CHAPTER III.

THE SHEPHERD'S TALE.

"Uncle Thomas," said Jack, "did you ever see a Bible?"

Jack Lucas was lying on the short, elastic grass on the side of Holford Hill, helping his great-uncle, Thomas Sprat, to watch the large flocks of Sir John Brydges, the greatest man in these parts. Four or five weeks of country air and country faire had done much to restore the roses to his cheeks and the strength to his muscles. He began once more to feel that life was worth having for the mere sake of living; to feel a keen enjoyment in climbing the steep hills, in following the sheep in their devious wanderings over the unenclosed pastures, and recalling to a sense of its duty any one of them which showed a disposition to stray too far.

The brown bread and milk, the boiled beef and greens, and ale, which deaf Margery set before him, had a flavor which he had not found for many months in the dainty cookery of his cousin Cicely. In those days the English peasants knew little, in ordinarily good seasons, of scarcity of food. Foreign travellers record their wonder and admiration at the "great shins of beef," the quantities of bread and animal food, consumed by the English yeomen and cottagers, and much of their superiority in battle was supposed to be owing to this circumstance.

Jack and his uncle suited each other very well. The old man was rather sparing of his words, but he was a pleased and indulgent listener to the boy's prattle, and when he did speak, it was always to the purpose. Sometimes in the evening, or when they were alone on the hillside, Jack would catechise the shepherd, and draw from him accounts of what he had seen in his younger days.

For the old man had not always been a shepherd on the hillside. He had followed his master to foreign wars, and helped to uphold the honor of England on more than one stricken field. He might have ended his days in peace and idleness in the knight's hall corner, for Sir John was a liberal and worthy man, and honored the old retainer of his father; but Thomas had no fancy for an idle life. He was hale and strong, and quite able to perform the duties of a shepherd, and he preferred living in the old cottage where his father and grandfather had lived before him.

Sir John was not one of those who insist on doing people good against their will or exactly in his own way and no other. He was content to let the old man please himself. Thus it came to pass that Thomas Sprat, had a home of his own to share with his great-nephew; and, as I have said, he made it very pleasant for the lad.

Anne's tale had produced a very different effect upon her brother's mind from what she had intended. Instead of putting an end to his curiosity and his mental questionings, she had given them a new impulse. Again and again, he went over in his mind the story of Agnes Harland. He recalled the words she had spoken, the account which Anne had given of the girl's constancy and bravery under trial, and wondered if it was anything in the words of the mysterious book which had given her so much courage, and whether that book was really a copy of the Holy Scripture.

And why should her superiors have been so angry with Agnes for reading the book, supposing it to be the Bible? Was it true that the word of God was so dangerous? Was it indeed like a poisonous drug, only to be touched by a skilful physician, and even then with caution? Or—Jack put away the thought with horror, but it returned again and again—was it true that the monks knew themselves condemned by its pages; that their pretensions to absolute authority over the mind and conscience of men had no ground or support in Holy Writ, and, therefore, they were afraid to put the book into the hands of the people? And, if this were true, how much more was true? What if Luther and the German heretics were right after all?

Jack's mind was like a seething caldron with these and similar thoughts and conjectures, and had been so, ever since he had heard the tale of Agnes Harland. He had never dared heretofore to mention the subject, and he hardly knew how he had ventured to begin upon it now. But there had already sprung up a very warm and intimate friendship between the old man of fourscore, grave, silent, and somewhat severe in his manners, and the fresh-hearted impulsive schoolboy, with his head full of the classical learning he had acquired at school, and the tales he had heard from his father and Cousin Cicely.

Deaf Margery remarked with some little jealousy, that Master Thomas said more words to Jacky in one day than he had done to her in a month; forgetting, poor woman, that Master Thomas might as well have tried to keep up a conversation with one of his own sheep.

Thomas himself was conscious of a new flavor, as it were, given to his quiet life by the advent of his young kinsman, which repaid him tenfold for any trouble he had taken in the matter.

On this particular day, Jack and his uncle were alone on the breezy side of Holford Hill, looking over a beautiful prospect of meadow, waste and woodland. The old man sat on a flat stone, leaning back against a great stunted oak tree which grew very conveniently just behind this his favorite seat, and, with his hands folded before him, seemed lost in meditation. Jack lay at full length on the thymy and springing turf, gazing up into the blue sky, and watching now the rooks, now the great sailing white clouds which passed over it. Suddenly he spoke out:

"Uncle Thomas, did you ever see a Bible?"

[Illustration: "Uncle Thomas, did you ever see a Bible?"]

The old man started and turned round with a look of surprise, somewhat as if his own thoughts had found an echo in the boy's words.

"A Bible, lad! And what set thee to thinking of a Bible?"

"Oh, I don't know exactly. I should so like to see one. There must be such fine tales in the Bible," replied Jack, feeling his way, as it were. "Tales of St. George and St. Patrick and such like."

The old man smiled and shook his head shrewdly. "I am not so sure of that, my son. I never saw or heard any such. I doubt whether St. George and St. Patrick are in the Bible at all, though they may be there for all that."

It was now Jack's turn to start. "Then you have seen a Bible!" he said, raising himself on his elbow and looking earnestly at the shepherd. And as Thomas did not answer, he repeated again, "Then you have really seen a Bible?"

"Ay, lad," replied the shepherd. "I have both seen a Bible, and held it in my hands, and read it too."

"But where? But how?" asked Jack.

"Raise yourself up and look about you," said the old man. "Do you see any one near?"

Jack started to his feet and gazed around him in every direction. "I see nobody," he said at last, "nobody but the falconer from the Hall, exercising his hawks in the waste half a mile away, and old Margery bringing water from the Lady-well. Nobody can come upon us here without being seen."

"Sit down here by me, then, and I will tell you the tale. I cannot think it will harm you. I had thought to carry the secret to my grave, since I have no son to whom I may leave it. But I have learned to love you as my own son, and all I have will be yours when I am gone. It will not be much; only the old cottage, and what little gold I have saved; but, if you have the cottage, you must have the secret of the cottage as well. So sit you down, and you will, and hear the old man's tale."

Jack obeyed, and prepared to listen with breathless attention. The old man once more glanced warily round him, and then began his narration.

"You asked me, dear boy, if I had ever seen a Bible. Yes, I have both seen and handled the Word of God in the vulgar tongue. It was not a printed book such as we have now; it was written by hand on parchment, and bound in leather with heavy iron clasps, like the enchanter's book in your legend of Merlin. But it was no enchanter's book. It was the real, true, living Word of God, done into English by good Master Wickliffe of Lutterworth."

"It happened first in this wise. I was a young boy of nine or ten years old, and sharp for my age as any lad in these parts. I had learned to read from my father, who was a substantial yeoman, and could both read and write. But there was little to read in those days, only a ballad now and then or some such folly, which my father did not greatly favor."

"About this time, I began to notice that though I was always sent to bed with the chickens, yet my father and mother and my elder brother, a boy of sixteen or thereabouts, sat up much later. I used to lie awake and listen after a while, and I could hear a low murmur of voices, as though some one were reading aloud. I dared not ask any questions, for I stood much in awe of my father and mother, more than is the fashion in these days," added the old man with a sigh.

"Well!" said Jack, fearful lest the shepherd should fall to moralizing on the degeneracy of the times, an exercise of mind as common then as now and quite as reasonable.

"Well," said the shepherd, "as I told you, I listened thus for several nights, now and then catching a word which roused my curiosity still more, till at last I could bear it no longer. One night (it was Easter-even of all the nights in the year), I rose softly from my bed, and putting on my clothes, I slipped carefully down the stairs, till I could peep through the door at the bottom. There sat my father and mother, surrounded by three or four neighbors. You have seen the little footstool which always stands by my great chair in the chimney corner?"

"Yes," replied Jack, wondering what the stool could have to do with the matter.

"My father had this stool turned upside down on his lap, and upon it lay a great book from which he was reading in low, reverent tones, the story of the raising of Lazarus from the dead. I noticed in one glance, as children do notice everything, that the door was barred and the window carefully darkened so that no gleam of light should appear without, and also that my brother seemed to be on the watch. I stood still in my hiding-place and listened to that wonderful tale, not losing one word, till my father came to that place where he that was dead came forth bound hand and foot with grave-clothes. Then I could no longer bear the excitement, and I cried out aloud. In another moment, my mother had drawn me out of my hiding-place, and I stood in the midst of the company."

"I was terribly frightened. I thought when I saw my father's grave face that I had done something dreadful; and I fell down on my knees at his feet and prayed him to pardon me. I shall never forget his look and tone as he raised me and placed me between his knees. It was seventy years ago and more, yet I seem to see and hear him now as he kissed me—a rare thing for him to do—and said to me—"

"'My dear son, I am not angry with you. You have unwittingly intruded into a great and dangerous secret, a secret which concerns men's lives, and you must now show that you are able to keep it.'"

"I was none the less frightened for this address. My head was as full of tales of enchantment as ever yours was, and I could think of nothing but that my father and his friends were engaged in some unlawful art, and I glanced fearfully around me, expecting to see I knew not what frightful appearance. My father seemed to perceive that I was frightened, for he passed his arm round me and bade me not be afraid."

"'This book,' said he, laying his hand on the volume, 'this book, my son, is no other than the Word of God, done into English by that good priest, Master Wickliffe of Lutterworth, in the days of my father, thy grandfather, for whom thou art named. My father held this book as his most precious treasure, albeit he suffered both persecution and loss of goods for its sake; and when he died, he bequeathed it to me. If I were known to possess it, the book would be taken and destroyed, and not only thy father and mother, but these neighbors, might be burned at the stake. So you see, my child, into what a perilous secret you have intruded yourself.'"

"'But, father,' I ventured to ask timidly, 'are you sure that this is really and truly the Word of God?'"

"'Yes, my son,' he replied, 'I am well assured of it.'"

"'How then?' I asked. 'I thought that only heretics were burned, and how should a man be accounted a heretic for reading the Word, of God?'"

"My father and his friends smiled, and one of them said, 'Truly, my dear lad, that is a question which has been asked by older heads than yours.'"

"'Tis indeed a grave question, and I will strive to explain the matter to you another day. Meantime, my son, attend to me. As I tell you, the lives of your father and mother depend upon your discretion. If you speak of what you have found out to any one, you may expect to see us burned alive at the stake. Do you know what that means?'"

"I did know, only too well. Only a year before, I had played the truant to see some great sight, I knew not what, which had drawn together a crowd of people over there on the border of the waste. I had slipped between them till I reached the front rank, and I had never forgotten the sight which met my eyes—the body of an aged woman consuming in the flames. The sight and the smell had haunted my dreams at times ever since."

"'I never will betray you, dear father; never,' I cried passionately. 'I will never breathe one word, if only you will let me hear God's Word.'"

"From that time, I was a regular attendant at the evening readings, nor would I have missed them for any reward which could have been promised me. My mother could repeat whole chapters of the Scripture, especially of the New Testament, and she caused me to learn them also; for she said—"

"'You may not always have the book. It may be destroyed, or you may have to leave home, but what is stored in your memory no man can take from you.'"

"Accordingly, she caused me to learn by heart large part of the sayings of our Lord, with the account of his miracles."

"Did our Lord work miracles like the holy image at Glastonbury, or like those we read of in the lives of the saints?" asked Jack. "Was he seen gliding along over the treetops, or kneeling a little way up in the air at his devotions, like St. Catherine; or did he live a whole week on five orange seeds, like St. Rose; or—"

"Nay, our Lord's miracles were very different from most of those related in the lives of the saints," replied the shepherd. "They were mostly performed to heal the sick, or to help those who were in some strait for want of food, or the like. But at last, the time came when I must go forth to seek my own living. My father was not rich, and had suffered, like almost every one else, by the long civil wars. So I was sent to keep sheep on the Stonehill farm, across the waste yonder, and quite on the other side of the parish. I did not come home for a year, and then it was upon a mournful occasion. My father had been arrested and thrown into jail for a heretic, and though my good master, Sir John Brydges, interceded for him, he could not save him. My brother was obliged to flee for his life, and what became of him I cannot say. I never saw or heard of him again."

"I was permitted to see my father and receive his blessing, but only in presence of witnesses. His enemies would gladly have pushed matters to extremity, and have turned my mother and me out into the world to wander as beggars, if indeed they had left us that resource, but again Sir John stood our friend. May God bless him for it, and give him his portion among the saints! He was a man of weight and power, and he used his power well. The cottage where my father and grandfather lived was assured to my mother for her life, and I was taken into the good knight's service, he thinking, I suppose, that I should be safer attending upon him."

"I followed his fortunes faithfully for more than forty years, and I supported his head when he died. His son, the present knight, has ever been kind to me. He would have given me a home in his own hall had I desired it, but I was ever a lover of solitude, and found more pleasure in following the sheep on the hillside than in sitting among the servants in the great hall. Besides, I have always cherished a secret hope that I might find my father's great book hidden somewhere about the old cottage."

"Then it was not destroyed?" said Jack.

"Not that I know of. It was never found. My father, fearing for its safety, had bestowed it in some new hiding-place the day that he was arrested, and he had no time to tell my mother where he had placed it."

"Then it may be in being now," said Jack. "Oh, uncle, if we could but find it!"

"Would to God I might!" replied the old man, looking upward and clasping his hands. "I would depart in peace, could I but once more hold the Word of God in my hands. And, son Jack—for dear you are to me as my own son—I know not if it may not be a fond fancy, but by times something tells me that I shall see it again before I die."