Sir Robert Melville with courtesy, and even, as it seem. ed, with kindness. There was then a dead pause, during which Lindesay looked towards the door, as if expecting with impatience the colleague of their embassy. The Queen alone was entirely unembarrassed, and, as if to break the silence, she addressed Lord Lindesay, with a glance at the large and cumbrous sword which he wore, as already mentioned, hanging from his neck. "You have there a trusty and a weighty travelling companion, my Lord. I trust you expected to meet with no eneiny here, against whom such a formidable weapon could be necessary? It is, methinks, somewhat a singular ornament for a court, though I am, as I well need to be, too much of a Stuart to fear a sword." "It is not the first time, madam," replied Lindesay, bringing round the weapon so as to rest its point on the ground, and leaning one hand on the huge cross-handle, "it is not the first time that this weapon has intruded. itself into the presence of the House of Stuart." "Possibly, my Lord," replied the Queen," it may have done service to my ancestors. Your ancestors were men of loyalty." "Ay, madam," replied he, "service it hath done; but such as kings love neither to acknowledge nor to reward. It was the service which the knife renders to the tree when trimming it to the quick, and depriving it of the superfluous growth of rank and unfruitful suckers, which rob it of nourishment." "You talk riddles, my Lord," said Mary; " I will hope the explanation carries nothing insulting with it." "You shall judge, madam," answered Lindesay. "With this good sword was Archibald Douglas, Earl of Angus, girded on the memorable day when he acquired the name of Bell-the-Cat, for dragging from the presence of your great-grandfather, the third James of the race, a crew of minions, flatterers, and favourites, whom he hanged over the bridge of Lauder, as a warning to such reptiles how they approach a Scottish throne. With this same weapon, the same inflexible champion of Scottish honour and nobility slew at one blow Spens of Kilspindie, a courtier of your grandfather James the Fourth, who had dared to speak lightly of him in the royal presence. They fought near the brook of Fala; and Bell-the-Cat, with this blade, sheared through the thigh of his opponent, and lopped the limb as easily as a shepherd's boy slices a twig from a sapling." "My Lord," replied the Queen, reddening, "my nerves are too good to be alarmed even by this terrible history-May I ask how a blade so illustrious passed from the House of Douglas to that of Lindesay ?Methinks it should have been preserved as a consecrated relic, by a family who have held all that they could do against their king to be done in favour of their country." "Nay, madam," said Melville, anxiously interfering, "ask not that question of Lord Lindesay-And you, my Lord, for shame-for decency-forbear to reply to it." "It is time that this lady should hear the truth," replied Lindesay. "And be assured," said the Queen, "that she will be moved to anger by none that you can tell her, my Lord. There are cases in which just scorn has always the mastery over just anger." "Then know," said Lindesay, "that upon the field of Carberry-Hill, when that false and infamous traitor and murderer, James, sometime Earl of Bothwell, and nick-named Duke of Orkney, offered to do personal battle with any of the associated nobles who came to drag bim to justice, I accepted his challenge, and was by the noble Earl of Morton gifted with his good sword, that I might therewith fight it out-Ah! so help me Heaven, had his presumption been one grain more, or his cowardice one grain less, I should have done such work with this good steel on his traitorous corpse, that the hounds and carrion-crows should have found their morsels daintily carved to their use !" The Queen's courage well nigh gave way at the mention of Bothwell's name-a name connected with such a train of guilt, shame, and disaster. But the prolonged 2* VOL. II. . boast of Lindesay gave her time to rally herself, and to answer with an appearance of cold contempt-" It is easy to slay an enemy who enters not the lists. But had Mary Stuart inherited her father's sword as well as his sceptre, the boldest of her rebels should not upon that day have complained that they had no one to cope withal. Your Lordship will forgive me if I abridge this conference. A brief description of a bloody fight is long enough to satisfy a lady's curiosity; and unless my Lord of Lindesay has something more important to tell us than of the deeds which old Bell-the-Cat achieved, and how he would himself have emulated them, had time and tide permitted, we will retire to our private apartment, and you, Fleming, shall finish reading to us yonder little treatise Des Rodomontades Espagnolles." 66 "Tarry, madam," said Lindesay, his complexion reddening in his turn; I know your quick wit too well of old to have sought an interview that you might sharpen its edge at the expense of my honour. Lord Ruthven and myself, with Sir Robert Melville, as a concurrent, come to your Grace on the part of the Secret Council, to tender to you what much concerns the safety of your own life and the welfare of the State." "The Secret Council ?" said the Queen; "by what powers can it subsist or act, while I, from whom it holds its character, am here detained under unjust restraint? But it matters not-what concerns the welfare of Scotland shall be acceptable to Mary Stuart, come from whatever quarter it will-and for what concerns her own life, she has lived long enough to be weary of it, even at the age of twenty-five. Where is your colleague, my Lord-why tarries he ?" "He comes, madam," said Melville, and Lord Ruthven entered at the instant, holding in his hand a packet. As the Queen returned his salutation she became deadly pale, but instantly recovered herself by dint of strong and sudden resolution, just as the noble, whose appearance seemed to excite such emotions in her bosom, entered the apartment in company with George Douglas, the youngest son of the Knight of Lochleven, who, during the absence of his father and brethren, acted as seneschal of the castle, under the direction of the elder Lady Lochleven, his father's mother. CHAPTER II. I give this heavy weight from off any head, LORD Ruthven had the look and bearing which became a soldier and a statesman, and the martial cast of his form and features procured him the popular epithet of Greysteil, by which he was distinguished by his intimates, after the hero of a metrical romance then generally known. His dress, which was a buff-coat embroidered, had a half-military character, but exhibited nothing of the sordid negligence which distinguished that of Lindesay But the son of an ill-fated sire, and the father of a yet more unfortunate family, bore in his look that cast of inauspicious melancholy, by which the physiognomists of that time pretended to distinguish those who were predestined to a violent and unhappy death. The terror which the presence of this nobleman impressed on the Queen's mind, arose from the active share he had borne in the slaughter of David Rizzio; his father having presided at the perpetration of that abominable crime, although so weak from long and wasting illness, that he could not endure the weight of his armour, having arisen from a sick-bed to commit a murder in the presence of his Sovereign. On that occasion his son also had attended, and taken an active part. It was little to be wondered at that the Queen, considering her condition when such a deed of horror was acted in her presence, should retain an instinctive terror for the principal actors in the murder. She returned, however, with grace the salutation of Lord Ruthven, and extended her hand to George Douglas, who kneeled and kissed it with respect; the first mark of a subject's homage which Roland Græme had seen any of them render to the captive Sovereign. She returned his greeting in silence, and there was a brief pause, during which the steward of the castle, a man of a sad brow and a severe eye, placed, under George Douglas's directions, a table and writing materials; and the page, obedient to his mistress's dumb signal, advanced a large chair to the side on which the Queen stood, the table thus forming a sort of bar which divided the Queen and her personal followers from her unwelcome visiters. The steward then withdrew after a low reverence. When he had closed the door behind him, the Queen broke silence-" With your favour, my lords, I will sit-my walks are not indeed extensive enough at present to fatigue me greatly, yet I find repose something more necessary than usual." She sat down accordingly, and shading her cheek with her beautiful hand, looked keenly and impressively at each of the nobles in turn. Mary Fleming applied her kerchief to her eyes, and Catherine Seyton and Roland Græme exchanged a glance, which showed that both were too deeply engrossed with sentiments of interest and commiseration for their royal mistress, to think of anything which regarded themselves. "I wait the purpose of your mission, my lords," said the Queen, after she had been seated for about a minute without a word being spoken,-"I wait your message from those you call the Secret Council.-I trust it is a petition of pardon, and a desire that I will resume my rightful throne, without using with due severity my right of pun ishing those who have dispossessed me of it?" |