rose folded his hands with a gesture of earnestness, and Lucas Hansen
said, "Bless thee, my son! Methinks I can aid thee in thy quest, so
thou canst lay aside," and here his voice grew sharper and more
peremptory, "all thy gentleman's airs and follies, and serve--ay, serve
and obey."

"I trust so," returned Ambrose; "my brother is even now becoming
prentice to Master Giles Headley, and we hope to live as honest men by
the work of our hands and brains."

"I forgot that you English herren are not so puffed up with pride and
scorn like our Dutch nobles," returned the printer. "Canst live
sparingly, and lie hard, and see that thou keepst the house clean, not
like these English swine?"

"I hope so," said Ambrose, smiling; "but I have an uncle and aunt, and
they would have me lie every night at their house beside the Temple
gardens."

"What is thine uncle?"

"He hath a post in the meine of my Lord Archbishop of York," said
Ambrose, blushing and hesitating a little. "He cometh to and fro to his
wife, who dwells with her old father, doing fine lavender's work for the
lawyer folk therein."

It was somewhat galling that this should be the most respectable
occupation that could be put forward, but Lucas Hansen was evidently
reassured by it. He next asked whether Ambrose could read Latin,
putting a book into his hand as he did so; Ambrose read and construed
readily, explaining that he had been trained at Beaulieu.

"That is well!" said the printer; "and hast thou any Greek?"

"Only the alphabeta," said Ambrose, "I made that out from a book at
Beaulieu, but Father Simon knew no more, and there was nought to study
from."

"Even so," replied Hansen, "but little as thou knowst 'tis as much as I
can hope for from any who will aid me in my craft. 'Tis I that, as thou
hast seen, furnish for the use of the children at the Dean's school of
Saint Paul's. The best and foremost scholars of them are grounded in
their Greek, that being the tongue wherein the Holy Gospels were first
writ. Hitherto I have had to get me books for their use from Holland,
whither they are brought from Basle, but I have had sent me from Hamburg
a fount of type of the Greek character, whereby I hope to print at home,
the accidence, and mayhap the _Dialogues_ of Plato, and it might even be
the sacred Gospel itself, which the great Doctor, Master Erasmus, is
even now collating from the best authorities in the universities."

Ambrose's eyes kindled wit