of gentle birth and noble blood. He was, in fact, a scion of an
ancient and powerful house; but it was one of those houses that had
suffered sorely in the recent strife, and whose members had been
scattered and cut off. He had no powerful relatives and friends to
turn to now for promotion to rich benefice or high ecclesiastical
preferment, and he had certainly never lamented this fact. In heart
and soul he was a follower of the rules of poverty laid down by the
founder of his order, and would have thought himself untrue to his
calling had he suffered himself to be endowed with worldly wealth.
Even such moneys as he received from Sir Oliver for the instruction
given to his sons were never kept by himself. All were given either
to the poor by his hands direct, or placed at the disposal of the
Prior of Chadwater, where he had been an inmate for a short time
previous to his installation as chaplain at Chad. He had not sought
this office; he would rather have remained beneath the priory
walls. He thought that it was something contrary to the will of the
founders for monks to become parochial priests, or to hold offices
and benefices which took them from the shelter of their monastery
walls. But such things were of daily occurrence now, and were
causing bitter jealousy to arise betwixt the parochial clergy and
the monks, sowing seeds of strife which played a considerable part
in the struggle this same century was to see. But it was useless to
try to stem the current single-handed, and the rule of obedience
was as strong within him as that of poverty and chastity.

When sent forth by his prior (who secretly thought that this young
monk was too strict and ascetic and too keen-witted to be a safe
inmate of a house which had long fallen from its high estate, and
was becoming luxurious and wealthy and lax), he had gone
unmurmuringly to Chad, and since then had become so much interested