“It will lead him to his,” said Sir Richard; “God grant it be not upon Tower-hill! for since that Florida plot, and after that his hopes of Irish preferment came to naught, he who could not help himself by fair means has taken to foul ones, and gone over to Italy to the Pope, whose infallibility has not been proof against Stukely’s wit; for he was soon his Holiness’s closet counsellor, and, they say, his bosom friend; and made him give credit to his boasts that, with three thousand soldiers he would beat the English out of Ireland, and make the Pope’s son king of it.”

“Ay, but,” said Mr. Leigh, “I suppose the Italians have the same fetch now as they had when I was there, to explain such ugly cases; namely, that the Pope is infallible only in doctrine, and quoad Pope; while quoad hominem, he is even as others, or indeed, in general, a deal worse, so that the office, and not the man, may be glorified thereby.  But where is Stukely now?”

“At Rome when last I heard of him, ruffling it up and down the Vatican as Baron Ross, Viscount Murrough, Earl Wexford, Marquis Leinster, and a title or two more, which have cost the Pope little, seeing that they never were his to give; and plotting, they say, some hare-brained expedition against Ireland by the help of the Spanish king, which must end in nothing but his shame and ruin.  And now, my sweet hosts, I must call for serving-boy and lantern, and home to my bed in Bideford.”

And so Amyas Leigh went back to school, and Mr. Oxenham went his way to Plymouth again, and sailed for the Spanish Main.

CHAPTER II

HOW AMYAS CAME HOME THE FIRST TIME

“Si taceant homines, facient te sidera notum,
Sol nescit comitis immemor esse sui.”

Old Epigram on Drake.

Five years are past and gone.  It is nine of the clock on a still, bright November morning; but the bells of Bideford church are still ringing for the daily service two hours after the usual time; and instead of going soberly according to wont, cannot help breaking forth every five minutes into a jocund peal, and tumbling head over heels in ecstasies of joy.  Bideford streets are a very flower-garden of all the colors, swarming with seamen and burghers, and burghers’ wives and daughters, all in their holiday attire.  Garlands are hung across the streets, and tapestries from every window.  The ships in the pool are dressed in all their flags, and give tumultuous vent to their feelings by peals of ordnance of every size.  Every stable is crammed with horses; and Sir Richard Grenville’s house is like a very tavern, with eating and drinking, and unsaddling, and running to and fro of grooms and serving-men.  Along the little churchyard, packed full with women, streams all the gentle blood of North Devon,—­tall and stately men, and fair ladies, worthy of the days when the gentry of England were by due right the leaders of the people, by personal prowess and beauty, as well