*R. Crowley is his preface to Piers Ploughman, printed in 1550. I hope that you will be among those who will not "stick to break the shell of the nut for the kernel's sake," and that although the "sense be somewhat dark" you will some day read the book for yourselves. Meantime in the next chapter I will tell you a little more about it. Chapter XX "PIERS THE PLOUGHMAN" -- continued WHEN Langland fell asleep upon the Malvern Hills he dreamed a wondrous dream. He thought that he saw a "fair field full of folk," where was gathered "all the wealth of the world and the woe both." "Working and wondering as the world asketh, Some put them to the plough and played them full seldom, In eareing and sowing laboured full hard." But some are gluttons and others think only of fine clothes. Some pray and others jest. There are rogues and knaves here, friars and priests, barons and burgesses, bakers and butchers, tailors and tanners, masons and miners, and folk of many other crafts. Indeed, the field is the world. It lies between a tower and a dungeon. The tower is God, the dungeon is the dwelling of the Evil One. Then, as Langland looked on all this, he saw "A lady lovely in face, in linnen i-clothed, Come adown from the cliff and spake me fair, And said, 'Son, sleepest thou? Seest thou this people All how busy they be about the maze?'" Langland was "afeard of her face though she was fair." But the lovely lady, who is Holy Church, speaks gently to the dreamer. She tells him that the tower is the dwelling of Truth, who is the lord of all and who gives to each as he hath need. The dungeon is the castle of Care. "Therein liveth a wight that Wrong is called, The Father of Falseness." Love alone, said the lady, leads to Heaven, "Therefore I warn ye, the rich, have ruth on the poor. Though ye be mighty in councils, be meek in your works, For the same measure ye meet, amiss or otherwise, Ye shall be weighed therewith when ye wend hence." "Truth is best in all things," she said at length. "I have told thee now what Truth is, and may no longer linger." And so she made ready to go. But the dreamer kneeled on his knees and prayed her stay yet a while to teach him to know Falsehood also, as well as Truth. And the lady answered:-- "'Look on thy left hand and see where he standeth, Both False and Flattery and all his train.' I looked on the left hand as the Lady me taught. Then was I ware of a woman wondrously clothéd, Purfled with fur, the richest on earth. Crowned with a crown. The King hath no better. All her five fingers were fretted with rings Of the most precious stones that a prince ever wore; In red scarlet she rode, beribboned with gold, There is no queen alive that is more adorned." This was Lady Meed or Bribery. "To-morrow," said Holy Church, "she shall wed with False." And so the lovely Lady departed.