souls of those whom he had slain.  There was a large division of the quadrangular building set apart for the priest who was to say these masses; and to watch over the well-being of the bedesmen.  In process of years the origin and primary purpose of the hospital had been forgotten by all excepting the local antiquaries; and the place itself came to be regarded as a very pleasant quaint set of almshouses; and the warden’s office (he who should have said or sung his daily masses was now called the warden, and read daily prayers and preached a sermon on Sundays) an agreeable sinecure.

Another legacy of old Sir Simon Bray was that of a small croft of land, the rent or profits of which were to go towards giving to all who asked for it a manchet of bread and a cup of good beer.  This beer was, so Sir Simon ordained, to be made after a certain receipt which he left, in which ground ivy took the place of hops.  But the receipt, as well as the masses, was modernized according to the progress of time.

Philip stood under a great broad stone archway; the back-door into the warden’s house was on the right side; a kind of buttery-hatch was placed by the porter’s door on the opposite side.  After some consideration, Philip knocked at the closed shutter, and the signal seemed to be well understood.  He heard a movement within; the hatch was drawn aside, and his bread and beer were handed to him by a pleasant-looking old man, who proved himself not at all disinclined for conversation.

‘You may sit down on yonder bench,’ said he.  ‘Nay, man! sit i’ the sun, for it’s a chilly place, this, and then you can look through the grate and watch th’ old fellows toddling about in th’ quad.’

Philip sat down where the warm October sun slanted upon him, and looked through the iron railing at the peaceful sight.

A great square of velvet lawn, intersected diagonally with broad flag-paved walks, the same kind of walk going all round the quadrangle; low two-storied brick houses, tinted gray and yellow by age, and in many places almost covered with vines, Virginian creepers, and monthly roses; before each house a little plot of garden ground, bright with flowers, and evidently tended with the utmost care; on the farther side the massive chapel; here and there an old or infirm man sunning himself, or leisurely doing a bit of gardening, or talking to one of his comrades—­the place looked as if care and want, and even sorrow, were locked out and excluded by the ponderous gate through which Philip was gazing.

‘It’s a nice enough place, bean’t it?’ said the porter, interpreting Philip’s looks pretty accurately.  ’Leastways, for them as likes it.  I’ve got a bit weary on it myself; it’s so far from th’ world, as a man may say; not a decent public within a mile and a half, where one can hear a bit o’ news of an evening.’

‘I think I could make myself very content here,’ replied Philip.  ‘That’s to say, if one were easy in one’s mind.’