Passengers warily walking in the middle of the street--sudden shrinking and confusion here and there, when some invalid, with bandaged throat and pale face, was descried limping among the common stream--struck Edith with an indefinite pang as they rode slowly onward. They had parted with their fellow-traveler a short time before, having themselves made a considerable circuit, in order to visit the family of an ejected minister in Surrey. Sir Philip had gone on without delay to his mother’s house, in Westminster, and Caleb Field and his daughter, with as much speed as their wearied horse would permit them, were pursuing their way to the residence of an old parishioner, on the Hampstead Road, who had offered to receive them. The first church they passed was open; from its doors poured a stream of people, newly dismissed from one of the many solemn services of that fear-stricken time. The preacher, a dark, grave man, wearing over his black dress the Geneva band, was last of all. He was passing on, without lifting his eyes, eagerly conversing with a youth who walked beside him. “Master Vincent,” said Field, as he passed by, “does the work prosper with you in this evil time?” “Ah! is it thou, good brother Field?” cried the preacher, greeting him cordially; “thou art welcome to a troublous place. Doth the work prosper, say you? Alas! brother, where is it that we can do other than echo that lamentation of the prophet: ‘Who hath believed my report?’” “Nay, but let us hope for better things,” said the stouter-hearted Puritan; “surely we may look that many brands shall be plucked from this burning. The people are earnest, as I hear, in seeking the Word and prayer, and I wot well these have been blessed symptoms, brother Vincent, since it was said of Saul, the persecutor in old times, ‘Behold he prayeth.’” “Fear--fear, only fear,” answered Vincent, despondingly, with a nervous twitching of his mouth; “fear--not of the Lord, brother, but of the Plague.” “And who shall say when the twain may join?” said Field. “Ah! brother, think’st thou it is the _death_ they fear, and not the after judgment, and yonder wondrous life beyond? An it were not for these, trust me, the material grave would lose its terrors.” “And thou hast ventured thy child in this doomed city?” said Vincent, hurriedly. “I will not bid thee welcome, gentle Mistress Edith, for this is no place for thee. Know’st thou the very air is heavy with the pestilence? I marvel, Master Field, that thou broughtest thy daughter into this peril.” “It is her own wayward will, not mine,” was the answer. “Now there is no way of amending it, we must have the issue with our Master in heaven. What do men say of the pestilence? Does it diminish or increase?”