have some bones left whole.--And what
thinkest, lad, of the outlook of matters public at this time?"

"Nay, what think you, that have been of late in London?"

"Robin," said Mr Underhill gravely, "dost mind, long years gone, when
King Edward his reign was well-nigh o'er, the ferment men's minds gat in
touching the succession?"

"_Eh, la belle journee_!" said Mrs Rose waggishly. "I do well mind the
ferment _you_ were in, Mr Underhill, and how you did push your Queen
Mary down all the throats of your friends: likewise how sweetly she did
repay you, bidding you for a month's visit to her palace of Newgate!
Pray you, shall it be the same again, _hermano_?"

"Dear heart! What a memory have you, Mistress Rose!" said Mr
Underhill, with another hearty laugh. "It shall scantly be Newgate
again, metrusteth: the rather, since there is no Queen Mary to thrust
adown your throats--thank the Lord for that and all other His mercies.
He that we may speak of is no Papist, whatso else; but I mistake
greatly, Robin, if somewhat the same matter shall not come o'er again,
should it please God to do a certain thing."

Mr Underhill spoke thus vaguely, having no wish to finish his days on
the gallows; as men had done ere now, for little more than a hint that
the reigning Sovereign might not live for ever.

"And when the ferment come, under what flag must we look for you, Mr
Underhill?" asked. Mrs Tremayne.

"Well," said he, "Harry Eighth left a lad and two lasses, and we have
had them all. But Harry Seventh left likewise a lad and two lasses; and
we have had the lad, but ne'er a one of the lasses."

"Both these lasses be dead," responded the Rector.

"They be so. But the first left a lad and a lass; and that lad left a
lass, and that lass left a lad--which is alive and jolly."

This meant, that Queen Margaret of Scotland, elder sister of Henry the
Eighth, had issue King James the Fifth, whose daughter was Mary Queen of
Scots, and her son was James the Sixth, then living.

"You count the right lieth there?" queried Mr Tremayne.

Mr Underhill nodded his head decidedly.

"And is--yonder party--well or ill affected unto the Gospellers?--how
hear you?"

"Lutheran to the back-bone--with no love for Puritans, as men do now
begin to call us Hot Gospellers."

"Thus is the Queen, mecounteth: and we have thriven well under her, and
have full good cause to thank God for her."

"Fifty years gone, Robin--when she was but a smatchet