"If--ay, if! I do not say a Papist must needs be a bad man nor a bad king. Not but what they all are so--for the most part," said Simon as in fear of overmuch concession. "But this is a Papist for sure, and as surely a bad man. 'T is pretty work he has had the doing of in Scotland, sir; and that not for his own superstition, but for a faith he doth not hold. Give him power and the time to use it, and what will he not attempt for the Scarlet Woman? Moreover, if the Duke of Monmouth be the King's son, born in lawful wedlock, as this same story of the Black Box would show----" "No more, Simon," interrupted my father angrily. "Say not another word of that. It is rank blasphemy and treason, and I, being a faithful subject of His Majesty, and on his commission of the peace, and holding command in the train-bands, may not hear repeated what His Majesty has denied. And most of all, Simon," he continued more kindly, "I do fear this sort of wild talk will get thee into trouble. Leave it to Republicans and Fifth Monarchy Men, old friend. I fear you have been running after sectaries in your old age, Simon." He knew it well, for the old steward, like the poor land that had asked and taken many years and much blood of his youth, had passed through many contrarious fits of thought and sentiment. In religion his politic fear of Rome had well-nigh driven him out of the back door of the Church into the arms of the Puritans. As he hovered between respect of his ancient captain and present master, and the enticements of controversy, "Go, Simon!" cried Sir Michael; "bid Parson Greenlow pray with you, and read you a lecture on Passive Obedience and the Duty of Non-resistance." "Humph!" muttered the old malcontent, as he walked toward the stable; "the parsons will be mighty ready to eat their sermons when the Duke's Scottish boot is on their leg. They 'll resist then, Sir Michael, even as we resisted Old Noll." And so three further years went by, and Ned came not, but did spend such time as he was not in Oxford with Madam Royston in his father's noble house in Basinghall Street in the City of London. Twice did he send me a letter in those days, with no word, indeed, of love in them, but so breathing the constancy of our old terms of alliance, and bringing me so much joy, that I cannot endure they should run the risk of the cold monument of print, and so will not here set down their words. And I grew in length and thickness, and, I hope, in other things beside, and had almost forgot my mirror but for the kinder and more pleasing glance it would now and again, toward the latter part of my seventeenth year, begin to throw back upon me, as I would pin a collar, or struggle to twist into some show of order the stubborn and difficult blackness of my hair. CHAPTER III