A ‘drizzling rain had set in and had driven the crowds from the streets. Frances drew a chair to the window of the library and sat there meditating on the strange events in which she was taking some small part, so different from the tranquil happenings of the district she had known all her life. She had imagined London a city of palaces facing broad streets, fanciedly, if not literally, paved with gold; a town of gaiety and laughter: and here was the reality, a cavernous, squalid, gloomy, human warren, peopled with murky demons bent on outrage of some sort, ill-natured and threatening. As the day waned, she saw that in spite of the rain the mob was collecting again, its atoms running hither and thither, calling to each other; bedraggled beings labouring under some common excitement. And now its roar came to her again, farther off than before,--a roar that chilled her while she listened, and the wave of sound this time seemed to have a fearful note of exultation in it. She wondered what had happened, and was anxious for her father if he were at the mercy of it. Mrs. Jarrett came into the room, followed by a man-servant, and also by one of her father’s secretaries, as the woman whispered to the girl: “My lady, we must close the shutters and bar them tightly, for the ruffians are threatening again, and may be here in force at any moment, to stone the windows, as they have done before.” The secretary seated himself at the table and was arranging papers. The man-servant opened the windows, from which Frances drew back, and now the cries came distinctly to her. “Death to Strafford!” “Down with the tyrant!” “To the block with the King’s Earl!” were some of the shouts she heard lustily called forth. “Oh! I fear my father is in danger. Do you think they have him in their power, that they exult so?” Good Mrs. Jarrett, anxiety on her own honest face, soothed her young mistress, and the secretary came forward. “Be not troubled, Madam,” he said. “While they cry ‘To the block’ it shows they have not possession of his lordship’s person, but hope to stir up rancour to his disfavour. While they shout for process of law, his lordship is safe, for the law is in his hands and in those of the King, whose behests he carries out.” This seemed a reasonable deduction, and it calmed the inquirer, although there remained to her disquietude the accent of triumph in the voice of the mob.