Something, if I remember me," replied his friend, " was said touching a sudden illness wherewith he was seized. But most men deem that he rather held himself excused, because he would have nought to do with sitting in judgment on the Archbishop, whom he holdeth in great veneration."

"For my own part," said Tracy, so soon as this matter is settled I shall journey to Canterbury, to set in order my own matters there. But now let us follow the rest, and see how the King receiveth the news of Becket's audacity."

CHAPTER V.

Ir was the tenth night after these events that Eadwith, the wife of Stigand, a serf on the estate of the See of Winchester, in a wild and unfrequented part of Surrey, was watching, in her wretched hovel, the feverish slumbers of her baby. It was a wild night in the beginning of November: the wind swept across the common, driving sheets of rain before it; sometimes rushing and roaring in the old oak wood on the hill above the house; sometimes growling and grappling like a wild beast in the roof itself; and sometimes shaking the ill-hung door, as if it would tear it from the hinges. Stigand was gone to seek the parish priest, fearing the baby would not overlive the night, and determined that it should not depart without the Holy Sacrament of Baptism. On the wood-fire a cake of dough was baking, and an ill-looking wiry-haired cur lay on the sheep's skin, which served as a rug. Suddenly

the dog started to its feet, and pricking up its ears began to bark violently.

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'Down, Odin ! quiet, cur!" said the poor mother. "Oh, my baby, that wretched beast has awaked you!"

While she vainly tried to hush the baby, the dog flew to the door, and scented eagerly at its sill; and at the same time a heavy hand was heard shaking the upper panel, and a voice, half-drowned by the wind, seemed to be demanding admittance.

"S. Edmund, S. Erkenwald, S. Ethelred, S. Alphege!" said the woman, stringing together her Saxon saints;" "S. Oswald, S. Wulfstan, S. Chad, S. Alkmund, S. Wilfred, preserve us!" And then in a voice that trembled with terror, she demanded who was there.

Open the door for our Lady's love!" said the voice: "here be two poor monks have perished with the rain and cold! Open the door to the friendless, and the benison of S. Giles be upon you."

"If you be robbers," answered Eadwith, "I cannot keep you out; and if you be honest men, welcome! Lie down, Odin!" she continued, opening the door.

The fierce wind drove a raindrift in at the open door, as two men, drenched from head to foot, but vested as Benedictine monks, entered. It was shut to again, and fastened with the oak bar. The wanderers gladly hung over the fire, spreading out their

hands to catch its heat: Eadwith threw on fresh logs; and the bright red glare of the burning wood danced on the rude logwalls, shewing at one corner a rude bed of sheepskins, a mud floor, a pitched roof, from the windbeam of which hung a crossbow and pruning-knife. A hole was broken through it, at which the smoke found a vent, except when it preferred eddying down into the house. A kind of shelf held a bundle of rushes for light, and a few quarrels for the cross-bow. Over the fire hung a side of bacon; from which the goodwife, being now certified of the character of her visitors, cut some savoury rashers, and set them on to broil, at the same time giving the cake another turn.

"Now our Lady be praised for this shelter!" said the elder of the travellers; "and poor though we be, we will try to repay it to you, my daughter. How call you this place ?"

"The nighest village," replied Eadwith, "is called Horne: but a long league is it thither. My husband went there at nightfall, and is not yet returned."

"Are we in Kent or in Surrey, my daughter?" asked the other.

" and

"In Surrey, father," answered the woman, nigher to Sussex than Kent, and yet not far from that neither. The sun at noonday stands right over Worth, which lieth in Sussex; at night he setteth behind Cowden, which is the first village in Kent. Hush, my baby !" she continued, as the child again

began to cry; and attempted to soothe it with the "Up-a-day!" which has descended to our nurseries from Saxon times.

"Aileth the child anything?" enquired the younger traveller.

"I fear me," answered the mother with tears, "that it is not long for this world, and he is my only one. His father is even now gone for Edred the chaplain, that it may not depart unbaptized."

"God shield it should do so!" said the other. "But hark! there is a hand on the lintel!"

Eadwith, knowing her husband's sign, flew to the door; and Odin, hearing by the step that it was his master, flew thither too, in a paroxysm of joy: for though he had been made to keep the peace towards the strangers, he evidently did not like their proximity.

"It is of no use, wife," began Stigand, "the chaplain is off and away, and returneth not till the morrow. Now, S. Martin defend us! who are these?" he added, as he caught sight of the strangers.

"Holy monks," replied his wife, "that were benighted on our common, and that sought for shelter here."

"And that will supply the chaplain's lack to your baby, if you wish it, my son," added the elder, who was addressed by the other as Father Francis.

The father having accepted the offer with joy, the simple form of Private Baptism was gone