of yeomanry and manhood into one community of griping traders and
sickly artisans. Mort Dieu! we are over-commerced as it is,--the bow
is already deserted for the ell-measure. The town populations are
ever the most worthless in war. England is begirt with mailed foes;
and if by one process she were to accumulate treasure and lose
soldiers, she would but tempt invasion and emasculate defenders.
Verily, I avise and implore thee to turn thy wit and scholarship to a
manlier occupation!"

"My life knows no other object; kill my labour and thou destroyest
me," said Adam, in a voice of gloomy despair. Alas, it seemed that,
whatever the changes of power, no change could better the hopes of
science in an age of iron! Warwick was moved. "Well," he said, after
a pause, "be happy in thine own way. I will do my best at least to
protect thee. To-morrow resume thy labours; but this day, at least,
thou must feast with me."

And at his banquet that day, among the knights and barons, and the
abbots and the warriors, Adam sat on the dais near the earl, and
Sibyll at "the mess" of the ladies of the Duchess of Clarence. And
ere the feast broke up, Warwick thus addressed his company:--

"My friends, though I, and most of us reared in the lap of war, have
little other clerkship than sufficed our bold fathers before us, yet
in the free towns of Italy and the Rhine,--yea, and in France, under
her politic king,--we may see that a day is dawning wherein new
knowledge will teach many marvels to our wiser sons. Wherefore it is
good that a State should foster men who devote laborious nights and
weary days to the advancement of arts and letters, for the glory of
our common land. A worthy gentleman, now at this board, hath deeply