as to surprise
and delight his teacher, his leisure hours were spent in the
library of the castle--for Kenilworth had a library of manuscripts
under Simon de Montfort--a long low room on an upper floor, one end
of which was boarded off as a chamber for the chaplain, who was of
course also librarian. And again, he evinced a joy in the services
of the castle chapel which sufficiently marked his vocation. The
earl was both devout and musical, and the solemn tones of the
Gregorian Church Modes were rendered with peculiar force by the
deep voices of the men, for which they seemed chiefly designed. As
Martin listened, he became aware of sensations and ideas which he
could not express--he wept for joy, or trembled with emotion like
Saint Augustine of old {8}.

Then again, Sunday by Sunday, the chaplain was like a living oracle
to him, as to many others. The ascetic face became beautiful with a
beauty not of this earth--"his pallor," said they, "became of a
fair shining red" when he spoke of Christ or holy things, while
anon his thunder tones awoke an echo in the heart of many as he
testified against cruelty and wrong, of which there was no lack in
those days.

Under his influence Martin was becoming moulded like pliant wax,
the boy of the greenwood was losing all his rusticity, and yet,
retaining his keen love of nature, was learning to look beyond
nature to nature's God. At times Martin was very weary of
Kenilworth, and almost wished himself back in the greenwood again,
so little was he in sympathy with the companions whom he had found.

But one day the earl called him aside, and with a tenderness one
could not have expected from that great statesman and mighty
warrior, broke the sad tidings to the poor boy of the death of his
ill-fated mother. It had arrived from Michelham; an outlaw had
brought the news to the priory, with the request that the monks
would send the tidings on to young Martin, wherever he might be.
The death of his poor mother at last severed the ties which bound
Martin to the greenwood; he longed after it no more; save that he
often had daydreams wherein, as a brother of Saint Francis, he
preached the glad tidings of the grace of God to his kindred after
the flesh in the green glades of the Sussex woods.

One thing he had yet to subdue--his temper; like that of most
people of excitable temperament it would some times flash forth
like fire; his companions soon found this out, and the elder pages
liked