“As we rose from table, I noted Argus pearcht on ye window-sill, eagerlie watching for his dinner, which he looketh for as punctualie as if he cd tell the diall; and to please the good, patient bird, till the scullion broughte him his mess of garden-stuff, I fetched him some pulse, which he took from mine hand, taking good heede not to hurt me with his sharpe beak. While I was feeding him, Erasmus came up, and asked me concerning Mercy Giggs; and I tolde him how that she was a friendlesse orphan, to whom deare father afforded protection and the run of ye house; and tolde him of her gratitude, her meekness, her patience, her docilitie, her aptitude for alle goode works and alms-deeds; and how, in her little chamber, she improved eache spare moment in ye way of studdy and prayer. He repeated ‘Friendlesse? she cannot be called friendlesse, who hath More for her protector, and his children for companions;’ and then woulde heare more of her parent’s sad story. Alsoe, would heare somewhat of Rupert Allington, and how father gained his law-suit. Alsoe, of Daisy, whose name he tooke to be ye true abbreviation for Margaret, but I tolde him how that my step-sister, and Mercy, and I, being all three of a name, and I being alwaies called Meg, we had in sport given one the significative of her characteristic virtue, and the other that of ye French Marguerite, which may indeed be rendered either pearl or daisy. And Chaucer, speaking of our English daisy, saith
‘Si douce est la Marguerite.’ ”
Next, a little further yet, we have dear Margaret’s thoughts upon herself and her own attractiveness—
“A glance at the anteceding pages of this libellus me-sheweth poor Will Roper at ye season his love-fitt for me was at its height. He troubleth me with it no longer, nor with his religious disquietations. Hard study of the law hath filled his head with other matters, and made him infinitely more rationall, and by consequents, more agreeable. ’Twas one of those preferences young people sometimes manifest, themselves know neither why nor wherefore, and are shamed, afterwards, to be reminded of. I’m sure I shall ne’er remind him. There was nothing in me to fix a rational or passionate regard. I have neither Bess’s witt nor white teeth, nor Daisy’s dark eyes, nor Mercy’s dimple. A plain-favoured girl, with changefule spiritts—that’s all.”
And within but a brief space we find her much in error, as to its degree, and its effect on William Roper, which she records as thus in the libellus.
“Soe my fate is settled. Who knoweth at sunrise what will chance before sunsett? No; the Greeks and Romans mighte speake of chance and of fate, but we must not. Ruth’s hap was to light on ye field of Boaz; but what she thought casual, ye Lord had contrived.
“Firste, he gives me ye marmot. Then, the marmot dies. Then, I, having kept ye creature soe long, and being naturalie tender, must cry a little over it. Then Will must come in and find me drying mine eyes. Then he must, most unreasonablie, suppose that I cd not have loved the poor animal for its own sake soe much as for his; and thereupon, falle a love-making in such down righte earneste, that I, being alreadie somewhat upset, and knowing ’twoulde please father . . . . and hating to be perverse . . . . and thinking much better of Will since he hath studied soe hard, and given soe largelie to ye poor, and left off broaching his heteroclite opinions. . . . I say, I supposed it must be soe, some time or another, soe ’twas noe use hanging back for ever and ever, soe now there’s an end, and I pray God give us a quiet life.
“Noe one wd suppose me reckoning on a quiet life if they knew how I’ve cried alle this forenoon, ever since I got quit of Will, by father’s carrying him off to Westminster. He’ll tell father, I know, as they goe along in the barge, or else coming back, which will be soon enow, though I’ve ta’en no heed of the hour. I wish ’twere cold weather, and that I had a sore throat or stiff neck, or somewhat that might reasonablie send me a-bed, and keep me there till to-morrow morning. But I’m quite well, and ’tis the dog-days, and cook is thumping the rolling-pin on the dresser, and dinner is being served, and here comes father.”
But with this extract the happy days of the household are ended; doubts, darkness, dangers and the shadows of the valley of death henceforth begin to close around and above them; and if, as the old Greeks and Romans deemed, a good man struggling nobly in the toils of necessity were a spectacle for the eyes of gods, then were the sufferings of Sir Thomas and his household of the grandest and most glorious.