"’He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good,’" replied Mr. Robesart. "His common, earthly blessings He gives to all alike." "And what call you such gifts as beauty, learning, and riches? Be they blessings, or no?" "All things that God has made are good. They are blessings when they leave His hand. If we would have them abide blessings, we must give them back to Him. If we keep them to adorn ourselves withal, they become curses to us. God’s first and greatest blessing is Himself. Let us keep Him in His right place—on the throne of the heart—and all else will fall into his right place, as by the wave of a magician’s wand." "Things be sorely apt to get out of their places!" said the Earl with a sigh. "I thank you, Father." "My Lord, when you find things out of their places, look and see if you have not given leave to somewhat else to occupy His place. God give you a good even!" A very small suite accompanied Earl Roger to Ireland; but it included his two best friends, Mr. Robesart and Lawrence Madison. His outside friends were considerably puzzled to know why he should leave England at such a particularly awkward moment as this, when the negotiations for the King’s marriage were in progress. The Earl of Kent, his late guardian—since Roger’s majority he had ceased to be a practical one so far as any personal control was concerned—was specially perplexed and astonished at this step. But he knew nothing of the interview at Fleshy. To all of them Roger gave a general and vague explanation, which had reference to the necessary care of his Irish estates. His own sole fervent desire was to put himself where Gloucester could not find him—to lose himself, as far as the conspirators were concerned. It was the only way that he could see just then to serve that God, and that King, to both of whom in his early youth he had pledged his heart’s devotion. Rarely has any journey been taken in more feverish haste than that of Roger Earl of March to Ireland in the summer of 1396. He felt as though he were not safe for a day until he had put the breadth of St. George’s Channel between himself and his uncle Gloucester. His journey from London to Haverford was almost a flight. His unsuspecting suite complained bitterly of the long forced marches over the mountains of South Wales which their unreasonable master obliged them to take. Two days delay at Haverford, before the wind would serve, brought Roger’s patience to the verge of distraction. "I _must_ go!" he said passionately to Mr. Robesart. "My Lord," was the grave answer, "it ill suits the archer to wear the uniform of the general. There is no must but one, and it is meet but for the lips of the Lord of all." "Yet surely He knoweth my necessity?" "Soothly: but I pray your Lordship to remember that what is _must_ with you may be _must not_ with Him." "I cannot rest till I be hence!"