"
said I. "I knew well enough what colours mine hair and eyes were of,
without his telling me. Could I dress mine hair every morrow afore the
mirror, and not see?"

"Well, _Edith_," saith she, "methinks he did not take much of thee. I
would I could have seen him,"--and her voice grew sadder. "Not that my
voice should have had any potency with him: that had it never yet. But
I would fain have noted how far the years had changed him, and if--if
there seemed any more hope of his amendment than of old time. There was
a time when in all _Oxfordshire_ he was allowed the goodliest man, and I
fear he was not far from being likewise the worst."

Here come in _Mother_, and my Lady _Stafford_ changed the discourse
right quickly. I saw I must say no more. But I am well assured Aunt
_Joyce's Mary_ was never my Lady _Stafford_. Who methinks it were it
should serve no good end to set down.

SELWICK HALL, DECEMBER YE XIX.
As we sat this even of the great chamber, saith _Father_:--

"_Stafford_, do you remember our talk some days gone, touching what
manner of life there should be in Heaven?"

"That do I well," Sir _Robert_ made answer.

"Well," quoth _Father_, "I have fallen to think more thereupon. And the
thought comes to me--wherefore account we always that we shall do but
one thing there, and that all shall do the same? Here is _Milisent_--
ay, and _Lettice_ too--that think they should be weary to sit of a cloud
and sing for ever and ever."

"Truly, so should I, methinks," saith Sir _Robert_.

"So should we all, I cast no doubt," answers _Father_, "if our capacity
for fatigue did extend into that life. But why expect the same thing
over and over? It is not so on earth. I am not reading, nor is
_Lettice_ sewing, nor _Milisent_ broidering, with no intermission, from
the morning to the night. Neither do we all the same fashion of work."

"Ay," saith Aunt _Joyce_, somewhat eagerly; "but the work done here
below is needful, _Aubrey_. There shall be no necessity for nought
there."

"Art avised o' that, _Joyce_?" saith _Father_.

"Why," saith she, "dost look for brooms and dusters in Heaven? Shall
_Bess_ and I sweep out the gold streets, thinkest, or fetch a pan to
seethe the fruits of the Tree of Life?"

"One would think," saith Sir _Robert_, "if all be allegorical, as some
wise doctors do say, that they should be shadowy brooms that swept
parabolical streets."

"