While the neighborhood of St. Margaret’s was in this unusual state, two females, followed by more than an equal number of serving-men, each with the Lord Protector’s badge upon his sleeve, came suddenly round a corner, and, before they seemed aware of it, were encompassed by the crowd, through which it seemed each instant more difficult to make a free passage. The two females were muffled in their mantles, with the hoods drawn so closely that it was difficult to distinguish their features, or gather an idea of their station, save by a certain air of dignity and refinement which hung about the shorter of the two, and which no vestments could entirely conceal. Both this lady and her companion seemed bewildered and terrified by the rush of human beings with which they had become so strangely mingled. At first they attempted to retrace their steps, but the street through which they had come was now blocked up by a company of more than two hundred working-men, who were coming up from their employment on the Strand, to assist in the destruction of St. Margaret’s. When thus convinced that all hopes of retreat were cut off, the female who had seemed most anxious to escape the crowd, put forth a white and trembling hand from beneath her mantle and drew the hood still more closely over her face, while the other in her fright allowed the drapery to fall back from her head and exposed the features of an elderly woman slightly wrinkled, and at the moment pale as a corpse with apprehension. Her sharp black eyes were keen with terror, and her wrinkled hands shook in a way that rendered the effort to draw her hood forward one of considerable difficulty. The servitors who followed these bewildered persons were but little annoyed by the position which seemed so painful to them, but one, a tall insolent man, held up his arm that all might see the Lord Protector’s badge, and ordered those immediately around him to make way for a noble lady of the Duke’s household to pass. He spoke loud and arrogantly, but the muffled female grasped his arm, and while her words came gaspingly from excess of fear, muttered— “Dost thou not see how these men lower and frown upon us already? Hearest thou not my noble father’s name bandied from lip to lip, and each time with a curse coupled with it? Take down thy arm, good Richard—muffle the sleeve within thy cloak and let us struggle forward as we are best able.”