Aug. 10, 1659 ing in the autumn of 1659. It was six years since 1 Ligg, to lie down : And they were bidden for to slepe GOWER, Halliwell's Dict. bee more searious, God be thanked I did not suffer by them. I am informed that greater numbers of horse & foot then wee have yet seene are to passe very suddenly; all immaginable haste is made to reduce Chesheire, soe that I hope they will finde no leasure to bee injurious to me.' John Stewkeley returns thanks, from 'Pickadilly,' for the invitation. 'The late noysis of riesings puts mee in a fear,' Cary Aug. writes later, that I have no fortune to see Claydon, the plas I do much long to be at; for if distorbances incres I would not be so uncevell to trobell your house, knowing strangers are unseasonabill at souch tims.' Sister Betty came with the Gardiners, Mun and Jack were at home, and so complete was the gathering that there is not a single family letter written to Sir Ralph during that month of September. It certainly required some courage on his part to receive his four sisters; they usually discovered in their old home some piece of furniture or linen which they claimed as a right under their mother's will, or begged as a favour. This time Pen and Peg took a fancy to the same chair, and called each other hard names about it; Pen considered that Peg's self-will hath grone up with her from her cradell; all together she cannot make her great brags, her one will, hether two, hath maide her unfortinate. I must follow Sister Gardiner's good humer and forget her ill humer to us both.' Cary writes to her brother, on the way home, 1659 Oct. 21, 1659 Nov. 3, 1659 'At the bare' at Reading: In souch paper as the Penelope and her husband stayed two months at Claydon, and John Stewkeley thus describes their return journey: The Squier had a sad martch to London: hee had a great contest with Pen for a place in the coach, but Scartlett was preferd before him hee rode as near the coach as if his horse had been tied to it, and was wett to the skin before hee came half way.' We can see Sir Ralph's carriages and the party of riders clattering into the market-palce at Aylesbury, all splashed and dripping after fourteen miles of heavy November roads; we hear the hard words and hard blows exchanged as the passengers struggle for places in the public coach; while the Claydon servants, the post-boys and ostlers are grinning to see Squire Denton foiled in his efforts to push away his wife in order to secure an inside seat for himself. 6 Peg Elmes describes the 'great disorder' the Squier' was put into, for he was turned a horseback in all the wett soe he had noe good luck 6 after all his long feasting.' ( No wonder that his ill-humour lasted beyond the journey; his black eye,' writes Brother Stewkeley, hath made him very nice of admitting any to see him since hee came up; hee is scarce in charity yet with his playfellows, but time will doe it.' Anne Hobart, staying with Daughter Smith at Ratcliffe, and looking back upon Claydon hospitalities, writes to Sir Ralph: I pety you from my hart, that you have so much compeny, but when I conseder how near and dear they ar all to you-it tis a recreaton, espeshally when it coms but sildom.' 6 Betty Verney returned with the Stewkeleys to Preshaw where she relapsed into sad fits of grumbling; but it is impossible not to sympathise with the poor orphan girl, who had missed all the petting and spoiling that were her due as the youngest of a large family, or to wonder that she envied Ursula Stewkeley, whose caprice and wilfulness were viewed at home with an indulgence that Betty had never known. She holds her peace,' we are told, after a good scolding from Cary, only repeats often, how happy Ury is to have a father and uncill which dus all they can to help her to live in pleshur.' OLIVER CROMWELL is dead and gone, but his Highness Richard, the Lord Protector, rules in his stead. There is a pause of silence and expectation. For a moment it seems as if the good ship of State would hold steadily on her course, even though the strong hand has relaxed its grip of the helm, and left her amidst gathering clouds to a feeble and inexperienced pilot. Dryden, in his heroic stanzas to Oliver's memory, could write with general acceptance— No civil broils have since his death arose, But faction now by habit does obey; As winds for halcyons when they breed at sea. But there are mutterings of the coming storm when Dr. Denton reports, in October 1658: 'The souldiers are not so quiett as I could wish, they would fayne a generall distinct from the Protector.' In marked contrast to the preceding years, the |