, hark thee, should one syllable of this
night's business bubble through thy lips, thou hadst better have stayed
in the paws of the hobgoblin. Away!"

Gregory needed no second invitation, but scampered home with great
despatch, leaving his master to grope out the way as he thought proper.

There was more bustle and preparation for dinner than usual on the
morrow. Oliver Tempest had sent messengers to Bashall and Waddow; but
the guests had not made their appearance. About noon the hall-table was
furnished with a few whittles and well-scoured trenchers. Bright pewter
cups and ale-flagons were set in rows on a side-table, and on the
kitchen hearth lay a savoury chine of pork and pease-pudding. In the
great boiling pot, hung on a crook over the fire, bubbled a score of
hard dumplings, and in the broth reposed a huge piece of beef--these
dainties being usually served in the following order--broth, dumpling,
beef, according to the old distich--

"No broth, no ba';
No ba', no meat at a'."

Dame Joan of Waddington was the presiding genius of the feast, the
conduit-pipe through which flowed the full stream of daily bounty,
dispensing every blessing, even the most minute. In that golden age of
domestic discipline it was not beneath the dignity of a careful
housewife to attend and take the lead in all culinary arrangements.

The master strode to and fro in the hall, and Elizabeth was humming at
her wheel. He looked anxious and ill at ease, often casting a furtive
glance towards the entrance, and occasionally a side-look at his
daughter. She sometimes watched her father's eye, as though she had
caught his restless apprehensions, and would have inquired the cause of
his uneasiness. Suddenly a loud bay from a favourite hound that was
dozing on the hearth announced the approach of a stranger. Oliver
advanced with a quick step into the courtyard, and soon re-entered
leading in a middle-sized, middle-aged personage, slightly formed, whose
pale and saintly features looked haggard and apprehensive, while his eye
wavered to and fro, less perhaps with curiosity than suspicion.

He was wrapped in a grey cloak; and a leathern jerkin, barely meeting in
front, displayed a considerable breadth of under garment in the space
between hose and doublet. These were fastened together with tags or
points, superseding the use of wooden skewers, with which latter mode of
suspension not a few of our country yeomen were in those days supplied.