"Young man, I trust that you are loyal and true to the faith of those forefathers of yours who have been one of England's brightest ornaments. In these latter days there has been a falling away. Men have let slip the ancient truths. Love of the world has been stronger within them than love of the truth. They have let themselves be corrupted by heresy; they have lost their first love. I trust it is not so with you. I trust you are one of the faithful who are yet looking for brighter days for England, when she shall be gathered again to the arms of the true Church. But a few minutes ago I saw you make the holy sign, and my heart went out to you as to a brother. These Protestants deny and contemn that symbol, as they despise and contemn in their wantonness the ordinances of God and the authority of His Vicar. I trust you have not fallen into like error; I trust that you are a true son of the old stock of Trevlyn?" "I know little of such disputed matters," answered Cuthbert, made a little nervous by the ardent glance bent upon him from the bright eyes of the speaker. He had a dark, narrow face, pale and eager, a small, pointed beard trimmed after the fashion of the times, and the wide-brimmed sugar-loaf hat drawn down upon his brows cast a deep shadow over his features. But his voice was peculiarly melodious and persuasive, and there was a nameless attraction about him that Cuthbert was quick to feel. Others in the days to follow felt it to their own undoing, but of that the lad knew nothing. He only wished to retain the good opinion this stranger seemed to have formed of him. "I have led but a hermit's life, as I have told you. I have been bred up in the faith of my forefathers, and that faith I believe. What perplexes me is that those who hold the Established or Reformed faith, as men term it, have the same creeds, the same doctrines as we ourselves. I have from time to time conformed to the law, and gone to the services, and I have not heard aught spoken within their walls that our good priest in old days used not to tell me was sound doctrine. There be things he taught me that these men say naught about; but no man may in one discourse touch upon every point of doctrine. I freely own that I have been sorely perplexed to know whence comes all this strife, all these heart burnings."