"Odds life!" said he. "When here it was ever with thee Wales this, and Wales that. We had no mountains like thy Welsh Mynyddau--that is the silly word, was it not? And no trees like those in the Vale of Towy, and no waters that brawled and foamed like thy mountain brooks, and no music like the twanging of thy bardic harps, and no birds sang so sweet, and no flowers bloomed so fair. Pshaw! now thou art back among them all again. I have sent thee home--art content?" "You have sent me back to blast and destroy my people. You have coupled my name with that of Gerald, that the curses of my dear people when they fall on him may fall on me also." "Bah!" said the King. "Catch me a bluebottle, and do not talk in such high terms." "Henry," she said, in thrilling tones, "I pray you----" "You were forever praying me at one time to send you back to Wales. I have done so, and you are not content." "I had rather a thousand times have buried my head--my shamed, my dishonored head"--she spoke with sternness and concentrated wrath--"in some quiet cloister, than to be sent back with a firebrand into my own land to lay its homesteads in ashes." "You do pretty well among yourselves in that way," said Henry contemptuously. "When were you ever known to unite? You are forever flying at each other's throats and wasting each other's lands. Those who cannot combine must be broken." Nest drew a long breath. She knitted her hands together. "Henry," she said, "I pray you, reconsider what Gerald has advised, and withhold consent." "Nay, it was excellent counsel." "It was the worst counsel that could be given. Think what has been done to my poor people. You have robbed them of their corn-land and have given it to aliens. You have taken from them their harbors, and they cannot escape. You have driven away their princes, and they cannot unite. You have crushed out their independence, and they cease to be men. They have but one thing left to them as their very own--their Church. And now you will plunder them of that--thrust yourselves in between them and God. They have had hitherto their own pastors, as they have had their own princes. They have followed the one in war and the other in peace. Their pastors have been men of their own blood, of their own speech, men who have suffered with them, have wept with them, and have even bled with them. These have spoken to them when sick at heart, and have comforted them when wounded in spirit. And now they are to be jostled out of their places, to make room for others, aliens in blood, ignorant of our language, indifferent to our woes; men who cannot advise nor comfort, men from whom our people will receive no gift, however holy. Deprived of everything that makes life endurable, will you now deprive them of their religion?" She paused, out of breath, with flaming cheek, and sparkling eyes--quivering, palpitating in every part of her body. "Nest," said the King, "you are a woman--a fool. You do not understand policy."