2.--RETROSPECT 16 3.--THE SECRET CHAMBER 27 4.--THE ARREST 33 5.--THE ROAD-SIDE INN 44 6.--THE TRIAL 55 7.--GLASTONBURY TOR 65 8.--ON THE TRACK 74 9.--IN THE RUINS OF THE ABBEY 91 PART II.--Cuthbert the Foundling. 1.--THE OLD MANOR HOUSE 101 2.--AN EVENTFUL RAMBLE 111 3.--AN ACT OF GRATITUDE 122 4.--EXETER GAOL 135 5.--PUT TO THE QUESTION 145 6.--AN UNEXPECTED DISCLOSURE 154 7.--CASTLE REDFYRNE 164 8.--LED FORTH TO DIE 177 9.--BREATHING TIME 187 10.--THE SHADOWS DARKEN 198 11.--AN ANCIENT INN 210 12.--THE HAND OF GOD 221 13.--THE TRUST FULFILLED 232 14.--SUUM CUIQUE TRIBUITUR 243 EPILOGUE 252 NOTES 257 _ERRATUM._ _Page 169, line 5, Read_ appetens _for_ appietens. PART I. _The Last Abbot._ They built in marble; built as they Who hoped these stones should see the day When Christ should come; and that these walls Might stand o’er them till judgment calls. THE LAST ABBOT OF GLASTONBURY, _A TALE OF THE DAYS OF HENRY VIII_. Prologue. It is a cold wintry night in the year 1524, the fifteenth of the high and mighty Lord, Henry, Eighth of that name, “by the grace of God King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland,” as the heralds vainly style him. All day long the clouds have been hanging over the forest of Avalon, heavy and dull as lead, and now towards eventide they descend in snow, an east wind arises, which blows the flakes before it, with such frantic violence, that their direction seems almost parallel to the earth, penetrating every nook of the forest, filling each hollow.