THE SANCTUARY; A TALE OP 1415. 



BY THE AUTHOR OF THE " BONDMAN." 



THE Breton merchants had acquired so much influence and so 

 much profit in their traffic with the English,, that the native mer- 

 chants took the alarm, and to so great a degree, that even then the 

 Commons possessed sufficient influence to obtain the passing of an 

 Act (under the pretext that the strangers were to be regarded as 

 French spies), ordaining that all Bretons, not denizens, should, under 

 pain of death, leave England before the then 24th of June, 1415. 

 This was in the reign of Henry V. Expostulation, and then gold, 

 was resorted to by the more wealthy individuals, to purchase exemp- 

 tion from the arbitrary decree. But gold, though omnipotent in 

 cases of greater moment, was here unavailing. The fifth Harry 

 deemed it expedient, at this juncture, to conciliate the native traders, 

 and more especially those of the good city of London, by the expul- 

 sion of the adventurers. As the Bretons one by one withdrew from 

 the land where they had so long lived and flourished, there might 

 have been seen young w r ives weeping tears, which they vainly strove 

 to conceal from their foreign husbands, and young maidens plighting 

 troth with those who might never again set foot in England. 



It was on the evening of the 23d of June, that a young Harwich 

 maiden was seated at a window, opening upon a delicious garden, 

 just within the eastern wall of the town. The casement was thrown 

 back, so that the perfume from the evening flowers could in no wise 

 be impeded. But the flowers might as well have wasted their 

 sweetness on the desert air as beneath the window of this maiden. 

 Her left elbow rested on the window-sill, and the upraised palm of 

 her left hand supported a soft glowing cheek. Her right hand 

 rested upon a missal that lay upon the window-ledge, and her eyes 

 were cast down ; but it could scarcely have been to read, for the sun 

 had long set, and besides, for the last hour, not a leaf of the missal 

 had been stirred. She raised her eyes, and the action of raising the 

 lids caused tears, which had been unheedingly surcharging the 

 lashes, to fall in round drops down the cheek. At this moment a 

 whispered " Mary !" caused the maiden to start ; and even in the 

 darkness of the hour her face might have been seen to crimson. 



" Mary !" repeated a tall figure, in a dark green tunic, beneath 

 the window, " Mary, this is almost the last hour I may abide in 

 England." 



The stranger paused. The maiden's bosom rose, as she listened to 

 this brief address, but she did not speak. Man, in his love, is often 

 unreasonable, and there might have been detected something of dis- 

 appointment, if not of anger, in the contraction of the brow, as he 

 looked up at the bending figure of his silent mistress. 



" Will you not answer me ?" he abruptly asked: " Is this to be 

 the end of all I had striven for and hoped ?" 



" What may I answer?" replied Mary, in a subdued voice; 

 <c Alas ! Henri, I thought you had been far from England before 

 this." 



