KENILWORTH.

by Sir Walter Scott, Bart.




INTRODUCTION

A certain degree of success, real or supposed, in the delineation of
Queen Mary, naturally induced the author to attempt something similar
respecting "her sister and her foe," the celebrated Elizabeth. He
will not, however, pretend to have approached the task with the same
feelings; for the candid Robertson himself confesses having felt the
prejudices with which a Scottishman is tempted to regard the subject;
and what so liberal a historian avows, a poor romance-writer dares not
disown. But he hopes the influence of a prejudice, almost as natural to
him as his native air, will not be found to have greatly affected the
sketch he has attempted of England's Elizabeth. I have endeavoured
to describe her as at once a high-minded sovereign, and a female of
passionate feelings, hesitating betwixt the sense of her rank and
the duty she owed her subjects on the one hand, and on the other her
attachment to a nobleman, who, in external qualifications at least,
amply merited her favour. The interest of the story is thrown upon that
period when the sudden death of the first Countess of Leicester seemed
to open to the ambition of her husband the opportunity of sharing the
crown of his sovereign.

It is possible that slander, which very seldom favours the memories
of persons in exalted stations, may have blackened the character of
Leicester with darker shades than really belonged to it. But the almost
general voice of the times attached the most foul suspicions to the
death of the unfortunate Countess, more especially as it took place so
very opportunely for the indulgence of her lover's ambition. If we can
trust Ashmole's Antiquities of Berkshire, there was but too much ground
for the traditions which charge Leicester with the murder of his wife.
In the following extract of the passage, the reader will find the
authority I had for the story of the romance:--

"At the west end of the church are the ruins of a manor, anciently
belonging (as a cell, or place of removal, as some report) to the
monks of Abington. At the Dissolution, the said manor, or lordship, was
conveyed to one--Owen (I believe), the possessor of Godstow then.

"In the hall, over the chimney, I find Abington arms cut in
stone--namely, a patonee between four martletts; and also another
escutcheon--namely, a lion rampant, and several mitres cut in stone
about the house. There is also in the said house a chamber called
Dudley's chamber, where the Earl of Leicester's wife was murdered, of
which this is the story following:--

"Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, a very goodly personage, and
singularly well featured, being a great favourite to Queen Elizabeth,
it was thought, and commonly reported, that had he been a bachelor or
widower, the Queen would have made him her husband; to this end, to free
himself of all obstacles, he commands, or perhaps, with fair flattering
entreaties, desires his wife to repose herself here at his servant
Anthony Forster's house, who then lived in the aforesaid manor-house;
and also prescribes to Sir Richard Varney (a prompter to this design),
at his coming hither, that he should first attempt to poison her, and if
that did not take effect, then by any other way whatsoever to dispatch
her. This, it seems, was proved by the report of Dr. Walter Bayly,
sometime fellow of New College, then living in Oxford, and professor of
physic in that university; whom, because he would not consent to take
away her life by poison, the Earl endeavoured to displace him the court.
This man, it seems, reported for most certain that there was a practice
in Cumnor among the conspirators, to have poisoned this poor innocent
lady, a little before she was killed, which was attempted after this
manner:--They seeing the good lady sad and heavy (as one that well
knew, by her other handling, that her death was not far off), began to
persuade her that her present disease was abundance of melancholy and
other humours, etc., and therefore would needs counsel her to take some
potion, which she absolutely refusing to do, as still suspecting the
worst; whereupon they sent a messenger on a day (unawares to her) for
Dr. Bayly, and entreated him to persuade her to take some little potion
by his direction, and they would fetch the same at Oxford; meaning to
have added something of their own for her comfort, as the doctor
upon just cause and consideration did suspect, seeing their great
importunity, and the small need the lady had of physic, and therefore
he peremptorily denied their request; misdoubting (as he afterwards
reported) lest, if they had poisoned her under the name of his potion,
he might after have been hanged for a colour of their sin, and the
doctor remained still well assured that this way taking no effect, she
would not long escape their violence, which afterwards happened thus.
For Sir Richard Varney abovesaid (the chief projector in this design),
who, by the Earl's order, remained that day of her death alone with her,
with one man only and Forster, who had that day forcibly sent away all
her servants from her to Abington market, about three miles distant from
this place; they (I say, whether first stifling her, or else strangling
her) afterwards flung her down a pair of stairs and broke her neck,
using much violence upon her; but, however, though it was vulgarly
reported that she by chance fell downstairs (but still without hurting
her hood that was upon her head), yet the inhabitants will tell you
there that she was conveyed from her usual chamber where she lay, to
another where the bed's head of the chamber stood close to a privy
postern door, where they in the night came and stifled her in her bed,
bruised her head very much broke her neck, and at length flung her down
stairs, thereby believing the world would have thought it a mischance,
and so have blinded their villainy. But behold the mercy and justice
of God in revenging and discovering this lady's murder; for one of the
persons that was a coadjutor in this murder was afterwards taken for a
felony in the marches of Wales, and offering to publish the manner
of the aforesaid murder, was privately made away in the prison by the
Earl's appointment; and Sir Richard Varney the other, dying about the
same time in London, cried miserably, and blasphemed God, and said to
a person of note (who hath related the same to others since), not long
before his death, that all the devils in hell did tear him in pieces.
Forster, likewise, after this fact, being a man formerly addicted to
hospitality, company, mirth, and music, was afterwards observed to
forsake all this, and with much melancholy and pensiveness (some say
with madness) pined and drooped away. The wife also of Bald Butter,
kinsman to the Earl, gave out the whole fact a little before her death.
Neither are these following passages to be forgotten, that as soon as
ever she was murdered, they made great haste to bury her before the
coroner had given in his inquest (which the Earl himself condemned as
not done advisedly), which her father, or Sir John Robertsett (as I
suppose), hearing of, came with all speed hither, caused her corpse to
be taken up, the coroner to sit upon her, and further inquiry to be made
concerning this business to the full; but it was generally thought that
the Earl stopped his mouth, and made up the business betwixt them; and
the good Earl, to make plain to the world the great love he bare to her
while alive, and what a grief the loss of so virtuous a lady was to his
tender heart, caused (though the thing, by these and other means, was
beaten into the heads of the principal men of the University of Oxford)
her body to be reburied in St, Mary's Church in Oxford, with great
pomp and solemnity. It is remarkable, when Dr. Babington, the Earl's
chaplain, did preach the funeral sermon, he tript once or twice in
his speech, by recommending to their memories that virtuous lady so
pitifully murdered, instead of saying pitifully slain. This Earl, after
all his murders and poisonings, was himself poisoned by that which
was prepared for others (some say by his wife at Cornbury Lodge before
mentioned), though Baker in his Chronicle would have it at Killingworth;
anno 1588." [Ashmole's Antiquities of Berkshire, vol.i., p.149. The
tradition as to Leicester's death was thus communicated by Ben Jonson to
Drummond of Hawthornden:--"The Earl of Leicester gave a bottle of liquor
to his Lady, which he willed her to use in any faintness, which she,
after his returne from court, not knowing it was poison, gave him, and
so he died."--BEN JONSON'S INFORMATION TO DRUMMOND OF HAWTHORNDEN, MS.,
SIR ROBERT SIBBALD'S COPY.]

The same accusation has been adopted and circulated by the author of
Leicester's Commonwealth, a satire written directly against the Earl of
Leicester, which loaded him with the most horrid crimes, and, among
the rest, with the murder of his first wife. It was alluded to in the
Yorkshire Tragedy, a play erroneously ascribed to Shakespeare, where
a baker, who determines to destroy all his family, throws his wife
downstairs, with this allusion to the supposed murder of Leicester's
lady,--

     "The only way to charm a woman's tongue
     Is, break her neck--a politician did it."

The reader will find I have borrowed several incidents as well as names
from Ashmole, and the more early authorities; but my first acquaintance
with the history was through the more pleasing medium of verse. There
is a period in youth when the mere power of numbers has a more strong
effect on ear and imagination than in more advanced life. At this season
of immature taste, the author was greatly delighted with the poems of
Mickle and Langhorne, poets who, though by no means deficient in the
higher branches of their art, were eminent for their powers of verbal
melody above most who have practised this department of poetry. One of
those pieces of Mickle, which the author was particularly pleased with,
is a ballad, or rather a species of elegy, on the subject of Cumnor
Hall, which, with others by the same author, was to be found in Evans's
Ancient Ballads (vol. iv., page 130), to which work Mickle made liberal
contributions. The first stanza especially had a peculiar species of
enchantment for the youthful ear of the author, the force of which is
not even now entirely spent; some others are sufficiently prosaic.

     CUMNOR HALL.

     The dews of summer night did fall;
     The moon, sweet regent of the sky,
     Silver'd the walls of Cumnor Hall,
     And many an oak that grew thereby,

     Now nought was heard beneath the skies,
     The sounds of busy life were still,
     Save an unhappy lady's sighs,
     That issued from that lonely pile.

     "Leicester," she cried, "is this thy love
     That thou so oft hast sworn to me,
     To leave me in this lonely grove,
     Immured in shameful privity?

     "No more thou com'st with lover's speed,
     Thy once beloved bride to see;
     But be she alive, or be she dead,
     I fear, stern Earl, 's the same to thee.

     "Not so the usage I received
     When happy in my father's hall;
     No faithless husband then me grieved,
     No chilling fears did me appal.

     "I rose up with the cheerful morn,
     No lark more blithe, no flower more gay;
     And like the bird that haunts the thorn,
     So merrily sung the livelong day.

     "If that my beauty is but small,
     Among court ladies all despised,
     Why didst thou rend it from that hall,
     Where, scornful Earl, it well was prized?

     "And when you first to me made suit,
     How fair I was you oft would say!
     And proud of conquest, pluck'd the fruit,
     Then left the blossom to decay.

     "Yes!  now neglected and despised,
     The rose is pale, the lily's dead;
     But he that once their charms so prized,
     Is sure the cause those charms are fled.

     "For know, when sick'ning grief doth prey,
     And tender love's repaid with scorn,
     The sweetest beauty will decay,--
     What floweret can endure the storm?

     "At court, I'm told, is beauty's throne,
     Where every lady's passing rare,
     That Eastern flowers, that shame the sun,
     Are not so glowing, not so fair.

     "Then, Earl, why didst thou leave the beds
     Where roses and where lilies vie,
     To seek a primrose, whose pale shades
     Must sicken when those gauds are by?

     "'Mong rural beauties I was one,
     Among the fields wild flowers are fair;
     Some country swain might me have won,
     And thought my beauty passing rare.

     "But, Leicester (or I much am wrong),
     Or 'tis not beauty lures thy vows;
     Rather ambition's gilded crown
     Makes thee forget thy humble spouse.

     "Then, Leicester, why, again I plead
     (The injured surely may repine)--
     Why didst thou wed a country maid,
     When some fair princess might be thine?

     "Why didst thou praise my hum'ble charms,
     And, oh!  then leave them to decay?
     Why didst thou win me to thy arms,
     Then leave to mourn the livelong day?

     "The village maidens of the plain
     Salute me lowly as they go;
     Envious they mark my silken train,
     Nor think a Countess can have woe.

     "The simple nymphs!  they little know
     How far more happy's their estate;
     To smile for joy, than sigh for woe--
     To be content, than to be great.

     "How far less blest am I than them?
     Daily to pine and waste with care!
     Like the poor plant that, from its stem
     Divided, feels the chilling air.

     "Nor, cruel Earl!  can I enjoy
     The humble charms of solitude;
     Your minions proud my peace destroy,
     By sullen frowns or pratings rude.

     "Last night, as sad I chanced to stray,
     The village death-bell smote my ear;
     They wink'd aside, and seemed to say,
     'Countess, prepare, thy end is near!'

     "And now, while happy peasants sleep,
     Here I sit lonely and forlorn;
     No one to soothe me as I weep,
     Save Philomel on yonder thorn.

     "My spirits flag--my hopes decay--
     Still that dread death-bell smites my ear;
     And many a boding seems to say,
     'Countess, prepare, thy end is near!'"

     Thus sore and sad that lady grieved,
     In Cumnor Hall, so lone and drear;
     And many a heartfelt sigh she heaved,
     And let fall many a bitter tear.

     And ere the dawn of day appear'd,
     In Cumnor Hall, so lone and drear,
     Full many a piercing scream was heard,
     And many a cry of mortal fear.

     The death-bell thrice was heard to ring,
     An aerial voice was heard to call,
     And thrice the raven flapp'd its wing
     Around the towers of Cumnor Hall.

     The mastiff howl'd at village door,
     The oaks were shatter'd on the green;
     Woe was the hour--for never more
     That hapless Countess e'er was seen!

     And in that Manor now no more
     Is cheerful feast and sprightly ball;
     For ever since that dreary hour
     Have spirits haunted Cumnor Hall.

     The village maids, with fearful glance,
     Avoid the ancient moss-grown wall;
     Nor ever lead the merry dance,
     Among the groves of Cumnor Hall.

     Full many a traveller oft hath sigh'd,
     And pensive wept the Countess' fall,
     As wand'ring onward they've espied
     The haunted towers of Cumnor Hall.

ARBOTSFORD, 1st March 1831.




KENILWORTH



CHAPTER I.

     I am an innkeeper, and know my grounds,
     And study them; Brain o' man, I study them.
     I must have jovial guests to drive my ploughs,
     And whistling boys to bring my harvests home,
     Or I shall hear no flails thwack.             THE NEW INN.

It is the privilege of tale-tellers to open their story in an inn, the
free rendezvous of all travellers, and where the humour of each displays
itself without ceremony or restraint. This is specially suitable when
the scene is laid during the old days of merry England, when the
guests were in some sort not merely the inmates, but the messmates
and temporary companions of mine Host, who was usually a personage of
privileged freedom, comely presence, and good-humour. Patronized by him
the characters of the company were placed in ready contrast; and they
seldom failed, during the emptying of a six-hooped pot, to throw off
reserve, and present themselves to each other, and to their landlord,
with the freedom of old acquaintance.

The village of Cumnor, within three or four miles of Oxford, boasted,
during the eighteenth of Queen Elizabeth, an excellent inn of the old
stamp, conducted, or rather ruled, by Giles Gosling, a man of a goodly
person, and of somewhat round belly; fifty years of age and upwards,
moderate in his reckonings, prompt in his payments, having a cellar of
sound liquor, a ready wit, and a pretty daughter. Since the days of
old Harry Baillie of the Tabard in Southwark, no one had excelled Giles
Gosling in the power of pleasing his guests of every description; and so
great was his fame, that to have been in Cumnor without wetting a cup
at the bonny Black Bear, would have been to avouch one's-self utterly
indifferent to reputation as a traveller. A country fellow might as well
return from London without looking in the face of majesty. The men of
Cumnor were proud of their Host, and their Host was proud of his house,
his liquor, his daughter, and himself.

It was in the courtyard of the inn which called this honest fellow
landlord, that a traveller alighted in the close of the evening, gave
his horse, which seemed to have made a long journey, to the hostler,
and made some inquiry, which produced the following dialogue betwixt the
myrmidons of the bonny Black Bear.

"What, ho! John Tapster."

"At hand, Will Hostler," replied the man of the spigot, showing himself
in his costume of loose jacket, linen breeches, and green apron, half
within and half without a door, which appeared to descend to an outer
cellar.

"Here is a gentleman asks if you draw good ale," continued the hostler.

"Beshrew my heart else," answered the tapster, "since there are but four
miles betwixt us and Oxford. Marry, if my ale did not convince the
heads of the scholars, they would soon convince my pate with the pewter
flagon."

"Call you that Oxford logic?" said the stranger, who had now quitted the
rein of his horse, and was advancing towards the inn-door, when he was
encountered by the goodly form of Giles Gosling himself.

"Is it logic you talk of, Sir Guest?" said the host; "why, then, have at
you with a downright consequence--

     'The horse to the rack,
     And to fire with the sack.'"

"Amen! with all my heart, my good host," said the stranger; "let it be a
quart of your best Canaries, and give me your good help to drink it."

"Nay, you are but in your accidence yet, Sir Traveller, if you call on
your host for help for such a sipping matter as a quart of sack; Were it
a gallon, you might lack some neighbouring aid at my hand, and yet call
yourself a toper."

"Fear me not." said the guest, "I will do my devoir as becomes a man who
finds himself within five miles of Oxford; for I am not come from the
field of Mars to discredit myself amongst the followers of Minerva."

As he spoke thus, the landlord, with much semblance of hearty welcome,
ushered his guest into a large, low chamber, where several persons were
seated together in different parties--some drinking, some playing at
cards, some conversing, and some, whose business called them to be early
risers on the morrow, concluding their evening meal, and conferring with
the chamberlain about their night's quarters.

The entrance of a stranger procured him that general and careless sort
of attention which is usually paid on such occasions, from which the
following results were deduced:--The guest was one of those who, with
a well-made person, and features not in themselves unpleasing, are
nevertheless so far from handsome that, whether from the expression
of their features, or the tone of their voice, or from their gait and
manner, there arises, on the whole, a disinclination to their society.
The stranger's address was bold, without being frank, and seemed eagerly
and hastily to claim for him a degree of attention and deference which
he feared would be refused, if not instantly vindicated as his right.
His attire was a riding-cloak, which, when open, displayed a handsome
jerkin overlaid with lace, and belted with a buff girdle, which
sustained a broadsword and a pair of pistols.

"You ride well provided, sir," said the host, looking at the weapons as
he placed on the table the mulled sack which the traveller had ordered.

"Yes, mine host; I have found the use on't in dangerous times, and I do
not, like your modern grandees, turn off my followers the instant they
are useless."

"Ay, sir?" said Giles Gosling; "then you are from the Low Countries, the
land of pike and caliver?"

"I have been high and low, my friend, broad and wide, far and near. But
here is to thee in a cup of thy sack; fill thyself another to pledge me,
and, if it is less than superlative, e'en drink as you have brewed."

"Less than superlative?" said Giles Gosling, drinking off the cup, and
smacking his lips with an air of ineffable relish,--"I know nothing
of superlative, nor is there such a wine at the Three Cranes, in the
Vintry, to my knowledge; but if you find better sack than that in the
Sheres, or in the Canaries either, I would I may never touch either pot
or penny more. Why, hold it up betwixt you and the light, you shall see
the little motes dance in the golden liquor like dust in the sunbeam.
But I would rather draw wine for ten clowns than one traveller.--I trust
your honour likes the wine?"

"It is neat and comfortable, mine host; but to know good liquor, you
should drink where the vine grows. Trust me, your Spaniard is too wise
a man to send you the very soul of the grape. Why, this now, which you
account so choice, were counted but as a cup of bastard at the Groyne,
or at Port St. Mary's. You should travel, mine host, if you would be
deep in the mysteries of the butt and pottle-pot."

"In troth, Signior Guest," said Giles Gosling, "if I were to travel only
that I might be discontented with that which I can get at home, methinks
I should go but on a fool's errand. Besides, I warrant you, there is
many a fool can turn his nose up at good drink without ever having
been out of the smoke of Old England; and so ever gramercy mine own
fireside."

"This is but a mean mind of yours, mine host," said the stranger;
"I warrant me, all your town's folk do not think so basely. You have
gallants among you, I dare undertake, that have made the Virginia
voyage, or taken a turn in the Low Countries at least. Come, cudgel your
memory. Have you no friends in foreign parts that you would gladly have
tidings of?"

"Troth, sir, not I," answered the host, "since ranting Robin of
Drysandford was shot at the siege of the Brill. The devil take the
caliver that fired the ball, for a blither lad never filled a cup
at midnight! But he is dead and gone, and I know not a soldier, or a
traveller, who is a soldier's mate, that I would give a peeled codling
for."

"By the Mass, that is strange. What! so many of our brave English hearts
are abroad, and you, who seem to be a man of mark, have no friend, no
kinsman among them?"

"Nay, if you speak of kinsmen," answered Gosling, "I have one wild slip
of a kinsman, who left us in the last year of Queen Mary; but he is
better lost than found."

"Do not say so, friend, unless you have heard ill of him lately. Many a
wild colt has turned out a noble steed.--His name, I pray you?"

"Michael Lambourne," answered the landlord of the Black Bear; "a son of
my sister's--there is little pleasure in recollecting either the name or
the connection."

"Michael Lambourne!" said the stranger, as if endeavouring to recollect
himself--"what, no relation to Michael Lambourne, the gallant cavalier
who behaved so bravely at the siege of Venlo that Grave Maurice thanked
him at the head of the army? Men said he was an English cavalier, and of
no high extraction."

"It could scarcely be my nephew," said Giles Gosling, "for he had not
the courage of a hen-partridge for aught but mischief."

"Oh, many a man finds courage in the wars," replied the stranger.

"It may be," said the landlord; "but I would have thought our Mike more
likely to lose the little he had."

"The Michael Lambourne whom I knew," continued the traveller, "was a
likely fellow--went always gay and well attired, and had a hawk's eye
after a pretty wench."

"Our Michael," replied the host, "had the look of a dog with a bottle
at its tail, and wore a coat, every rag of which was bidding good-day to
the rest."

"Oh, men pick up good apparel in the wars," replied the guest.

"Our Mike," answered the landlord, "was more like to pick it up in a
frippery warehouse, while the broker was looking another way; and, for
the hawk's eye you talk of, his was always after my stray spoons. He was
tapster's boy here in this blessed house for a quarter of a year; and
between misreckonings, miscarriages, mistakes, and misdemeanours, had
he dwelt with me for three months longer, I might have pulled down sign,
shut up house, and given the devil the key to keep."

"You would be sorry, after all," continued the traveller, "were I to
tell you poor Mike Lambourne was shot at the head of his regiment at the
taking of a sconce near Maestricht?"

"Sorry!--it would be the blithest news I ever heard of him, since it
would ensure me he was not hanged. But let him pass--I doubt his
end will never do such credit to his friends. Were it so, I should
say"--(taking another cup of sack)--"Here's God rest him, with all my
heart."

"Tush, man," replied the traveller, "never fear but you will have credit
by your nephew yet, especially if he be the Michael Lambourne whom I
knew, and loved very nearly, or altogether, as well as myself. Can you
tell me no mark by which I could judge whether they be the same?"

"Faith, none that I can think of," answered Giles Gosling, "unless that
our Mike had the gallows branded on his left shoulder for stealing a
silver caudle-cup from Dame Snort of Hogsditch."

"Nay, there you lie like a knave, uncle," said the stranger, slipping
aside his ruff; and turning down the sleeve of his doublet from his neck
and shoulder; "by this good day, my shoulder is as unscarred as thine
own.

"What, Mike, boy--Mike!" exclaimed the host;--"and is it thou, in good
earnest? Nay, I have judged so for this half-hour; for I knew no other
person would have ta'en half the interest in thee. But, Mike, an thy
shoulder be unscathed as thou sayest, thou must own that Goodman Thong,
the hangman, was merciful in his office, and stamped thee with a cold
iron."

"Tush, uncle--truce with your jests. Keep them to season your sour ale,
and let us see what hearty welcome thou wilt give a kinsman who has
rolled the world around for eighteen years; who has seen the sun set
where it rises, and has travelled till the west has become the east."

"Thou hast brought back one traveller's gift with thee, Mike, as I well
see; and that was what thou least didst: need to travel for. I remember
well, among thine other qualities, there was no crediting a word which
came from thy mouth."

"Here's an unbelieving pagan for you, gentlemen!" said Michael
Lambourne, turning to those who witnessed this strange interview betwixt
uncle and nephew, some of whom, being natives of the village, were no
strangers to his juvenile wildness. "This may be called slaying a Cumnor
fatted calf for me with a vengeance.--But, uncle, I come not from
the husks and the swine-trough, and I care not for thy welcome or no
welcome; I carry that with me will make me welcome, wend where I will."

So saying, he pulled out a purse of gold indifferently well filled, the
sight of which produced a visible effect upon the company. Some shook
their heads and whispered to each other, while one or two of the less
scrupulous speedily began to recollect him as a school-companion,
a townsman, or so forth. On the other hand, two or three grave,
sedate-looking persons shook their heads, and left the inn, hinting
that, if Giles Gosling wished to continue to thrive, he should turn his
thriftless, godless nephew adrift again, as soon as he could. Gosling
demeaned himself as if he were much of the same opinion, for even the
sight of the gold made less impression on the honest gentleman than it
usually doth upon one of his calling.

"Kinsman Michael," he said, "put up thy purse. My sister's son shall be
called to no reckoning in my house for supper or lodging; and I reckon
thou wilt hardly wish to stay longer where thou art e'en but too well
known."

"For that matter, uncle," replied the traveller, "I shall consult my own
needs and conveniences. Meantime I wish to give the supper and sleeping
cup to those good townsmen who are not too proud to remember Mike
Lambourne, the tapster's boy. If you will let me have entertainment for
my money, so; if not, it is but a short two minutes' walk to the Hare
and Tabor, and I trust our neighbours will not grudge going thus far
with me."

"Nay, Mike," replied his uncle, "as eighteen years have gone over thy
head, and I trust thou art somewhat amended in thy conditions, thou
shalt not leave my house at this hour, and shalt e'en have whatever
in reason you list to call for. But I would I knew that that purse of
thine, which thou vapourest of, were as well come by as it seems well
filled."

"Here is an infidel for you, my good neighbours!" said Lambourne, again
appealing to the audience. "Here's a fellow will rip up his kinsman's
follies of a good score of years' standing. And for the gold, why, sirs,
I have been where it grew, and was to be had for the gathering. In
the New World have I been, man--in the Eldorado, where urchins play
at cherry-pit with diamonds, and country wenches thread rubies for
necklaces, instead of rowan-tree berries; where the pantiles are made of
pure gold, and the paving-stones of virgin silver."

"By my credit, friend Mike," said young Laurence Goldthred, the cutting
mercer of Abingdon, "that were a likely coast to trade to. And what may
lawns, cypruses, and ribands fetch, where gold is so plenty?"

"Oh, the profit were unutterable," replied Lambourne, "especially when
a handsome young merchant bears the pack himself; for the ladies of that
clime are bona-robas, and being themselves somewhat sunburnt, they catch
fire like tinder at a fresh complexion like thine, with a head of hair
inclining to be red."

"I would I might trade thither," said the mercer, chuckling.

"Why, and so thou mayest," said Michael--"that is, if thou art the same
brisk boy who was partner with me at robbing the Abbot's orchard. 'Tis
but a little touch of alchemy to decoct thy house and land into ready
money, and that ready money into a tall ship, with sails, anchors,
cordage, and all things conforming; then clap thy warehouse of goods
under hatches, put fifty good fellows on deck, with myself to command
them, and so hoist topsails, and hey for the New World!"

"Thou hast taught him a secret, kinsman," said Giles Gosling, "to
decoct, an that be the word, his pound into a penny and his webs into a
thread.--Take a fool's advice, neighbour Goldthred. Tempt not the sea,
for she is a devourer. Let cards and cockatrices do their worst, thy
father's bales may bide a banging for a year or two ere thou comest to
the Spital; but the sea hath a bottomless appetite,--she would swallow
the wealth of Lombard Street in a morning, as easily as I would a
poached egg and a cup of clary. And for my kinsman's Eldorado, never
trust me if I do not believe he has found it in the pouches of some such
gulls as thyself.--But take no snuff in the nose about it; fall to and
welcome, for here comes the supper, and I heartily bestow it on all
that will take share, in honour of my hopeful nephew's return, always
trusting that he has come home another man.--In faith, kinsman, thou art
as like my poor sister as ever was son to mother."

"Not quite so like old Benedict Lambourne, her husband, though," said
the mercer, nodding and winking. "Dost thou remember, Mike, what thou
saidst when the schoolmaster's ferule was over thee for striking up thy
father's crutches?--it is a wise child, saidst thou, that knows its own
father. Dr. Bircham laughed till he cried again, and his crying saved
yours."

"Well, he made it up to me many a day after," said Lambourne; "and how
is the worthy pedagogue?"

"Dead," said Giles Gosling, "this many a day since."

"That he is," said the clerk of the parish; "I sat by his bed the
whilst. He passed away in a blessed frame. 'MORIOR--MORTUUS SUM VEL
FUI--MORI'--these were his latest words; and he just added, 'my last
verb is conjugated."

"Well, peace be with him," said Mike, "he owes me nothing."

"No, truly," replied Goldthred; "and every lash which he laid on thee,
he always was wont to say, he spared the hangman a labour."

"One would have thought he left him little to do then," said the clerk;
"and yet Goodman Thong had no sinecure of it with our friend, after
all."

"VOTO A DIOS!" exclaimed Lambourne, his patience appearing to fail him,
as he snatched his broad, slouched hat from the table and placed it on
his head, so that the shadow gave the sinister expression of a Spanish
brave to eyes and features which naturally boded nothing pleasant.
"Hark'ee, my masters--all is fair among friends, and under the rose; and
I have already permitted my worthy uncle here, and all of you, to use
your pleasure with the frolics of my nonage. But I carry sword and
dagger, my good friends, and can use them lightly too upon occasion. I
have learned to be dangerous upon points of honour ever since I served
the Spaniard, and I would not have you provoke me to the degree of
falling foul."

"Why, what would you do?" said the clerk.

"Ay, sir, what would you do?" said the mercer, bustling up on the other
side of the table.

"Slit your throat, and spoil your Sunday's quavering, Sir Clerk,"
said Lambourne fiercely; "cudgel you, my worshipful dealer in flimsy
sarsenets, into one of your own bales."

"Come, come," said the host, interposing, "I will have no swaggering
here.--Nephew, it will become you best to show no haste to take offence;
and you, gentlemen, will do well to remember, that if you are in an inn,
still you are the inn-keeper's guests, and should spare the honour
of his family.--I protest your silly broils make me as oblivious as
yourself; for yonder sits my silent guest as I call him, who hath been
my two days' inmate, and hath never spoken a word, save to ask for his
food and his reckoning--gives no more trouble than a very peasant--pays
his shot like a prince royal--looks but at the sum total of the
reckoning, and does not know what day he shall go away. Oh, 'tis a jewel
of a guest! and yet, hang-dog that I am, I have suffered him to sit
by himself like a castaway in yonder obscure nook, without so much as
asking him to take bite or sup along with us. It were but the right
guerdon of my incivility were he to set off to the Hare and Tabor before
the night grows older."

With his white napkin gracefully arranged over his left arm, his velvet
cap laid aside for the moment, and his best silver flagon in his right
hand, mine host walked up to the solitary guest whom he mentioned, and
thereby turned upon him the eyes of the assembled company.

He was a man aged betwixt twenty-five and thirty, rather above the
middle size, dressed with plainness and decency, yet bearing an air of
ease which almost amounted to dignity, and which seemed to infer that
his habit was rather beneath his rank. His countenance was reserved and
thoughtful, with dark hair and dark eyes; the last, upon any momentary
excitement, sparkled with uncommon lustre, but on other occasions
had the same meditative and tranquil cast which was exhibited by his
features. The busy curiosity of the little village had been employed to
discover his name and quality, as well as his business at Cumnor;
but nothing had transpired on either subject which could lead to its
gratification. Giles Gosling, head-borough of the place, and a steady
friend to Queen Elizabeth and the Protestant religion, was at one time
inclined to suspect his guest of being a Jesuit, or seminary priest, of
whom Rome and Spain sent at this time so many to grace the gallows
in England. But it was scarce possible to retain such a prepossession
against a guest who gave so little trouble, paid his reckoning so
regularly, and who proposed, as it seemed, to make a considerable stay
at the bonny Black Bear.

"Papists," argued Giles Gosling, "are a pinching, close-fisted race,
and this man would have found a lodging with the wealthy squire at
Bessellsey, or with the old Knight at Wootton, or in some other of their
Roman dens, instead of living in a house of public entertainment, as
every honest man and good Christian should. Besides, on Friday he stuck
by the salt beef and carrot, though there were as good spitch-cocked
eels on the board as ever were ta'en out of the Isis."

Honest Giles, therefore, satisfied himself that his guest was no Roman,
and with all comely courtesy besought the stranger to pledge him in
a draught of the cool tankard, and honour with his attention a small
collation which he was giving to his nephew, in honour of his return,
and, as he verily hoped, of his reformation. The stranger at first shook
his head, as if declining the courtesy; but mine host proceeded to
urge him with arguments founded on the credit of his house, and the
construction which the good people of Cumnor might put upon such an
unsocial humour.

"By my faith, sir," he said, "it touches my reputation that men should
be merry in my house; and we have ill tongues amongst us at Cumnor (as
where be there not?), who put an evil mark on men who pull their hat
over their brows, as if they were looking back to the days that are
gone, instead of enjoying the blithe sunshiny weather which God has sent
us in the sweet looks of our sovereign mistress, Queen Elizabeth, whom
Heaven long bless and preserve!"

"Why, mine host," answered the stranger, "there is no treason, sure, in
a man's enjoying his own thoughts, under the shadow of his own bonnet?
You have lived in the world twice as long as I have, and you must know
there are thoughts that will haunt us in spite of ourselves, and to
which it is in vain to say, Begone, and let me be merry."

"By my sooth," answered Giles Gosling, "if such troublesome thoughts
haunt your mind, and will not get them gone for plain English, we will
have one of Father Bacon's pupils from Oxford, to conjure them away with
logic and with Hebrew--or, what say you to laying them in a glorious red
sea of claret, my noble guest? Come, sir, excuse my freedom. I am an old
host, and must have my talk. This peevish humour of melancholy sits ill
upon you; it suits not with a sleek boot, a hat of trim block, a fresh
cloak, and a full purse. A pize on it! send it off to those who have
their legs swathed with a hay-wisp, their heads thatched with a felt
bonnet, their jerkin as thin as a cobweb, and their pouch without ever
a cross to keep the fiend Melancholy from dancing in it. Cheer up,
sir! or, by this good liquor, we shall banish thee from the joys
of blithesome company, into the mists of melancholy and the land of
little-ease. Here be a set of good fellows willing to be merry; do not
scowl on them like the devil looking over Lincoln."

"You say well, my worthy host," said the guest, with a melancholy smile,
which, melancholy as it was, gave a very pleasant: expression to his
countenance--"you say well, my jovial friend; and they that are moody
like myself should not disturb the mirth of those who are happy. I will
drink a round with your guests with all my heart, rather than be termed
a mar-feast."

So saying, he arose and joined the company, who, encouraged by the
precept and example of Michael Lambourne, and consisting chiefly of
persons much disposed to profit by the opportunity of a merry meal at
the expense of their landlord, had already made some inroads upon the
limits of temperance, as was evident from the tone in which Michael
inquired after his old acquaintances in the town, and the bursts of
laughter with which each answer was received. Giles Gosling himself
was somewhat scandalized at the obstreperous nature of their mirth,
especially as he involuntarily felt some respect for his unknown guest.
He paused, therefore, at some distance from the table occupied by these
noisy revellers, and began to make a sort of apology for their license.

"You would think," he said, "to hear these fellows talk, that there was
not one of them who had not been bred to live by Stand and Deliver; and
yet tomorrow you will find them a set of as painstaking mechanics, and
so forth, as ever cut an inch short of measure, or paid a letter of
change in light crowns over a counter. The mercer there wears his hat
awry, over a shaggy head of hair, that looks like a curly water-dog's
back, goes unbraced, wears his cloak on one side, and affects a
ruffianly vapouring humour: when in his shop at Abingdon, he is, from
his flat cap to his glistening shoes, as precise in his apparel as if he
was named for mayor. He talks of breaking parks, and taking the highway,
in such fashion that you would think he haunted every night betwixt
Hounslow and London; when in fact he may be found sound asleep on his
feather-bed, with a candle placed beside him on one side, and a Bible on
the other, to fright away the goblins."

"And your nephew, mine host, this same Michael Lambourne, who is lord of
the feast--is he, too, such a would-be ruffler as the rest of them?"

"Why, there you push me hard," said the host; "my nephew is my nephew,
and though he was a desperate Dick of yore, yet Mike may have mended
like other folks, you wot. And I would not have you think all I said
of him, even now, was strict gospel; I knew the wag all the while, and
wished to pluck his plumes from him. And now, sir, by what name shall I
present my worshipful guest to these gallants?"

"Marry, mine host," replied the stranger, "you may call me Tressilian."

"Tressilian?" answered mine host of the Bear. "A worthy name, and, as I
think, of Cornish lineage; for what says the south proverb--

     'By Pol, Tre, and Pen,
     You may know the Cornish men.'

Shall I say the worthy Master Tressilian of Cornwall?"

"Say no more than I have given you warrant for, mine host, and so shall
you be sure you speak no more than is true. A man may have one of those
honourable prefixes to his name, yet be born far from Saint Michael's
Mount."

Mine host pushed his curiosity no further, but presented Master
Tressilian to his nephew's company, who, after exchange of salutations,
and drinking to the health of their new companion, pursued the
conversation in which he found them engaged, seasoning it with many an
intervening pledge.



CHAPTER II.

     Talk you of young Master Lancelot? --MERCHANT OF VENICE.

After some brief interval, Master Goldthred, at the earnest instigation
of mine host, and the joyous concurrence of his guest, indulged the
company with, the following morsel of melody:--

     "Of all the birds on bush or tree,
     Commend me to the owl,
     Since he may best ensample be
     To those the cup that trowl.
     For when the sun hath left the west,
     He chooses the tree that he loves the best,
     And he whoops out his song, and he laughs at his jest;
     Then, though hours be late and weather foul,
     We'll drink to the health of the bonny, bonny owl.

     "The lark is but a bumpkin fowl,
     He sleeps in his nest till morn;
     But my blessing upon the jolly owl,
     That all night blows his horn.
     Then up with your cup till you stagger in speech,
     And match me this catch till you swagger and screech,
     And drink till you wink, my merry men each;
     For, though hours be late and weather be foul,
     We'll drink to the health of the bonny, bonny owl."

"There is savour in this, my hearts," said Michael, when the mercer had
finished his song, "and some goodness seems left among you yet; but what
a bead-roll you have read me of old comrades, and to every man's name
tacked some ill-omened motto! And so Swashing Will of Wallingford hath
bid us good-night?"

"He died the death of a fat buck," said one of the party, "being shot
with a crossbow bolt, by old Thatcham, the Duke's stout park-keeper at
Donnington Castle."

"Ay, ay, he always loved venison well," replied Michael, "and a cup
of claret to boot--and so here's one to his memory. Do me right, my
masters."

When the memory of this departed worthy had been duly honoured,
Lambourne proceeded to inquire after Prance of Padworth.

"Pranced off--made immortal ten years since," said the mercer; "marry,
sir, Oxford Castle and Goodman Thong, and a tenpenny-worth of cord, best
know how."

"What, so they hung poor Prance high and dry? so much for loving to walk
by moonlight. A cup to his memory, my masters-all merry fellows like
moonlight. What has become of Hal with the Plume--he who lived near
Yattenden, and wore the long feather?--I forget his name."

"What, Hal Hempseed?" replied the mercer. "Why, you may remember he was
a sort of a gentleman, and would meddle in state matters, and so he
got into the mire about the Duke of Norfolk's affair these two or three
years since, fled the country with a pursuivant's warrant at his heels,
and has never since been heard of."

"Nay, after these baulks," said Michael Lambourne, "I need hardly
inquire after Tony Foster; for when ropes, and crossbow shafts, and
pursuivant's warrants, and such-like gear, were so rife, Tony could
hardly 'scape them."

"Which Tony Foster mean you?" said the innkeeper.

"Why, him they called Tony Fire-the-Fagot, because he brought a light
to kindle the pile round Latimer and Ridley, when the wind blew out Jack
Thong's torch, and no man else would give him light for love or money."

"Tony Foster lives and thrives," said the host. "But, kinsman, I would
not have you call him Tony Fire-the-Fagot, if you would not brook the
stab."

"How! is he grown ashamed on't?" said Lambourne, "Why, he was wont to
boast of it, and say he liked as well to see a roasted heretic as a
roasted ox."

"Ay, but, kinsman, that was in Mary's time," replied the landlord, "when
Tony's father was reeve here to the Abbot of Abingdon. But since that,
Tony married a pure precisian, and is as good a Protestant, I warrant
you, as the best."

"And looks grave, and holds his head high, and scorns his old
companions," said the mercer.

"Then he hath prospered, I warrant him," said Lambourne; "for ever when
a man hath got nobles of his own, he keeps out of the way of those whose
exchequers lie in other men's purchase."

"Prospered, quotha!" said the mercer; "why, you remember Cumnor Place,
the old mansion-house beside the churchyard?"

"By the same token, I robbed the orchard three times--what of that?
It was the old abbot's residence when there was plague or sickness at
Abingdon."

"Ay," said the host, "but that has been long over; and Anthony Foster
hath a right in it, and lives there by some grant from a great courtier,
who had the church-lands from the crown. And there he dwells, and has
as little to do with any poor wight in Cumnor, as if he were himself a
belted knight."

"Nay," said the mercer, "it is not altogether pride in Tony neither;
there is a fair lady in the case, and Tony will scarce let the light of
day look on her."

"How!" said Tressilian, who now for the first time interfered in
their conversation; "did ye not say this Foster was married, and to a
precisian?"

"Married he was, and to as bitter a precisian as ever ate flesh in Lent;
and a cat-and-dog life she led with Tony, as men said. But she is dead,
rest be with her! and Tony hath but a slip of a daughter; so it is
thought he means to wed this stranger, that men keep such a coil about."

"And why so?--I mean, why do they keep a coil about her?" said
Tressilian.

"Why, I wot not," answered the host, "except that men say she is as
beautiful as an angel, and no one knows whence she comes, and every one
wishes to know why she is kept so closely mewed up. For my part, I never
saw her--you have, I think, Master Goldthred?"

"That I have, old boy," said the mercer. "Look you, I was riding hither
from Abingdon. I passed under the east oriel window of the old mansion,
where all the old saints and histories and such-like are painted. It was
not the common path I took, but one through the Park; for the postern
door was upon the latch, and I thought I might take the privilege of an
old comrade to ride across through the trees, both for shading, as the
day was somewhat hot, and for avoiding of dust, because I had on my
peach-coloured doublet, pinked out with cloth of gold."

"Which garment," said Michael Lambourne, "thou wouldst willingly make
twinkle in the eyes of a fair dame. Ah! villain, thou wilt never leave
thy old tricks."

"Not so-not so," said the mercer, with a smirking laugh--"not altogether
so--but curiosity, thou knowest, and a strain of compassion withal; for
the poor young lady sees nothing from morn to even but Tony Foster, with
his scowling black brows, his bull's head, and his bandy legs."

"And thou wouldst willingly show her a dapper body, in a silken
jerkin--a limb like a short-legged hen's, in a cordovan boot--and a
round, simpering, what-d'ye-lack sort of a countenance, set off with a
velvet bonnet, a Turkey feather, and a gilded brooch? Ah! jolly mercer,
they who have good wares are fond to show them!--Come, gentles, let
not the cup stand--here's to long spurs, short boots, full bonnets, and
empty skulls!"

"Nay, now, you are jealous of me, Mike," said Goldthred; "and yet my
luck was but what might have happened to thee, or any man."

"Marry confound thine impudence," retorted Lambourne; "thou wouldst not
compare thy pudding face, and sarsenet manners, to a gentleman, and a
soldier?"

"Nay, my good sir," said Tressilian, "let me beseech you will not
interrupt the gallant citizen; methinks he tells his tale so well, I
could hearken to him till midnight."

"It's more of your favour than of my desert," answered Master Goldthred;
"but since I give you pleasure, worthy Master Tressilian, I shall
proceed, maugre all the gibes and quips of this valiant soldier, who,
peradventure, hath had more cuffs than crowns in the Low Countries. And
so, sir, as I passed under the great painted window, leaving my rein
loose on my ambling palfrey's neck, partly for mine ease, and partly
that I might have the more leisure to peer about, I hears me the lattice
open; and never credit me, sir, if there did not stand there the person
of as fair a woman as ever crossed mine eyes; and I think I have looked
on as many pretty wenches, and with as much judgment, as other folks."

"May I ask her appearance, sir?" said Tressilian.

"Oh, sir," replied Master Goldthred, "I promise you, she was in
gentlewoman's attire--a very quaint and pleasing dress, that might have
served the Queen herself; for she had a forepart with body and sleeves,
of ginger-coloured satin, which, in my judgment, must have cost by the
yard some thirty shillings, lined with murrey taffeta, and laid down and
guarded with two broad laces of gold and silver. And her hat, sir, was
truly the best fashioned thing that I have seen in these parts, being of
tawny taffeta, embroidered with scorpions of Venice gold, and having a
border garnished with gold fringe--I promise you, sir, an absolute
and all-surpassing device. Touching her skirts, they were in the old
pass-devant fashion."

"I did not ask you of her attire, sir," said Tressilian, who had shown
some impatience during this conversation, "but of her complexion--the
colour of her hair, her features."

"Touching her complexion," answered the mercer, "I am not so special
certain, but I marked that her fan had an ivory handle, curiously
inlaid. And then again, as to the colour of her hair, why, I can
warrant, be its hue what it might, that she wore above it a net of green
silk, parcel twisted with gold."

"A most mercer-like memory!" said Lambourne. "The gentleman asks him of
the lady's beauty, and he talks of her fine clothes!"

"I tell thee," said the mercer, somewhat disconcerted, "I had little
time to look at her; for just as I was about to give her the good time
of day, and for that purpose had puckered my features with a smile--"

"Like those of a jackanape simpering at a chestnut," said Michael
Lambourne.

"Up started of a sudden," continued Goldthred, without heeding the
interruption, "Tony Foster himself, with a cudgel in his hand--"

"And broke thy head across, I hope, for thine impertinence," said his
entertainer.

"That were more easily said than done," answered Goldthred indignantly;
"no, no--there was no breaking of heads. It's true, he advanced his
cudgel, and spoke of laying on, and asked why I did not keep the
public road, and such like; and I would have knocked him over the pate
handsomely for his pains, only for the lady's presence, who might have
swooned, for what I know."

"Now, out upon thee for a faint-spirited slave!" said Lambourne; "what
adventurous knight ever thought of the lady's terror, when he went
to thwack giant, dragon, or magician, in her presence, and for her
deliverance? But why talk to thee of dragons, who would be driven back
by a dragon-fly. There thou hast missed the rarest opportunity!"