turned from the Abbot's room, while the latter, following him to
the stair-head, finally commended him to the protection of the
holy Julian, patron of travellers.

Underneath, in the porch of the Abbey, the monks had gathered to
give him a last God-speed. Many had brought some parting token
by which he should remember them. There was brother Bartholomew
with a crucifix of rare carved ivory, and brother Luke with a
white-backed psalter adorned with golden bees, and brother
Francis with the "Slaying of the Innocents" most daintily set
forth upon vellum. All these were duly packed away deep in the
traveller's scrip, and above them old pippin-faced brother
Athanasius had placed a parcel of simnel bread and rammel cheese,
with a small flask of the famous blue-sealed Abbey wine. So,
amid hand-shakings and laughings and blessings, Alleyne Edricson
turned his back upon Beaulieu.

At the turn of the road he stopped and gazed back. There was the
wide-spread building which he knew so well, the Abbot's house,
the long church, the cloisters with their line of arches, all
bathed and mellowed in the evening sun. There too was the broad
sweep of the river Exe, the old stone well, the canopied niche of
the Virgin, and in the centre of all the cluster of white-robed
figures who waved their hands to him. A sudden mist swam up
before the young man's eyes, and he turned away upon his journey
with a heavy heart and a choking throat.



CHAPTER III.