my curiosity and admiration.

He approached the evil-smelling pot, and stirred it up with a face
which indicated so much anxiety that it was clear that he had pushed his
courtesy to us so far as to risk the ruin of some important experiment.
Dipping his ladle into the compound, he scooped some up, and then poured
it slowly back into the vessel, showing a yellow turbid fluid. The
appearance of it evidently reassured him, for the look of anxiety
cleared away from his features, and he uttered an exclamation of relief.
Taking a handful of a whitish powder from a trencher at his side he
threw it into the pipkin, the contents of which began immediately to
seethe and froth over into the fire, causing the flames to assume
the strange greenish hue which we had observed before entering. This
treatment had the effect of clearing the fluid, for the chemist was
enabled to pour off into a bottle a quantity of perfectly watery
transparent liquid, while a brownish sediment remained in the vessel,
and was emptied out upon a sheet of paper. This done, Sir Jacob Clancing
pushed aside all his bottles, and turned towards us with a smiling face
and a lighter air.

'We shall see what my poor larder can furnish forth,' said he.
'Meanwhile, this odour may be offensive to your untrained nostrils, so
we shall away with it. He threw a few grains of some balsamic resin
into the brazier, which at once filled the chamber with a most agreeable
perfume. He then laid a white cloth upon the table, and taking from a
cupboard a dish of cold trout and a large meat pasty, he placed them
upon it, and invited us to draw up our settles and set to work.

'I would that I had more toothsome fare to offer ye,' said he. 'Were
we at Snellaby Hall, ye should not be put off in this scurvy fashion, I
promise ye. This may serve, however, for hungry men, and I can still
lay my hands upon a brace of bottles of the old Alicant.' So saying, he
brought a pair of flasks out from a recess, and having seen us served
and our glasses filled, he seated himself in a high-backed oaken chair
and presided with old-fashioned courtesy over our feast. As we supped, I
explained to him what our errand was, and narrated the adventures of the
night, without making mention of our destination.

'You are bound for Monmouth's camp,' he said quietly, when I had
finished, looking me full in the face with his keen dark eyes. 'I know
it, but ye need not fear lest I betray you, even were it in my