But I gave them no time to find out, for, crossing the garden into which I had fallen, I quickly slipped out at the gate into a fair cloistered square where, adjusting my battle- stained gown, I marched boldly up to the house at the gate and knocked.
A porter came at my summons and demanded, surlily enough, what I wanted.
"I am a fresh man here," said I, "and have lost my way.

I pray you direct me to Saint Alban Hall." "Saint Alban Hall ?" said he.

"Art thou a scholar of Saint Alban Hall ?" "No," said I, "but I bear a message to one there, Master Penry by name." "How comes it," demanded the porter, who, by the tone of him, might have been the chancellor himself, "that you wear that gown, sirrah ?" "That is my business," said I, seeing it was no profit to talk civilly to him, "and if you want not to see your neck wrung, give over questions, and tell me where is Saint Alban Hall." He grew red in the face as I gripped his arm, which he could by no means get free till I let him.
"This is Saint Alban Hall," said he, "and Master Penry lives over my lodging." Then I thought it better to be civil to the fellow, as he guessed I had no business there in a college gown.

So I gave him a groat, and bad him take me up forthwith.
Master Penry was a lean, wrathful-visaged Welshman, with deep grey eyes, and a large forehead, and a mass of straight black hair down his neck.
As I entered his room, which was disordered and dirty, he was pacing to and fro, talking or praying aloud in his native tongue.

He let me stand there a minute or two, amazed at his jargon, and scarcely knowing whether I had lit upon a sane man or not.