But in Stanfield the Church flourished, and Anthony had the great happiness of receiving his first convert in the person of Mr. Rowe, the young owner of a house called East Maskells, separated from Stanfield Place by a field-path of under a mile in length, though the road round was over two; and the comings and goings were frequent now between the two houses. Mr. Rowe was at present unmarried, and had his aunt to keep house for him, a tolerant old maiden lady who had conformed placidly to the Reformed Religion thirty years before, and was now grown content with it. Several "schismatics" too--as those Catholics were called who attended their parish church--had waxed bolder, and given up their conformity to the Establishment; so it was a happy and courageous flock that gathered Sunday by Sunday at Stanfield Place.
Just before Christmas, Anthony received a long and affectionate letter from James Maxwell, who was still at Douai.
"The Rector will still have me here," he wrote, "and shows me to the young men as if I were a kind of warrior; which is bad for pride; but then he humbles me again by telling me I am of more use here as an example, than I should be in England; and that humbles me again. So I am content to stay. It is a humbling thing, too, to find young men who can tell me the history of my arms and legs better than I know it myself. But the truth is, I can never walk well again--yet _laudetur Jesus Christus_."
Then James Maxwell wrote a little about his grief for Hubert; gave a little news of foreign movements among the Catholics; and finally ended as follows:
"At last I understand who your friend was behind Bow Church, who stuttered and played the Catholic so well. It was our old servant Lackington; who turned Protestant and entered Walsingham"s service. I hear all this from one P. lately in the same affairs, but now turned to Christ his service instead; and who has entered here as a student. So beware of him; he has a pointed beard now, and a bald forehead. I hear, too, from the same source that he was on your track when you landed, but now thinks you to be in France. However, he knows of you; so I counsel you not to abide over long in one place. Perhaps you may go to Lancashire; that is like heaven itself for Catholics. Their zeal and piety there are beyond praise; but I hear they somewhat lack priests. G.o.d keep you always, my dear Brother; and may the Queen of Heaven intercede for you. Pray for me."
Soon after the New Year, Mary Corbet was able to get away from Court and come down again to her friends for a month or two at Stanfield.
During her stay they all had an adventure together at East Maskells. They had been out a long expedition into the woods one clear frosty day and rode in just at sunset for an early supper with Mr. Rowe and his aunt.
They had left their horses at the stable and come in round the back of the house; so that they missed the servant Miss Rowe had placed at the front door to warn them, and came straight into the winter-parlour, where they found Miss Rowe in conversation with an ecclesiastic. There was no time to retreat; and Anthony in a moment more found himself being introduced to a minister he had met at Lambeth more than once--the Reverend Robert Carr, who had held the odd t.i.tle of "Archbishop"s Curate"
and the position of minister in charge of the once collegiate church of All Saints", Maidstone, ever since the year "59. He had ridden up from Maidstone for supper and lodging, and was on his way to town.
Anthony managed to interrupt Miss Rowe before she came to his a.s.sumed name Capell, and remarked rather loudly that he had met Mr. Carr before; who recognised him too, and greeted him by his real name.
It was an uncomfortable situation, as Mr. Carr was quite unaware of the religion of five out of six of those present, and very soon began to give voice to his views on Papistry. He was an oldish man by now, and of some importance in Maidstone, where he had been appointed Jurat by the Corporation, and was a very popular and influential man.
"The voice of the people," he said in the midst of a conversation on the national feeling towards Spain, "that is what we must hearken to. Even sovereigns themselves must come to that some day. They must rule by obeying; as man does with G.o.d"s laws in nature."
"Would you say that, sir, of her Grace?" asked Mary Corbet meekly.
"I should, madam; though I fear she has injured her power by her behaviour this year. It was her people who saved her.--Hawkins, who is now ruined as he says; my lord Howard, who has paid from his own purse for the meat and drink of her Grace"s soldiers, and those who fought with them; and not her Grace, who saved them; or Leicester, now gone to his account, who sat at Tilbury and did the bowing and the prancing and the talking while Hawkins and the rest did the fighting. No, madam, it is the voice of the people to which we must hearken."
This was rather confused and dangerous talking too; but here was plainly a man to be humoured; he looked round him with a suffused face and the eye of a c.o.c.k, and a little white plume on his forehead increased his appearance of pugnacity.
"It is the same in religion," he said, when all preserved a deferential silence; "it is that that lies at the root of papist errors. As you know very well," he went on, turning suddenly on Anthony, "our bishops do nothing to guide men"s minds; they only seem to: they ride atop like the figure on a c.o.c.k-horse, but it is the legs beneath that do the work and the guiding too: now that is right and good; and the Church of England will prosper so long as she goes like that. But if the bishops try to rule they will find their mistake. Now the Popish Church is not like that; she holds that power comes from above, that the Pope guides the bishops, the bishops the priests, and the priests the people."
"And the Holy Ghost the Pope; is it not so, sir?" asked Mr. Buxton.
Mr. Carr turned an eye on him.
"So they hold, sir," he said after a pause.
"They think then, sir, that the shepherds guide the sheep?" asked Anthony humbly.
Mary Corbet gave a yelp of laughter; but when Mr. Carr looked at her she was grave and deferential again. Miss Rowe looked entreatingly from face to face. The minister did not notice Anthony"s remark; but swept on again on what was plainly his favourite theme,--the infallibility of the people. It was a doctrine that was hardly held yet by any; but the next century was to see its gradual rise until it reached its climax in the Puritanism of the Stuart times. It was true, as Mr. Carr said, that Elizabeth had ruled by obeying; and that the people of England, encouraged by success in resisting foreign domination, were about to pa.s.s on to the second position of resisting any domination at all.
Presently he pulled out of his pocket a small printed sheet, and was soon declaiming from it. It was not very much to the point, except as ill.u.s.trating the national spirit which he believed so divine. It was a ballad describing the tortures which the Spaniards had intended to inflict upon the heretic English, and began:
"All you that list to look and see What profit comes from Spain, And what the Pope and Spaniards both Prepared for our gain.
Then turn your eyes and lend your ears And you shall hear and see What courteous minds, what gentle hearts, They bear to thee and me!
And it ended in the same spirit:
"Be these the men that are so mild Whom some so holy call!
The Lord defend our n.o.ble Queen And country from them all!"
"There!" the minister cried when he had done, "that is what the Papists are like! Trust me; I know them I should know one in a moment if he ventured into this room, by his crafty face. But the Lord will defend His own Englishmen; nay! He has done so. "G.o.d blew and they were scattered,""
he ended, quoting from the Armada medal.
As the four rode home by pairs across the field-path in the frosty moonlight Mr. Buxton lamented to Anthony the effect of the Armada.
"The national spirit is higher than ever," he said, "and it will be the death of Catholicism here for the present. Our country squires, I fear, faithful Catholics to this time, are beginning to wonder and question.
When will our Catholic kings learn that Christ His Kingdom is not of this world? Philip has smitten the Faith in England with the weapon which he drew in its defence, as he thought."
"I was once of that national spirit myself," said Anthony.
"I remember you were," said Mr. Buxton, smiling; "and what grace has done to you it may do to others."
The spring went by, and in the week after Easter, James" news about Lancashire was verified by a letter from a friend of Mr. Buxton"s, a Mr.
Norreys, the owner of one of the staunch Catholic houses, Speke Hall, on the bank of the Mersey.
"Here," he wrote, "by the mercy of G.o.d there is no lack of priests, though there be none to spare; my own chaplain says ma.s.s by dispensation thrice on Sunday; but on the moors the sheep look up and are not fed; and such patient sheep! I heard but last week of a church where the folk resort, priest or no, each Sunday to the number of two hundred, and are led by a lector in devotion, ending with an act of spiritual communion made all together. These d.a.m.nable heresies of which the apostle wrote have not poisoned the springs of sound doctrine; some of us here know naught yet of Elizabeth and her supremacy, or even of seven-wived Harry his reformation. Send us then, dear friend, a priest, or at least the promise of one; lest we perish quite."
Mr. Buxton had a sore struggle with himself over this letter; but at last he carried it to Anthony.
"Read that," he said; and stood waiting.
Anthony looked up when he had done.
"I am your chaplain," he said, "but I am G.o.d"s priest first."
"Yes, dear lad," said his friend, "I feared you would say so; and I will say so to Norreys"; and he left the room at once.
And so at last it came to be arranged that Anthony should leave for Lancashire at the end of July; and that after his departure Stanfield should be served occasionally by the priest who lived on the outskirts of Tonbridge; but the daily ma.s.s would have to cease, and that was a sore trouble to Mr. Buxton. No definite decision could be made as to when Anthony could return; that must wait until he saw the needs of Lancashire; but he hoped to be able at least to pay a visit to Stanfield again in the spring of the following year.
It was arranged also, of course, that Isabel should accompany her brother. They were both of large independent means, and could travel in some dignity; and her presence would be under these circ.u.mstances a protection as well as a comfort to Anthony. It would need very great sharpness to detect the seminary priest under Anthony"s disguise, and amid the surroundings of his cavalcade of four or five armed servants, a French maid, and a distinguished-looking lady.
Yet, in spite of this, Mr. Buxton resolved to do his utmost to prevent Isabel from going to Lancashire; partly, of course, he disliked the thought of the dangers and hardships that she was certain to encounter; but the real motive was that he had fallen very deeply in love with her.
It was her exceptional serenity that seemed to him her greatest charm; her movements, her face, her grey eyes, the very folds of her dress seemed to breathe with it; and to one of Mr. Buxton"s temperament such a presence was cool and sweet and strangely fascinating.
It was now April, and he resolved to devote the next month or two to preparing her for his proposal; and he wrote frankly to Mary Corbet telling her how matters stood, entreating her to come down for July and counsel him. Mary wrote back at once, rather briefly, promising to come; but not encouraging him greatly.
"I would I could cheer you more," she wrote; "of course I have not seen Isabel since January; but, unless she has changed, I do not think she will marry you. I am writing plainly you see, as you ask in your letter.
But I can still say, G.o.d prosper you."