While Cradock gazed with great admiration, John Rosedew, with his fingers upon his lips, and looking half ashamed of himself, went to a cupboard, whose doors, half open, gave a glimpse of countless sermons. From among them he drew a wide–mouthed bottle of leeches, and set it upon the table. Then he pulled out the stopper, unplugged it, and lo! from a hole in the cork fell out two sovereigns and a half one. As this money rolled on the table, John could not help chuckling a little. “Ha, good sister Eudoxia, have I overreached thee again? Double precaution there, you see, Crad. She has a just horror of my sermons, and she runs at the sight of a leech. ‘Non missura cutemʼ—be sure, not a word about it, Crad. That asylum is inviolable, and sempitern, I hope. I shall put more there next week”. Cradock took the money at once, with the deepest gratitude, but no great fuss about it; for he saw how bitterly that good man would feel it, if he were small enough to refuse. I shall not dwell upon their good–bye, as we have had enough valediction; only Cradock promised to write from London, so soon as he could give an address there; then leaving sadness behind him, carried a deal of it with him. Only something must yet be recounted, which befell him in Nowelhurst. And this is the first act of it. While he was in his garret packing a little bag of necessaries, forced upon him by Miss Doxy from Johnʼs wardrobe and her own almost indiscriminately, and while she was pulling and struggling up–stairs with John, and Jemima, and Jenny—for she would have made Cradock, if she could, carry the entire house with him—he, stowing some things in his pocket, felt what he had caught up so hastily, while flying out of the wood. He examined it by the candlelight, and became at once intent upon it. It had lain beneath a drift of dead leaves backed by a scraggy branch, whence anything short of a grand “skedaddle” would never have dislodged it. And yet it was a great deal too pretty to be treated in that way. Cradock could not help admiring it, though he shuddered and felt some wild hopes vanish as he made out the meaning. It was a beautiful gold bracelet, light, and of first–rate workmanship, harmonious too with its purpose, and of elegant design. The lower half was a strong soft chain of the fabric of Trichinopoli, which bends like the skin of a snake; the front and face showed a strong right arm, gauntleted, yet entirely dependent upon the hand of a lady. No bezilling, no jewel whatever, except that a glorious rose–shaped pearl hung, as in contest, between them.