oir whatever voices pleased them, wherever they
might be found, by force if not by favor, barring only the royal singers
at Windsor; and when men have such privileges it is best to be wary how
one puts temptation in their way.

"Thou hadst mine oath before I even saw the boy," said the precentor,
haughtily. "Dost think me perjured--_Primus Magister Scholarum, Custos
Morum, Quartus Custos Rotulorum?_ Pouf! I know my place. My oath's my
oath. But, soft; enough--here comes the boy. Who could have told a
skylark in such popinjay attire?"

CHAPTER XXIII

A NEW LIFE

And now a strange, new life began for Nicholas Attwood, in some things
so grand and kind that he almost hated to dislike it.

It was different in every way from the simple, pinching round in
Stratford, and full of all the comforts of richness and plenty that make
life happy--excepting home and mother.

Master Gaston Carew would have nothing but the best, and what he wanted,
whether he needed it or not; so with him money came like a summer rain,
and went like water out of a sieve: for he was a wild blade.

They ate their breakfast when they pleased; dined at eleven, like the
nobility; supped at five, as was the fashion of the court. They had
wheat-bread the whole week round, as only rich folk could afford, with
fruit and berries in their season, and honey from the Surrey bee-farms
that made one's mouth water with the sight of it dripping from the flaky
comb; and on Fridays spitchcocked eels, pickled herrings, and plums,
with simnel-cakes, poached eggs and milk, cream cheese and cordial,
like very kings; so that Nick could not help thriving.

The master-player very seldom left him by himself to mope or to be
melancholy; but, while ever vaguely promising to let him go, did
everything in his power to make him rather wish to stay; so that Nick
was constantly surprised by the free-handed kindness of this man whom he
had every other reason in the world, he thought, for deeming his
worst enemy.

When there were any new curiosities in Fleet street,--wild men with
rings in their noses, wondrous fishes, puppet-shows, or red-capped
baboons whirling on a pole,--Carew would have Nick see them as well as
Cicely; and often took them both to Bartholomew's Fair, where there was
a giant eating raw beef and a man dancing upon a rope high over the
heads of the people. He would have had Nick every Thursday to the
bear-baiting in the Paris Garden circus beside; but o