he stood, the dispersion of his friends. To the rear of the palisades,
which protected the spot where he was placed, already grouped "the
lookers-on and no fighters," as the chronicler [Fabyan] words it, who,
as the guns slackened, ventured forth to learn the news, and who now,
filling the churchyard of Hadley, strove hard to catch a peep of Henry
the saint, or of Bungey the sorcerer. Mingled with these gleamed the
robes of the tymbesteres, pressing nearer and nearer to the barriers,
as wolves, in the instinct of blood, come nearer and nearer round the
circling watch-fire of some northern travellers. At this time the friar,
turning to one of the guards who stood near him, said, "The mists are
needed no more now; King Edward hath got the day, eh?"

"Certes, great master," quoth the guard, "nothing now lacks to the
king's triumph except the death of the earl."

"Infamous nigromancer, hear that!" cried Bungey to Adam. "What now
avail thy bombards and thy talisman! Hark yet--tell me the secret of the
last,--of the damnable engine under my feet, and I may spare thy life."

Adam shrugged his shoulders in impatient disdain. "Unless I gave thee my
science, my secret were profitless to thee. Villain and numskull, do thy
worst."

The friar made a sign to a soldier who stood behind Adam, and the
soldier silently drew the end of the rope which girded the scholar's
neck round a bough of the leafless tree. "Hold!" whispered the friar,
"not till I give the word. The earl may recover himself yet," he
added to himself; and therewith he began once more to vociferate his
incantations. Meanwhile the eyes of Sibyll had turned for a moment from
her father; for the burst of sunshine, lighting up the valley below, had
suddenly given to her eyes, in the distance, the gable-ends of the
old farmhouse, with the wintry orchard,--no longer, alas! smiling with
starry blossoms. Far remote from the battlefield was that abode of
peace,--that once happy home, where she had watched the coming of the
false one!

Loftier and holier were the thoughts of the fated king. He had turned
his face from the field, and his eyes were fixed upon the tower of the
church behind. And while he so gazed, the knoll from the belfry began
solemnly to chime. It was now near the hour of the Sabbath prayers, and
amidst horror and carnage, still the holy custom was not suspended.

"Hark!" said the king, mournfully, "that chime summons many a soul to
God!"

While thus the