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Selwick Hall, October ye ii.

There goeth my first two pence for a blank week. In good sooth, I have been in ill case to write. This weary Nym would in no wise leave me be, but went to Anstace and Hal, and gat their instance (persuaded them to intercede) unto Father and Mother. Which did send for me, and would know at me if I list to wed with Nym or no. And verily, so bashful am I, and afeared to speak when I am took on the sudden thus, that I count they gat not much of me, but were something troubled to make out what I would be at. Nor wis I what should have befallen (not for that Father nor Mother were ever so little hard unto me, good lack! but only that I was stupid), had not Aunt Joyce come in, who no sooner saw how matters stood than she up and spake for me.

“Now, Aubrey and Lettice,” saith she, “both of you, fall a-catechising me in the stead of Nell. The maid hath no list to wed with Nym Lewthwaite, and hath told me so much aforetime. Leave her be, and send him away the other side of Jericho, where he belongs, and let him, an’ he list, fetch back a Syrian maiden with a horn o’er her forehead and a ring of her nose.”

“Wherefore didst thou not tell us so much, Nell, my lass?” saith Father right kindlily, laying of his hand on my shoulder.

But in the stead of answering him thankfully, as a dutiful daughter should, what did I but burst forth o’ crying, as though he had been angered with me: yea, nor might I stop the same, but went on, truly I knew not wherefore, till Mother came up and put her arms around me, and hushed me as she wont to do when I was a little child.

“The poor child is o’erwrought,” quoth she, tenderly. “Let us leave her be, Aubrey, till she calms down.—There, come to me and have it out, my Nelly, and none shall trouble thee, trust me.”

Lack-a-daisy! I sobbed all the harder for a season, but in time I calmed down, as Mother says, and when so were, I prayed her of pardon for that I could be so foolish.

“Nay, my lass,” saith she, “we be made of body and soul, and either comes uppermost at times. ’Tis no good trying to live with one, which so it be.”

“Ah, the old monks made that blunder,” saith Father, “and thought they could live with souls only, or well-nigh so. And there be scores of other that essay to live with nought but bodies. A man that starves his body is ill off, but a man that starves his soul is yet worser. No is it thus, Mynheer?”

Mynheer van Stuyvesant had come in while Father was a-speaking.

“Ah!” saith he, “there be in my country certain called Mennonites, that do starve their natures of yonder fashion.”

“Which half of them—body or soul?” saith Father.

“Nay, I would say both two,” he makes answer. “They run right to the further end of every matter. Because they read in their Bibles that ‘in the multitude of words there wanteth not sin,’ therefore they do forbid all speech that is not of very necessity—even a word more than needful is sin in their eyes. If you shall say, ‘Sit you down in that chair to your comfort,’ there are eight words more than you need. You see?—there are eight sins. ‘Sit’ were enough. So, one mouthful more bread than you need—no, no!—that is a sin. One drop of syrup to your bread—not at all! You could eat your bread without syrup. All that is joyous, all that is comfortable, all that you like to do—all so many sins. Those are the Mennonites.”

“What sinful men they must be!” saith Father.

“Good lack, Master Stuyvesant, but think you all those folks tarried in Holland?” saith Aunt Joyce. “Marry, I could count you a round dozen I have met in this country. And they be trying, I warrant you. My fingers have itched to shake them ere now.”

“How do they serve them when they would get them wed?” saith Father. “Quoth Master John to Mistress Bess, ‘Wed me’ and no more?—and saith she, ‘Ay’ and no more? A kiss, I ween, shall be a sin, for ’tis no wise necessary.”

I could not help to laugh, and so did Aunt Joyce and Mother.

“Wed!” makes answer Mynheer, “the Mennonites wed? Why, ’tis the biggest of all their sins, the wedding.”

“There’ll not be many of them, I reckon,” saith Aunt Joyce.

“More than you should think,” saith he. “There be to join them every year.”

“Well, I’ll not join them this bout,” quoth she.

“Now, wherein doth that differ from the old monks?” saith Father, as in meditation. “Be we setting up monasteries for Protestants already?”

Mynheer shrugged up his shoulders. “They say, the Mennonites,” he made answer, “that all pleasing of self is contrary unto God’s Word. I must do nothing that pleases me. Are there two dishes for my dinner? I like this, I like not that. Good! I take that I love not. Elsewise, I please me. A Christian man must not please himself—he must please God. And (they say) he cannot please both.”

“Ah, therein lieth the fallacy,” saith Father. “All pleasing of self counter unto God, no doubt, is forbidden in Holy Scripture. But surely I am not bid to avoid doing God’s commandments, if He command a thing I like?”

“Why, at that rate,” quoth Aunt Joyce, “one should never search God’s Word, nor pray unto Him—except such as did not love it. Methinks these Mennonites stand o’ their heads, with their heels in air.”

“Ah, but they say it is God’s command that thou shalt not please thyself,” saith Mynheer. “Therefore, that which pleases thee cannot be His will. You see?”

“They do but run the old monks’ notions to ground,” quoth Father. “They go a bit further—that is all. I take it that whensoever my will is contrary unto God’s, my will must go down. But when my will runneth alongside of His, surely I am at liberty to take as much pleasure in doing His will as I may? ‘Ye have been called unto liberty,’ saith Paul: ‘only, let not your liberty be an occasion to the flesh, but in love serve one another.’ ”

“And if serving one another be pleasant unto thee, then give o’er,” quoth Aunt Joyce. “Good lack, this world doth hold some fools!”

“Pure truth, Joyce,” saith Father. “Yet, for that of monks, in good sooth I do look to see them back, only under other guise. Monachism is human nature: and human nature will out. If he make not way at one door, trust him to creep forth of an other.”

“But, Aubrey, the Church is reformed. There is no room for monks and nuns, and such rubbish,” saith Aunt Joyce.

“The Church is reformed—ay,” saith he: “but human nature is not. That shall not be until we see the King in His beauty—whether by our going to Him in death, or by His coming to us in the clouds of heaven.”

“Dear heart, man!—be not alway on the watch for black clouds,” quoth she. “As well turn Mennonite at once.”

“Well, ‘sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,’ ” Father makes answer: “and so far thou art right, Joyce. Yet it is well we should remember, at times, that we be not yet in Heaven.”

“ ‘At times!’ ” quoth Aunt Joyce, with a laugh. “What a blessed life must be thine, if those that be about thee suffer thee to forget the same save ‘at times’! I never made that blunder yet, I can tell thee.”

And so she and I away, and left all laughing.

Selwick Hall, October ye xxii.

This afternoon come Hal and Anstace, with their childre. Milly soon carried off the childre, for she is a very child herself, and can lake (play) with childre a deal better than I: and Hal went (said he) to seek Father, with whom I found him an hour later in the great chamber, and both right deep in public matter, whereof I do love to hear them talk at times, but Milly and Edith be no wise compatient (the lost adjective of compassion) therewith. Anstace came with me to our chamber, and said she had list for a good chat.

“Whereof be we to chat?” said I, something laughing.

“Oh, there is plenty,” saith she. “We shall not be done with the childre this hour.”

“Thou wilt not, Anstace,” said I, “for in very deed all mothers do love rarely to talk over their childre, and I need not save thee. But I am no great talker, as thou well wist.”

“That do I,” saith she: “for of all young maids ever I saw, thou hast the least list (inclination) to discourse. But, Nell, I want to know somewhat of thee. What ails thee at Nym Lewthwaite?”

“Why, nothing at all,” I made answer: “save that I do right heartily desire him to leave me be.”

“Good sooth, but I thought it a rare chance for thee,” quoth she: “and I was fair astonied when Edith told me thou wouldst have none ado with him. But thou must mind thy shooting, Nell: if thou pitchest all thine arrows over high, thou wilt catch nought.”

“I want to pitch no arrows,” said I.

“Well, but I do desire thee to conceive,” saith she, “that too much niceness is not good for a young maid. ’Tis all very well to go a-picking and a-choosing ere thou art twenty: but trust me, Nell, by the time thou comest to thirty, thou shouldst be thankful to take any man that will have thee.”

“Nay!” said I, “that shall I not.”

“Eh, but thou wilt,” quoth she, “yea, if it were Nym Lewthwaite.”

“I won’t!” said I.

Anstace fell a-laughing. “Then thou wilt have to go without!” saith she.

“Well,” said I, “that could I do, may-be, nor break my heart o’er it neither. But to take any that should have me—Anstace, I would as soon sell me for a slave.”

“Come, Nell!—where didst pick up such notions?” quoth she.

“Verily, I might answer thee, of the Queen’s Majesty,” said I: “and if I be not in good company enough, search thou for better. Only, for pity’s sake, Sister Anstace, do let me a-be.”

“Eh, I’ll let thee be,” saith she, and wagged her head and laughed. “But in good sooth, Nell, thou art a right queer body. And if it should please the Queen’s Highness to wed with Mounseer (Note 1), as ’tis thought of many it shall, then thou wilt be out of her company, and I shall be in. What shalt thou do then for company?”

“Marry, I can content me with Aunt Joyce and Cousin Bess,” quoth I, “and none so bad neither.”

So at after that we gat to other discourse, and after a while, when Milly came in with the childre, we all went down into the great chamber, where Father, and Hal, and Mynheer, were yet at their weighty debates. Cousin Bess was sat in the window, a-sewing on some flannel: and Aunt Joyce, in the same window, but the other corner, was busied with tapestry-work, being a cushion that she is fashioning for a Christmas gift for some dame that is her friend at Minster Lovel. ’Tis well-nigh done; and when it shall be finished, it shall go hence by old Postlethwaite the carrier; for six weeks is not too much betwixt here and Minster Lovel.

As we came in, I heard Father to say—

“Truly, there is no end of the diverse fantasy of men’s minds.” And then he brought forth some Latin, which I conceived not: but whispering unto Aunt Joyce (which is something learned in that tongue) to say what it were, she made answer, “So many men, so many minds.” (Quot homines, tot sententiae.)

“Ha!” saith Mynheer. “Was it not that which the Emperor Charles did discover with his clocks and watches? He was very curious in clocks and watches—the Emperor Charles the Fifth—you know?—and in his chamber at the Monastery of San Yuste he had so many. And watching them each day, he found they went not all at one. The big clock was five minutes to twelve when the little watch was two minutes past. So he tried to make them at one: but they would not. No, no! the big clock and the little watch, they go their own way. Then said the Emperor, ‘Now I see something I saw not aforetime. I thought I could make these clocks go together, but no! Yet they are only the work of men like me. Ah, the foolish man to think that I could compel men to think all alike, who are the work of the great God.’ You see?”

“If His Majesty had seen it a bit sooner,” quoth Hal, “there should have been spared some ill work both in Spain and the Low Countries.”

Mynheer saith, “Ah!” more than once, and wagged his head right sadly.

“Why,” quoth Hal, something earnestly, “mind you not, some dozen years gone, of the stir was made all over this realm, when the ministers were appointed to wear their surplices at all times of their ministration, and no longer to minister in gowns ne cloaks, with their hats on, as they had been wont? Yea, what tumult had we then against the order taken by the Queen and Council, and against the Archbishop and Bishops for consenting thereto! And, all said, what was the mighty ado about? Why, whether a man should wear a black gown or a white. Heard one ever such stuff?”

“Ah, Hal, that shall scantly serve,” saith Father. “Mind, I pray thee, that the question to the eyes of these men was somewhat far otherwise. Thou wouldst not say that Adam and Eva were turned forth of Paradise by reason they plucked an apple?”

“But, I pray you, Sir Aubrey, what was the question?” saith Mynheer. “For I do not well know, as I fain should.”

“Look you,” quoth Father, “in the beginning of the Book of Common Prayer, and you shall find a rubric, that ‘such ornaments of the church and of the ministers thereof, at all times of their ministration, shall be retained and be in use, as were in this Church of England, by the authority of Parliament, in the second year of King Edward the Sixth.’ ”

“But they were not retained,” breaks in Hal, that will alway be first to speak of aught.

(Lack-a-day! shall that cost me two pence?)

“They were not retained,” repeateth Father, “but the clergy took to ministering in their gowns and other common apparel, such as they ware every day, with no manner of vestments of no sort. Whereupon, such negligence being thought unseemly, it pleased the Queen’s Majesty, sitting in her Council, and with consent of the Archbishop and Bishops, to issue certain injunctions for the better ordering of the Church: to wit, that at all times of their ministration the clergy should wear a decent white surplice, and no other vestment, nor should minister in their common apparel as aforetime.”

“Then the rubric touching the garments as worn under King Edward was done away?” saith Mynheer.

“Done away completely,” quoth Hal, afore Father could speak.

“But not by Parliament?” answers Mynheer.

“Good lack, what matter?” saith Hal. “The Queen’s Majesty is supreme in this Church of England. If she issue her injunctions through her great Council, or her little Council, or her Bishops, they are all one, so they be her true injunctions.”

“These were issued through the Bishops,” saith Father, “though determined on in the Privy Council.”

“Then did the ministers not obey?” asks Mynheer.

“Many did. But some counted the surplice a return towards Popery, and utterly refused to wear it. I mind (remember) there was a burying at that time at Saint Giles’ Church in London, without (outside) Cripplegate, where were six clerks that ware the white surplice: and Master Crowley, the Vicar, stood in the church door to withstand their entering, saying that no such superstitious rags of Rome should come into his church. There should have been a bitter tumult there, had not the clerks had the wit to give way and tarry withoutside the door. And about the same time, a Scots minister did preach in London right vehemently against the order taken for the apparel of ministers. Why, at Saint Mildred’s in Bread Street, where a minister that had conformed was brought of the worshipful of that parish for the communion service, he was so withstood by the minister of the church and his adherents, that the Deputy of the Ward and other were fain to stand beside him in the chancel to defend him during the service, or the parson and his side should have plucked him down with violence. And at long last,” saith Father, laughing, “the Scots minister that had so inveighed against them was brought to conform; but no sooner did he show himself in the pulpit of Saint Margaret Pattens in a surplice, than divers wives rose up and pulled him forth of the pulpit, tearing his surplice and scratting his face right willingly.”

“Eh, good lack!” cries Mynheer. “Your women, they keep silence in the churches after such a manner?”

“There was not much silence that morrow, I warrant,” quoth Hal, laughing right merrily.

“Eh, my gentlemen, I pray you of pardon,” saith Cousin Bess, looking up earnestly from her flannel, “but had I been in yon church I’d have done the like thing. I’d none have scrat his face, but I’d have rent a good tear in that surplice.”

“Thou didst not so, Bess, the last Sunday morrow,” quoth Father, laughing as he turned to look at her.

“Nay, ’tis all done and settled by now,” saith she. “I should but get took up for brawling. But I warrant you, that flying white thing sticketh sore in my throat, and ever did. An’ I had my way, no parson should minister but in his common coat.”

“But that were unseemly and undecent, Bess,” quoth Aunt Joyce.

“Nay, Mistress Joyce, but methinks ’tis a deal decenter,” answers she. “Wherefore, if a man can speak to me of earthly things in a black gown, must he needs don a white when he cometh to speak to me of heavenly things? There is no wit in such stuff.”

“See you, Mynheer,” saith Father, again laughing, “even here in Selwick Hall, where I trust we be little given to quarrel, yet the clocks keep not all one time.”

“Eh! No!” saith Mynheer, shrugging of his shoulders and smiling. “The gentlewomen, they be very determined in their own opinions.”

“Well, I own, I like to see things decent,” saith Aunt Joyce. “I desire not to have back the Popish albs and such like superstitious gauds—not I: but I do like to see a parson in a clean white surplice, and I would be right sorry were it laid aside.”

Cousin Bess said nought, but wagged her head, and tare her flannel in twain.

“Now, I dare be bound, Bess, thou countest me gone half-way back to Rome,” saith Aunt Joyce.

“That were nigh the Via Mala,” quoth Father.

“Eh, Mistress Joyce, I’ll judge no man, nor no woman,” makes answer Cousin Bess. “The Lord looketh on the heart; and ’tis well for us He doth, for if we were judged by what other folk think of us, I reckon we should none of us come so well off. But them white flying kites be rags of Popery, that will I say—yea, and stand to.”

“Which side be you, Father?” asks Anstace.

“Well, my lass,” saith he, “though I see not, mine own self, the Pope and all his Cardinals to lurk in the folds of Dr. Meade’s white surplice, and I am bound to say his tall, portly figure carrieth it off rarely, yet I do right heartily respect Bess her scruple, and desire to abstain from that which she counteth the beginnings of evil.”

“Now, I warrant you, Bess shall reckon that, of carrying it off well, to be the lust of the eye,” saith Aunt Joyce. “She’s a bit of a Mennonite, is Bess.”

“Eh, Mistress Joyce, pray you, give me not such an ill word!” saith Cousin Bess, reproachfully. “I never cared for Mammon, not I. I’d be thankful for a crust of bread and a cup of water, and say grace o’er him with Amen.”

We all laughed, and Father saith—

“Nay, Bess, thou takest Joyce wrong. In that of the Mennonites, she would say certain men of whom Mynheer told us a few days gone, that should think all things pleasurable and easeful to be wrong.”

“Good lack, Mistress Joyce, but I’m none so bad as that!” saith Bess. “I’m sure, when I make gruel for whoso it be, I leave no lumps in, nor let it burn neither.”

“No, dear heart, thou art only a Mennonite to thyself, not to other folk,” saith Aunt Joyce. “Thou shouldst be right well content of a board for thy bed, but if any one of us had the blanket creased under our backs, it should cost thee thy night’s rest. I know thee, Bess Wolvercot.”

“Well, and I do dearly love to see folk comfortable,” quoth she. “As for me, what recketh? I thank the Lord, my health is good enough; and a very fool were I to grumble at every bit of discomfort. Why, only do think, Mistress Joyce, how much worser I might have been off! Had I been born of that country I heard Master Banaster a-telling of, where they never see the sun but of the summer, and dwell of huts full o’ smoke, with ne’er a chimney—why, I never could see if my face were clean, nor my table rubbed bright. Eh, but I wouldn’t like that fashion of living!”

“They have no tables in Greenland for to rub, Bess,” quoth Hal.

“Nor o’er many clean faces, I take it,” saith Father.

“Ah! did you hear, Sir,” saith Mynheer, “of Mynheer Heningsen’s voyage to Greenland the last year?”

“I have not, Mynheer,” saith Father. “Pray you, what was notable therein?”

“Ah! he was not far from the coast of Greenland, when he found the ship go out of her course. He turned the rudder, or how you say, to guide the ship—I am not sea-learned, I ask your pardon if I mistake—but the ship would not move. Then they found, beneath a sunken rock, and it was—how you say?—magnetical, that drew to it the iron of the ship. Then Mynheer Heningsen, he look to his charts, for he know no rock just there. And what think you he found? Why, two hundred years back, exactly—in the year of our Lord 1380, there were certain Venetians, the brothers Zeni, sailing in these seas, and they brought word home to Venice that on this very spot, where Heningsen found nothing but a sunken rock, they found a beautiful large island, where were one hundred villages, inhabited by Christian people, in a state of great civility (civilisation), but so simple and guileless that hardly you can conceive. Think you! nothing now but a sunken rock.”

“But what name hath the island?” asks Hal.

“No name at all. No eyes ever saw it but the brothers Zeni of Venice.”

“Nay, Mynheer, I cry you mercy,” saith Father of his thoughtful fashion. “If the brothers Zeni told truth (as I mean to signify no doubt), there was One that saw it, from the time when He pronounced all things very good, to the day when some convulsion of nature, whatso it were, by His commandment engulfed that fair isle in the waters. ‘Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did He—in heaven, and in earth, and in the sea, and in all deep places.’ Not one hair from the head of those unknown Christians, that were Christians in truth, perished in those North waters. We shall know it when we meet them in the Land that is very far off.”

Selwick Hall, October ye xxxi.

Mine hand was so weary when I was come to the last sentence afore this, that I set down no more. Truly, there was little at after that demerited the same.

And now I be come to the end of my month, I have been a-reading over what I writ, to see how much I must needs pay. There be but two blots, the which shall be so many pence: and two blank spaces of one week or over, the which at two pence each brings the account to sixpence. I cannot perceive that I have at any time writ disrespectfully of my betters—which, I take it, be Father, and Mother, and Aunt Joyce, and Cousin Bess, and Mynheer Stuyvesant, But for speaking unkindly of other, I fear I am not blameless. I can count six two-pences, which shall be one shilling and sixpence. I must try and do better when my month cometh round again. Verily, I had not thought that I should speak unkindly six times in one month! ’Tis well to find out a body’s faults.

So now I pass my book over to Milly—and do right earnestly desire that she may be less faultful than I. What poor infirm things be we, in very sooth!

Note 1. François Duke of Anjou, who visited the Queen in September, 1579, to urge his suit. Elizabeth hesitated for some time before she gave a decided negative.