After passing through a few
passages, they arrived at the cell, or rather study, usually occupied by
Dunstan when at court, and entered it, not without a slight feeling of
dread, or rather of reluctance.
"Here it is," said Edwy, and held up a parchment, folded, sealed, and
directed to "Ella, Thane of Aescendune."
"I should like to know what he has written," said the prince. "Redwald,
you understand these things; can you open the letter without breaking
the seal?"
"There is no need of that," replied the captain of the hus-carles, "I
can easily seal it again; see, there is the signet, and here the wax."
So he broke the letter open and extended it to the prince, whose liberal
education had given him the faculty of reading the monkish Latin, in
which Dunstan wrote, at a glance, and he read aloud:
"TO MY BROTHER IN CHRIST,
"ELLA, THANE OF AESCENDUNE--
"It grieveth me much, most beloved brother, to be under the necessity of
sending your son Elfric home in some little disgrace; but it is, alas a
necessity that I should do so, in virtue of the authority our good lord
and king, Edred, hath entrusted to me. The lad was bright, and, I think,
innocent of aught like deadly sin, when he came to this huge Babel,
where the devil seems to lead men even as he will, and he hath fallen
here into evil company--nay, into the very company most evil of all in
this wicked world, that of designing and shameless women, albeit of
noble birth.
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