"_This to make known that our worthy and well-trusted servant, Colonel Nathaniel Fiennes, has our commission to undertake the government of our good and faithful city of Bristol, and we hereby direct and do command that all persons submit and yield due obedience to the lawful authority so holden by him_. "_Signed_, _Lenthal_." The astonished colonel made some vapouring protest in speech, but not by action. For the son of Lord Saye and Sele had not come thither unattended. At his back was a _posse_ of stalwart fellows--soldiers, who, that same morning, were under the orders of him now being placed in arrest, but, having learnt there was a change of commanding officers, knew better than to refuse obedience to the new one. So the deposed governor, forced to part company with his _convives_, was carried off to prison as a common malefactor. He, too, the son of the Earl of Essex, Lord General of the Parliamentary army--the Parliament itself having ordered it! Verily, these were days when men feared not to arraign and punish--unlucky times for tyrants and traitors! To have concealed a deficit of four thousand pounds in the national exchequer _then_ would have been a more dangerous deception than to waste as many millions _now_, without being able to render account of them. CHAPTER TWENTY TWO. THE CADGERS ON DANGEROUS GROUND. "Yonner be the big city at last! Glad I am. Ain't you that, Jinkum?" It was Jerky Jack who spoke, the exclamation meant for his sister, who was with him, the interrogation addressed to the donkey. They were not upon any of the Forest roads, but quite on the other side of the Severn, trudging along towards Bristol, the big city whose spires Jack had caught sight of. One could almost fancy that the dumb brute comprehended the question facetiously put; at the words elevating its head, giving a wallop or two with its long ears, and mending the pace. "It be good three mile to go yet," rejoined the woman. "Just that frae the cross roads--a bit forrard." "Well, Winny; us ought to get theer by seven o' the clock?" "So us ought, if nothin' stop we," and she cast an anxious glance along the road ahead. "Don't think theer be much danger o' gettin' stopt now. The Governor o' Glo'ster sayed when's we got well on maybe we'd meet some o' the Bristol sodgers patrollin' about. Weesh we did. 'Tain't noways comfortable travellin', all o' the time in fear o' being pulled up and knocked about by them Cavalieres. Ha! ha! If that party we passed at Berkeley cud a' seed through my wooden leg, 'tain't likely I'd be stumpin' along here?" "True. But 'tain't wise to cry safe till one be sure o' it. Ye know they told us in Glo'ster that the King's dragoneers ha' it all their own way in the country places; him's they call Prince Roopert, goin' about like a ragin' lion, runnin' people through, an' shootin' 'em down wi' pistols as if they were no better than dogs. It's a big risk us be runnin', Jack!"