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to Learncamp's stern questioning or the abbod's more temperate expos matices. He knew it would be of 2017 He was detected, and be saw in every line of the legste's face the history of his guilt written, and is be The forged letters, bearing the king's name, which were to hire reclaced Lochamp himself in the vice-royalty of England by a commissica of Prine Jin's own nammay-the pretended royal rescript, by vime of which he had exacted the retributions from Rivelsby and elsewhere the attempt on the Lady Gladine's person, both at the tower vbi at the monastery-had all been red t him Dabois had known mere af is master's secrets than even Sir Marias was aware, and Willan of Ey had been the purchaser. It id nec even need the abbot's conirmativa ten the Gason's dying ocatessen to prove Sir Nicholas a Tune in art, and an assassin in intention; for the legate had found Isa 20, at Menamstede where she had taken rete when she found her husband denochced as a traitor), and bad heard her story from her own lips.

He stood there, sullen and speechless awaiting the doom that he felt was sure to come.

For a few moments Longchamp preserved an ominous sience after the long catalogue of Le Hardi's crimes had been produced against him He kept his eyes fixed on the knight's face, but Sir Nicholas would not meet his glance. At last the prelate turned to the knights who stood behind him.

“Is all ready?" he asked.
He was answered in the affirma-

tive.

placed him under the beam, to which a long halter had been already attached, and a groom proceeded to strike the spurs from his heels. After what seemed some vain attempt at intercession, Abbot Martin had quitted the scene.

"Croquard! where is Croquard ?" said Longchamp, looking round for the dwarf who usually served him as executioner. Whether the abbey cheer had beguiled him-for Croquard had sensual propensities-or whether he had been left a space behind on their hurried march, the dwarf could not be found.

"Have ye never a scullion about your house," said Longchamp to one of the Benedictines, "that will serve this noble knight for his last apparelling? I promised him this service, I do remember!

One of the legate's knights led forth a squalid figure, with long red hair, from which a pair of keen animal eyes looked out, whom he had found creeping under the ruined wall, actuated probably by the same curiosity as his betters. Cuthwin, still a pensioner of Rivelsby, had relapsed into something like his natural self during the siege-even his food had been dealt out but sparingly in those days of scarcity.

"Lo! the very man! A dainty page indeed! Teach him his work, some of ye, and despatch."

With ready hands the Saxon, who showed a very apt intelligence as to the duties expected of him, made fast the rope. The Crusader shuddered with a new horror, when he saw the malice in those twinkling eyes that peered into his own.

Again, when all was ready, and even the careless jesters in the crowd, to whom such scenes were but a passing excitement, were hushed into expectation as they watched Longchamp's stern face, the prelate kept silence for a space before he spoke.

"Nicholas le Hardi," he said at last, "your hour is not yet come. I promised but this forenoon to a woman's tears and prayers-and for a woman's sake-a life which otherwise I had not spared to take, if I knew I were to stand at Heaven's bar myself to-morrow. I promised, gallant knights and gentlemen," he

continued, turning to the listeners, "blame me those that choose-that if, by Mary's grace, I reached Rivelsby in time to save my kinswoman from that polluting touch, I would, for her sake, do what I do now. Go, Nicholas le Hardi-live! live, shamed and dishonoured; let life be your punishment.-Turn him loose."

Cuthwin did but half understand that his work was over, and still kept his grasp fixed tenaciously on the noose round Le Hardi's throat, from which he had to be driven by force, howling like some baffled beast of prey, whilst others, in obedience to the legate's order, cut the prisoner free. The crowd made way for him; and amidst the jeers and mocking laughter of the grooms and ruder bystanders, and muttered curses and glances of scorn from those of higher degree, the disgraced knight, with features in which a hell of bitter passions was already working, hurried forth into the gathering dark

ness.

There was a murmur, half of applause, half of disappointment, at the sentence. The legate cared for neither. He spoke no more of the criminal whom he had just dismissed; except that when he again greeted Gladice in the abbot's presence, he said to her "Fair kinswoman, you have cost me dear!"

Sad and hurried was the repast which the besieged of Rivelsby spread that evening for their deliverers.

Joy and gratitude had enough of sorrow there to temper them. There was no need of the warning skeleton at that banquet; gallant friends and brethren, who should have shared the joy of rescue and safety, lay yet unburied round them. Already the superior had issued orders for a solemn litany at midnight, when prayer and incense should rise to heaven-not unaccepted, if it was the sacrifice of pious and loving hearts-for those who had died in their defence. Not the humblest mercenary but should be remembered by name in the grateful devotions of those whom he had served at Rivelsby. It was with these, rather than with the living who sat at table round him, that Abbot Martin's thoughts were busy :

he was very silent and still, now that the first emotions of joy were over. Gladice, though she could not refuse the presence which her princely kinsman, with a playful courtesy, almost insisted on as the reward of his exertions in her cause, had little heart to reply either to jest or compliment; at the lightest question her eyes filled with tears. The spirit which had borne up through all the perils of those last days, sank now under the consciousness of safety. Even the legate himself, after a while, became thoughtful. Though he ate and drank like one who had ridden hard and fasted long, there was a deep shadow on that bold front which was not often seen there. Save that he swore an oath scarce

seemly on a churchman's lips, when the abbot told him how his name had been made use of to decoy their fair guest from her sanctuary, he showed that evening little of his usual buoyant spirit and fiery temper.

"That minds me," said the abbot, as they spoke of the Gascon esquire's sharo in this last outrage, "that I have a token here which the unhappy man we speak of, in his last hour, charged me to deliver to your holi

ness.

He produced, as he spoke, a small gold piece, which appeared to be bent and disfigured.

Longchamp examined it with some curiosity.

66

The Gascon Dubois gave you this, you say?"

"Even so," replied the abbot; "I received his confession personally, and shrived him by his own desire. I may not say," continued the churchman, with something like a shudder, "that I found him so much of a penitent as I might have desired. He had a belt fairly filled with coin, which he gave me freely enough, to bestow in charity on the poor; but this piece he held long and fingered in strange fashion, while I urged him, in such poor words as I had, to make Heaven an offering of greater worth-to die in peace with all men; for he had spoken bitter words to the last against this Sir Nicholas, and against your holiness, under your favour. At last he put

it into my hands: 'I give you this, father,' he said; it is the last thing that I had thought to part with ; but I have no use for it now; tell the lord legate I am gone where all debts are paid. Tell him,' he said (I mind his broken words)-'tell him he taunted me, and I had sworn to have his life; but had I found such an one for my master, I had done him true service.'"'

"Ha!" said the legate, "the miscreant had his form of conscience, then? Most of us have, abbot ; but, by my faith, it is hard enough to discover it in some men. Certes, it is a gift of very diverse quality. Here do I loth and scorn the knave whose treacherous services I have bought; I boast myself that my own hands are clean; I would not stir a hair's-breadth, if I know myself, from what I hold to be right and justice, for all the gold in England; and yet, without scruple, I proffer to others that which I abhor as poison for myself! Resolve us now, good lord abbot - what is truth-or honour?"

-

If Abbot Martin knew, it existed in his mind as an instinct, not as a definition. He was no casuist; and his only reply to the legate's question was a look of puzzled distress.

"Your holiness will honour our poor house to-night?" said the abbot to his noble guest as he rose to take his leave; we are but in sorrowful case, yet we will make shift to lodge at least some portion of your company."

--

"No, my good abbot," said the legate-"I must hasten back again. The snake is scotched, not killed. For aught I know, this may be my last hour of power, and my last act of grace. The England that I love is jealous of me. King Richard is far away. To-day I am England's viceroy - and by heaven, some shall feel it!-to-morrow I may be a landless exile. Fare you well, Abbot Martin-farewell, for the present, Waryn - braver and truer hearts I shall hardly find! With such a stout friend once more at Ladysmede, you shall hardly suffer loss here at St Mary's, come what will-for all of us, le bon temps viendra!”

"Your holiness's pardon," said

Waryn, quietly-"our roads hence lie together."

"What!" said the legate, with his heartiest smile" you leave our good friends here so soon! Nay, nay, young friend, I will not tax your loyalty so hard. You will scarce find the world of men-or of women -ungrateful. Not yet-you have not served them so long. No, Waryn -my lord abbot cannot spare his son. And are there no bright eyes" -he added in a pretended whisper that was only the more audible, as he sought to catch his kinswoman's averted face-"that could chain you here even for a day?"

"I have nothing that binds me here," replied Foliot, colouring, and avoiding Longchamp's questioning eye" nothing. You will not refuse me, my lord, to be of your company. I have served you in your prosperity-have had more honour at your hands than my deserts-if times should change, you will not think so meanly of me as to bid me leave you now?"

"No," said Longchamp, looking from him to Gladice with a puzzled expression, but speaking with some tremor in his voice-"No, be it so; for the present, our fortunes lie to gether. But courage! le bon temps viendra!"

That night, as Giulio afterwards remembered, whilst he lay half-asleep after the terrors of that eventful day, a figure had stooped over him, and hot lips had pressed his forehead. If it was Giacomo, as he thought, it was the Italian's last farewell. He

was seen never again in England, and was believed to have entered a house of strict recluses in his own country. It was said that Abbot Martin knew his after history; if he did, he kept the secret faithfully.

For many years afterwards, a crippled and broken man, in the lay habit of the Benedictines, might be seen slowly and painfully traversing the cloisters with the help of his staff, or sunning himself, in summer, on the stone benches on the river-walk that looked towards Ladysmede. A settled gloom was on his brow-the uncharitable among the brotherhood called it sullenness-the gentler said it was remorse. He conversed with few, and was sadly irregular in his devotions; but he spent many hours in Abbot Martin's chamber, and the superior ever treated him with kindness and respect. Within those quiet walls, where they who entered left even the names that they had borne in the world behind them, it was soon scarcely remembered that Brother Wilfred had been Sir Godfrey de Burgh.

There is no record that the Lady Gladice ever took the veil. The chronicles of Ladysmede and Rivelsby henceforth are few and scanty. But Sir Jules de Burgh of Ladysmede will be found to have married a Gladys Foliot; and while the antiquarian spells their names out from the old Lombardic characters, the reader of our tale may rejoice, like us, to think he lights upon a hint of the future fortunes of "The Luck of Ladysmede."

It is not an infrequent commence in the mean voi, fumar & period of genera amerika pre pency, 231 when no monetary ess eis de Llegad to a moms for the atvinge, that as 11-stated 201 big reagered bone, öring budinem upon a scale with plans it freon in the rank if the great firms in this entry—with a vast exterior, collated wedia, a stability based upon the tradities of years, and a reputation wile his never been implicel-bodi sul denly fall, and we are startled to read in the Times that the same which had been reared and sustained by a combination of caution, industry, and enterprise, Las me to the ground with a crash, and buried in its ruins a host of unsuspecting victims. If we examine into the cause of the disaster, we may usually trace it either to the rashness or the incapacity of those partners who were intrusted with the management of the concern. Probably they had been induced, by some specious adventurer, to embark largely in speculations in which he had everything to gain and nothing to lose, but which were altogether out of the line of their ordinary business; dazzled by the prospect of enormous but visionary profits, and so little skilled in human nature as to be unable to detect the true character of him in whom they place an implicit confidence, they have swallowed with simple gullibility the bait with which he dexterously allured them to their own destruction. It may seem strange that the sleeping partners should have intrusted the business to such incompetent hands; but, by the original constitution of the firm, it sometimes happens that its management necessarily devolves upon those members of it who were distinguished either by reckless imprudence, crotchety and impracticable obstinacy, or imbecile credulity. It does, indeed, not unfrequently occur

badly venture to size mudras of pare philanthr They will endeavour to defend the imprudence of the speculation by denying altogether that in ever bad for its chject the realisation of capital Their misfumes are annouted to a goodnature endeavor to help another house out of difficulties in which it had bear me involved; and they considered themselves justified in cooperating for this purpose with one whom they knew to be thoroughly dishonest, and to have private objects of his own to serve diametrically opposed to the interests of their own house. Whether this plea will be held valid by the wretched victims of so much disinterested philanthropy, is questionable; it is just possible that they may consider that the first duty of those who had important interests confided to their charge was to protect them, and under no circumstances to combine with men notoriously bankrupt alike in character and resources for the accomplishment of an object, even although it might in their opinion be desirable in the abstract. ́It is always disagreeable to be personal in alluding to topics of so painful a nature, but there are occasions upon which any feeling of delicacy should give way to graver considerations, and if by timely warnings these lamentable catastrophes can be avoided, no person sensible of the importance of the crisis should hesitate to give them. Any one conversant with the principles upon which the well-known house of Bull is at this moment endeavouring to keep up its "foreign connection," must feel anxious for its stability, and painfully conscious that