at the forge, where good-humoured, brawny Harry Blane
was no small contrast to his gaunt compeer Original-Sin Hopkins, she
averred that she was travelling from her relations, and having been
obliged to send her servant back for a packet that had been forgotten,
this good youth, who had come to her help when her horse had cast a
shoe, had undertaken to guide her to the smith's, and to take her
again to meet her man, if he did not come for her himself. Might she be
allowed in the meantime to sit with Master Blane's good housewife?

Master Blane was only too happy, and Mistress Jane Lane was accordingly
introduced to the pleasant kitchen, with sanded floor, and big
oak table, open hearth, and beaupots in the oriel window where the
spinning-wheel stood, and where the neat and hospitable Dame Blane made
her kindly welcome.

Steadfast, marvelling at her facility of speech, and glad the king's
safety did not depend on his uttering such a story, told Blane that he
must go after his cattle and should look after the groom on the way.

As he walked through the wood, and drew near the glade, he was dismayed
to hear voices, and to see Peter Pierce leaning against the wall of the
house, but Rusha came running up to him exclaiming, "Oh! Stead, here is
this good stranger that you met, telling us all about brother Jeph."

"Yes, my kind host," said the grey-coated guest, with a slight nasal
intonation, rising as Stead came near, "I find that you are the very lad
my friend and brother Jephthah Kenton, that singular Christian man, bade
me search out. 'If you go near Bristol, beloved,' quoth he,' search
me out my brothers Steadfast and Benoni, and my sisters, Patience and
Jerusha, and greet them well from me, and bear witness of me to them.
They dwell, said he, in a lonely hut in the wood side, and with them
a fair little maiden, sprung of the evil and idolatrous seed of the
malignants, but whom their pious nurture may yet bring to a knowledge of
the truth,' and by that token, I knew that it was the same." There was
an odd little twinkle towards Emlyn just then.

"And Stead, Jeph is an officer," said Patience, who was busied in
setting before the visitor on a little round table, the best ale, bread,
cheese, and butter that her hut afforded, together with an onion, which,
he declared, was "what his good grandfather, a valiant man for the
godly, had ever loved best."

"An officer! Aye is he. A captain of his Ironside troop, very like to