“ Then turning to Neville she asked, "My Lord, why is it necessary to speak of Ireland? It breeds quarrels to name it; well is it called Ire-land, the land of ire, and anger, and quarreling. I forbid the word in this house. If the Irish are assassins for God's sake, may God forgive them!"
"There is nothing impossible to God, madame," said Neville. "But men find some limitations; and when effects are so much talked of and condemned, it is the part of Eternal Justice—though only from a mortal's mouth—to balance the deeds with the deeds that called them forth. ”

“ She was white as the satin robe that clothed her, and her eyes held in their depths the shadow of that fear and grief which filled her heart. And though her mother was sorry for her distress, she was vexed that her girl could not better hide her trouble. "I hate to be pitied, Jane," she said, "and above all by 'her Highness.' And those Cromwell girls, they too will be crying 'Oh dear me!' and 'Poor Jane!' and you will be a sweet sadness to spice their own glory and happiness. Keep a brave heart, my girl. Something may happen any hour." ”

“ London is manifestly with the Commonwealth, and every man in it is looking to you and to the army for protection. Some, indeed, I met who had lost heart, and who thought it better that Charles Stuart should come back than that England should become a graveyard fighting him."
"Such men are suckled slaves," said Lambert. "I would hang them without word or warrant for it."
"Yea," said Cromwell; "for Freedom is dead in them. That's their fault, it will not reach us. Thousands of Englishmen have died to crown our England with Freedom; for Freedom is not Freedom unless England be free." ”

“ A kingship is a settled office. The laws are full of the king; they do not name a protector—and men feel to the law as they do to a god."
"Take the crown, Oliver. Why not?"
"I have no orders to take it. My angel told me when I was a boy, that I should become the greatest man in England, but he said not that I should be king. And I know also from One who never lied to me, that this nation will yearn after its old monarchy. I am here to do a work, to sow seeds that will take generations to ripen, but my reign is only an interregnum. I shall found no dynasty." ”

“ He may live till morning—no longer," said Matilda; "he is only waiting to see Stephen, and Stephen will never come. Ben said he was with the King's horse, and the King is slain, and all is red ruin and sorrow without end. When you rise to-morrow morning, you can tell yourself Matilda de Wick is motherless, fatherless, brotherless, friendless, and homeless; and I dare say you will add piously, 'It is the Lord's doing'; but it is not the Lord's doing, it is Oliver Cromwell's work. I would walk every step of the way to London if I might see him hung when I got there!" ”

“ At Swaffham and de Wick this fateful feeling was aggravated by keen personal interests. To Mrs. Swaffham and Jane the coming battle might mean widowhood and orphanage; sons and brothers might be among those appointed to die for Freedom's sake. To de Wick it might mean the extinction of the family, root and branch, the loss to the lonely Earl and his daughter of the one love on which their future could build any hope. They could not bear audibly to surmise these things, but they feared them; and not even Jane had yet reached that far-seeing faith, which, for a noble end, levels life and death. ”

“ England had to come out of the Valley and Shadow of Popery, and it is the Lord General's sword that shall lead her into the full light—there is something round your neck, Matilda, that looks as if you were still in darkness."
Then Matilda laughed and put her hand to her throat, and slipped into her bosom a rosary of coral and gold beads. "It was my mother's," she said; "you know that she was of the Old Profession, and I wear it for her sake."
"It is said that Charles Stuart also wears one for his mother's sake."
"It is a good man that remembers a good mother; and the King is a good man." ”

“ He had taken Perth on the second of August; he left it with ten thousand men on the third; he was on the border by the eighth; he was at Warwick on the twenty-fourth, where he was immediately joined by Harrison, Fleetwood and Lambert. Such swiftness and precision must have been prearranged, either by Cromwell or by Destiny. It was to be the last battle of the Civil War, and Cromwell knew it, for he had beyond the lot of mortals that wondrous insight, that prescience, which, like the scabbard of the sword Excalibur, was more than the blade itself—the hilt armed with eyes. ”

“ Cannot you wait and serve for five years? If not, your love is but a summer fruit, and Jane Swaffham is worthy of something better."
"Sir, I entreat. I am no coward, but I cannot bear to think of five years."
"I have said my say. There is nothing to add or to take from it—save, to remind you, Lord Neville, that there is more heroism in self-denial than in battle."
Then Cluny perceived that entreaty would only weaken his cause, and he advanced and offered his hand, saying, "I am much in your debt, sir. 'Tis more than I deserve, but Love must always beg more than his desert." ”

“ Every moment is full of uncertainty and danger."
"Prince Rupert will not see us injured."
"I cannot take Prince Rupert for our surety. He has not yet spoken to me about your marriage. He is at the mercy of so many minds."
"That detestable Lord Neville! Ever and always, he brings me trouble and sorrow. There are half-a-dozen of my lovers who would run him through for a look. I would do it myself. You need not smile, sir, I am as ready with the sword as any man, and have matched both Stephen and Cymlin Swaffam. I hate Neville. I would most willingly make an end of him."
"Hush, Matilda! ”

“ We do not do that enough, and so when our poor help is not sufficient, we tremble. Where is the hope and trust you sent to me when I lay between life and death in Scotland? Oh, what poor creatures we are, when we trust in ourselves! nothing then but tears and fears and the grave to end all. But I confess I never expected Jane Swaffham to be down in the mire. Jane knows she is the daughter of the everlasting, powerful, infinite, inscrutable God Almighty; she knows this God is also one of goodness and mercy and truth without end, to those who love Him. ”

“ And she really heard its glad music with her natural body, and the melody of that everlasting chime was in her heart to the last moment of her life. And her children looked at her and were amazed, for her face was changed; and when the people shouted, to "God save the Lord Protector of the Commonwealth!" she stood up without her staff, and was the first to render him obeisance.
Jane watched her with wonder and delight; she forgot her own grief in this aged mother's surpassing happiness, and she partly understood that hour the new doctrine of the men called Quakers. ”

“ And I am sure if the Lady Mary and Lord Neville wished to marry, it would give his kind heart the greatest pleasure to make them happy. Do you think he loves riches or rank or honours or power? I declare to you that he cares not a fig for any of them."
"Pray, then, what does he love?"
"First and foremost, he loves England. He loves England with every breath he draws. England is the word graven on the palms of his hands; it was the word that made his sword invincible. He loves the Protestant faith, which he holds one with all religious and civil freedom. ”

“ There is not another man in the world who would have presumed to box the Lady Matilda de Wick's ears; accordingly I am in love with his courage and self-respect. I deserved what I got, I deserved it richly, Jane;"—and she rose and went to the glass, and turned her head right and left, and looked at her ears, and then with a laugh said, "Poor little ears! You had to suffer for a saucy tongue. Jane, my ears burn, my cheeks burn, I do believe my heart burns. I shall laugh and cry as long as I live, and remember Cymlin Swaffham." ”

“ It won't do, Lord Neville. If I was asking you to become a Fifth Monarchy Man, or one of those unbaptised, buttonless hypocrites, who call themselves Quakers, you might talk about the letters of your creed. Pooh! Pooh!"
"Sir, not for any woman born, will a man, worth the name of a man, give up his creed or his country. Mistress Swaffham would not ask this thing of me. She takes me as I am. I love her with all my soul. To the end of our life days, I will love and cherish her. ”

“ My marriage to Cymlin will be a barrier sacred to both of us. Our friendship can hold itself above endearments. You need not fear for Cymlin; Matilda de Wick will honour her husband, whether she obeys him or not. Cymlin is formed for power and splendour, and he will stand near the throne."
"If there be a throne."
"Of that, who now doubts? Cromwell is falling sick, and you may feel 'God save the King' in the air. If you had married Stephen, he would have been alive to join in the cry. I could weep at your obstinacy, Jane." ”

“ Nothing has been heard of him, and I wish to tell you what Sir Thomas Jevery said." She did so, and Cromwell listened with a smile of incredulity. "We know Neville better than that," he answered. "It would be a great wonder if he should think of America, Jane. Would a man in his senses leave you, and his estate, and his good friends and good prospects to go into the wilderness? Truly he would not. His home and land in Fife are worth more than Jevery's gold and jewels, and I do think my favour may count for something. And more than these things there is your love. You do love him, Jane?" ”

“ It is not Cromwell's way to snap at the stick, but at the cowardly hands that hold it."
"If he can reach them," muttered Matilda.
"Then, Sir Thomas, we have united Scotland to the Commonwealth. Kingship is abolished there; vassalage and slavish feudal institutions are swept away; heritors are freed from military service. Oh, 'tis a grand union for the Scotch common people! I say nothing of the nobles; no reparation has been made them—they don't deserve any; they are always invading England on one pretext or another. ”

“ Hastily she glanced over the lines, until she came to the discovery of the plot.
"Oh, indeed, here is the burden of Jane Swaffham!" she cried in a passion. "We are discovered. All is known—all has been known from the very first. Stephen, you are in instant danger. You must away at once."
"I do not believe it."
"Fool! How else could Jane have sent this word? She says Cromwell has known it from its beginning. The man has a devil; who can circumvent him? You must fly at once. The warrant for your arrest will doubtless come by to-night's mail. My God, are our troubles never to cease? ”

“ Abel Dewey was ready for it; and as she watched him ride away, her thoughts turned to de Wick, and she wondered in what mood Matilda might be, and how she would receive the information sent her. Would it be a surprise?
"Not it," answered Mrs. Swaffham. "Matilda knows all about the plot; that is most certain; but its discovery may be news to her, and if so, she will not thank you for it, Jane. Why will she burn herself with fire not on her hearthstone?"
"Prince Rupert is her lover. She will do anything he desires her to do." ”

“ God knows I need it, but my heart wakes, and I do fear it will wake this night—if so, there is no sleep for me. You see, dearest, how God mingles our cup. When I was Mr. Cromwell, I could sleep from night till morning. When I was General Cromwell, my labours gave me rest. Now that I am Lord Protector of three Kingdoms, sleep, alas! is gone far from me! In my mind I run to and fro through all the land. I have a thousand plans and anxieties, Elizabeth, my dearest; great place is not worth looking after. It is not."
"But if beyond our will we be led into great place and great honour, Oliver?" ”

“ His eyes blazed with spiritual exaltation, and flamed with human anger, as in a voice, sharp and untunable, but ringing with passionate fervour, he cried—
"I say to you, and truly I mean it, if England's Red Cross fly not above free men, let it fall! Let it fall o'er land and sea forever! The natural milk of Freedom, the wine and honey of Freedom, which John Eliot and John Pym and John Hampden gave us to eat and to drink, broke our shackles and made us strong to rise in the face of forsworn kings and red-shod priests, devising our slavery. ”

“ Then Matilda laughed, and stooping to her friend, kissed her and said, "Come, little Jane, I will ask your pardon. It is the curse of these days, that one must lie to one's own heart, or quarrel with the heart one loves. Kiss and be friends, Jane. I came to get your receipt for lavender conserves, and this is nothing to it."
"Jane was conserving, yesterday," answered Mrs. Swaffham, "and she has a new receipt from her sister Armingford for brewing a drink against sleeplessness. It is to be made from the blue flowers picked from the knaps." ”

“ Be not too nice, when too much niceness may be murder. Jane, there is no time to talk. Let them through the door."
"I will call mother," she said; "let them in until I bring her here." Then she opened the door, and Matilda brought the two wayworn, blood-stained, fainting fugitives within the sanctuary.
Mrs. Swaffham was not long in answering Matilda's petition. That divine compassion that oversteps every obstacle, and never asks who or what art thou, saw the visible necessity and hastened to meet it. ”

“ From the misty, bare mountains of Scotland, came John Knox, and from the fogs and swamps of the Fen country, comes Oliver Cromwell. So it is, and should be. God chooses for great men, not only the time, but the place of their birth. The strength of Cromwell's character is in its mysticism, and this quality has been fed from its youth up by the monotony of his rural life, by the sombre skies above him, by his very house, which was like a deserted cloister buried in big trees. ”

“ She did not believe it at the time, and the lapse of time had impaired whatever of likelihood it possessed.
"Yes, yes," she said to herself. "Rupert undoubtedly killed Neville, and gave the jewels and money and papers to Charles Stuart. But how can I tell this thing? I cannot! If it would restore the man's life—perhaps. Oh, that I had never seen him! How many miserable hours I can mix with his name! The creature was very unworthy of Jane, and I am glad he is dead. Yes, I am. Thousands of better men are slain, and forgotten—let him be forgotten also. ”

“ But friendship gives up its forms tardily; people kiss each other and say fond words long after the love that ought to vitalise such symbols is dead and buried; and for awhile the two girls did believe themselves glad to meet again. There were a score of things delightful to women over which they could agree, and Jane's admiration for her friend's beautiful gowns and laces and jewels, and her interest in Matilda's descriptions of the circumstances in which they were worn, was so genuine, that Matilda had forgotten her relation to Lord Neville, when the irritating name was mentioned. ”

“ His son-in-law, Rich, the three months' bridegroom of his "little Frankie," was but a few weeks dead, and the Earl of Warwick, his firmest friend among the nobility, was dying. His favourite daughter, Elizabeth, was very ill, and he himself was feeling unmistakable premonitions of his dissolution. For, day by day, his soul was freeing itself from the ligaments of the body, rising into a finer air, seeing right and wrong with the eyes of immortality. But he would do his duty to the last tittle of strength,—fall battling for the right,—and as to what should come after, God would care for that. ”

“ And I tell you, for I know it, that with this milk of Freedom England will yet feed all the nations of the world. She will! Only be faithful, and here and now, God shall so witness for us that all men must acknowledge it. For I do know that Charles Stuart, and the men with him, shall be before us like dust on a turning wheel. We shall have a victory like that of Saul over Nahash, and I know not of any victory like to it, since the world began—Two of them—not left together. ”

“ He had seen the young Commonwealth messenger, and his handsome person and patrician manner had given him a moment's envious look back to the days when he also had been young and hopeful, and full of faith in his own great future. The slight hauteur of Neville, his punctilious care for Cromwell's instructions, his whole bearing of victory, as against his own listless attitude of "failure," set his mind in a mood either to ignore the young man, or else by the simplest word or incident to change from indifference to dislike.
Matilda's letter furnished the impetus to dislike. ”

“ But human beings without these tidal fluctuations are not interesting; people who always pursue the "even tenor of their way" leave us chilled and dissatisfied; we prefer that charm of uncertain expectation, which, with all its provocations, made Matilda dear and delightful to Jane, and Jane perennially interesting, even to those who did not think as she thought or do as she did.
At length April came, and the bare brown garden was glorious with the gold and purple of the crocus flowers and the moonlight beauty of the lilies. ”

“ Charles Stuart suffered lawfully and by consent of Parliament."
"A most astonishing difference!" answered Matilda, drawing on her gloves impatiently, "to be murdered with consent of Parliament! that is lawful; without consent of Parliament, that is very wicked indeed. But even as a man you might pity him."
"Pity him! Not I! He has his just reward. He bound himself for his enemies with cords of his own spinning. But you will not see the truth, Matilda——"
"So then, it is useless wasting good Puritan breath on me. Dear Jane, can we never escape this subject? ”