But, when left to his own reflections, Nigel could not help feeling
solitude nearly as irksome as the company of Sir Mungo Malagrowther.
The total wreck of his fortune,--which seemed now to be rendered
unavoidable by the loss of the royal warrant, that had afforded him
the means of redeeming his paternal estate,--was an unexpected and
additional blow. When he had seen the warrant he could not precisely
remember; but was inclined to think, it was in the casket when he took
out money to pay the miser for his lodgings at Whitefriars. Since
then, the casket had been almost constantly under his own eye, except
during the short time he was separated from his baggage by the arrest
in Greenwich Park. It might, indeed, have been taken out at that time,
for he had no reason to think either his person or his property was in
the hands of those who wished him well; but, on the other hand, the
locks of the strong-box had sustained no violence that he could
observe, and, being of a particular and complicated construction, he
thought they could scarce be opened without an instrument made on
purpose, adapted to their peculiarities, and for this there had been
no time. But, speculate as he would on the matter, it was clear that
this important document was gone, and probable that it had passed into
no friendly hands. "Let it be so," said Nigel to himself; "I am
scarcely worse off respecting my prospects of fortune, than when I
first reached this accursed city. But to be hampered with cruel
accusations, and stained with foul suspicions-to be the object of pity
of the most degrading kind to yonder honest citizen, and of the
malignity of that envious and atrabilarious courtier, who can endure
the good fortune and good qualities of another no more than the mole
can brook sunshine--this is indeed a deplorable reflection; and the
consequences must stick to my future life, and impede whatever my
head, or my hand, if it is left me, might be able to execute in my
favour."

The feeling, that he is the object of general dislike and dereliction,
seems to be one of the most unendurably painful to which a human being
can be subjected. The most atrocious criminals, whose nerves have not
shrunk from perpetrating the most horrid cruelty, endure more from the
consciousness that no man will sympathise with their sufferings, than
from apprehension of the personal agony of their impending punishment;
and are known often to attempt to palliate their enormities, and
sometimes altogether to deny what is established by the clearest
proof, rather than to leave life under the general ban of humanity. It
was no wonder that Nigel, labouring under the sense of general, though
unjust suspicion, should, while pondering on so painful a theme,
recollect that one, at least, had not only believed him innocent, but
hazarded herself, with all her feeble power, to interpose in his
behalf.

"Poor girl!" he repeated; "poor, rash, but generous maiden! your fate
is that of her in Scottish story, who thrust her arm into the staple
of the door, to oppose it as a bar against the assassins who
threatened the murder of her sovereign. The deed of devotion was
useless; save to give an immortal name to her by whom it was done, and
whose blood flows, it is said, in the veins of my house."

I cannot explain to the reader, whether the recollection of this
historical deed of devotion, and the lively effect which the
comparison, a little overstrained perhaps, was likely to produce in
favour of Margaret Ramsay, was not qualified by the concomitant ideas
of ancestry and ancient descent with which that recollection was
mingled. But the contending feelings suggested a new train of ideas.--
"Ancestry," he thought, "and ancient descent, what are they to me?--My
patrimony alienated--my title become a reproach--for what can be so
absurd as titled beggary?--my character subjected to suspicion,--I
will not remain in this country; and should I, at leaving it, procure
the society of one so lovely, so brave, and so faithful, who should
say that I derogated from the rank which I am virtually renouncing?"

There was something romantic and pleasing, as he pursued this picture
of an attached and faithful pair, becoming all the world to each
other, and stemming the tide of fate arm in arm; and to be linked thus
with a creature so beautiful, and who had taken such devoted and
disinterested concern in his fortunes, formed itself into such a
vision as romantic youth loves best to dwell upon.

Suddenly his dream was painfully dispelled, by the recollection, that
its very basis rested upon the most selfish ingratitude on his own
part. Lord of his castle and his towers, his forests and fields, his
fair patrimony and noble name, his mind would have rejected, as a sort
of impossibility, the idea of elevating to his rank the daughter of a
mechanic; but, when degraded from his nobility, and plunged into
poverty and difficulties, he was ashamed to feel himself not
unwilling, that this poor girl, in the blindness of her affection,
should abandon all the better prospects of her own settled condition,
to embrace the precarious and doubtful course which he himself was
condemned to. The generosity of Nigel's mind recoiled from the
selfishness of the plan of happiness which he projected; and he made a
strong effort to expel from his thoughts for the rest of the evening
this fascinating female, or, at least, not to permit them to dwell
upon the perilous circumstance, that she was at present the only
creature living who seemed to consider him as an object of kindness.

He could not, however, succeed in banishing her from his slumbers,
when, after having spent a weary day, he betook himself to a perturbed
couch. The form of Margaret mingled with the wild mass of dreams which
his late adventures had suggested; and even when, copying the lively
narrative of Sir Mungo, fancy presented to him the blood bubbling and
hissing on the heated iron, Margaret stood behind him like a spirit of
light, to breathe healing on the wound. At length nature was exhausted
by these fantastic creations, and Nigel slept, and slept soundly,
until awakened in the morning by the sound of a well-known voice,
which had often broken his slumbers about the same hour.




CHAPTER XXXI


  Many, come up, sir, with your gentle blood!
  Here's a red stream beneath this coarse blue doublet,
  That warms the heart as kindly as if drawn
  From the far source of old Assyrian kings.
  Who first made mankind subject to their sway.
                           _Old Play_.

The sounds to which we alluded in our last, were no other than the
grumbling tones of Richie Moniplies's voice.

This worthy, like some other persons who rank high in their own
opinion, was very apt, when he could have no other auditor, to hold
conversation with one who was sure to be a willing listener--I mean
with himself. He was now brushing and arranging Lord Glenvarloch's
clothes, with as much composure and quiet assiduity as if he had never
been out of his service, and grumbling betwixt whiles to the following
purpose:--"Hump--ay, time cloak and jerkin were through my hands--I
question if horsehair has been passed over them since they and I last
parted. The embroidery finely frayed too--and the gold buttons of the
cloak--By my conscience, and as I am an honest man, there is a round
dozen of them gane! This comes of Alsatian frolics--God keep us with
his grace, and not give us over to our own devices!--I see no sword--
but that will be in respect of present circumstances."

Nigel for some time could not help believing that he was still in a
dream, so improbable did it seem that his domestic, whom he supposed
to be in Scotland, should have found him out, and obtained access to
him, in his present circumstances. Looking through the curtains,
however, he became well assured of the fact, when he beheld the stiff
and bony length of Richie, with a visage charged with nearly double
its ordinary degree of importance, employed sedulously in brushing his
master's cloak, and refreshing himself with whistling or humming, from
interval to interval, some snatch of an old melancholy Scottish
ballad-tune. Although sufficiently convinced of the identity of the
party, Lord Glenvarloch could not help expressing his surprise in the
superfluous question--"In the name of Heaven, Richie, is this you?"

"And wha else suld it be, my lord?" answered Richie; "I dreamna that
your lordship's levee in this place is like to be attended by ony that
are not bounded thereto by duty."

"I am rather surprised," answered Nigel, "that it should be attended
by any one at all--especially by you, Richie; for you know that we
parted, and I thought you had reached Scotland long since."

"I crave your lordship's pardon, but we have not parted yet, nor are
soon likely so to do; for there gang twa folk's votes to the unmaking
of a bargain, as to the making of ane. Though it was your lordship's
pleasure so to conduct yourself that we were like to have parted, yet
it was not, on reflection, my will to be gone. To be plain, if your
lordship does not ken when you have a good servant, I ken when I have
a kind master; and to say truth, you will be easier served now than
ever, for there is not much chance of your getting out of bounds."

"I am indeed bound over to good behaviour," said Lord Glenvarloch,
with a smile; "but I hope you will not take advantage of my situation
to be too severe on my follies, Richie?"

"God forbid, my lord--God forbid!" replied Richie, with an expression
betwixt a conceited consciousness of superior wisdom and real feeling-
-"especially in consideration of your lordship's having a due sense of
them. I did indeed remonstrate, as was my humble duty, but I scorn to
cast that up to your lordship now--Na, na, I am myself an erring
creature--very conscious of some small weaknesses--there is no
perfection in man."

"But, Richie," said Lord Glenvarloch, "although I am much obliged to
you for your proffered service, it can be of little use to me here,
and may be of prejudice to yourself."

"Your lordship shall pardon me again," said Richie, whom the relative
situation of the parties had invested with ten times his ordinary
dogmatism; "but as I will manage the matter, your lordship shall be
greatly benefited by my service, and I myself no whit prejudiced."

"I see not how that can be, my friend," said Lord Glenvarloch, "since
even as to your pecuniary affairs--"

"Touching my pecuniars, my lord," replied Richie, "I am indifferently
weel provided; and, as it chances, my living here will be no burden to
your lordship, or distress to myself. Only I crave permission to annex
certain conditions to my servitude with your lordship."

"Annex what you will," said Lord Glenvarloch, "for you are pretty sure
to take your own way, whether you make any conditions or not. Since
you will not leave me, which were, I think, your wisest course, you
must, and I suppose will, serve me only on such terms as you like
yourself."

"All that I ask, my lord," said Richie, gravely, and with a tone of
great moderation, "is to have the uninterrupted command of my own
motions, for certain important purposes which I have now in hand,
always giving your lordship the solace of my company and attendance,
at such times as may be at once convenient for me, and necessary for
your service."

"Of which, I suppose, you constitute yourself sole judge," replied
Nigel, smiling.

"Unquestionably, my lord," answered Richie, gravely; "for your
lordship can only know what yourself want; whereas I, who see both
sides of the picture, ken both what is the best for your affairs, and
what is the most needful for my own."

"Richie, my good friend," said Nigel, "I fear this arrangement, which
places the master much under the disposal of the servant, would scarce
suit us if we were both at large; but a prisoner as I am, I may be as
well at your disposal as I am at that of so many other persons; and so
you may come and go as you list, for I suppose you will not take my
advice, to return to your own country, and leave me to my fate."

"The deil be in my feet if I do," said Moniplies,--"I am not the lad
to leave your lordship in foul weather, when I followed you and fed
upon you through the whole summer day, And besides, there may be brave
days behind, for a' that has come and gane yet; for

"It's hame, and it's hame, and it's hame we fain would be, Though the
cloud is in the lift, and the wind is on the lea; For the sun through
the mirk blinks blithe on mine ee, Says,--'I'll shine on ye yet in our
ain country!"

Having sung this stanza in the manner of a ballad-singer, whose voice
has been cracked by matching his windpipe against the bugle of the
north blast, Richie Moniplies aided Lord Glenvarloch to rise, attended
his toilet with every possible mark of the most solemn and deferential
respect, then waited upon him at breakfast, and finally withdrew,
pleading that he had business of importance, which would detain him
for some hours.

Although Lord Glenvarloch necessarily expected to be occasionally
annoyed by the self-conceit and dogmatism of Richie Moniplies's
character, yet he could not but feel the greatest pleasure from the
firm and devoted attachment which this faithful follower had displayed
in the present instance, and indeed promised himself an alleviation of
the ennui of his imprisonment, in having the advantage of his
services. It was, therefore, with pleasure that he learned from the
warder, that his servant's attendance would be allowed at all times
when the general rules of the fortress permitted the entrance of
strangers.

In the meanwhile, the magnanimous Richie Moniplies had already reached
Tower Wharf. Here, after looking with contempt on several scullers by
whom he was plied, and whose services he rejected with a wave of his
hand, he called with dignity, "First oars!" and stirred into activity
several lounging Tritons of the higher order, who had not, on his
first appearance, thought it worth while to accost him with proffers
of service. He now took possession of a wherry, folded his arms within
his ample cloak, and sitting down in the stern with an air of
importance, commanded them to row to Whitehall Stairs. Having reached
the Palace in safety, he demanded to see Master Linklater, the under-
clerk of his Majesty's kitchen. The reply was, that he was not to be
spoken withal, being then employed in cooking a mess of cock-a-leekie
for the king's own mouth.

"Tell him," said Moniplies, "that it is a dear countryman of his, who
seeks to converse with him on matter of high import."

"A dear countryman?" said Linklater, when this pressing message was
delivered to him. "Well, let him come in and be d--d, that I should
say sae! This now is some red-headed, long-legged, gillie-white-foot
frae the West Port, that, hearing of my promotion, is come up to be a
turn-broche, or deputy scullion, through my interest. It is a great
hinderance to any man who would rise in the world, to have such
friends to hang by his skirts, in hope of being towed up along with
him.--Ha! Richie Moniplies, man, is it thou? And what has brought ye
here? If they should ken thee for the loon that scared the horse the
other day!--"

"No more o' that, neighbour," said Richie,--"I am just here on the
auld errand--I maun speak with the king."

"The king? Ye are red wud," said Linklater; then shouted to his
assistant in the kitchen, "Look to the broches, ye knaves--_pisces
purga_--_Salsamenta fac macerentur pulchre_--I will make you
understand Latin, ye knaves, as becomes the scullions of King James."
Then in a cautious tone, to Richie's private ear, he continued, "Know
ye not how ill your master came off the other day?--I can tell you
that job made some folk shake for their office."

"Weel, but, Laurie, ye maun befriend me this time, and get this wee
bit sifflication slipped into his Majesty's ain most gracious hand. I
promise you the contents will be most grateful to him."

"Richie," answered Linklater, "you have certainly sworn to say your
prayers in the porter's lodge, with your back bare; and twa grooms,
with dog-whips, to cry amen to you."

"Na, na, Laurie, lad," said Richie, "I ken better what belangs to
sifflications than I did yon day; and ye will say that yoursell, if ye
will but get that bit note to the king's hand."

"I will have neither hand nor foot in the matter," said the cautious
Clerk of the Kitchen; "but there is his Majesty's mess of cock-a-
leekie just going to be served to him in his closet--I cannot prevent
you from putting the letter between the gilt bowl and the platter; his
sacred Majesty will see it when he lifts the bowl, for he aye drinks
out the broth."

"Enough said," replied Richie, and deposited the paper accordingly,
just before a page entered to carry away the mess to his Majesty.

"Aweel, aweel, neighbour," said Laurence, when the mess was taken
away, "if ye have done ony thing to bring yoursell to the withy, or
the scourging post, it is your ain wilful deed."

"I will blame no other for it," said Richie; and with that undismayed
pertinacity of conceit, which made a fundamental part of his
character, he abode the issue, which was not long of arriving.

In a few minutes Maxwell himself arrived in the apartment, and
demanded hastily who had placed a writing on the king's trencher,
Linklater denied all knowledge of it; but Richie Moniplies, stepping
boldly forth, pronounced the emphatical confession, "I am the man."

"Follow me, then," said Maxwell, after regarding him with a look of
great curiosity.

They went up a private staircase,--even that private staircase, the
privilege of which at Court is accounted a nearer road to power than
the _grandes entrees_ themselves. Arriving in what Richie described as
an "ill redd-up" ante-room, the usher made a sign to him to stop,
while he went into the king's closet. Their conference was short, and
as Maxwell opened the door to retire, Richie heard the conclusion of
it.

"Ye are sure he is not dangerous?--I was caught once.--Bide within
call, but not nearer the door than within three geometrical cubits. If
I speak loud, start to me like a falcon--If I speak loun, keep your
lang lugs out of ear-shot--and now let him come in."

Richie passed forward at Maxwell's mute signal, and in a moment found
himself in the presence of the king. Most men of Richie's birth and
breeding, and many others, would have been abashed at finding
themselves alone with their Sovereign. But Richie Moniplies had an
opinion of himself too high to be controlled by any such ideas; and
having made his stiff reverence, he arose once more into his
perpendicular height, and stood before James as stiff as a hedge-
stake.

"Have ye gotten them, man? have ye gotten them?" said the king, in a
fluttered state, betwixt hope and eagerness, and some touch of
suspicious fear. "Gie me them--gie me them--before ye speak a word, I
charge you, on your allegiance."

Richie took a box from his bosom, and, stooping on one knee, presented
it to his Majesty, who hastily opened it, and having ascertained that
it contained a certain carcanet of rubies, with which the reader was
formerly made acquainted, he could not resist falling into a sort of
rapture, kissing the gems, as if they had been capable of feeling, and
repeating again and again with childish delight, "_Onyx cum prole,
silexque_---_Onyx cum prole!_ Ah, my bright and bonny sparklers, my
heart loups light to see you again." He then turned to Richie, upon
whose stoical countenance his Majesty's demeanour had excited
something like a grim smile, which James interrupted his rejoicing to
reprehend, saying, "Take heed, sir, you are not to laugh at us--we are
your anointed Sovereign."

"God forbid that I should laugh!" said Richie, composing his
countenance into its natural rigidity. "I did but smile, to bring my
visage into coincidence and conformity with your Majesty's
physiognomy."

"Ye speak as a dutiful subject, and an honest man," said the king;
"but what deil's your name, man?"

"Even Richie Moniplies, the son of auld Mungo Moniplies, at the West
Port of Edinburgh, who had the honour to supply your Majesty's
mother's royal table, as weel as your Majesty's, with flesh and other
vivers, when time was."

"Aha!" said the king, laughing,--for he possessed, as a useful
attribute of his situation, a tenacious memory, which recollected
every one with whom he was brought into casual contact,--"Ye are the
self-same traitor who had weelnigh coupit us endlang on the causey of
our ain courtyard? but we stuck by our mare. _Equam memento rebus in
arduis servare_. Weel, be not dismayed, Richie; for, as many men have
turned traitors, it is but fair that a traitor, now and then, suld
prove to be, contra expectanda, a true man. How cam ye by our jewels,
man?--cam ye on the part of George Heriot?"

"In no sort," said Richie. "May it please your Majesty, I come as
Harry Wynd fought, utterly for my own hand, and on no man's errand;
as, indeed, I call no one master, save Him that made me, your most
gracious Majesty who governs me, and the noble Nigel Olifaunt, Lord of
Glenvarloch, who maintained me as lang as he could maintain himself,
poor nobleman!"

"Glenvarlochides again!" exclaimed the king; "by my honour, he lies in
ambush for us at every corner!--Maxwell knocks at the door. It is
George Heriot come to tell us he cannot find these jewels.--Get thee
behind the arras, Richie--stand close, man--sneeze not--cough not--
breathe not!--Jingling Geordie is so damnably ready with his gold-ends
of wisdom, and sae accursedly backward with his gold-ends of siller,
that, by our royal saul, we are glad to get a hair in his neck."

Richie got behind the arras, in obedience to the commands of the good-
natured king, while the Monarch, who never allowed his dignity to
stand in the way of a frolic, having adjusted, with his own hand, the
tapestry, so as to complete the ambush, commanded Maxwell to tell him
what was the matter without. Maxwell's reply was so low as to be lost
by Richie Moniplies, the peculiarity of whose situation by no means
abated his curiosity and desire to gratify it to the uttermost.

"Let Geordie Heriot come in," said the king; and, as Richie could
observe through a slit in the tapestry, the honest citizen, if not
actually agitated, was at least discomposed. The king, whose talent
for wit, or humour, was precisely of a kind to be gratified by such a
scene as ensued, received his homage with coldness, and began to talk
to him with an air of serious dignity, very different from the usual
indecorous levity of his behaviour. "Master Heriot," he said, "if we
aright remember, we opignorated in your hands certain jewels of the
Crown, for a certain sum of money--Did we, or did we not?"

"My most gracious Sovereign," said Heriot, "indisputably your Majesty
was pleased to do so."

"The property of which jewels and _cimelia_ remained with us,"
continued the king, in the same solemn tone, "subject only to your
claim of advance thereupon; which advance being repaid, gives us right
to repossession of the thing opignorated, or pledged, or laid in wad.
Voetius, Vinnius, Groenwigeneus, Pagenstecherus,--all who have treated
_de Contractu Opignerationis, consentiunt in eundem_,--gree on the
same point. The Roman law, the English common law, and the municipal
law of our ain ancient kingdom of Scotland, though they split in mair
particulars than I could desire, unite as strictly in this as the
three strands of a twisted rope."

"May it please your Majesty," replied Heriot, "it requires not so many
learned authorities to prove to any honest man, that his interest in a
pledge is determined when the money lent is restored."

"Weel, sir, I proffer restoration of the sum lent, and I demand to be
repossessed of the jewels pledged with you. I gave ye a hint, brief
while since, that this would be essential to my service, for, as
approaching events are like to call us into public, it would seem
strange if we did not appear with those ornaments, which are heirlooms
of the Crown, and the absence whereof is like to place us in contempt
and suspicion with our liege subjects."

Master George Heriot seemed much moved by this address of his
Sovereign, and replied with emotion, "I call Heaven to witness, that I
am totally harmless in this matter, and that I would willingly lose
the sum advanced, so that I could restore those jewels, the absence of
which your Majesty so justly laments. Had the jewels remained with me,
the account of them would be easily rendered; but your Majesty will do
me the justice to remember, that, by your express order, I transferred
them to another person, who advanced a large sum, just about the time
of my departure for Paris. The money was pressingly wanted, and no
other means to come by it occurred to me. I told your Majesty, when I
brought the needful supply, that the man from whom the monies were
obtained, was of no good repute; and your most princely answer was,
smelling to the gold--_Non olet_, it smells not of the means that have
gotten it."

"Weel, man," said the king, "but what needs a' this din? If ye gave my
jewels in pledge to such a one, suld ye not, as a liege subject, have
taken care that the redemption was in our power? And are we to suffer
the loss of our _cimelia_ by your neglect, besides being exposed to
the scorn and censure of our lieges, and of the foreign ambassadors?"

"My lord and liege king," said Heriot, "God knows, if my bearing blame
or shame in this matter would keep it from your Majesty, it were my
duty to endure both, as a servant grateful for many benefits; but when
your Majesty considers the violent death of the man himself, the
disappearance of his daughter, and of his wealth, I trust you will
remember that I warned your Majesty, in humble duty, of the
possibility of such casualties, and prayed you not to urge me to deal
with him on your behalf."

"But you brought me nae better means," said the king--"Geordie, ye
brought me nae better means. I was like a deserted man; what could I
do but grip to the first siller that offered, as a drowning man grasps
to the willow-wand that comes readiest?--And now, man, what for have
ye not brought back the jewels? they are surely above ground, if ye
wad make strict search."

"All strict search has been made, may it please your Majesty," replied
the citizen; "hue and cry has been sent out everywhere, and it has
been found impossible to recover them."

"Difficult, ye mean, Geordie, not impossible," replied the king; "for
that whilk is impossible, is either naturally so, _exempli gratia_, to
make two into three; or morally so, as to make what is truth
falsehood; but what is only difficult may come to pass, with
assistance of wisdom and patience; as, for example, Jingling Geordie,
look here!" And he displayed the recovered treasure to the eyes of the
astonished jeweller, exclaiming, with great triumph, "What say ye to
that, Jingler?--By my sceptre and crown, the man stares as if he took
his native prince for a warlock! us that are the very _malleus
maleficarum_, the contunding and contriturating hammer of all witches,
sorcerers, magicians, and the like; he thinks we are taking a touch of
the black art outsells!--But gang thy way, honest Geordie; thou art a
good plain man, but nane of the seven sages of Greece; gang thy way,
and mind the soothfast word which you spoke, small time syne, that
there is one in this land that comes near to Solomon, King of Israel,
in all his gifts, except in his love to strange women, forby the
daughter of Pharaoh."

If Heriot was surprised at seeing the jewels so unexpectedly produced
at the moment the king was upbraiding him for the loss of them, this
allusion to the reflection which had escaped him while conversing with
Lord Glenvarloch, altogether completed his astonishment; and the king
was so delighted with the superiority which it gave him at the moment,
that he rubbed his hands, chuckled, and finally, his sense of dignity
giving way to the full feeling of triumph, he threw himself into his
easy-chair, and laughed with unconstrained violence till he lost his
breath, and the tears ran plentifully down his cheeks as he strove to
recover it. Meanwhile, the royal cachinnation was echoed out by a
discordant and portentous laugh from behind the arras, like that of
one who, little accustomed to give way to such emotions, feels himself
at some particular impulse unable either to control or to modify his
obstreperous mirth. Heriot turned his head with new surprise towards
the place, from which sounds so unfitting the presence of a monarch
seemed to burst with such emphatic clamour.

The king, too, somewhat sensible of the indecorum, rose up, wiped his
eyes, and calling,--"Todlowrie, come out o' your den," he produced
from behind the arras the length of Richie Moniplies, still laughing
with as unrestrained mirth as ever did gossip at a country
christening. "Whisht, man, whisht, man," said the king; "ye needna
nicher that gait, like a cusser at a caup o' corn, e'en though it was
a pleasing jest, and our ain framing. And yet to see Jingling Geordie,
that bauds himself so much the wiser than other folk--to see him, ha!
ha! ha!--in the vein of Euclio apud Plautum, distressing himself to
recover what was lying at his elbow--

'Peril, interii, occidi--quo curram? quo non curram?--Tene, tene--
quem? quis? nescio--nihil video."

"Ah! Geordie, your een are sharp enough to look after gowd and silver,
gems, rubies, and the like of that, and yet ye kenna how to come by
them when they are lost.--Ay, ay--look at them, man--look at them--
they are a' right and tight, sound and round, not a doublet crept in
amongst them."

George Heriot, when his first surprise was over, was too old a
courtier to interrupt the king's imaginary triumph, although he darted
a look of some displeasure at honest Richie, who still continued on
what is usually termed the broad grin. He quietly examined the stones,
and finding them all perfect, he honestly and sincerely congratulated
his Majesty on the recovery of a treasure which could not have been
lost without some dishonour to the crown; and asked to whom he himself
was to pay the sums for which they had been pledged, observing, that
he had the money by him in readiness.

"Ye are in a deevil of a hurry, when there is paying in the case,
Geordie," said the king.--"What's a' the haste, man? The jewels were
restored by an honest, kindly countryman of ours. There he stands, and
wha kens if he wants the money on the nail, or if he might not be as
weel pleased wi' a bit rescript on our treasury some six months hence?
Ye ken that our Exchequer is even at a low ebb just now, and ye cry
pay, pay, pay, as if we had all the mines of Ophir."

"Please your Majesty," said Heriot, "if this man has the real right to
these monies, it is doubtless at his will to grant forbearance, if he
will. But when I remember the guise in which I first saw him, with a
tattered cloak and a broken head, I can hardly conceive it.--Are not
you Richie Moniplies, with the king's favour?"

"Even sae, Master Heriot--of the ancient and honourable house of
Castle Collop, near to the West Port of Edinburgh," answered Richie.

"Why, please your Majesty, he is a poor serving-man," said Heriot.
"This money can never be honestly at his disposal."

"What for no?" said the king. "Wad ye have naebody spraickle up the
brae but yoursell, Geordie? Your ain cloak was thin enough when ye cam
here, though ye have lined it gay and weel. And for serving-men, there
has mony a red-shank cam over the Tweed wi' his master's wallet on his
shoulders, that now rustles it wi' his six followers behind him. There
stands the man himsell; speer at him, Geordie."

"His may not be the best authority in the case," answered the cautious
citizen.

"Tut, tut, man," said the king, "ye are over scrupulous. The knave
deer-stealers have an apt phrase, _Non est inquirendum unde venit_
VENISON. He that brings the gudes hath surely a right to dispose of
the gear.--Hark ye, friend, speak the truth and shame the deil. Have
ye plenary powers to dispose on the redemption-money as to delay of
payments, or the like, ay or no?"

"Full power, an it like your gracious Majesty," answered Richie
Moniplies; "and I am maist willing to subscrive to whatsoever may in
ony wise accommodate your Majesty anent the redemption-money, trusting
your Majesty's grace will be kind to me in one sma' favour."

"Ey, man," said the king, "come ye to me there? I thought ye wad e'en
be like the rest of them.--One would think our subjects' lives and
goods were all our ain, and holden of us at our free will; but when we
stand in need of ony matter of siller from them, which chances more
frequently than we would it did, deil a boddle is to be had, save on
the auld terms of giff-gaff. It is just niffer for niffer.--Aweel,
neighbour, what is it that ye want--some monopoly, I reckon? Or it may
be a grant of kirk-lands and teinds, or a knighthood, or the like? Ye
maun be reasonable, unless ye propose to advance more money for our
present occasions."

"My liege," answered Richie Moniplies, "the owner of these monies
places them at your Majesty's command, free of all pledge or usage as
long as it is your royal pleasure, providing your Majesty will
condescend to show some favour to the noble Lord Glenvarloch,
presently prisoner in your royal Tower of London."

"How, man--how,--man--how, man!" exclaimed the king, reddening and
stammering, but with emotions more noble than those by which he was
sometimes agitated--"What is that you dare to say to us?--Sell our
justice!--sell our mercy!--and we a crowned king, sworn to do justice
to our subjects in the gate, and responsible for our stewardship to
Him that is over all kings?"--Here he reverently looked up, touched
his bonnet, and continued, with some sharpness,--"We dare not traffic
in such commodities, sir; and, but that ye are a poor ignorant
creature, that have done us this day some not unpleasant service, we
wad have a red iron driven through your tongue, _in terrorem_ of
others.--Awa with him, Geordie,--pay him, plack and bawbee, out of our
monies in your hands, and let them care that come ahint."

Richie, who had counted with the utmost certainty upon the success of
this master-stroke of policy, was like an architect whose whole
scaffolding at once gives way under him. He caught, however, at what
he thought might break his fall. "Not only the sum for which the
jewels were pledged," he said, "but the double of it, if required,
should be placed at his Majesty's command, and even without hope or
condition of repayment, if only--"

But the king did not allow him to complete the sentence, crying out
with greater vehemence than before, as if he dreaded the stability of
his own good resolutions,--"Awa wi' him--swith awa wi' him! It is time
he were gane, if he doubles his bode that gate. And, for your life,
letna Steenie, or ony of them, hear a word from his mouth; for wha
kens what trouble that might bring me into! _Ne inducas in
tentationem_--_Vade retro, Sathanas!--Amen_."

In obedience to the royal mandate, George Heriot hurried the abashed
petitioner out of the presence and out of the Palace; and, when they
were in the Palace-yard, the citizen, remembering with some resentment
the airs of equality which Richie had assumed towards him in the
commencement of the scene which had just taken place, could not
forbear to retaliate, by congratulating him with an ironical smile on
his favour at Court, and his improved grace in presenting a
supplication.

"Never fash your beard about that, Master George Heriot," said Richie,
totally undismayed; "but tell me when and where I am to sifflicate you
for eight hundred pounds sterling, for which these jewels stood
engaged?"

"The instant that you bring with you the real owner of the money,"
replied Heriot; "whom it is important that I should see on more
accounts than one."

"Then will I back to his Majesty," said Richie Moniplies, stoutly,
"and get either the money or the pledge back again. I am fully
commissionate to act in that matter."

"It may be so, Richie," said the citizen, "and perchance it may _not_
be so neither, for your tales are not all gospel; and, therefore, be
assured I will see that it _is_ so, ere I pay you that large sum of
money. I shall give you an acknowledgment for it, and I will keep it
prestable at a moment's warning. But, my good Richard Moniplies, of
Castle Collop, near the West Port of Edinburgh, in the meantime I am
bound to return to his Majesty on matters of weight." So speaking, and
mounting the stair to re-enter the Palace, he added, by way of summing
up the whole,--"George Heriot is over old a cock to be caught with
chaff."

Richie stood petrified when he beheld him re-enter the Palace, and
found himself, as he supposed, left in the lurch.--"Now, plague on
ye," he muttered, "for a cunning auld skinflint! that, because ye are
an honest man yoursell, forsooth, must needs deal with all the world
as if they were knaves. But deil be in me if ye beat me yet!--Gude
guide us! yonder comes Laurie Linklater next, and he will be on me
about the sifflication.--I winna stand him, by Saint Andrew!"

So saying, and changing the haughty stride with which he had that
morning entered the precincts of the Palace, into a skulking shamble,
he retreated for his wherry, which was in attendance, with speed
which, to use the approved phrase on such occasions, greatly resembled
a flight.




CHAPTER XXXII


_Benedict_. This looks not like a nuptial.
                    _Much Ado About Nothing._

Master George Heriot had no sooner returned to the king's apartment,
than James inquired of Maxwell if the Earl of Huntinglen was in
attendance, and, receiving an answer in the affirmative, desired that
he should be admitted. The old Scottish Lord having made his reverence
in the usual manner, the king extended his hand to be kissed, and then
began to address him in a tone of great sympathy.

"We told your lordship in our secret epistle of this morning, written
with our ain hand, in testimony we have neither pretermitted nor
forgotten your faithful service, that we had that to communicate to
you that would require both patience and fortitude to endure, and
therefore exhorted you to peruse some of the most pithy passages of
Seneca, and of Boethius _de Consolatione_, that the back may be, as we
say, fitted for the burden--This we commend to you from our ain
experience.

'Non ignara mail, miseris succurrere disco,'

sayeth Dido, and I might say in my own person, _non ignarus_; but to
change the gender would affect the prosody, whereof our southern
subjects are tenacious. So, my Lord of Huntinglen, I trust you have
acted by our advice, and studied patience before ye need it--_venienti
occurrite morbo_--mix the medicament when the disease is coming on."

"May it please your Majesty," answered Lord Huntinglen, "I am more of
an old soldier than a scholar--and if my own rough nature will not
bear me out in any calamity, I hope I shall have grace to try a text
of Scripture to boot."

"Ay, man, are you there with your bears?" said the king; "The Bible,
man," (touching his cap,) "is indeed _principium et fons_--but it is
pity your lordship cannot peruse it in the original. For although we
did ourselves promote that work of translation,--since ye may read, at
the beginning of every Bible, that when some palpable clouds of
darkness were thought like to have overshadowed the land, after the
setting of that bright occidental star, Queen Elizabeth; yet our
appearance, like that of the sun in his strength, instantly dispelled
these surmised mists,--I say, that although, as therein mentioned, we
countenanced the preaching of the gospel, and especially the
translation of the Scriptures out of the original sacred tongues; yet
nevertheless, we ourselves confess to have found a comfort in
consulting them in the original Hebrew, whilk we do not perceive even
in the Latin version of the Septuagint, much less in the English
traduction."

"Please your Majesty," said Lord Huntinglen, "if your Majesty delays
communicating the bad news with which your honoured letter threatens
me, until I am capable to read Hebrew like your Majesty, I fear I
shall die in ignorance of the misfortune which hath befallen, or is
about to befall, my house."

"You will learn it but too soon, my lord," replied the king. "I grieve
to say it, but your son Dalgarno, whom I thought a very saint, as he
was so much with Steenie and Baby Charles, hath turned out a very
villain."

"Villain!" repeated Lord Huntinglen; and though he instantly checked
himself, and added, "but it is your Majesty speaks the word," the
effect of his first tone made the king step back as if he had received
a blow. He also recovered himself again, and said in the pettish way
which usually indicated his displeasure--"Yes, my lord, it was we that
said it--_non surdo canis_--we are not deaf--we pray you not to raise
your voice in speech with us--there is the bonny memorial--read, and
judge for yourself."

The king then thrust into the old nobleman's hand a paper, containing
the story of the Lady Hermione, with the evidence by which it was
supported, detailed so briefly and clearly, that the infamy of Lord
Dalgarno, the lover by whom she had been so shamefully deceived,
seemed undeniable. But a father yields not up so easily the cause of
his son.

"May it please your Majesty," he said, "why was this tale not sooner
told? This woman hath been here for years--wherefore was the claim on
my son not made the instant she touched English ground?"

"Tell him how that came about, Geordie," said the king, dressing
Heriot.

"I grieve to distress my Lord Huntinglen," said Heriot; but I must
speak the truth. For a long time the Lady Hermione could not brook the
idea of making her situation public; and when her mind became changed
in that particular, it was necessary to recover the evidence of the
false marriage, and letters and papers connected with it, which, when
she came to Paris, and just before I saw her, she had deposited with a
correspondent of her father in that city. He became afterwards
bankrupt, and in consequence of that misfortune the lady's papers
passed into other hands, and it was only a few days since I traced and
recovered them. Without these documents of evidence, it would have
been imprudent for her to have preferred her complaint, favoured as
Lord Dalgarno is by powerful friends."

"Ye are saucy to say sae," said the king; "I ken what ye mean weel
eneugh--ye think Steenie wad hae putten the weight of his foot into
the scales of justice, and garr'd them whomle the bucket--ye forget,
Geordie, wha it is whose hand uphaulds them. And ye do poor Steenie
the mair wrang, for he confessed it ance before us and our privy
council, that Dalgarno would have put the quean aff on him, the puir
simple bairn, making him trow that she was a light-o'-love; in whilk
mind he remained assured even when he parted from her, albeit Steenie
might hae weel thought ane of thae cattle wadna hae resisted the like
of him."

"The Lady Hermione," said George Heriot, "has always done the utmost
justice to the conduct of the duke, who, although strongly possessed
with prejudice against her character, yet scorned to avail himself of
her distress, and on the contrary supplied her with the means of
extricating herself from her difficulties."

"It was e'en like himsell--blessings on his bonny face!" said the
king; "and I believed this lady's tale the mair readily, my Lord
Huntinglen, that she spake nae ill of Steenie--and to make a lang tale
short, my lord, it is the opinion of our council and ourself, as weel
as of Baby Charles and Steenie, that your son maun amend his wrong by
wedding this lady, or undergo such disgrace and discountenance as we
can bestow."

The person to whom he spoke was incapable of answering him. He stood
before the king motionless, and glaring with eyes of which even the
lids seemed immovable, as if suddenly converted into an ancient statue
of the times of chivalry, so instantly had his hard features and
strong limbs been arrested into rigidity by the blow he had received--
And in a second afterwards, like the same statue when the lightning
breaks upon it, he sunk at once to the ground with a heavy groan. The
king was in the utmost alarm, called upon Heriot and Maxwell for help,
and, presence of mind not being his _forte_, ran to and fro in his
cabinet, exclaiming--"My ancient and beloved servant--who saved our
anointed self! _vae atque dolor!_ My Lord of Huntinglen, look up--look
up, man, and your son may marry the Queen of Sheba if he will."

By this time Maxwell and Heriot had raised the old nobleman, and
placed him on a chair; while the king, observing that he began to
recover himself, continued his consolations more methodically.

"Haud up your head--haud up your head, and listen to your ain kind
native Prince. If there is shame, man, it comesna empty-handed--there
is siller to gild it--a gude tocher, and no that bad a pedigree;--if
she has been a loon, it was your son made her sae, and he can make her
an honest woman again."

These suggestions, however reasonable in the common case, gave no
comfort to Lord Huntinglen, if indeed he fully comprehended them; but
the blubbering of his good-natured old master, which began to
accompany and interrupt his royal speech, produced more rapid effect.
The large tear gushed reluctantly from his eye, as he kissed the
withered hands, which the king, weeping with less dignity and
restraint, abandoned to him, first alternately and then both together,
until the feelings of the man getting entirely the better of the
Sovereign's sense of dignity, he grasped and shook Lord Huntinglen's
hands with the sympathy of an equal and a familiar friend."

"_Compone lachrymas_," said the Monarch; "be patient, man, be patient;
the council, and Baby Charles, and Steenie, may a' gang to the deevil-
-he shall not marry her since it moves you so deeply."

"He _shall_ marry her, by God!" answered the earl, drawing himself up,
dashing the tear from his eyes, and endeavouring to recover his
composure. "I pray your Majesty's pardon, but he shall marry her, with
her dishonour for her dowry, were she the veriest courtezan in all
Spain--If he gave his word, he shall make his word good, were it to
the meanest creature that haunts the streets--he shall do it, or my
own dagger shall take the life that I gave him. If he could stoop to
use so base a fraud, though to deceive infamy, let him wed infamy."

"No, no!" the Monarch continued to insinuate, "things are not so bad
as that--Steenie himself never thought of her being a streetwalker,
even when he thought the worst of her."

"If it can at all console my Lord of Huntinglen," said the citizen, "I
can assure him of this lady's good birth, and most fair and unspotted
fame."

"I am sorry for it," said Lord Huntinglen--then interrupting himself,
he said--"Heaven forgive me for being ungrateful for such comfort!--
but I am well-nigh sorry she should be as you represent her, so much
better than the villain deserves. To be condemned to wed beauty and
innocence and honest birth--"

"Ay, and wealth, my lord--wealth," insinuated the king, "is a better
sentence than his perfidy has deserved."

"It is long," said the embittered father, "since I saw he was selfish
and hardhearted; but to be a perjured liar--I never dreaded that such
a blot would have fallen on my race! I will never look on him again."

"Hoot ay, my lord, hoot ay," said the king; "ye maun tak him to task
roundly. I grant you should speak more in the vein of Demea than
Mitio, _vi nempe et via pervulgata patrum_; but as for not seeing him
again, and he your only son, that is altogether out of reason. I tell
ye, man, (but I would not for a boddle that Baby Charles heard me,)
that he might gie the glaiks to half the lasses of Lonnun, ere I could
find in my heart speak such harsh words as you have said of this deil
of a Dalgarno of yours."

"May it please your Majesty to permit me to retire," said Lord
Huntinglen, "and dispose of the case according to your own royal sense
of justice, for I desire no favour for him."

"Aweel, my lord, so be it; and if your lordship can think," added the
Monarch, "of any thing in our power which might comfort you--"

"Your Majesty's gracious sympathy," said Lord Huntinglen, "has already
comforted me as far as earth can; the rest must be from the King of
kings."

"To Him I commend you, my auld and faithful servant," said James with
emotion, as the earl withdrew from his presence. The king remained
fixed in thought for some time, and then said to Heriot, "Jingling
Geordie, ye ken all the privy doings of our Court, and have dune so
these thirty years, though, like a wise man, ye hear, and see, and say
nothing. Now, there is a thing I fain wad ken, in the way of
philosophical inquiry--Did you ever hear of the umquhile Lady
Huntinglen, the departed Countess of this noble earl, ganging a wee
bit gleed in her walk through the world; I mean in the way of slipping
a foot, casting a leglin-girth, or the like, ye understand me?"

[Footnote: A leglin-girth is the lowest hoop upon a _leglin_, or milk-
pail. Allan Ramsay applies the phrase in the same metaphorical sense.

"Or bairns can read, they first maun spell,
 I learn'd this frae my mammy,
 And cast a leglin-girth mysell,
 Lang ere I married Tammy."
                              _Christ's Kirk On The Green_.]

"On my word as an honest man," said George Heriot, somewhat surprised
at the question, "I never heard her wronged by the slightest breath of
suspicion. She was a worthy lady, very circumspect in her walk, and
lived in great concord with her husband, save that the good Countess
was something of a puritan, and kept more company with ministers than
was altogether agreeable to Lord Huntinglen, who is, as your Majesty
well knows, a man of the old rough world, that will drink and swear."

"O Geordie!" exclaimed the king, "these are auld-warld frailties, of
whilk we dare not pronounce even ourselves absolutely free. But the
warld grows worse from day to day, Geordie. The juveniles of this age
may weel say with the poet--

'Aetas parentum, pejor avis, tulit
 Nos nequiores--'

This Dalgarno does not drink so much, or swear so much, as his father;
but he wenches, Geordie, and he breaks his word and oath baith. As to
what you say of the leddy, and the ministers, we are a' fallible
creatures, Geordie, priests and kings, as weel as others; and wha kens
but what that may account for the difference between this Dalgarno and
his father? The earl is the vera soul of honour, and cares nae mair
for warld's gear than a noble hound for the quest of a foulmart; but
as for his son, he was like to brazen us a' out--ourselves, Steenie,
Baby Charles, and our council--till he heard of the tocher, and then,
by my kingly crown, he lap like a cock at a grossart! These are
discrepancies betwixt parent and son not to be accounted for
naturally, according to Baptista Porta, Michael Scott _de secretis_,
and others.--Ah, Jingling Geordie, if your clouting the caldron, and
jingling on pots, pans, and veshels of all manner of metal, hadna
jingled a' your grammar out of your head, I could have touched on that
matter to you at mair length."

Heriot was too plain-spoken to express much concern for the loss of
his grammar learning on this occasion; but after modestly hinting that
he had seen many men who could not fill their father's bonnet, though
no one had been suspected of wearing their father's nightcap, he
inquired "whether Lord Dalgarno had consented to do the Lady Hermione
justice."

"Troth, man, I have small doubt that he will," quoth the king; "I gave
him the schedule of her worldly substance, which you delivered to us
in the council, and we allowed him half-an-hour to chew the cud upon
that. It is rare reading for bringing him to reason. I left Baby
Charles and Steenie laying his duty before him; and if he can resist
doing what _they_ desire him--why, I wish he would teach _me_ the gate
of it. O Geordie, Jingling Geordie, it was grand to hear Baby Charles
laying down the guilt of dissimulation, and Steenie lecturing on the
turpitude of incontinence!"

"I am afraid," said George Heriot, more hastily than prudently, "I
might have thought of the old proverb of Satan reproving sin."

"Deil hae our saul, neighbour," said the king, reddening, "but ye are
not blate! I gie ye license to speak freely, and, by our saul, ye do
not let the privilege become lost _non utendo_--it will suffer no
negative prescription in your hands. Is it fit, think ye, that Baby
Charles should let his thoughts be publicly seen?--No--no--princes'
thoughts are _arcana imperii_--_Qui nescit dissimulare nescit
regnare_. Every liege subject is bound to speak the whole truth to the
king, but there is nae reciprocity of obligation--and for Steenie
having been whiles a dike-louper at a time, is it for you, who are his
goldsmith, and to whom, I doubt, he awes an uncomatable sum, to cast
that up to him?"

Heriot did not feel himself called on to play the part of Zeno and
sacrifice himself for upholding the cause of moral truth; he did not
desert it, however, by disavowing his words, but simply expressed
sorrow for having offended his Majesty, with which the placable king
was sufficiently satisfied.

"And now, Geordie, man," quoth he, "we will to this culprit, and hear
what he has to say for himself, for I will see the job cleared this
blessed day. Ye maun come wi' me, for your evidence may be wanted."

The king led the way, accordingly, into a larger apartment, where the
Prince, the Duke of Buckingham, and one or two privy counsellors were
seated at a table, before which stood Lord Dalgarno, in an attitude of
as much elegant ease and indifference as could be expressed,
considering the stiff dress and manners of the times.

All rose and bowed reverently, while the king, to use a north country
word, expressive of his mode of locomotion, _toddled_ to his chair or
throne, making a sign to Heriot to stand behind him.

"We hope," said his Majesty, "that Lord Dalgarno stands prepared to do
justice to this unfortunate lady, and to his own character and
honour?"

"May I humbly inquire the penalty," said Lord Dalgarno,
 "in case I should unhappily find compliance with your Majesty's
demands impossible?"

"Banishment frae our Court, my lord," said the king; "frae our Court
and our countenance."

"Unhappy exile that I may be!" said Lord Dalgarno, in a tone of
subdued irony--"I will at least carry your Majesty's picture with me,
for I shall never see such another king." "And banishment, my lord,"
said the Prince, sternly, "from these our dominions."

"That must be by form of law, please your Royal Highness," said
Dalgarno, with an affectation of deep respect; "and I have not heard
that there is a statute, compelling us, under such penalty, to marry
every woman we may play the fool with. Perhaps his Grace of Buckingham
can tell me?"

"You are a villain, Dalgarno," said the haughty and vehement
favourite.

"Fie, my lord, fie!--to a prisoner, and in presence of your royal and
paternal gossip!" said Lord Dalgarno. "But I will cut this
deliberation short. I have looked over this schedule of the goods and
effects of Erminia Pauletti, daughter of the late noble--yes, he is
called the noble, or I read wrong, Giovanni Pauletti, of the Houee of
Sansovino, in Genoa, and of the no less noble Lady Maud Olifaunt, of
the House of Glenvarloch--Well, I declare that I was pre-contracted in
Spain to this noble lady, and there has passed betwixt us some certain
_proelibatio matrimonii_; and now, what more does this grave assembly
require of me?"

"That you should repair the gross and infamous wrong you have done the
lady, by marrying her within this hour," said the Prince.

"O, may it please your Royal Highness," answered Dalgarno, "I have a
trifling relationship with an old Earl, who calls himself my father,
who may claim some vote in the matter. Alas! every son is not blessed
with an obedient parent!" He hazarded a slight glance towards the
throne, to give meaning to his last words.

"We have spoken ourselves with Lord Huntinglen," said the king, "and
are authorised to consent in his name."

"I could never have expected this intervention of a _proxaneta_, which
the vulgar translate blackfoot, of such eminent dignity," said
Dalgarno, scarce concealing a sneer. "And my father hath consented? He
was wont to say, ere we left Scotland, that the blood of Huntinglen
and of Glenvarloch would not mingle, were they poured into the same
basin. Perhaps he has a mind to try the experiment?"

"My lord," said James, "we will not be longer trifled with--Will you
instantly, and _sine mora_, take this lady to your wife, in our
chapel?"