The way was long, and the path which Longpole and his companions followed led through a variety of green fields and lanes, silent and solitary, which gave the young knight full time to muse over his situation. Had he given credit to the words of his conductor, and for an instant supposed that the reason of his having been so suddenly seized was the charge of instigating a body of Cornish miners to tumult, he would have felt, no apprehension; for he knew it would be easy to clear himself of crimes committed in a county which he had never seen in his life. But Sir Osborne felt that if such a charge were brought forward, it would merely be as a pretext to place him in the power of his bitterest enemies. The manner in which he had been made a prisoner, so different from the open, fair course of any legal proceeding, the persons who had seized him bearing no appearance of officers of the law, the doubt that the chief of them had himself expressed as to the veracity of the charge, and the presence of a set of smuggling Portuguese sailors, all showed evidently to Sir Osborne that his detention solely originated in some deep wile of a man famous for his daring cunning and his evil deeds. Yet still, knowing the full extent of his danger, and blessed with a heart unused to quail to any circumstance of fate, the knight would have felt no apprehension, had not odd little Human Nature, who always keeps a grain or two of superstition in the bottom of her snuff-box, continually reminded him of the prophecy of his singular companion of the day before, and reproached him for not having followed the advice which would infallibly have removed him from the difficulties by which he was now surrounded. The mysterious vagueness, too, the shadowy uncertainty, of the predicted evil, which seemed even now in its accomplishment, in despite of all his efforts, weighed upon his mind; and it was not till the long, heavy brick front of an old manor-house met his view, giving notice that he was near the place of his destination, that he could arouse his energies to encounter what was to follow. The large folding-doors leading into a stone hall were pushed open by his conductors, and Sir Osborne was brought in, and made to sit down upon a bench by the fire. One or two servants only were in the hall; and they, unlike the persons who brought him, were dressed in livery, with the cognizance of Sir Payan--a snake twisted round a crane--embroidered on the sleeve. "His worship is in the book-room, Dick," said one of the men; "take your prisoner there." These few words were all that passed, for an ominous sort of silence seemed to hang over the dwelling, and affected all within it. Without reply, Longpole led the young knight forward, followed by two of those who had assisted in securing him; and at the end of a long corridor, which terminated the hall, knocked at a door in a recess.