o it to have his
drudgery done, when the Priests must leave their pulpits to turn
informers against poor prisoners." The Justice obtained a list of the
names of the prisoners, made out on their commitment, and, taking it for
granted that all were still present, issued warrants for the collection
of fines by levies upon their estates. Among the names was that of a
poor widow, who had been discharged, and was living, at the time the
clerical magistrate swore she was at the meeting, twenty miles distant
from the prison.

Soon after this event, our old friend fell sick. He had been discharged
from prison, but his sons were still confined. The eldest had leave,
however, to attend him in his illness, and he bears his testimony that
the Lord was pleased to favor his father with His living presence in his
last moments. In keeping with the sturdy Non-conformist's life, he was
interred at the foot of his own orchard, in Siddington, a spot he had
selected for a burial-ground long before, where neither the foot of a
priest nor the shadow of a steeple-house could rest upon his grave.

In closing our notice of this pleasant old narrative, we may remark that
the light it sheds upon the antagonistic religious parties of the time is
calculated to dissipate prejudices and correct misapprehensions, common
alike to Churchmen and Dissenters. The genial humor, sound sense, and
sterling virtues of the Quaker farmer should teach the one class that
poor James Nayler, in his craziness and folly, was not a fair
representative of his sect; while the kind nature, the hearty
appreciation of goodness, and the generosity and candor of Bishop
Nicholson should convince the other class that a prelate is not
necessarily, and by virtue of his mitre, a Laud or a Bonner. The
Dissenters of the seventeenth century may well be forgiven for the
asperity of their language; men whose ears had been cropped because they
would not recognize Charles I. as a blessed martyr, and his scandalous
son as the head of the Church, could scarcely be expected to make
discriminations, or suggest palliating circumstances, favorable to any
class of their adversaries. To use the homely but apt simile of
McFingal,

"The will's confirmed by treatment horrid,
As hides grow harder when they're curried."

They were wronged, and they told the world of it. Unlike Shakespeare's
cardinal, they did not die without a sign. They branded, by their fierce
epithet