"Admit him instantly," said the Archbishop--"my mind tells me he brings us joyful tidings.--Never knew I such humble penitence,-- such willing resignation of natural affections and desires to the doing of Heaven's service, but it was rewarded with a guerdon either temporal or spiritual." As he spoke, a man singularly dressed entered the apartment. His garments, of various colours, and showily disposed, were none of the newest or cleanest, neither were they altogether fitting for the presence in which he now stood. "How now, sirrah!" said the Prelate; "when was it that jugglers and minstrels pressed into the company of such as we without permission?" "So please you," said the man, "my instant business was not with your reverend lordship, but with my lord the Constable, to whom I will hope that my good news may atone for my evil apparel." "Speak, sirrah, does my kinsman live?" said the Constable eagerly. "And is like to live, my lord," answered the man--"a favourable crisis (so the leeches call it) hath taken place in his disorder, and they are no longer under any apprehensions for his life." "Now, God be praised, that hath granted me so much mercy!" said the Constable. "Amen, amen!" replied the Archbishop solemnly.--"About what period did this blessed change take place?" "Scarcely a quarter of an hour since," said the messenger, "a soft sleep fell on the sick youth, like dew upon a parched field in summer--he breathed freely--the burning heat abated--and, as I said, the leeches no longer fear for his life." "Marked you the hour, my Lord Constable?" said the Bishop, with exultation--"Even then you stooped to those counsels which Heaven suggested through the meanest of its servants! But two words avouching penitence--but one brief prayer--and some kind saint has interceded for an instant hearing, and a liberal granting of thy petition. Noble Hugo," he continued, grasping his hand in a species of enthusiasm, "surely Heaven designs to work high things by the hand of him whose faults are thus readily forgiven--whose prayer is thus instantly heard. For this shall _Te Deum Laudamus_ be said in each church, and each convent in Gloucester, ere the world be a day older." The Constable, no less joyful, though perhaps less able to perceive an especial providence in his nephew's recovery, expressed his gratitude to the messenger of the good tidings, by throwing him his purse. "I thank you, noble lord," said the man; "but if I stoop to pick up this taste of your bounty, it is only to restore it again to the donor." "How now, sir?" said the Constable, "methinks thy coat seems not so well lined as needs make thee spurn at such a guerdon." "He that designs to catch larks, my lord," replied the messenger, "must not close his net upon sparrows--I have a greater boon to ask of your lordship, and therefore I decline your present gratuity."