"The Gold that Glitters" from Emily Sarah Holt. English novelist (1836-1893).

"The Well in the Desert" from Emily Sarah Holt. English novelist (1836-1893).

"The White Lady of Hazelwood" from Emily Sarah Holt. English novelist (1836-1893).

"The King's Daughters" from Emily Sarah Holt. English novelist (1836-1893).

The thirteenth century was one of rapid and terrible incidents, tumultuous politics, and in religious matters of low and degrading superstition. Transubstantiation had just been formally adopted as a dogma of the Church, accompanied as it always is by sacramental confession, and quickly followed by the elevation of the host and the invention of the pix. Various Orders of monks were flocking into England. The Pope was doing his best, aided by the Roman clergy, and to their shame be it said, by some of the English, to fix his iron yoke on the neck of the Church of England. The doctrine of human...

"Good lack, Agnes Why, Agnes Stone Thou art right well be-called Stone; for there is no more wit nor no more quickness in thee than in a pebble. Lack-a-daisy but this were never good land sithence preaching came therein, -idle foolery that it is -good for nought but to set folk by the ears, and learn young maids for to gad about a-showing of their fine raiment, and a-gossiping one with another, whilst all the work to be wrought in the house falleth on their betters. Bodykins o' me canst not hear mass once i' th' week, and tell thy beads of the morrow with one hand whilst thou feedest the...

"The mossy marbles rest On the lips he hath pressed In their bloom, And the names he loved to hear Have been carved for many a year On the tomb."

"Give you good-morrow, neighbour Whither away with that great fardel (Bundle), prithee?" "Truly, Mistress, home to Staplehurst, and the fardel holdeth broadcloth for my lads' new jerkins." The speakers were two women, both on the younger side of middle age, who met on the road between Staplehurst and Cranbrook, the former coming towards Cranbrook and the latter from it.

"O pale, pale face, so sweet and meek, Oriana " Tennyson. "Is the linen all put away, Clarice?" "Ay, Dame." "And the rosemary not forgotten?" "I have laid it in the linen, Dame." "And thy day's task of spinning is done?" "All done, Dame." "Good. Then fetch thy sewing and come hither, and I will tell thee somewhat touching the lady whom thou art to serve." "I humbly thank your Honour." And dropping a low courtesy, the girl left the room, and returned in a minute with her work. "Thou mayest sit down, Clarice."

The historical portion of this tale has been partially narrated in one of my previous volumes, "In All Time of our Tribulation," in which the Despenser story is begun, and its end told from another point of view. That volume left Isabelle of France at the height of her ambition, in the place to reach which she had been plotting so long and so unscrupulously. Here we see the Nemesis come upon her and the chief partner of her guilt; the proof that there is a God that judgeth in the earth. It is surely one of the saddest stories of history-sad as all stories are which tell of men and women whom...