_MDC together make sixteen hundred_ } _and_ } _XXVVVV, forty_ } _the total_ 1644. _and_ } _IIII, four_ } I have shown it to many in private, and all agree that no better chronogramma was made during the late troubles: but, to be sure, I had leisure for it. To leave these toys--on the last day but one of August, and a little before nine in the evening, there came into the church (that was lit by a few lanterns only) two foot-soldiers bearing a ladder between them and a rope, which presently they set down in a corner by the belfry and departed. They being scarce gone, by-and-by there entered two other soldiers with a prisoner, whom they unbound--for his arms had been trussed behind him--and bade make what cheer he might until the morrow. Now, whether he had spied us or not as they brought him in I cannot say; but, being loosed, he moved at first down the aisle uncertainly as a man might who found even the dull light too strong for his eyes--then with a quick tottering step towards us, that were gathered around a lantern and taking our supper near the belfry: and as he drew toward us I knew him for old Carminowe. "Why, what harm can they have found in _you_?" asked I, taking his hand (as fellows will in misfortune) and giving him a seat beside us. At this distance of time I will own that this speech of mine seems not over-delicate; yet these were the words I used, and, be sure, I meant them well. He put my question aside. "You had ill-luck," he said. "I watched you from the high ground, and my heart went with you; that is to say, with _you_, Sir--and with _you_." Here he bowed to Grylls and Jack Trecarrel, and went on as if explaining his performance lucidly. "My son, Sirs, had he lived, would have been about your age. He died at eighteen and a few months: but I think of him year by year as alive and growing, and so I seem to share in his hopes and his high mettle." My companions--as well they might--stared at him, and from him to me; thinking, no doubt, that here was some madman. "Excuse me," said I, and presented him formally. "This gentleman and I are, in a fashion, acquaintances. He is a countryman of yours, by name Carminowe." "Carminowe?" Young Grylls looked at him musingly. "I have read the name on a hundred old parchments at home." "The estates, Sir," said Carminowe, "have passed into many hands, but into none worthier than that of Grylls." "Faith, that's handsomely said!" answered Grylls, perceiving now that, in spite of the old man's dress, he had to do with a gentleman. "And, as for the estates, our greed (which, a generation or two back, was a scandal) has not swallowed them all, I hope?--though, for that matter, if these crop-ears prevail, 'tis little enough that any of us will inherit."