man of humors? Probably not: nor can we say of a certainty that he was the runaway warrior who was of so bad repute for a time in the army of the Duke of Bedford: but we do know from these musty papers that he had a "Jacket of red velvet, bound round the bottom with red leather," and "Another jacket of russet velvet lyned with blanket clothe;" also "Two jackets of deer's leather, with a collar of black velvet," and so on.

We do not however care so much about this Fastolf inventory, as for what good Margaret Paston may have to say: and as we read her letters we seem to go back on her quaint language and her good wifely fondness to the very days when they were written in the great country-house of Norfolk, near upon the city of Norwich, with the gentle east wind. from the German Ocean, blowing over the Norfolk fens, and over the forests, and over the orchards, and over the barns, and into the hall-windows, and lifting the very sheets of paper on which the good dame Margery is writing. And what does she say?

vicinity of sounds intrench on the memory of a worthy Knight; and few do heed the inconsiderable difference in spelling their names."

Ryte worshipful husband, I recommend me.

unto you"

she begins; and thereafter goes on to

speak of a son who has been doing unwise things, and been punished therefor as would seem :

"As for his demeaning, syn you departed, in good faith, it hath been ryt good, I hope he will be well demeaned to please you hereafterward; and I beseche you hartily that you would vouchsafe to be hys good fader, for I hope he is chastyzed, and will be worthier. As for all oder tyngges at home, I hope that I, and oder shall do our part therein, as wel as we may; but as for mony it cometh in slowly, and God hav you in his keeping, and sen you good speed in all yr matters."

Again, in another note, she addresses her husband,

"Myn oune sweethert [a good many years after marriage too!] in my most humble wyse I recommend me to you; desiring hertly to her of your welfare, the which I beseche Almighty God preserve and kepe."

And a son writes to this same worthy Marga

ret:

"Ryght worshipful and my moste kynde and tender moder, I recommend me to you, thanking you of the great coste, and of the grete chere that ye dyd me, and myn, at my last being with you. Item: As for the books that weer Sir James [would] it like you that may have them? I am not able to buy them; but somewhat wolde I give, and the

remnant with a good devout hert, by my truthe, I will pray for his soule.

66 Also, moder, I herd while in London ther was a goodly young woman to marry whyche was daughter to one Seff, a mercer, and she will have 200 pounds in money to her marriage, and 20 £ by year after the dysesse of a stepmoder of hers, whiche is upon 50 yecres of age and fore I departed out o' Lunnon, I spak with some of the mayd's friends, and hav gotten their good wille to hav her married to my broder Edmond. Master Pykenham too is another that must be consulted so he says: Wherefore, Moder, we must beseeche you to helpe us forward with a lettyr to Master Pykenham, for to remember him for to handyl this matter, now, this Lent."

A younger son writes:—

"I beseeche you humbly of your blessing: also, modyr, I beseeche you that ther may be purveyed some meane that I myth have sent me home by the same messenger that shall bring my Aunt Poynings answer two paire hose 1 payr blak and another russet, whyche be redy for me at the hosers with the crooked back next to the Blk Friars gate, within Ludgate. John Pampyng knoweth him well eno'. And if the blk hose be paid for, he will send me the russet ones unpaid for. I beseeche you that this geer be not forgot, for I have not an whole hose to do on. I pray you visit the Rood of St. Pauls, and St. Savior at Barmonsey whyls ye abide in London, and let my sister Margery go with you to pray to them that she may have a good husband ere she come home again. Written at Norwich on holyrood day, by yr

"Son and lowly Servant

"JNO: PASTON THE YOUNGEST."

This sounds as home-like as if it were written

yesterday, and about one of us

even to the send

ing of two pair of hose if one was paid for. And yet this familiar, boy-like letter was written in the year 1465 six years before Caxton had set up his press in Westminster - twenty-seven before Columbus had landed on San Salvador, and at a time when Louis XI. and barber Oliver (whose characters are set forth in Scott's story of Quentin Durward) were hanging men who angered them. on the branches of the trees which grew around the dismal palace of Plessis-les-Tours, in France.

A Burst of Balladry.

this

I have brought my readers through a waste literary country to-day; but we cannot reach the oases of bloom without going across the desert spaces. In looking back upon this moil and turmoilfret and wear and barrenness of the fifteenth century, in which we have welcomed talk about Caxton's sorry translations, and the wheezing of his press; and have given an ear to the hunting discourse of Dame Juliana, for want of better things; and have dwelt with a certain gleesomeness on the

homely Paston Letters, let us not forget that there has been all the while, and running through all the years of stagnation, a bright thread of balladry, with glitter and with gayety of color. This ballad music - whose first burst we can no more pin to a

date than we can the first singing of the birds — had lightened, in that early century, the walk of the wayfarer on all the paths of England; it had spun its tales by bivouac fires in France; it had caught as in silken meshes- all the young foragers on the ways of Romance. To this epoch, of which we have talked, belongs most likely that brave ballad of Chevy Chase, which keeps alive the memory of Otterbourne, and of that woful hunting which

"Once there did, in Chevy Chase befal."

"To drive the deare with hounde and horne

Erle Percy took his way;

The child may rue, that is unborn

The hunting of that day."

Hereabout, too, belongs in all probability the early English shaping of the jingling history of the brave deeds of Sir Guy of Warwick; and some of the tales of Robin Hood and his "pretty men all," which had been sung in wild and crude carols for