or letter between Richard Calle and yourself. You must be in strict durance for a short season; and then a higher than us shall decide, contract or no contract. Heaven forfend that I, or any servant of the altar, should let matrimony." "My child, go to your chamber," whispers the subdued mother.

The Michaelmas of 1469 is nearly come. Margery Paston is still in durance at her mother's house. Every art has been tried to make her deny the betrothal. The priest has worked upon the fears of the mother-the daughter has been studiously kept from her presence. But this state of things cannot abide. Dame Margaret thus writes to Sir John

Paston: "I greet you well, and send you God's blessing and mine; letting you weet that on Thursday last was, my mother and I were with my Lord of Norwich, and desired him that he would no more do in the matter touching your sister till that ye, and my brother, and others, that were executors to your father, might be here together, for they had the rule of her as well as I; and he said plainly that he had been required so often to examine her, that he might not, nor would, no longer delay it; and charged me, in pain of cursing, that she should not be deferred, but that she should appear before him the next day. And I said plainly that I would neither bring her nor send her. And then he said that he would send for her himself, and charged that she should be at her liberty to come when he sent for her."

On the next day-it is a Friday-Margery Paston is brought into the Bishop's Court. There, surrounded with the panoply of the Church, sits old Walter Lyhart-he that built the roof of the nave, and the screen, of Norwich Cathedral. The maiden trembles, but her spirit remains unbroken. The bishop puts her in remembrance how she was born,-what kin and friends she has-" And ye shall have more, young lady, if ye will be ruled and guided after them. But if ye will not, what rebuke, and loss, and shame will be yours? They will evermore forsake you, for any good, or help, or comfort that ye shall have of them. Be well advised. I have heard say that ye love one

that your friends are not well pleased that ye should love. Be advised-be right well advised." "I am the betrothed wife of Richard Calle. I must cleave to him for better for worse.'

"Rehearse to me what you said to him. Let me understand if it makes matrimony?"

"We have plighted our troth-we are handfasted. How can I repeat the words? Richard said Oh, my lord spare me. I am bound in my conscience, whatsoever the words were. If the very words make not sure, make it, I beseech you, surer ere I go hence."

And then the bishop dismisses the maiden with many frowns.

Richard Calle is summoned. He briefly tells the time and place where the vows were exchanged. The bishop is bewildered. He scarcely dare hesitate to confirm the marriage. But the subtle priest is at his side, and he whispers the fearful word of "Lollardie." Then the bishop hastily breaks up the court, and says, "That he supposed there should be found other things against him that might cause the letting the marriage; and therefore he would not be too hasty to give sentence."

Margery Paston stands again upon her mother's threshold. The aged servant is weeping as he opens the door: "Oh, my dear young mistress! I am commanded to shut this gate against you." The figure of Sir James Gloys looms darkly in the hall. "Begone, mistress!" he exclaims. I will go to my grandmother," sobs out the poor girl,

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"Your grandmother banishes you for ever from her presence," retorts the churlish priest.

It is night. The pride and the purity of the unhappy Margery forbid her to seek the protection of her Richard. She has been watched. Exhausted and heart-broken, she gladly accepts the shelter which Roger Best offers her. That shelter becomes her prison.

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Here closes the record. But what a succession of Shadows is called up by the endorsement of the letter which tells of these sorrows: They were after married together." The contract could not be dissolved.

The Pastons can struggle no longer. Caister is yielded to the Duke of Norfolk—" for lack of victuals, lack of gunpowder; men's hearts failing, and no surety of rescue." Thus writes John of Gelston. His troubles are not yet over; for the great Duke harasses him with an appeal of murder, from the widows of two men that had been killed at the assault of the castle. But John contrives to quiet the widows, and very shortly is a favourite in the Duke's castle at Framlingham. A very singular world that of England in the fifteenth century— men, and women too, fighting to the death for house and land one day, and, when the matter is settled, lovingly embracing, the victor and the vanquished, till a new dispute sets them fighting again.

In this interval of family peace, John the younger has some important matters of his own to

attend to. He has failed in a love adventure with Mistress Alice Boleyn; and so his brother is negotiating for him with Mistress Katharine Dudley. The times are unquiet; and this wooing does not prosper. For John has been at the battle of Barnet, and "is hurt with an arrow in his right arm beneath the elbow." But Margaret the Queen is landed in the west, and the Pastons, who have ever been Lancastrians, have still their hopes. John is in a bad plight after the victory of Edward: "Now, I have neither meat, drink, clothes, leechcraft, nor money, but upon borrowing; and I have essayed my friends so far that they begin to fail now in my greatest need." Up to the last, however, John is looking for "tidings." They come; for the battle of Tewkesbury has been fought, and the game is up. It is pleasant to learn that this rash Paston escapes very easily; for in a fortnight after the final struggle, "Sir Thomas Wingfield sent for me, and let me know that the king had signed my bill of pardon." Out of the battle-field these Yorkists and Lancastrians were not a sanguinary race. When their passions were high, and their harness on, they fought without flinching—a very brave pitiless race. They did their work effectually; but that done, and a head or two upon London bridge, the lords went quietly back to their castles and the tenants to their ploughs. The world would go on in its own way, though Warwick the king-maker had fought his last fight. And so John Paston, even amidst his tribulation, writes