The Bishop was, by that, hot to do grace to the Young Lovell. And, after he had made the monk Francis recite over again all that he had said, he agreed very heartily to do all that that monk asked of him. For that was a position that jumped very well with Bishop Sherwood’s character, and one that made all things the plainer to him. Being a churchman, subtle rather than vigorous, he desired above all things the good and glory of his see. He desired that, so much above his own glory and good, that in later years he left his see and went into exile rather than that the bishopric should suffer from the King’s hatred of his person. But he could see very well that the bishopric of Durham would lose rather than gain by taking the lands of a young lord, well loved and deserving well of those parts. The Church, as he was aware, was called, in those days, avaricious, gluttonous and avid of lands and rent. But here, by a shining instance, he might show that the see-palatine of Durham held its hand and so that see should gain in credit and renown at the expense even of all other bishoprics in the realm and of the realm itself. And here was a course of action that this Bishop could very well understand and set going. Besides, of his own predilection, he had a hearty inclination towards such high and chivalric natures as was the Young Lovell’s. He saw in him a shining and armoured protector against the foes of his see. Seeing things very much in symbols and pictures, this Bishop seemed to see that young lord, in silver harness, shining in the sun and raising his sword against the mists, fumes and flames that beset this fair city of Durham. Therefore he said hastily to the monk Francis that if that monk would take a sheet of parchment and write the various matters of canon law and the rest, he, the Bishop, would commit them to memory, and, that evening he would call before him the lawyer Stone, the Young Lovell and, if it seemed advisable, the King’s commissioner and announce to them what his rede was in all these matters. So he gave the monk a great sheet of parchment from a chest and the monk turned round to the pulpit and began to write. The Bishop walked up and down behind his back, rubbing his hands delicately together with pleasure at that their scheme and at the discomfiture of the King’s commissioner that must ensue therefrom. Now let us turn for a moment to what passed in the house of the Princess Rohtraut of Croy, Lady mother of Dacre, during this time, whilst the monk wrote. VII