they had reached the very walls of the fortress itself.

The great and terrible fire was stayed ere nightfall. True, the
flames smouldered and even raged in the burning area for another
day and night, but the spread of them was checked. The citizens,
recovering from their apathetic despair, and encouraged by the
example of their King, no longer stood trembling by, but joined
together to imitate his actions and sacrifice a little property to
save much.

"Thank God, thank God, the peril is at an end! The very flames have
glutted themselves, and are sinking down into the smouldering heaps
of the ruins they have wrought!" said Reuben, coming back on the
Thursday evening from an expedition of inquiry and discovery.
"Terrible indeed is the sight, but the worst is now known. Four
hundred streets, ninety churches--if what I heard be true--and
thirteen thousand houses--fifteen wards destroyed, and eight more
half burned! Was ever such a fire known before? Yet can we say,
Heaven be praised that it has spread no further. Verily, it seemed
once as though nothing would escape!"

Gertrude, too, was full of excitement.

"Father has had a summons from the Lord Mayor. He was urgently sent
for soon after thou hadst gone. O Reuben, dost think the King has
remembered my words to him? dost think he has put in a plea for my
father when the city is rebuilt?"

"It is like enough," answered Reuben; "they say his Majesty does
not forget when his word is plighted. He will be a rich man if he
be employed by the corporation. And how goes the sick lady?"

"So well that my lord has taken her away by boat to a villa hard by
Lambeth, where she will be quieter and more at rest than she could
be here. Janet and Dorcas have gone with her as her maids, her own
servants having fled hither and thither. She would fain have had
Dinah, too, but Dinah was not willing."

Husband and wife smiled a little at each other, and then Reuben
said:

"Thou, wilt have a stepmother soon, little wife. How wilt thou like
that?"

"Well enow, so it be Dinah," answered Gertrude, smiling; "but there
is the father coming in. Prithee, let me run to him and hear his
news!"

Others had seen the approach of the familiar figure, and there was
quite a little group around the door of the two houses to ask news
of the Master Builder as he approached. His face wore a beaming
look, and in reply to the many questions showered upon him he
answered gaily:

"In truth, good frien