walking with Sampietro in Paradise, as the Padrone may do with his
Fattore, when after a while He said, not as complaining exactly but
as stating a fact, "Sampietro, this place is going down!"

Here Sampietro, who is always impetuous and knew very well what He
meant, dared to interrupt, "Il Santissimo can't blame me," said he
huffily. "Il Santissimo does not suppose they all come in by the gate?
_Che Che!_"

"Not come in by the gate, Sampietro. What do you mean?" said Our Lord.
"If Il Santissimo will but step this way, round by these bushes," said
Sampietro, "He shall see." And there sure enough He saw; for there was
Our Lady drawing us all up helter-skelter, pell-mell, willy-nilly into
Heaven in a great bucket, to our great gain and undeserved good. O
clemens, O pia, O dulcis Virgo Maria.

The road between Chatham and Sittingbourne might seem to be
unquestionably that by which the pilgrims rode, and as certainly the
Roman highway. It is, however, rather barren of mediaeval interest,
little being left to us older than the change of religion. At Rainham
we have a church, however, dedicated in honour of St Margaret, parts
of which date from the thirteenth century, though in the main it is a
Perpendicular building. Within are two ornaments of the late
seventeenth century, and two brasses, one to William Bloor, who died
in 1529, and the other to John Norden, who died in 1580, and to his
four wives. As for William Bloor, there is a local story of some
relation of his, Christopher Bloor by name, and of a nightly journey
on a coach driven by a headless coachman beside whom sits a headless
footman, and all drawn by headless horses, Christopher himself sitting
within, his head in his hands. So much I heard, but I could not find