should fasten papers to the chancel door--nay, it runs hard on
sacrilege, hard; and men have burned for matters of less weight.
But what have we here? The light falls apace. Good Master
Richard, y' have young eyes. Read me, I pray, this libel."

Dick Shelton took the paper in his hand and read it aloud. It
contained some lines of very rugged doggerel, hardly even rhyming,
written in a gross character, and most uncouthly spelt. With the
spelling somewhat bettered, this is how they ran:


"I had four blak arrows under my belt,
Four for the greefs that I have felt,
Four for the nomber of ill menne
That have opressid me now and then.

One is gone; one is wele sped;
Old Apulyaird is ded.

One is for Maister Bennet Hatch,
That burned Grimstone, walls and thatch.

One for Sir Oliver Oates,
That cut Sir Harry Shelton's throat.

Sir Daniel, ye shull have the fourt;
We shall think it fair sport.

Ye shull each have your own part,
A blak arrow in each blak heart.