"I cannot tell, Jack: thou didst never set me on recounting of my pedigree, as I remember." "But wherefore not tell the same?" "What matter?" quietly responded Arthur. "`What matter'--whether I looked on thee as a mere parson's son, with nought in thine head better than Greek and Latin, or as near kinsman of one with very purple blood in him,--one that should be well-nigh Premier Earl of England, but for an attainder?" Arthur passed by the slight offered alike to his father's profession and to the classics, merely replying with a smile,--"I am glad if it give thee pleasure to know it." "But tell me, prithee, with such alliance, what on earth caused Master Tremayne to take to parsonry?" The contempt in which the clergy were held, for more than a hundred years after this date, was due in all probability to two causes. The first was the natural reaction from the overweening reverence anciently felt for the sacerdotal order: when the _sacerdos_ was found to be but a presbyter, his charm was gone. But the second was the disgrace which had been brought upon their profession at large, by the evil lives of the old priests. "I believe," said Arthur, gravely, "it was because he accounted the household service of God higher preferment than the nobility of men." "Yet surely he knew how men would account of him?" "I misdoubt if he cared for that, any more than I do, Jack Enville." "Nor is thy mother any more than a parson's daughter." "My father, and my mother's father," said Arthur, his eyes flashing, "were all but martyrs; for it was only the death of Queen Mary that saved either from the martyr's stake. That is my lineage, Jack Enville,--higher than Courtenay of Powderham." "Thou must be clean wood, Arthur!" said Jack, laughing. "Why, there were poor chapmen and sely [simple] serving-maids among them that were burnt in Queen Mary's days; weavers, bricklayers, and all manner of common folk. There were rare few of any sort." [Of any consequence.] "They be kings now, whatso they were," answered Arthur. "There was a bishop or twain, Jack, if I mistake not," put in Basset, yawning; "and a Primate of all England, without I dreamed it." "Go to, Jack!" pursued Arthur. "I can tell thee of divers craftsmen that were very common folk--one Peter, a fisherman, and one Paul, a tent-maker, and an handful belike--whose names shall ring down all the ages, long after men have forgotten that there ever were Courtenays or Envilles. I set the matter on thine own ground to say this." "Stand and deliver, Jack Enville! That last word hath worsted thee," said Basset. "I am not an orator," returned Jack, loftily. "I am a gentleman." "Well, so am I, as I suppose, but I make not such ado thereof as thou," answered Basset. The last word had only just escaped his lips, when Arthur Tremayne stepped suddenly to the side of the vessel. "The Don ahead?" inquired Basset, with sleepy sarcasm.