"Nay, nay, Sim; 'tis a thing impossible. Dame Lowe told me her sister was a godly Puritan like ourselves; more stiff in her opinions altogether than she and the parson, for Dame Drayton had counselled that he should give up the church rather than use the new prayer-book, since he could not believe and accept all that was taught in it, and—" "It would have been a bad case for us if Parson Lowe had refused to conform to the new rule, like so many did," interrupted Sim at this point. "Yes, it would; and a worse case for his wife and children, for they might have starved by this time instead of living in a comfortable house, with money to help the poor as well as themselves, and I must say, since these changes came, parson has been even more strict and attentive to his duties, though none could complain of him before." "But what has that to do with Master Drayton being a Quaker?" asked the lad, a little impatiently. "Why, cannot you see, Sim, that all the family are of so godly a sort, that they would not be likely to take up with all the unruly and wild notions that these pestilent people teach?" "I don't know what the Quakers teach, but I know that one fellow named Westland has had his ears cut off, and now three girls of the same name have come to live with us in Soper Lane. If they were not Quakers themselves, would they take in a disgraced Quaker's children?" The widow looked at her son for a minute as if she thought this argument was unanswerable, but after a minute's pause she said— "They are kind and godly folk, you say, and so it may be they are not of this pestilent sect that hath been suffered to spring up to speak evil of dignities, though they succour these children." But although the widow said this, she decided to go and see her friend the vicar, and have a word with his wife too if it was possible, for it would never do to let her son—her only child—become contaminated, even though he was being taught his trade without the cost of a penny to herself. During the rest of the evening she asked the boy a good many questions about his work in Soper Lane, and the ways of the household, but there seemed no fault to be found with anything, though doubtless the household was ruled strictly, as most Puritan homes were. Still, what Sim had told her about Westland made her uncomfortable, and before she went to bed she decided to go to the vicarage the next morning as soon as Sim had started to Soper Lane, and doubtless the parson or Dame Lowe would be able to explain everything, and set her fears at rest. But when she went, she heard from the maid-servant that the vicar was ill in bed with a bad cold, and that she would have to wait a little while to see her mistress.