to his chaplains, “Father’s soul!” said the bishop, “let him alone, for he hath more learning than you all.” He was twice accused of heresy to Tunstall, who abhorred to shed blood; but information being given against him to Bonner, bishop of London, an order was issued for his apprehension. Gilpin had intelligence of the danger, yet he only provided against it by ordering William Airy, his house steward, to provide a long garment, that he might go the more comely to the stake. The sudden death of Mary cleared off the impending storm. Not long afterwards, bishop Tunstall presented Gilpin to the rectory of Houghton, a large parish with fourteen villages, which he laboriously served. He built a grammar school, from whence he sent students almost daily to the university, and maintained them there at his own cost. Honoured by the wise, and respected by the noble, the earl of Bedford solicited from queen Elizabeth the vacant bishopric of Carlisle for Gilpin. A _congé d’élire_ was accordingly issued, but Gilpin resisted the dignity against all entreaties. “If I had been chosen to a bishopric elsewhere,” he said, “I would not have refused it; but in Carlisle I have many friends and kindred, at whom I must connive in many things, not without hurt to myself, or else deny them many things, not without hurt to them, which difficulties I have avoided by the refusal of that bishopric.” He was chosen provost of his own (Queen’s) college in Oxford, but this advancement he also declined. Yet he did the office and work of a bishop, by preaching, taking care of the poor, providing for the necessities of other churches, erecting schools, encouraging learned men, and keeping open house to all that needed. Cecil, lord Burleigh, the queen’s secretary, having visited Gilpin at Houghton, on his return towards Durham, when he came to Rainton-hill, reflected his eye upon the open country he had passed, and looking earnestly upon Gilpin’s house, said, “I do not blame this man for refusing a bishopric. What doth he want that a bishopric could more enrich him withal? besides that he is free from the great weight of cares.” Gilpin annually visited the people of Ridsdale and Tindale, and was “little else than adored by that half barbarous and rustic people.” When at Rothbury, in these parts, “there was a pestilent faction among some of them who were wont to resort to the church; the men being bloodily minded, practised a bloody manner of revenge, termed by them a _deadly feud_:” if one faction came to the church the other kept away, inasmuch as they could not meet without bloodshed. It so happened that when Gilpin was in the pulpit both parties came to the church; one party stood in the chancel, the other in the body of the church. Each body was armed with swords and javelins, and their weapons making a clashing sound, Gilpin, unaccustomed to such a spectacle, was somewhat moved, yet he proceeded with his sermon. A