"This letter," he said, "is from the godly preacher of the word, Henry
Warden, young man? is it not so?" Halbert answered in the affirmative.
"And he writes to us, it would seem, in some strait, and refers us to
you for the circumstances. Let us know, I pray you, how things stand
with him."

In some perturbation Halbert Glendinning gave an account of the
circumstances which had accompanied the preacher's imprisonment. When
he came to the discussion of the _handfasting_ engagement, he was
struck with the ominous and displeased expression of Murray's brows,
and, contrary to all prudential and politic rule, seeing something was
wrong, yet not well aware what that something was, had almost stopped
short in his narrative.

"What ails the fool?" said the Earl, drawing his dark-red eyebrows
together, while the same dusky glow kindled on his brow--"Hast thou not
learned to tell a true tale without stammering?"

"So please you," answered Halbert, with considerable address, "I have
never before spoken in such a presence."

"He seems a modest youth," said Murray, turning to his next attendant,
"and yet one who in a good cause will neither fear friend nor
foe.--Speak on, friend, and speak freely."

Halbert then gave an account of the quarrel betwixt Julian Avenel and
the preacher, which the Earl, biting his lip the while, compelled
himself to listen to as a thing of indifference. At first he appeared
even to take the part of the Baron.

"Henry Warden," he said, "is too hot in his zeal. The law both of God
and man maketh allowance for certain alliances, though not strictly
formal, and the issue of such may succeed."

This general declaration he expressed, accompanying it with a glance
around upon the few followers who were present at this interview. The
most of them answered--"There is no contravening that;" but one or two
looked on the ground, and were silent. Murray then turned again to
Glendinning, commanding him to say what next chanced, and not to omit
any particular. When he mentioned the manner in which Julian had cast
from him his concubine, Murray drew a deep breath, set his teeth hard,
and laid his hand on the hilt of his dagger. Casting his eyes once
more around the circle, which was now augmented by one or two of the
reformed preachers, he seemed to devour his rage in silence, and again
commanded Halbert to proceed. When he came to describe how Warden had
been dragged to a dungeon, the Earl seemed to have found the point at
which he might give vent to his own resentment, secure of the sympathy
and approbation of all who were present. "Judge you," he said, looking
to those around him, "judge you, my peers, and noble gentlemen of
Scotland, betwixt me and this Julian Avenel--he hath broken his own
word, and hath violated my safe-conduct--and judge you also, my
reverend brethren, he hath put his hand forth upon a preacher of the
gospel, and perchance may sell his blood to the worshippers of
Anti-Christ!"

"Let him die the death of a traitor," said the secular chiefs, "and
let his tongue be struck through with the hangman's fiery iron to
avenge his perjury!"

"Let him go down to his place with Baal's priests," said the preachers,
"and be his ashes cast into Tophet!"

Murray heard them with the smile of expected revenge; yet it is
probable that the brutal treatment of the female, whose circumstances
somewhat resembled those of the Earl's own mother, had its share in
the grim smile which curled his sun-burnt cheek and its haughty lip.
To Halbert Glendinning, when his narrative was finished, he spoke with
great kindness.

"He is a bold and gallant youth," said he to those around, "and formed
of the stuff which becomes a bustling time. There are periods when men's
spirits shine bravely through them. I will know something more of him."

He questioned him more particularly concerning the Baron of Avenel's
probable forces--the strength of his castle--the dispositions of his
next heir, and this brought necessarily forward the sad history of his
brother's daughter, Mary Avenel, which was told with an embarrassment
that did not escape Murray.

"Ha! Julian Avenel," he said, "and do you provoke my resentment, when
you have so much more reason to deprecate my justice! I knew Walter
Avenel, a true Scotsman and a good soldier. Our sister, the Queen,
must right his daughter; and were her land restored, she would be a
fitting bride to some brave man who may better merit our favour than
the traitor Julian."--Then looking at Halbert, he said, "Art thou of
gentle blood, young man?"

Halbert, with a faltering and uncertain voice, began to speak of his
distant pretensions to claim a descent from the ancient Glendonwynes
of Galloway, when Murray interrupted him with a smile.

"Nay--nay--leave pedigrees to bards and heralds. In our days, each,
man is the son of his own deeds. The glorious light of reformation
hath shone alike on prince and peasant; and peasant as well as prince
may be illustrated by fighting in its defence. It is a stirring world,
where all may advance themselves who have stout hearts and strong
arms. Tell me frankly why thou hast left thy father's house."

Halbert Glendinning made a frank confession of his duel with Piercie
Shafton, and mentioned his supposed death.

"By my hand," said Murray, "thou art a bold sparrow-hawk, to match
thee so early with such a kite as Piercie Shafton. Queen Elizabeth
would give her glove filled with gold crowns to know that meddling
coxcomb to be under the sod.--Would she not, Morton?"

"Ay, by my word, and esteem her glove a better gift than the crowns,"
replied Morton, "which few Border lads like this fellow will esteem
just valuation."

"But what shall we do with this young homicide?" said Murray; "what
will our preachers say?"

"Tell them of Moses and of Benaiah," said Morton; "it is but the smiting
of an Egyptian when all is said out."

"Let it be so," said Murray, laughing; "but we will bury the tale, as
the prophet did the body, in the sand. I will take care of this
swankie.--Be near to us, Glendinning, since that is thy name. We
retain thee as a squire of our household. The master of our horse will
see thee fully equipped and armed."

During the expedition which he was now engaged in, Murray found
several opportunities of putting Glendinning's courage and presence of
mind to the test, and he began to rise so rapidly in his esteem, that
those who knew the Earl considered the youth's fortune as certain. One
step only was wanting to raise him to a still higher degree of
confidence and favour--it was the abjuration of the Popish religion.
The ministers who attended upon Murray and formed his chief support
amongst the people, found an easy convert in Halbert Glendinning, who,
from his earliest days, had never felt much devotion towards the
Catholic faith, and who listened eagerly to more reasonable views of
religion. By thus adopting the faith of his master, he rose higher in
his favour, and was constantly about his person during his prolonged
stay in the west of Scotland, which the intractability of those whom
the Earl had to deal with, protracted from day to day, and week to
week.




Chapter the Thirty-Sixth.


  Faint the din of battle bray'd
    Distant down the hollow wind;
  War and terror fled before,
    Wounds and death were left behind.
                      PENROSE.

The autumn of the year was well advanced, when the Earl of Morton,
one morning, rather unexpectedly, entered the antechamber of Murray, in
which Halbert Glendinning was in waiting.

"Call your master, Halbert," said the Earl; "I have news for him from
Teviotdale; and for you too, Glendinning.--News! news! my Lord of
Murray!" he exclaimed at the door of the Earl's bedroom; "come forth
instantly." The Earl appeared, and greeted his ally, demanding eagerly
his tidings.

"I have had a sure friend with me from the south," said Morton; "he
has been at Saint Mary's Monastery, and brings important tidings." "Of
what complexion?" said Murray, "and can you trust the bearer?" "He is
faithful, on my life," said Morton; "I wish all around your Lordship
may prove equally so."

"At what, and whom, do you point?" demanded Murray.

"Here is the Egyptian of trusty Halbert Glendinning, our Southland
Moses, come alive again, and flourishing, gay and bright as ever, in
that Teviotdale Goshen, the Halidome of Kennaquhair."

"What mean you, my lord?" said Murray.

"Only that your new henchman has put a false tale upon you. Piercie
Shafton is alive and well; by the same token that the gull is thought
to be detained there by love to a miller's daughter, who roamed the
country with him in disguise."

"Glendinning," said Murray, bending his brow into his darkest frown,
"thou hast not, I trust, dared to bring me a lie in thy mouth, in
order to win my confidence?"

"My lord," said Halbert, "I am incapable of a lie. I should choke on
one were my life to require that I pronounced it. I say, that this
sword of my father was through the body--the point came out behind his
back--the hilt pressed upon his breast-bone. And I will plunge it as
deep in the body of any one who shall dare to charge me with
falsehood."

"How, fellow!" said Morton, "wouldst thou beard a nobleman?"

"Be silent, Halbert," said Murray, "and you, my Lord of Morton, forbear
him. I see truth written on his brow."

"I wish the inside of the manuscript may correspond with the
superscription," replied his more suspicious ally. "Look to it, my
lord, you will one day lose your life by too much confidence."

"And you will lose your friends by being too readily suspicious,"
answered Murray. "Enough of this--let me hear thy tidings."

"Sir John Foster," said Morton, "is about to send a party into Scotland
to waste the Halidome."

"How! without waiting my presence and permission?" said Murray--"he is
mad--will he come as an enemy into the Queen's country?"

"He has Elizabeth's express orders," answered Morton, "and they are
not to be trifled with. Indeed, his march has been more than once
projected and laid aside during the time we have been here, and has
caused much alarm at Kennaquhair. Boniface, the old Abbot, has
resigned, and whom think you they have chosen in his place?"

"No one surely," said Murray; "they would presume to hold no election
until the Queen's pleasure and mine were known?"

Morton shrugged his shoulders--"They have chosen the pupil of old
Cardinal Beatoun, that wily determined champion of Rome, the
bosom-friend of our busy Primate of Saint Andrews. Eustace, late the
Sub-Prior of Kennaquhair, is now its Abbot, and, like a second Pope
Julius, is levying men and making musters to fight with Foster if he
comes forward."

"We must prevent that meeting," said Murray, hastily; "whichever
party wins the day, it were a fatal encounter for us--Who commands the
troop of the Abbot?"

"Our faithful old friend, Julian Avenel, nothing less," answered Morton.

"Glendinning," said Murray, "sound trumpets to horse directly, and let
all who love us get on horseback without delay--Yes, my lord, this
were indeed a fatal dilemma. If we take part with our English friends,
the country will cry shame on us--the very old wives will attack us
with their rocks and spindles--the very stones of the street will rise
up against us--we cannot set our face to such a deed of infamy. And my
sister, whose confidence I already have such difficulty in preserving,
will altogether withdraw it from me. Then, were we to oppose the
English Warden, Elizabeth would call it a protecting of her enemies
and what not, and we should lose her."

"The she-dragon," said Morton, "is the best card in our pack; and yet
I would not willingly stand still and see English blades carve Scots
flesh--What say you to loitering by the way, marching far and easy for
fear of spoiling our horses? They might then fight dog fight bull,
fight Abbot fight archer, and no one could blame us for what chanced
when we were not present."

"All would blame us, James Douglas," replied Murray; "we should lose
both sides--we had better advance with the utmost celerity, and do
what we can to keep the peace betwixt them.--I would the nag that
brought Piercie Shafton hither had broken his neck over the highest
heuch in Northumberland!--He is a proper coxcomb to make all this
bustle about, and to occasion perhaps a national war!"

"Had we known in time," said Douglas, "we might have had him privily
waited upon as he entered the Borders; there are strapping lads enough
would have rid us of him for the lucre of his spur-whang.  [Footnote:
_Spur-whang_--Spur-leather.] But to the saddle, James Stewart, since
so the phrase goes. I hear your trumpets. Bound to horse and away--we
shall soon see which nag is best breathed."

Followed by a train of about three hundred well-mounted men-at-arms,
these two powerful barons directed their course to Dumfries, and from
thence eastward to Teviotdale, marching at a rate which, as Morton had
foretold, soon disabled a good many of their horses, so that when they
approached the scene of expected action, there were not above two
hundred of their train remaining in a body, and of these most were
mounted on steeds which had been sorely jaded.

They had hitherto been amused and agitated by various reports
concerning the advance of the English soldiers, and the degree of
resistance which the Abbot was able to oppose to them. But when they
were six or seven miles from Saint Mary's of Kennaquhair, a gentleman
of the country, whom Murray had summoned to attend him, and on whose
intelligence he knew he could rely, arrived at the head of two or
three servants, "bloody with spurring, fiery red with haste."
According to his report, Sir John Foster, after several times
announcing, and as often delaying, his intended incursion, had at last
been so stung with the news that Piercie Shafton was openly residing
within the Halidome, that he determined to execute the commands of his
mistress, which directed him, at every risk, to make himself master of
the Euphuist's person. The Abbot's unceasing exertions had collected a
body of men almost equal in number to those of the English Warden, but
less practised in arms. They were united under the command of Julian
Avenel, and it was apprehended they would join battle upon the banks
of a small stream which forms the verge of the Halidome.

"Who knows the place?" said Murray.

"I do, my lord," answered Glendinning.

"'Tis well," said the Earl; "take a score of the best-mounted
horse--make what haste thou canst, and announce to them that I am
coming up instantly with a strong power, and will cut to pieces,
without mercy, whichever party strikes the first blow.--Davidson,"
said he to the gentleman who brought the intelligence, "thou shalt be
my guide.--Hie thee on, Glendinning--Say to Foster, I conjure him, as
he respects his mistress's service, that he will leave the matter in
my hands. Say to the Abbot, I will burn the Monastery over his head,
if he strikes a stroke till I come--Tell the dog, Julian Avenel, that
he hath already one deep score to settle with me--I will set his head
on the top of the highest pinnacle of Saint Mary's, if he presume to
open another. Make haste, and spare not the spur for fear of spoiling
horse-flesh."

"Your bidding shall be obeyed, my lord," said Glendinning; and
choosing those whose horses were in best plight to be his attendants,
he went off as fast as the jaded state of their cavalry permitted.
Hill and hollow vanished from under the feet of the chargers.

They had not ridden half the way, when they met stragglers coming off
from the field, whose appearance announced that the conflict was
begun.  Two supported in their arms a third, their elder brother, who
was pierced with an arrow through the body. Halbert, who knew them to
belong to the Halidome, called them by their names, and questioned
them of the state of the affray; but just then, in spite of their
efforts to retain him in the saddle, their brother dropped from the
horse, and they dismounted in haste to receive his last breath. From
men thus engaged, no information was to be obtained. Glendinning,
therefore, pushed on with his little troop, the more anxiously, as he
perceived other stragglers, bearing Saint Andrew's cross upon their
caps and corslets, flying apparently from the field of battle.  Most
of these, when they were aware of a body of horsemen approaching on
the road, held to the one hand or the other, at such a distance as
precluded coming to speech of them. Others, whose fear was more
intense, kept the onward road, galloping wildly as fast as their
horses could carry them, and when questioned, only glared without
reply on those who spoke to them, and rode on without drawing bridle.
Several of these were also known to Halbert, who had therefore no
doubt, from the circumstances in which he met them, that the men of
the Halidome were defeated. He became now unspeakably anxious
concerning the fate of his brother, who, he could not doubt, must have
been engaged in the affray. He therefore increased the speed of his
horse, so that not above five or six of his followers could keep up
with him. At length he reached a little hill, at the descent of which,
surrounded by a semi-circular sweep of a small stream, lay the plain
which had been the scene of the skirmish.

It was a melancholy spectacle. War and terror, to use the expression
of the poet, had rushed on to the field, and left only wounds and
death behind them. The battle had been stoutly contested, as was
almost always the case with these Border skirmishes, where ancient
hatred, and mutual injuries, made men stubborn in maintaining the
cause of their conflict.  Towards the middle of the plain, there lay
the bodies of several men who had fallen in the very act of grappling
with the enemy; and there were seen countenances which still bore the
stern expression of unextinguishable hate and defiance, hands which
clasped the hilt of the broken falchion, or strove in vain to pluck
the deadly arrow from the wound. Some were wounded, and, cowed of the
courage they had lately shown, were begging aid, and craving water, in
a tone of melancholy depression, while others tried to teach the
faltering tongue to pronounce some half-forgotten prayer, which, even
when first learned, they had but half understood. Halbert, uncertain
what course he was next to pursue, rode through the plain to see if,
among the dead or wounded, he could discover any traces of his brother
Edward. He experienced no interruption from the English. A distant
cloud of dust announced that they were still pursuing the scattered
fugitives, and he guessed, that to approach them with his followers,
until they were again under some command, would be to throw away his
own life, and that of his men, whom the victors would instantly
confound with the Scots, against whom they had been successful. He
resolved, therefore, to pause until Murray came up with his forces, to
which he was the more readily moved, as he heard the trumpets of the
English Warden sounding the retreat, and recalling from the pursuit.
He drew his men together, and made a stand in an advantageous spot of
ground, which had been occupied by the Scots in the beginning of the
action, and most fiercely disputed while the skirmish lasted.

While he stood here, Halbert's ear was assailed by the feeble moan of
a woman, which he had not expected to hear amid that scene, until the
retreat of the foes had permitted the relations of the slain to
approach, for the purpose of paying them the last duties. He looked
with anxiety, and at length observed, that by the body of a knignt in
bright armour, whose crest, though soiled and broken, still showed the
marks of rank and birth, there sat a female wrapped in a horseman's
cloak, and holding something pressed against her bosom, which he soon
discovered to be a child. He glanced towards the English. They
advanced not, and the continued and prolonged sound of their trumpets,
with the shouts of the leaders, announced that their powers would not
be instantly re-assembled. He had, therefore, a moment to look after
this unfortunate woman. He gave his horse to a spearman as he
dismounted, and, approaching the unhappy female, asked her, in the
most soothing tone he could assume, whether he could assist her in her
distress. The mourner made him no direct answer; but endeavouring,
with a trembling and unskilful hand, to undo the springs of the visor
and gorget, said, in a tone of impatient grief, "Oh, he would recover
instantly could I but give him air--land and living, life and honour,
would I give for the power of undoing these cruel iron platings that
suffocate him!" He that would soothe sorrow must not argue on the
vanity of the most deceitful hopes. The body lay as that of one whose
last draught of vital air had been drawn, and who must never more have
concern with the nether sky. But Halbert Glendinning failed not to
raise the visor and cast loose the gorget, when, to his great
surprise, he recognized the pale face of Julian Avenel. His last fight
was over, the fierce and turbid spirit had departed in the strife in
which it had so long delighted.

"Alas! he is gone," said Halbert, speaking to the young woman, in whom
he had now no difficulty of knowing the unhappy Catherine.

"Oh, no, no, no!" she reiterated, "do not say so--he is not dead--he
is but in a swoon. I have lain as long in one myself--and then his
voice would arouse me, when he spoke kindly, and said, Catherine, look
up for my sake--And look up, Julian, for mine!" she said, addressing
the senseless corpse; "I know you do but counterfeit to frighten me,
but I am not frightened," she added, with an hysterical attempt to
laugh; and then instantly changing her tone, entreated him to "speak,
were it but to curse my folly.  Oh, the rudest word you ever said to
me would now sound like the dearest you wasted on me before I gave you
all. Lift him up," she said, "lift him up, for God's sake!--have you
no compassion? He promised to wed me if I bore him a boy, and this
child is so like to its father!--How shall he keep his word, if you do
not help me to awaken him?--Christie of the Clinthill, Rowley,
Hutcheon! ye were constant at his feast, but ye fled from him at the
fray, false villains as ye are!"

"Not I, by Heaven!" said a dying man, who made some shift to raise
himself on his elbow, and discovered to Halbert the well-known
features of Christie; "I fled not a foot, and a man can but fight
while his breath lasts--mine is going fast.--So, youngster," said he,
looking at Glendinning, and seeing his military dress, "thou hast
ta'en the basnet at last? it is a better cap to live in than die in. I
would chance had sent thy brother here instead--there was good in
him--but thou art as wild, and wilt soon be as wicked as myself."

"God forbid!" said Halbert, hastily.

"Marry, and amen, with all my heart," said the wounded man, "there
will be company enow without thee where I am going. But God be praised
I had no hand in that wickedness," said he, looking to poor Catherine;
and with some exclamation in his mouth, that sounded betwixt a prayer
and a curse, the soul of Christie of the Clinthill took wing to the
last account.

Deeply wrapt in the painful interest which these shocking events had
excited, Glendinning forgot for a moment his own situation and duties,
and was first recalled to them by a trampling of horse, and the cry of
Saint George for England, which the English soldiers still continued
to use. His handful of men, for most of the stragglers had waited for
Murray's coming up, remained on horseback, holding their lances
upright, having no command either to submit or resist.

"There stands our Captain," said one of them, as a strong party of
English came up, the vanguard of Foster's troop.

"Your Captain! with his sword sheathed, and on foot in the presence of
his enemy? a raw soldier, I warrant him," said the English leader.
"So! ho! young man, is your dream out, and will you now answer me if
you will fight or fly?"

"Neither," answered Halbert Glendinning, with great tranquillity.

"Then throw down thy sword and yield thee," answered the Englishman.

"Not till I can help myself no otherwise," said Halbert, with the same
moderation of tone and manner.

"Art thou for thine own hand, friend, or to whom dost thou owe
service?" demanded the English Captain.

"To the noble Earl of Murray."

"Then thou servest," said the Southron, "the most disloyal nobleman
who breathes--false both to England and Scotland."

"Thou liest," said Glendinning, regardless of all consequences.

"Ha! art thou so hot how, and wert so cold but a minute since? I lie,
do I? Wilt thou do battle with me on that quarrel?"

"With one to one--one to two--or two to five, as you list," said
Halbert Glendinning; "grant me but a fair field."

"That thou shalt have.--Stand back, my mates," said the brave
Englishman. "If I fall, give him fair play, and let him go off free
with his people."

"Long life to the noble Captain!" cried the soldiers, as impatient to
see the duel, as if it had been a bull-baiting.

"He will have a short life of it, though," said the sergeant, "if he,
an old man of sixty, is to fight, for any reason, or for no reason,
with every man he meets, and especially the young fellows he might be
father to.--And here comes the Warden besides to see the sword-play."

In fact, Sir John Foster came up with a considerable body of his
horsemen, just as his Captain, whose age rendered him unequal to the
combat with so strong and active a youth as Glendinning, was deprived
of his sword.

"Take it up for shame, old Stawarth Bolton," said the English Warden;
"and thou, young man, tell me who and what thou art?"

"A follower of the Earl of Murray, who bore his will to your honour,"
answered Glendinning,--"but here he comes to say it himself; I see the
van of his horsemen come over the hills."

"Get into order, my masters," said Sir John Foster to his followers;
"you that have broken your spears, draw your swords. We are something
unprovided for a second field, but if yonder dark cloud on the hill
edge bring us foul weather, we must bear as bravely as our broken
cloaks will bide it.  Meanwhile, Stawarth, we have got the deer we
have hunted for--here is Piercie Shafton hard and fast betwixt two
troopers."

"Who, that lad?" said Bolton; "he is no more Piercie Shafton than I
am. He hath his gay cloak indeed--but Piercie Shafton is a round dozen
of years older than that slip of roguery. I have known him since he
was thus high. Did you never see him in the tilt-yard or in the
presence?"

"To the devil with such vanities!" said Sir John Foster; "when had I
leisure for them or any thing else? During my whole life has she kept
me to this hangman's office, chasing thieves one day and traitors
another, in daily fear of my life; the lance never hung up in the
hall, the foot never out of the stirrup, the saddles never off my
nags' backs; and now, because I have been mistaken in the person of a
man I never saw, I warrant me, the next letters from the Privy Council
will rate me as I were a dog--a man were better dead than thus slaved
and harassed."

A trumpet interrupted Foster's complaints, and a Scottish pursuivant
who attended, declared "that the noble Earl of Murray desired, in all
honour and safety, a personal conference with Sir John Foster, midway
between their parties, with six of company in each, and ten free
minutes to come and go."

"And now," said the Englishman, "comes another plague. I must go speak
with yonder false Scot, and he knows how to frame his devices, to cast
dust in the eyes of a plain man, as well as ever a knave in the north.
I am no match for him in words, and for hard blows we are but too ill
provided.--Pursuivant, we grant the conference--and you, Sir
Swordsman," (speaking to young Glendinning,) "draw off with your
troopers to your own party--march--attend your Earl's
trumpet.--Stawarth Bolton, put our troop in order, and be ready to
move forward at the wagging of a finger.--Get you gone to your own
friends, I tell you, Sir Squire, and loiter not here."

Notwithstanding this peremptory order, Halbert Glendinning could not
help stopping to cast a look upon the unfortunate Catherine, who lay
insensible of the danger and of the trampling of so many horses around
her, insensible, as the second glance assured him, of all and forever.
Glendinning almost rejoiced when he saw that the last misery of life
was over, and that the hoofs of the war-horses, amongst which he was
compelled to leave her, could only injure and deface a senseless
corpse. He caught the infant from her arms, half ashamed of the shout
of laughter which rose on all sides, at seeing an armed man in such a
situation assume such an unwonted and inconvenient burden.

"Shoulder your infant!" cried a harquebusier.

"Port your infant!" said a pikeman.

"Peace, ye brutes," said Stawarth Bolton, "and respect humanity in
others if you have none yourselves. I pardon the lad having done some
discredit to my gray hairs, when I see him take care of that helpless
creature, which ye would have trampled upon as if ye had been littered
of bitch-wolves, not born of women."

While this passed, the leaders on either side met in the neutral space
betwixt the forces of either, and the Earl accosted the English
Warden:

"Is this fair or honest usage, Sir John, or for whom do you hold the
Earl of Morton and myself, that you ride in Scotland with arrayed
banner, fight, slay, and make prisoners at your own pleasure? Is it
well done, think you, to spoil our land and shed our blood, after the
many proofs we have given to your mistress of our devotion due to her
will, saving always the allegiance due to our own sovereign?"

"My Lord of Murray," answered Foster, "all the world knows you to be a
man of quick ingine and deep wisdom, and these several weeks you have
held me in hand with promising to arrest my sovereign mistress's
rebel, this Piercie Shafton of Wilverton, and you have never kept your
word, alleging turmoils in the west, and I wot not what other causes
of hinderance. Now, since he has had the insolence to return hither,
and live openly within ten miles of England, I could no longer, in
plain duty to my mistress and queen, tarry upon your successive
delays, and therefore I have used her force to take her rebel, by the
strong hand, wherever I can find him."

"And is Piercie Shafton in your hands, then?" said the Earl of Murray.
"Be aware that I may not, without my own great shame, suffer you to
remove him hence without doing battle."

"Will you, Lord Earl, after all the advantages you have received at the
hands of the Queen of England, do battle in the cause of her rebel?" said
Sir John Foster.

"Not so, Sir John," answered the Earl, "but I will fight to the death in
defence of the liberties of our free kingdom of Scotland."

"By my faith," said Sir John Foster, "I am well content--my sword is
not blunted with all it has done yet this day."

"By my honour, Sir John," said Sir George Heron of Chipchase, "there
is but little reason we should fight these Scottish Lords e'en now,
for I hold opinion with old Stawarth Bolton, and believe yonder
prisoner to be no more Piercie Shafton than he is the Earl of
Northumberland; and you were but ill advised to break the peace
betwixt the countries for a prisoner of less consequence than that gay
mischief-maker."

"Sir George," replied Foster, "I have often heard you herons are
afraid of hawks--Nay, lay not hand on sword, man--I did but jest; and
for this prisoner, let him be brought up hither, that we may see who
or what he is--always under assurance, my Lords," he continued,
addressing the Scots.

"Upon our word and honour," said Morton, "we will offer no violence."

The laugh turned against Sir John Foster considerably, when the
prisoner, being brought up, proved not only a different person from
Sir Piercie Shafton, but a female in man's attire.

"Pluck the mantle from the quean's face, and cast her to the horse-boys,"
said Foster; "she has kept such company ere now, I warrant."

Even Murray was moved to laughter, no common thing with him, at the
disappointment of the English Warden; but he would not permit any
violence to be offered to the fair Molinara, who had thus a second
time rescued Sir Piercie Shafton at her own personal risk.

"You have already done more mischief than you can well answer," said
the Earl to the English Warden, "and it were dishonour to me should I
permit you to harm a hair of this young woman's head."

"My lord," said Morton, "if Sir John will ride apart with me but for
one moment, I will show him such reasons as shall make him content to
depart, and to refer this unhappy day's work to the judgment of the
Commissioners nominated to try offences on the Border."

He then led Sir John Foster aside, and spoke to him in this
manner:--"Sir John Foster, I much marvel that a man who knows your
Queen Elizabeth as you do, should not know that, if you hope any thing
from her, it must be for doing her useful service, not for involving
her in quarrels with her neighbours without any advantage. Sir Knight,
I will speak frankly what I know to be true. Had you seized the true
Piercie Shafton by this ill-advised inroad; and had your deed
threatened, as most likely it might, a breach betwixt the countries,
your politic princess and her politic council would rather have
disgraced Sir John Foster than entered into war in his behalf. But now
that you have stricken short of your aim, you may rely on it you will
have little thanks for carrying the matter farther. I will work thus
far on the Earl of Murray, that he will undertake to dismiss Sir
Piercie Shafton from the realm of Scotland.--Be well advised, and let
the matter now pass off--you will gain nothing by farther violence,
for if we fight, you as the fewer and the weaker through your former
action, will needs have the worse."

Sir John Foster listened with his head declining on his breast-plate.

"It is a cursed chance," he said, "and I shall have little thanks for
my day's work."

He then rode up to Murray, and said, that, in deference to his Lordship's
presence and that of my Lord of Morton, he had come to the resolution of
withdrawing himself, with his power, without farther proceedings.

"Stop there, Sir John Foster," said Murray; "I cannot permit you to
retire in safety, unless you leave some one who may be surety to
Scotland, that the injuries you have at present done us may be fully
accounted for--you will reflect, that by permitting your retreat, I
become accountable to my Sovereign, who will demand a reckoning of me
for the blood of her subjects, if I suffer those who shed it to depart
so easily."

"It shall never be told in England," said the Warden, "that John
Foster gave pledges like a subdued man, and that on the very field on
which he stands victorious.--But," he added, after a moment's pause,
"if Stawarth Bolton wills to abide with you on his own free choice, I
will say nothing against it; and, as I bethink me, it were better he
should stay to see the dismissal of this same Piercie Shafton."

"I receive him as your hostage, nevertheless, and shall treat him as
such," said the Earl of Murray. But Foster, turning away as if to give
directions to Bolton and his men, affected not to hear this
observation.

"There rides a faithful servant of his most beautiful and Sovereign
Lady," said Murray aside to Morton. "Happy man! he knows not whether
the execution of her commands may not cost him his head; and yet he is
most certain that to leave them unexecuted will bring disgrace and
death without reprieve. Happy are they who are not only subjected to
the caprices of Dame Fortune, but held bound to account and be
responsible for them, and that to a sovereign as moody and fickle as
her humorous ladyship herself!"

"We also have a female Sovereign, my lord," said Morton.

"We have so, Douglas," said the Earl,--with a suppressed sigh; "but it
remains to be seen how long a female hand can hold the reins of power
in a realm so wild as ours. We will now go on to Saint Mary's, and see
ourselves after the state of that House.--Glendinning, look to that
woman, and protect her.--What the fiend, man, hast thou got in thine
arms?--an infant as I live!--where couldst thou find such a charge, at
such a place and moment?"

Halbert Glendinning briefly told the story. The Earl rode forward to
the place where the body of Julian Avenel lay, with his unhappy
companion's arms wrapped around him like the trunk of an uprooted oak
borne down by the tempest with all its ivy garlands. Both were cold
dead. Murray was touched in an unwonted degree, remembering, perhaps,
his own birth. "What have they to answer for, Douglas," he said, "who
thus abuse the sweetest gifts of affection?"

The Earl of Morton, unhappy in his marriage, was a libertine in his
amours.

"You must ask that question of Henry Warden, my lord, or of John
Knox--I am but a wild counsellor in women's matters."

"Forward to Saint Mary's," said the Earl; "pass the word
on--Glendinning, give the infant to this same female cavalier, and let
it be taken charge of. Let no dishonour be done to the dead bodies,
and call on the country to bury or remove them.--Forward, I say, my
masters!"




Chapter the Thirty-Seventh.


  Gone to be married?--Gone to swear a peace!

KING JOHN

The news of the lost battle, so quickly carried by the fugitives to
the village and convent, had spread the greatest alarm among the
inhabitants.  The Sacristan and other monks counselled flight; the
Treasurer recommended that the church plate should be offered as a
tribute to bribe the English officer; the Abbot alone was unmoved and
undaunted.

"My brethren," he said, "since God has not given our people victory in
the combat, it must be because he requires of us, his spiritual
soldiers, to fight the good fight of martyrdom, a conflict in which
nothing but our own faint-hearted cowardice can make us fail of
victory. Let us assume, then, the armour of faith, and prepare, if it
be necessary, to die under the ruin of these shrines, to the service
of which we have devoted ourselves. Highly honoured are we all in this
distinguished summons, from our dear brother Nicholas, whose gray
hairs have been preserved until they should be surrounded by the crown
of martyrdom, down to my beloved son Edward, who, arriving at the
vineyard at the latest hour of the day, is yet permitted to share its
toils with those who have laboured from the morning. Be of good
courage, my children. I dare not, like my sainted predecessors,
promise to you that you shall be preserved by miracle--I and you are
alike unworthy of that especial interposition, which, in earlier
times, turned the sword of sacrilege against the bosom of tyrants by
whom it was wielded, daunted the hardened hearts of heretics with
prodigies, and called down hosts of angels to defend the shrine of God
and of the Virgin. Yet, by heavenly aid, you shall this day see that
your Father and Abbot will not disgrace the mitre which sits upon his
brow. Go to your cells, my children, and exercise your private
devotions. Array yourselves also in alb and cope, as for our most
solemn festivals, and be ready, when the tolling of the largest bell
announces the approach of the enemy, to march forth to meet them in
solemn procession. Let the church be opened to afford such refuge as
may be to those of our vassals, who, from their exertion in this day's
unhappy battle, or the cause, are particularly apprehensive of the
rage of the enemy.  Tell Sir Piercie Shafton, if he has escaped the
fight--"

"I am here, most venerable Abbot," replied Sir Piercie; "and if it so
seemeth meet to you, I will presently assemble such of the men as have
escaped this escaramouche, and will renew the resistance, even unto
the death. Certes, you will learn from all, that I did my part in this
unhappy matter. Had it pleased Julian Avenel to have attended to my
counsel, specially in somewhat withdrawing of his main battle, even as
you may have marked the heron eschew the stoop of the falcon,
receiving him rather upon his beak than upon his wing, affairs, as I
do conceive, might have had a different face, and we might then, in a
more bellacose manner, have maintained that affray. Nevertheless, I
would not be understood to speak any thing in disregard of Julian
Avenel, whom I saw fall fighting manfully with his face to his enemy,
which hath banished from my memory the unseemly term of 'meddling
coxcomb,' with which it pleased him something rashly to qualify my
advice, and for which, had it pleased Heaven and the saints to have
prolonged the life of that excellent person, I had it bound upon my
soul to have put him to death with my own hand."

"Sir Piercie," said the Abbot, at length interrupting him, "our time
allows brief leisure to speak what might have been."

"You are right, most venerable Lord and Father," replied the
incorrigible Euphuist; "the preterite, as grammarians have it,
concerns frail mortality less than the future mood, and indeed our
cogitations respect chiefly the present. In a word, I am willing to
head all who will follow me, and offer such opposition as manhood and
mortality may permit, to the advance of the English, though they be my
own countrymen; and be assured, Piercie Shafton will measure his
length, being five feet ten inches, on the ground as he stands, rather
than give two yards in retreat, according to the usual motion in which
we retrograde."

"I thank you, Sir Knight," said the Abbot, "and I doubt not that you
would make your words good; but it is not the will of Heaven that carnal
weapons should rescue us. We are called to endure, not to resist, and may
not waste the blood of our innocent commons in vain--Fruitless opposition
becomes not men of our profession; they have my commands to resign the
sword and the spear,--God and Our Lady have not blessed our banner."

"Bethink you, reverend lord," said Piercie Shafton, very eagerly, "ere
you resign the defence that is in your power--there are many posts
near the entry of this village, where brave men might live or die to
the advantage; and I have this additional motive to make defence,--the
safety, namely, of a fair friend, who, I hope, hath escaped the hands
of the heretics."

"I understand you, Sir Piercie," said the Abbot--"you mean the
daughter of our Convent's miller?"

"Reverend my lord," said Sir Piercie, not without hesitation, "the
fair Mysinda is, as may be in some sort alleged, the daughter of one
who mechanically prepareth corn to be manipulated into bread, without
which we could not exist, and which is therefore an employment in
itself honourable, nay necessary. Nevertheless, if the purest
sentiments of a generous mind, streaming forth like the rays of the
sun reflected by a diamond, may ennoble one, who is in some sort the
daughter of a molendinary mechanic----"

"I have no time for all this, Sir Knight," said the Abbot; "be it
enough to answer, that with our will we war no longer with carnal
weapons. We of the spirituality will teach you of the temporality how
to die in cold blood, our hands not clenched for resistance, but
folded for prayer--our minds not filled with jealous hatred, but with
Christian meekness and forgiveness--our ears not deafened, nor our
senses confused, by the sound of clamorous instruments of war; but, on
the contrary, our voices composed to Halleluiah, Kyrie-Eleison, and
Salve Regina, and our blood temperate and cold, as those who think
upon reconciling themselves with God, not of avenging themselves of
their fellow-mortals."

"Lord Abbot," said Sir Piercie, "this is nothing to the fate of my
Molinara, whom I beseech you to observe, I will not abandon, while
golden hilt and steel blade bide together on my falchion. I commanded
her not to follow us to the field, and yet methought I saw her in her
page's attire amongst the rear of the combatants."

"You must seek elsewhere for the person in whose fate you are so
deeply interested," said the Abbot; "and at present I will pray of
your knighthood to inquire concerning her at the church, in which all
our more defenceless vassals have taken refuge. It is my advice to
you, that you also abide by the horns of the altar; and, Sir Piercie
Shafton," he added, "be of one thing secure, that if you come to harm,
it will involve the whole of this brotherhood; for never, I trust,
will the meanest of us buy safety at the expense of surrendering a
friend or a guest. Leave us, my son, and may God be your aid!"

When Sir Piercie Shafton had departed, and the Abbot was about to
betake himself to his own cell, he was surprised by an unknown person
anxiously requiring a conference, who, being admitted, proved to be no
other than Henry Warden. The Abbot started as he entered, and
exclaimed, angrily,--"Ha! are the few hours that fate allows him who
may last wear the mitre of this house, not to be excused from the
intrusion of heresy?  Dost thou come," he said, "to enjoy the hopes
which fete holds out to thy demented and accursed sect, to see the
bosom of destruction sweep away the pride of old religion--to deface
our shrines,--to mutilate and lay waste the bodies of our benefactors,
as well as their sepulchres--to destroy the pinnacles and carved work
of God's house, and Our Lady's?"

"Peace, William Allan!" said the Protestant preacher, with dignified
composure; "for none of these purposes do I come. I would have these
stately shrines deprived of the idols which, no longer simply regarded
as the effigies of the good and of the wise, have become the objects
of foul idolatry.  I would otherwise have its ornaments subsist,
unless as they are, or may be, a snare to the souls of men; and
especially do I condemn those ravages which have been made by the
heady fury of the people, stung into zeal against will-worship by
bloody persecution. Against such wanton devastations I lift my
testimony."

"Idle distinguisher that thou art!" said the Abbot Eustace, interrupting
him; "what signifies the pretext under which thou dost despoil the house
of God? and why at this present emergence will thou insult the master of
it by thy ill-omened presence?"

"Thou art unjust, William Allan," said Warden; "but I am not the less
settled in my resolution. Thou hast protected me some time since at
the hazard of thy rank, and what I know thou holdest still dearer, at
the risk of thy reputation with thine own sect. Our party is now
uppermost, and, believe me, I have come down the valley, in which thou
didst quarter me for sequestration's sake, simply with the wish to
keep my engagements to thee."

"Ay," answered the Abbot, "and it may be, that my listening to that
worldly and infirm compassion which pleaded with me for thy life, is now
avenged by this impending judgment. Heaven hath smitten, it may be,
the erring shepherd, and scattered the flock."

"Think better of the Divine judgments," said Warden. "Not for thy
sins, which are those of thy blended education and circumstances; not for
thine own sins, William Allan, art thou stricken, but for the accumulated
guilt which thy mis-named Church hath accumulated on her head, and those
of her votaries, by the errors and corruption of ages."

"Now, by my sure belief in the Rock of Peter," said the Abbot, "thou
dost rekindle the last spark of human indignation for which my bosom
has fuel--I thought I might not again have felt the impulse of earthly
passion, and it is thy voice which once more calls me to the
expression of human anger! yes, it is thy voice that comest to insult
me in my hour of sorrow, with these blasphemous accusations of that
church which hath kept the light of Christianity alive from the times
of the Apostles till now."

"From the times of the Apostles?" said the preacher, eagerly.
"_Negatur, Gulielme Allan_--the primitive church differed as much
from that of Rome, as did light from darkness, which, did time permit,
I should speedily prove. And worse dost thou judge, in saying, I come
to insult thee in thy hour of affliction, being here, God wot, with
the Christian wish of fulfilling an engagement I had made to my host,
and of rendering myself to thy will while it had yet power to exercise
aught upon me, and if it might so be, to mitigate in thy behalf the
rage of the victors whom God hath sent as a scourge to thy obstinacy."

"I will none of thy intercession," said the Abbot, sternly; "the
dignity to which the church has exalted me, never should have swelled
my bosom more proudly in the time of the highest prosperity, than it
doth at this crisis--I ask nothing of thee, but the assurance that my
lenity to thee hath been the means of perverting no soul to Satan,
that I have not given to the wolf any of the stray lambs whom the
Great Shepherd of souls had intrusted to my charge."

"William Allan," answered the Protestant, "I will be sincere with
thee.  What I promised I have kept--I have withheld my voice from
speaking even good things. But it has pleased Heaven to call the
maiden Mary Avenel to a better sense of faith than thou and all the
disciples of Rome can teach. Her I have aided with my humble power--I
have extricated her from the machinations of evil spirits to which she
and her house were exposed during the blindness of their Romish
superstition, and, praise be to my Master, I have not reason to fear
she will again be caught in thy snares."

"Wretched man!" said the Abbot, unable to suppress his rising
indignation, "is it to the Abbot of St. Mary's that you boast having
misled the soul of a dweller in Our Lady's Halidome into the paths of
foul error and damning heresy?--Thou dost urge me, Wellwood, beyond
what it becomes me to bear, and movest me to employ the few moments of
power I may yet possess, in removing from the face of the earth one
whose qualities, given by God, have been so utterly perverted as thine
to the service of Satan."

"Do thy pleasure," said the preacher; "thy vain wrath shall not
prevent my doing my duty to advantage thee, where it may be done
without neglecting my higher call. I go to the Earl of Murray."