Chapter XIII: August 12, Feast of St. Clare

THE Queen goes to-morrow, and I am right glad on't. Not that I have aught against her Grace. She has been a good mistress to me, and I have learned many things of Mistress Patience, chiefly the art of knitting stockings, with which I am delighted. Moreover, I believe the restraint I have had to put on myself in the presence, has been good discipline for me, who am ever apt to speak without thought.

Another privilege I have gained by my attendance on the Queen, which I fear I shall sorely miss. I mean that of walking abroad. The Queen hath visited the poor people in the village, and all about here, even to two or three miles distant; and as Amice cannot walk far on account of her lame ancle, I have attended her Grace, along with Mistress Patience, and Master Griffith, who is a very sober, good-natured gentleman, about as old as my father. It did seem marvellous pleasant to be going to the cottages once more, nursing the babes, chatting with the good wives, and making acquaintance with the children. Mistress Bullen sometimes goes with us, and the men are loud in praise of her beauty and kindness. I don't think the women fancy her so much, and I must say I don't fancy her at all any more.

The Queen is very liberal, and gives with an open hand; but she is shrewd, too, and will not be imposed upon. Roger Smith, whom she met in the street, told her Grace a pitiful tale of his sick wife and children, and his want of work. She said but little at the time, giving him a small alms, but presently she turned to me and asked if I knew anything about them. I told her that he had help constantly from our house; besides that, we bought fish of him, whenever we could get them.

"And can he not get them as oft as you need them?" she asked.

I told her I knew no reason why he could not, as the sea was but a few miles away, and I knew he owned a boat; but added that I thought he was not over fond of work, so long as he could get bread without. She made no remark that day, but the next time we were out, she asked a little urchin who was playing in a pool of dirty water, where Roger Smith lived. He put his thumb in his mouth and hung down his head, but presently pointed out a very dirty cottage, with a dunghill before the door, strewed all over with fish-heads and the like. The smell was so bad, that Mrs. Patience ventured a remonstrance, but her Grace persevered, and we entered the cottage. There lay Roger on the settle bed, in what was plainly a drunken sleep. On the rude table lay the remains of a couple of fowls, amid fish-bones, fragments of bread, and ribs of some animal looking mightily like a deer's, while a slatternly woman, and a bold, impudent-looking girl were just beginning to clear away, though it was nearly nine o'clock of the morning. It was clear there had been a debauch over night; and that, whatever else might be needed, there was no want of food. Her Grace looked deliberately round the room, and then turned away.

"What do you please to want, Madam?" asked the woman, in a half servile, half impudent tone.

"I heard there was a sick woman with sick children living here;" answered her Grace, "and that they were in want of food; but fowls, and venison, and strong waters, and a man asleep at this time of day, are no arguments either of poverty or honesty."

And with that she turned and left the house, without another word said, only the girl gave an insolent laugh. Dame Lee, on whom we called afterward, and whom we found spinning of fine thread, though she is above eighty years old, told us that the Smiths were a shame and scandal to the whole village—that the housewife herself was no better than she should be, and Roger a good deal worse.

"That is the way the good Sisters get imposed upon, because they cannot go out to see for themselves," said she. "There is no need for that family ever to ask an alms, and the same is true of others in the place; while those who really need help, are many of them too modest to ask, or too feeble to reach the gate, or hold their own amid the press about it."

"Can you direct us to some of these poor souls of whom you speak?" asked the Queen.

Dame Lee spoke of several, and pointed out their dwelling-places to us, and then mentioned another.

"There is Magdalen Jewell, who lives alone by herself in the moor, at the foot of Grey Tor," said she. "'Tis a lonesome place, and perhaps your ladyship may not care to walk so far."

"How far?" asked the Queen.

"Nay, 'tis but a scant mile, but the way is somewhat rough," answered the dame.

"And is this Magdalen of whom you speak a widow?" asked the Queen.

"No Madam, she hath never been married. She took care of her old father as long as he lived, and was a most dutiful and kind daughter to him; and since his death she has bided alone, till of late that she hath adopted a little orphan maid, one of the survivors of the great wreck last winter. Magdalen owns the house she lives in, and a small garden and orchard, which, with the thread she spins, makes most part of her living. I fear she is often pinched, but she never complains, or asks for help. She might have changed her condition many times, for she was wonderful fair when I first knew her, and of good conditions, and she is a well-favored woman even now; but, nobody knows why, she would none of her suitors, and still lives alone, save, as I said, for the child she hath adopted."

"We must see this woman, I think," said the Queen, turning to Patience and myself. "And now, dame, can we do naught for you?"

The old woman drew herself up with gentle pride.

"I thank your goodness, Madam, but I have need of nothing;" said she. "I have eight sons living hereabouts, besides two sailing on the high seas, and they let their parents want for nothing. My husband is old and infirm, but he still makes a shift to busy himself about our bit of flax land and our orchard, and he also makes and mends nets, and with a good husband and dutiful children, I have no need to ask help of any one."

"Ten sons!" repeated the Queen, musingly, and methought very sadly. "You have indeed much for which to be thankful. How long have you been wedded?"

"Sixty years, Madam, have my good man and I lived together without e'er a quarrel or a wish for change," answered the dame, with gentle pride. "We have had our troubles and our pinches, specially when our children were young, and my eldest child, my only maiden, died of a long waste at seventeen. But we won through them all by the blessing of God, and in all our troubles kept a stout and loving heart. I am sure we never wished ourselves apart, or would have spared one of our little troublesome, hungry brood. I wish all wedded folk could say as much as that!"

"I wish, indeed, they might," said the Queen, with another sad cloud crossing her face (and methought I saw another on the face of Mrs. Patience). "Well, dame, since we can bestow no alms upon you, will you not bestow one upon us, and give us a draught of milk or fair water?"

The dame was evidently well pleased, and bustled about to bring forth her milk and cream, her brown bread and honey, and a dish of early apples. The Queen ate and drank, and would have us do the same. Mrs. Bullen said she was not hungry.

"Then you may eat a little to please the good woman," said the Queen, speaking in French, and more sharply, methought, than was needful; but, somehow, I think she is apt to be sharp with Mistress Anne. "I have seen you make your court before now by eating when you had no need."

Mistress Anne colored as red as fire, but she obeyed without a word. When we had eaten and drank, her Grace took from her breast a very small gold crucifix.

"This cross, good dame, hath had the blessing of our holy Father at Rome, and holds, beside, some earth from the holy sepulchre. I pray you keep it as an aid to your devotion and a remembrance of Queen Catherine; and when you look thereon, give me the benefit of your prayers."

"There now is a woman to be envied, if envy were not a sin," said her Grace, as we quitted the house. "Think you not so, maidens?"

"Not I, for one, Madam," answered Mistress Bullen. "What has her life been but one long slavery? What pleasure is there in such a life—just mending, and saving, and cooking, and washing—nursing stupid children, and waiting on her clod of a husband. Methinks one hour of real life, such as we had at the French court, would be worth it all!"

"And you, maiden, what do you think?" asked her Grace, turning to me.

"It was a saying of my honored mother's that love makes easy service, Madam," I answered. "I think such a life as that of the good dame's may be as noble and honorable in the sight of God, as that of any woman in the world."

"That is a strange speech for a nun," said Mrs. Anne, with her usual levity. "What, as honorable as that of a religious?"

"Yes, if she were called to it," I answered.

"And to last so long—sixty years of drudging and poverty," said Mrs. Anne, with a shudder: "No, no! A short life and a merry one for me."

[I thought of these words many a time after that short and merry life had come to its miserable close, and that fair head, with the crown it coveted and wrought for, lay together on the scaffold. I did never believe the shameful charges brought against her, by which her death was compassed, but 'tis impossible to acquit her of great lightness of conduct, and want of womanly delicacy, or of the worse faults of lawless ambition and treachery against her kind mistress, than whom no one need wish a better. Though I am and have long been of the reformed religion, my feelings have ever been on the side of Queen Catherine.]

The next day we went across the moor, to see the woman, Magdalen Jewell, of whom Dame Lee had told us. Mistress Anne was not with us, pleading a headache as an excuse, and I was not sorry to miss her company, but we had Master Griffith instead, and a serving man, who led the Queen's donkey. The rest of us walked; and oh, what joy it was to me to feel the springy turf under foot, and smell the fresh odors of the moorland once more! How beautiful the world is! I can't think why God hath made it so fair, and then set it before us as our highest duty to shut ourselves from it between stone walls. "The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof," we sing in the Venite, and all the Psalms are full of such thoughts. But this is beside the matter.

We had a charming walk over the high, breezy moor, and Master Griffith entertained us with remembrances of his own country of Wales, where he says the people speak a language of their own, as they do in some parts of Cornwall. The Queen riding before us, would now and then put in a word to keep him going.

Presently the path dipped into a little hollow, and there we saw the cottage at the foot of the Tor which had been our landmark all the way. 'Twas to my mind more like a nest than a cottage, so small was it, and so covered (where the vine gave the stones leave to show themselves) with gray and yellow lichens. A humble porch well shaded with a great standard pear, and fragrant with honeysuckle and sweetbriar, held the good woman's chair, wherein lay a spindle and distaff.

Magdalen herself was at work in her garden, gathering of herbs to dry, and attended by quite a retinue. There was a very old dog lying blinking in the sunshine, and a motherly cat with two or three mischievous kitlings, and also a lame and tame goose, which attended her mistress' footsteps, and now and then with hisses and outspread wings chased away the kitlings, when they made too free. A more important member of the party was the little orphan maid, a child of some five years, who with grave and womanly industry, was carrying away the cut herbs, and spreading them in the shade to dry. A row of beehives reached all the length of the garden wall, and before them a bed of sweet flowers and herbs, such as bees love. On one side was a field in which fed a cow and an ass, while on the other was a small and old, but well-tended orchard, and at the bottom of this a still, glassy pool. Behind all, rose the gray, steep Tor, like a protecting fortress. It was a lovely picture, and one on which I could have gazed an hour; but presently, the woman catching sight of us, laid aside her industry, and came forward to give us welcome, which she did I must say somewhat stiffly at the first. But she presently thawed into more cordiality under the charm of her Grace's manner, and remarking that we had had a long walk, she busied herself to provide refreshment.

"Pray do not incommode yourself, my good woman," said the Queen: "we have come but from the convent yonder, where I am at present abiding, and this is one of the young pupils, whom I dare say you have seen."

"Not I, madam!" she answered, somewhat bluntly. "I have no errand to take me to the convent since I desire no alms at the hands of the ladies, and I have naught to sell but that which their own gardens supply."

"You might go thither for purposes of devotion," said the Queen: "'tis a great privilege to worship in a church possessed of so many holy relics."

A strange look, methought, passed over the woman's face, as her Grace spoke, but she made no answer to the Queen, only to press us to eat and drink.

"And you live here quite alone, save this child?" said the Queen, after she had asked and heard an account of the little maiden.

"Aye, madam, ever since my old father died, some ten years since, till this child was sent me, as it were."

"But had you no brother, or other relative?" Again the strange look crossed Magdalen's face, as she answered: "I had a brother once, and for aught I know he may be living now; but 'tis long since I have seen or heard from him. Our paths went different ways."

"How so?" asked the Queen.

"Because I chose to maintain my old father in his helplessness, and he chose to bestow himself in yonder abbey of Glastonbury, with his portion of my gaffer's goods."

"Doubtless he chose wisely!" she added, with a scorn which I cannot describe. "'Twas an easier life than tilling barren land, and bearing with the many humors of a childish, testy old man."

"You should not speak so of your brother," said the Queen, somewhat severely.

"You are right, Madam;" answered Magdalen, softening. "Scorn becomes not any sinner, whose own transgressions have been many. Nevertheless, under your favor, I believe my brother did mistake his duty in this thing."

"Yet you yourself have chosen a single life, it seems!" said the Queen. "Why was that?"

"I did not choose it," she said quietly, but yet her face was moved. "'Twas so ordered for me, and I make the best of it. I doubt not many married women are happier than I; but yourself must see, Madam, that no single woman, so she be good and virtuous, can possibly be as miserable as is many a good and virtuous wife, through no fault of her own; aye—and while she hath nothing of which she may complain before the world."

"'Tis even so!" said her Grace; and again saw the cloud upon her brow. I wonder if she is unhappy with her husband? After a little silence, the Queen fell to talking of the child, and after some discourse, she offered to leave with the parish priest such a sum of money as should be a dower for the girl, whether she should marry or enter a convent. Magdalen colored and hesitated.

"I thank you much for your kindness," said she, at last. "I have never yet received an alms, but the child is an orphan, and hath no earthly protection but myself; and should I die before my brother, he, or the men with whom he has placed himself, would take that small portion of goods which belongs to me, and little Catherine would be left wholly destitute. I believe Sir John, the village priest, to be a good man, so far as his lights go, and anything you may be pleased to place in his hands will be safe. I therefore accept your offer and thank you with all my heart; and may the blessing of the God of the fatherless abide upon you."

"That seems like a good woman," remarked Master Griffith to Mistress Patience, after we had left the cottage.

"Yet I liked not her saying about the priest," returned Mrs. Patience, austerely. "What did she mean by her limitation—'A good man, so far as his lights go,' forsooth! What is she, to judge of his lights? Methinks the saying savored somewhat too much of Lollardie, or Lutheranism."

"Then, if I thought so, I would not say so," said Master Griffith, in a low tone. "You would not like to cast a suspicion on the poor creature, which might bring her to the stake at last."

Whereat Mistress Patience murmured something under her breath about soft-heartedness toward heretics being treason to the Church; but she added no more. I think Master Griffith hath great influence over her, and if I may venture to say so, over his mistress as well; and I wonder not at it, for he hath a calm, wise way with him, and a considerate manner of speaking, which seems to carry much weight. It was odd, certainly, what Magdalen Jewell said about the priest, and also about her brother. It does seem hard that he should have gone away and left her to bear the whole burden of nursing and maintaining her father, and yet, as we are taught to believe, it is he who hath chosen the better part. Another thing which struck me about this same Magdalen was, that she was so wonderful well spoken, for a woman in her state of life. Even her accent was purer than that of the women about here, and she used marvellous good phrases, as though she were conversant with well-educated people.

This was the last of our walks. To-morrow the Queen goes, and then I shall fall back into my old way of life again, I suppose—writing, and working, and walking in the garden for recreation. Well, I must needs be content, since there is no other prospect before me for my whole life. It will not be quite so monotonous as that of the poor lady who lived for twenty years in the Queen's room, and never looked out.

I ought to say, that when we returned from visiting Magdalen Jewell, we found that a post had arrived with letters for the Queen, and also a packet for Mistress Anne, who seemed wonderful pleased with her news, and with a fine ring which she said her brother had sent her.

"Your brother is very generous," said her Grace, (and I saw her face flush and her eyes flash.) "Methinks I have seen that same ring before. 'Tis not very becoming for your brother to make so light of his Majesty's gifts, as to bestow them, even on his sister."

"I trust your Grace will be so good as not to betray my poor brother's carelessness to his Majesty," answered Mrs. Bullen, with an air and tone of meekness, which seemed to me to have much of mocking therein. "It might prove the ruin of us both."

To my great terror and amazement, the Queen turned absolutely pale as ashes, and put out her hand for support. Both Mrs. Anne and myself sprang forward, but she recovered herself in a moment, and her color came back again.

"'Tis nothing," said she, quietly. "I think the heat was too much for me. Patience, your arm; I will lie down awhile."

The glance which Patience cast on Mrs. Bullen in passing, was such as one might give to a viper or other loathsome reptile. Mrs. Bullen, on her part, returned it, with a mocking smile. Presently I saw her in the garden in close conference with Amice, as indeed I have done several times before. I cannot guess what they should have in common, and it is all the more odd that I know Amice does not like her.