whether dressed in the silks, satins, velvets, feathers, and embroidery of Harry VIII.'s days, or clad in the sober broadcloth of the present time, was and is liable to the same casualties. That life has ever been the same, filled of ups and downs, wisdom and folly, accidents and offences; that the seasons of the year were Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter; that there was night and day-only the world slept during the former, in place of the latter, as the world does now; that the sun shone, and the rain wetted, and without going further, to my thinking, a gallant in silks, and satins, and feathers, and a shower of rain, cuts but a sorry figure against the beau of patent boots, and possessed of an umbrella.

Henry found the Duke of Norfolk awaiting him, who conducted the Monarch into a private compartment of the pavillion; a species of privy chamber, provided for the King's exclusive use during the jousts, and communicating with the public gallery of the Lord of the Jousts by a short passage, guarded by the royal yeomen. Raising the heavy velvet curtain that fell over the entrance to the apartment, Norfolk ushered the King in. A Benedictine monk and a figure in complete tilting armour, cased from head to foot, not even his beaver raised, occupied the room.

"Your Grace," spoke Norfolk, bending the knee, “the thing we wot of hath found one to proclaim it, in this— strong knight; the treason of the Queen and her paramours shall be published; and in a challenge to the Lord Rochford, the means we intend using be prepared."

"Must thou mix the Viscount with it?" asked Henry. "Ay, your Grace! Heard you not the Lady Rochford?” returned Norfolk.

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Tush, my lord Duke; a vile woman. Bah!" and the King mused.

"Our sole evidence, save Smeaton."

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Well, well! Be it so. But the challenge, should it prove against us? should Rochford triumph?"

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'Nay, your Grace. Be it your care it come not to issue."

"True, my lord," said the King, "the challenge will suffice; but who is this doughty knight?”

None answered.

"Dost thou not hear me, Norfolk?"

"Your Grace-"

"Trifle not with me.

Who is this man? Tell me his

name, rank, or by the Lord-"

Henry's passion choked him. And he stamped his foot upon the ground, and shook his clenched fist at the three, getting purple in the face, and his little eyes glistening, and looking very evil.

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Who is he?" thundered Henry, recovering his voice, and pointing to the steel-clad warrior.

Norfolk let fall his plumed and jewelled cap, then picked it up to let it fall again. He murmured a few inarticulate words, while Henry's passion rose at each moment, till it appeared likely enough to kill him.

"May it please you," began Norfolk. "No!" screamed Henry.

"If "

The King made a step forward.

"Your Grace," spoke the man in armour, coming from the corner of the room, his iron panoply clanking at every stride, "Your Grace," and the warrior fell upon his knee before the irate King, "if you will know my name and degree-"

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"Say thou art Lord of Hell; anything but what thou art," whispered Barret, the Benedictine. 'Say thou art one of the Yorkshire gentles whose name thou art familiar with. Any one, seek not a particular. Quick, or you are

lost."

"Hast thou not a tongue, or is it a mocking one, that thou kneelest to blurt some words, yet answer not my question," stormed the King, pacing the room. "Now, by the Holy Virgin, I will see thy face. Unbar thy helmet, villian. Norfolk, unbar it, I say, or I must summon the guard." The armed man raised the bars of his casque. "The Earl of Poverty!"

Henry staggered to a seat. The Duke and the monk fell upon their knees.

"A false man to a false charge-it is fitting;" then rising, and advancing sternly to the three, kneeling in the centre of the chamber, Henry spoke, "My Lord of Norfolk, it is well and good that neither noble or knight will battle for their King's honour, but must put his cause to the doing of-the Earl of Poverty."

"Oh! my gracious lord-" faltered Norfolk, but the king interrupted him.

"No excuses.

God's death!

Who brought this man?" "I," answered the Benedictine, fearlessly.

The King turned furiously upon the monk, as if he would kill him with his look; but the latter never let his eyes fall, but curiously investigated Henry's swollen and working features.

"Thou! and darest thou avow it?"

"God has worked his will with vile instruments ere this. May not the King?"

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Monk, monk, thy scripture might excuse thy Church's deeds, but not the doings of thy Monarch's honour. What ho! without there!"

A score of the yeomen of the guard rushed into the room at the King's call.

"Seize me that man-yon in the harness-and hang him on the single tree of the East Hill of the Park. Away! see it done quickly."

The guard hurried the Lord of Poverty out of the apartment. Turning to the monk, Henry addressed him: "For thee, priest, begone; let me never see thee more.

If after twenty days thou be found in England, I will hang thee as high as thy comrade. See to it.

Barret bowed.

"Before twenty days, oh! King

Henry stopped to listen to the monk.

"I shall witness the consummation of my labours, and will quit this land-"

quit

"To return no more."

"Thou sayest it."

The monk slowly raised the velvet curtain, and turning to the King, bent his head, and was gone.

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"Norfolk!" the Duke started, to the lists, arrest the Viscount Rochford and Sir Henry Norris, as I do throw the baton down."

And with a flushed face, Henry passed out; not by the little corridor he had before threaded, but turning aside, and calling loudly for his horse; the 'squires shouted, the grooms ran to and fro, and at last the steed was brought, Henry maddening at each delay. Mounting the animal, the King struck its sides furiously with the spur, riding over all in

the way, and arriving in the lists at the moment when Rochford, with combined skill and strength, had overthrown man and horse, while the welkin rang with shouts. Riding into the middle of the lists, the Monarch cast his gold baton in the dust, and, in a voice that resounded above the din, cried"Let be, let be. I close the lists."

XXX.

THE WALK TO LONDON.

A fortnight had passed. There was a company of sturdy travellers, four in number, wending their way along the road from Greenwich to London. A tall monk formed the first of them; the second of the four was a swash-buckler in a leathern doublet, quilted and sword-proof, an iron headpiece, and the broadsword and target of his class; he was a tall, strong man, not carrying much flesh, and not over handsome. The third was a mendicant, as his rags gave evidence, the cast of his features, whine of voice, and shuffling habit of body; a sharp featured, spare man, very like a fox in his face, and doubtless carrying out the likeness in other points than mere resemblance of visage. The last was a species of nondescript, neither beggar, nor bully, nor priest, yet something of the three; a tall, graceful figure, which the long monkish cloak could scarce hide, an under doublet of velvet soiled, and the lace stripped, a broad tarnished girdle, with a long keen dagger inserted, and a sword with a leathern scabbard, the steel peeping through in places; the hood of the cloak was drawn far over the face, and his companions could discern little of their comrade's features. But merrily proceeded three of the company, laughing and jesting, and making the way shorter by all possible means of conversation and fellowship; nevertheless a few sharp words passed at intervals, as well they might, when the conversation turned upon so engrossing a topic as the arrest of Anne Boleyn, and her approaching trial. "Say you, my master," spoke the monk, "that Anne was arrested at Greenwich, the day after the jousts?"

"Even so," answered him addressed, the fourth of the company, and to designate whom, it were as well to call the Stranger. "As she sat at dinner, my lord Duke of Norfolk,

with Sir Thomas Audley, did arrest her, and convey her by water to the Tower."

"When comes on her trial?" asked the buckler man, in a tone of voice he had not used, speaking of his own, "when comes on her trial?"

The Stranger turned to the monk, gathering from the last speaker's indifference it was needless to answer him, and said slowly and significantly, "Upon the morrow, is it not?"

The monk looked suspiciously at the querist, ere he answered, "It is so said. I have even heard she and her brother are to be tried upon that day."

"And gentlemen," said the beggar, "Masters Brereton and Weston, with Sir Henry Norris, when does their trial

come on ?"

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They have been already tried, and found guilty." "Of what?"

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Adultery with the Queen."

"Have any confessed?"

"None but the knave Smeaton," answered the Stranger. "Ho! ho! the singing bird," laughed the soldier; "he hath sung to a fine purpose. The dishonour of the King, the varlet! they will squeeze his weazand for him, I warrant, lest he sing another tune, by and by."

The monk gave a side look at the speaker, and smiled inwardly.

"And so Anne Boleyn is in the Tower?" said the soldier, after a pause.

"Whither thou wilt never go," replied the beggar. "Where then, I ask?"

"To Newgate, when they catch thee, and to the gallows after."

“And thou to the whipping-post.

The four walked on a long while in silence.

“Where is the Earl of Wiltshire, the Lady Anne's father?" asked the beggar.

"I know not," spoke the monk, "save that he appeareth strangely indifferent."

"Poor Anne," sighed the Stranger; "deserted of all! all those friends that hung about her in her prosperity. All, all have deserted her."

"Not so," said the monk, secretly noticing the Stranger; "there is one remains, Mistress Mary Lee.'