inutes; and then
Arundel turned to the accused.

"Margery Marnell, Baroness Marnell of Lymington, the Court demands of
you whether you will put your name to this paper, and hold to all things
therein contained?"

"Let me read the paper, my Lord Archbishop, and then I will give you an
answer."

The Archbishop did not wish her to read the paper; but Margery steadily
declined to sign anything in the dark. At length the council permitted
it to be read to her. It contained a promise to abjure all Lollard
doctrines, and to perform a severe penance, such as the council should
lay on her, for the scandal which she had caused to the Church. Margery
at once refused to sign anything of the kind. The Archbishop warned her
that in that case she must be prepared to submit to the capital
sentence.

"Ye may sentence me," she said, in her clear voice, always distinct,
however feeble, "to what ye will. I fear you not. I wis ye have power
to kill my body, but my soul never shall ye have power to touch. That
is Christ's, who witteth full well how to keep it; and to His blessed
hands, not yours, I commit myself, body and soul."

The Archbishop then passed sentence. The Court found Margery, Baroness
Marnell of Lymington, guilty of all crimes whereof she stood indicted,
and sentenced her to death by burning, in the open place called Tower
Hill, on the 6th day of March next ensuing.

The prisoner bowed her head when the sentence had been pronounced, and
then said as she rose, and stretched out her hand to Lord Marnell, who
came forward and supported her, "I greatly fear, reverend fathers, that
your day is yet to come, when you shall receive sentence from a Court
whence there is no appeal, and shall be doomed to a dreader fire!"

When Lord Marnell had assisted his wife back into her dungeon, and laid
her gently on the bed, he turned and shook his fist at the wall.

"If I, Ralph Marnell of Lymington, had thee here, Abbot Thomas Bilson--"

"Thou wouldst forgive him, my good Lord," faintly said Margery.

"Who? I? Forgive _him_? What a woman art thou, Madge! Nay--by the
bones of Saint Matthew, I would break every bone in his body! Forsooth,
Madge, those knaves the Archbishop and the Abbot have played me a scurvy
trick, and gone many times further than I looked for, when I called them
into this business. But it is so always, as I have heard,--thy
chirurgeon and thy confessor, if they once bear the hand in thy matters,
will