In Convent Walls. Emily Sarah Holt

only for those of John and Cicely de Chaucombe. Now, set again to thy chronicling, my Sissot, and do it in the light of that Throne, and in the expectation of that Book: so shall it be done well.”

      And so Jack left me. But to speak sooth, seeing the matter thus makes me to feel as though I scarce dared do it at all. Howsobe, I have it to do: and stedfast way maketh stedfast heart.

      There were plenty of people who hated Sir Hugh Le Despenser, but I and my mother Dame Alice were not amongst them. He had been brought up with the King from his youth, but the King never loved him till after the death of Sir Piers de Gavaston. The Queen loved him, just so long as the King did not. That was always her way; the moment that she saw he cared for anything which was not herself, she at once began to hate it. And verily he never gave her cause, for he held her ever dearest of any mortal thing.

      Sir Hugh was as goodly a gentleman as man’s eyes might see. Those who loved him not called him proud—yea, the very spirit of pride. But the manner they thought pride seemed to me rather a kind of sternness or shortness of speech, as if he wished to have done with the matter in hand. Some people call every thing pride; if man talk much, they say he loves to hear his own voice; if he be silent, he despises his company. Now it seems to me that I often speak and am silent from many other causes than pride, and therefore it may be the like with other folk. Do those which are ever accusing other of pride, do all their actions for that reason? If not so, how or why should they suspect it in other men? I do not think Sir Hugh was so much prouder than other. He knew his own value, I dare say; and very like he did not enjoy being set at nought—who doth so? Other said he was ambitious: and there might be some sooth-fastness in the accusation; yet I fancy the accusers loved a slice of worldly grandeur no less than most men. And some said he was wicked man: that did I never believe.

      As for his wife, Dame Alianora, I scarcely know what to say of her. She was a curious mixture of qualities. She clung to the King her uncle when others forsook him, she was free-handed, and she could feel for man in trouble: those were her good points. Yet she seemed to feel but what she saw; it was “out of sight, out of mind,” with her; and she loved new faces rather too well to please me. I think, for one thing, she was timid; and that oft-times causes man to appear what he is not. But she was better woman than either of her sisters—the Lady Margaret Audley and the Lady Elizabeth de Clare. I never saw her do, nor heard her say, the heartless acts and speeches whereof I knew both of them guilty. I dare say, as women go, she was not ill woman. For, alas! I have lived long enough to know that there be not many good ones.

      Well, I said—no did I?—that I would begin with the year 1324 of our Lord God. But, lack-a-day! there were matters afore 1324, like as there were men before Agamemnon. Truly, methinks there be a two-three I did well not to omit: aswhasay, the dying of Queen Margaret, widow of King Edward of Westminster, which deceased seven years earlier than so. I shall never cease to marvel how it came to pass that two women of the same nation, of the same family, being aunt and niece by blood, should have been so strangely diverse as those two Queens. All that was good, wise, and gentle, was in Queen Margaret: what was in Queen Isabel will my chronicle best tell. This most reverend lady led a very retired life after her husband’s death, being but a rare visitor to the Court, dwelling as quietly and holily as any nun might dwell, and winning love and respect from all that knew her. Very charitable was she and most devout: and (if it be lawful to say thus) had I been Pope, I had sooner canonised her than a goodly number that hath been. But I do ill to speak thus, seeing the holy Father is infallible, and acts in such matters but by the leading of God’s Spirit, as saith the Church. Good lack, but there be queer things in this world! I saw once Father Philip screw up his mouth when one said the same in his hearing, and saith he—

      “The Lord Pope is infallible when he speaketh ex cathedrâ, but so only.”

      “But how,” saith he that spake, “shall we know when he is sat in his chair and when he is out of it?”

      An odd look came into Father Philip’s eyes.

      “Master,” saith he, “when I was a little lad, my mother told me divers times that it was not seemly to ask curious questions.”

      But I guess what the good Friar thought, though it be not always discreet to speak out man’s thoughts. Ah me! will the time ever come when man may say what he will, with no worse thereafter than a sneer or a sharp rebuke from his neighbour? If so were, I would I had been born in those merry days—but I should want Jack to be born then belike.

      “Sissot,” saith a voice over my shoulder, “wist thou the full meaning of thy wish?”

      Jack is given to coming in quietly—I never knew him make a noise—and peeping over my shoulder to see how my chronicle maketh progress: for he can well read, though he write not.

      “What so, Jack?” said I.

      “I reckon we should be the younger by some centuries,” quoth he, “and perchance should not be at all. But allowing it, dost thou perceive that such a difference should mean a change in all things?—that no fear should in likelihood mean no reverence nor obedience, and might come to mean more than that?”

      “That were dread!” said I. “What manner of times should they be?”

      “I think,” saith he, “those very ‘tempora periculosa’ whereof Saint Paul speaketh, when men shall love their own selves, and be proud, unthankful, without affection, peace, or benignity, loving their pleasures rather than God. And if it serve thee, I would not like to live in those times.”

      “Dear heart, nor would I!” quoth I. “Yet surely, Jack, that seemeth a gainsaying. Were all men free to speak what they would, and not be called to account therefor, it were soothly to love their neighbours and show benignity.”

      “Ay, if it were done for that end,” he made answer. “But the heart of man is a cage of deceits. Much must befall the world, I take it, ere that cometh to pass: and while they that bring it about may be good men that mean well, they that come to use it may be evil, and mean ill. The Devil is not come to an end of his shifts, be thou sure. Let man run as fast and far as he will, Satan shall wit how to keep alongside.”

      I said nought. Jack is very wise, a deal more than I, yet I cannot always see through his eye-glasses. Mayhap it is not always because I am wiser of the twain.

      “Freedom to do good and be good is a good thing,” then saith he: “but freedom to be ill, and do ill, must needs be an ill thing. And man being what he is, how makest thou sure that he shall always use his freedom for good, and not for ill?”

      “Why, that must man chance,” said I.

      “A sorry chance,” answereth he. “I were liever not to chance it. I thought I heard thee deny Fina this last week to go to the dance at Underby Fair?”

      “So thou didst,” said I. “She is too young, and too giddy belike, to trust with a bevy of idle damosels as giddy as she.”

      “Well, we are none of us so far grown-up in all wisdom that it were safe to trust us with our own reins in all things. Hast never heard the saw, ‘He that ruleth his own way hath a fool to his governor’?”

      “Well!” said I; “but then let the wise men be picked out to rule us, and the fools to obey.”

      “Excellent doctrine, my Sissot!” quoth Jack, smiling in his eyes: “at least, for the fools. I might somewhat pity the wise men. But how to bring it about? Be the fools to pick out the wise men? and are they wise enough to do it? I sorely fear we shall have a sorry lot of governors when thy law comes to be tried. I think, Wife, thou and I had better leave God to rule the world, for I suspect we should do it something worser than He.”

      Let me fall back to my chronicling. Another matter happed in the year 1319, the which I trow I shall not lightly forget. The Queen abode at Brotherton, the King being absent. The year afore, had the Scots made great raids on the northern parts of England, had burned the outlying parts of York while the King was there, and taken the Earl of Richmond prisoner: and now, hearing of the Queen at Brotherton, but slenderly guarded, down they marched into Yorkshire,