Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 11.djvu/105

 1581.] THE JESUIT INVASION. 89 missed Campian, one of them followed, and overtook him and begged him to return. The students added their entreaties. If Campian would but remain at Ly- ford on Sunday, half Oxford, they said, would ride over to hear him preach. The temptation was strong. Knowing his weakness, Parsons had placed him under Emerson's authority : but Emerson wanted strength, and clamour and entreaty prevailed. He gave the re- quired permission, and himself went on upon his way ; while Campian ' turned again by the road that he came,' promising to follow in the ensuing week. The expected sermon became of course the talk of the Uni- versity. An agent of Leicester, named Eliot, was in Oxford at the time with a warrant in his pocket for Campian' s apprehension. He gave notice to a magis- trate, collected a posse of constables, and 011 Sunday morning early concealed them in the neighbourhood of the grange ; whilst he himself went boldly to the gate, and pretending to be a Catholic requested to be admitted to mass. The nuns and the Catholic visitors had for two days enjoyed to the full the presence of their idolized teacher. The Sunday only remained, and then he was to leave them indeed. The students had crowded over as they promised, and Eliot passed in as one of them. Mass was celebrated. They all communicated ; and then followed the last sermon which Campian was ever to preach. The subject was the tears of Jesus at the aspect of Jerusalem, Jerusalem that murdered the prophets and stoned them that were sent to her. England was that