nd to ensure them
against being dragged into the penitential company who were to ask for
their lives on the 22nd of May, consisting of such of the prisoners who
could still stand or go--for jail-fever was making havoc among them, and
some of the better-conditioned had been released by private interest.
The remainder, not more than half of the original two hundred and
seventy-eight, were stripped to their shirts, had halters hung round
their necks, and then, roped together as before, were driven through the
streets to Westminster, where the King sat enthroned. There, looking
utterly miserable, they fell on their knees before him, and received his
pardon for their misdemeanours. They returned to their masters, and so
ended that Ill May day, which was the longer remembered because one
Churchill, a ballad-monger in Saint Paul's Churchyard, indited a poem on
it, wherein he swelled the number of prentices to two thousand, and of
the victims to two hundred. Will Wherry, who escaped from among the
prisoners very forlorn, was recommended by Ambrose to the work of a
carter at the Dragon, which he much preferred to printing.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

AT THE ANTELOPE.

"Say, Father Thames, for thou hast seen
Full many a sprightly race,
Disporting on thy margent green,
The paths of pleasure trace."
Gray.

Master Hope took all the guests by boat to Windsor, and very soon the
little party at the Antelope was in a state of such perfect felicity as
became a proverb with them all their lives afterwards. It was an inn
wherein to take one's ease, a large hostel full of accommodation for man
and horse, with a big tapestried room of entertainment below, where
meals were taken, with an oriel window with a view of the Round Tower,
and above it a still more charming one, known as the Red Rose, because
one of the Dukes of Somerset had been wont to lodge there. The walls
were tapestried with the story of Saint Genoveva of Brabant, fresh and
new on Mrs Streatfield's marriage; there was a huge bed with green
curtains of that dame's own work, where one might have said:--

"Above, below, the rose of snow,
Twined with her blushing foe we spread."

so as to avoid all offence. There was also a cupboard or sideboard of
the choicer plate belonging to the establishment, and another awmry
containing appliances for chess and backgammon, likewise two large
chairs, several stools, and numerous chests.

This apartment was given up t