Here was Mr.John, for instance, come to Padley expressly for the selling of some meadows to meet his fines; here was his son Thomas, the heir now, not only to Padley, but to Norbury, whose lord, his uncle, lay in the Fleet Prison.

Here was Mr.Fenton, who had suffered the like in the matter of fines more than once.

Hardly one of the folk there but had paid a heavy price for his conscience; and all the worship that was permitted to them, and that by circumstance, and not by law, was such as they had engaged in that morning with shuttered windows and a sentinel for fear that, too, should be silenced.
They talked, then, guardedly of those things, since the servants were in and out continually, and though all professed the same faith as their masters, yet these were times that tried loyalty hard.

Mr.John, indeed, gave news, of his brother Sir Thomas, and said how he did; and read a letter, too, from Italy, from his younger brother Nicholas, who was fled abroad after a year's prison at Oxford; but the climax of the talk came when dinner was over, and the muscadel, with the mould-jellies, had been put upon the tables.

It was at this moment that Mr.John nodded to his son, who went to the door, to see the servants out, and stood by it to see that none listened.