f feeling, when
Dr Thorpe pronounced the child's complaint to be only measles, was
intense. The baby, Frances, also suffered lightly, but Kate declined to
be ill of any thing, to the great relief of her mother. So the fearful
danger passed over. No name in the Avery family was inscribed on the
tablet of death given to the angel.

John Avery was very indignant at the cant names given by the populace to
the sweating sickness. "The new acquaintance"--"Stop-gallant"--"Stoop,
knave, and know thy master"--so men termed it, jesting on the very brink
of the grave.

"Truly," said he, "'tis enough to provoke a heavier visitation at God's
hand, when His holy ears do hear the light and unseemly manner wherein
men have received this one."

"Nor is the one of them true," replied Dr Thorpe. "This disorder is no
new acquaintance, for we had it nigh all over one half of England in
King Henry's days. I know I had in Bodmin eight sick therewith at one
time."

When this terror was passing away, an event happened which rejoiced the
Papists, and sorely grieved the Gospellers.

On the 5th of April previous, after the deprivation of Gardiner, Dr
Poynet had been appointed Bishop of Winchester, and 2000 marks in land
assigned for his maintenance. The new Bishop was married; and soon
after his elevation, it transpired that his wife had a previous husband
yet living. Whether the Bishop knew this at the time of his marriage
does not appear; but we may in charity hope that he was ignorant. He
was publicly divorced in Saint Paul's Cathedral on the 28th of July; to
the extreme delight of the Papists, in whose eyes a blot on the
character of a Protestant Bishop was an oasis of supreme pleasure.

The Gospellers were downcast and distressed. Isoult Avery, coming in
from the market, recounted with pain and indignation the remarks which
she had heard on all sides. But John only smiled when she told him of
them.

"It is but like," said he. "The sin of one member tainteth the whole
body, specially in their eyes that be not of the body. Rest thee, dear
heart! The Judge of all the earth shall not blunder because they do,
neither in Bishop Poynet's case nor in our own."

"But," said Isoult, "we had no hand in marrying Bishop Poynet."

"Little enough," he answered. "He shall bear his own sin (how much or
little it be) to his own Master. If he knew not that the woman was not
free, it is lesser his sin than hers; and trust me, God shall