Here her eye "in a fine frenzy rolling," fell full upon that of
Christie of the Clinthill, and at once her fears for having given
offence interrupted the current of maternal rebuke, which, like rebuke
matrimonial, may be often better meant than timed. There was something
of sly and watchful significance in Christie's eye, an eye gray, keen,
fierce, yet wily, formed to express at once cunning, and malice, which
made the dame instantly conjecture she had said too much, while she
saw in imagination her twelve goodly cows go lowing down the glen in a
moonlight night, with half a score of Border spearsmen at their heels.

Her voice, therefore, sunk from the elevated tone of maternal
authority into a whimpering apologetic sort of strain, and she
proceeded to say, "It is no that I have ony ill thoughts of the Border
riders, for Tibb Tacket there has often heard me say that I thought
spear and bridle as natural to a Borderman as a pen to a priest, or a
feather-fan to a lady; and--have you not heard me say it, Tibb?"

Tibb showed something less than her expected alacrity in attesting her
mistress's deep respect for the freebooters of the southland hills;
but, thus conjured, did at length reply, "Hout ay, mistress, I'se
warrant I have heard you say something like that."

"Mother!" said Halbert, in a firm and commanding tone of voice, "what
or whom is it that you fear under my father's roof?--I well hope that
it harbours not a guest in whose presence you are afraid to say your
pleasure to me or my brother? I am sorry I have been detained so late,
being ignorant of the fair company which I should encounter on my
return.--I pray you let this excuse suffice: and what satisfies you,
will, I trust, be nothing less than acceptable to your guests."

An answer calculated so jistly betwixt the submission due to his
parent, and the natural feeling of dignity in one who was by birth
master of the mansion, excited universal satisfaction. And as Elspeth
herself confessed to Tibb on the same evening, "She did not think it
had been in the callant.  Till that night, he took pets and passions
if he was spoke to, and lap through the house like a four-year-auld at
the least word of advice that was minted at him, but now he spoke as
grave and as douce as the Lord Abbot himself.  She kendna," she said,
"what might be the upshot of it, but it was like he was a wonderfu'
callant even now."

The party then separated, the young men retiring to their apartments,
the elder to their household cares. While Christie went to see his horse
properly accommodated, Edward betook himself to his book, and Halbert,
who was as ingenious in employing his hands as he had hitherto appeared
imperfect in mental exertion, applied himself to constructing a place of
concealment in the floor of his apartment by raising a plank, beneath
which he resolved to deposit that copy of the Holy Scriptures which had
been so strangely regained from the possession of men and spirits.

In the meanwhile Sir Piercie Shafton sate still as a stone, in the
chair in which he had deposited himself, his hands folded on his
breast, his legs stretched straight out before him and resting upon
the heels, his eyes cast up to the ceiling as if he had meant to count
every mesh of every cobweb with which the arched roof was canopied,
wearing at the same time a face of as solemn and imperturbable
gravity, as if his existence had depended on the accuracy of his
calculation.

He could scarce be roused from his listless state of contemplative
absorption so as to take some supper, a meal at which the younger
females appeared not. Sir Piercie stared around twice or thrice as if
he missed something; but he asked not for them, and only evinced his
sense of a proper audience being wanting, by his abstraction and
absence of mind, seldom speaking until he was twice addressed, and
then replying, without trope or figure, in that plain English which
nobody could speak better when he had a mind.

Christie, finding himself in undisturbed possession of the
conversation, indulged all who chose to listen with details of his own
wild and inglorious warfare, while Dame Elspeth's curch bristled with
horror, and Tibb Tacket, rejoiced to find herself once more in the
company of a jackman, listened to his tales, like Desdemona to
Othello's, with undisguised delight. Meantime the two young
Glendinnings were each wrapped up in his own reflections, and only
interrupted in them by the signal to move bedward.

        *        *         *        *         *



Chapter the Fifteenth.


  He strikes no coin,'tis true, but coins new phrases,
  And vends them forth as knaves vend gilded counters,
  Which wise men scorn, and fools accept in payment.
                             OLD PLAY.

In the morning Christie of the Clinthill was nowhere to be seen. As this
worthy personage did seldom pique himself on sounding a trumpet before
his movements, no one was surprised at his moonlight departure, though
some alarm was excited lest he had not made it empty-handed. So, in the
language of the national ballad,

  Some ran to cupboard, and some to kist,
  But nought was away that could be mist.

All was in order, the key of the stable left above the door, and that
of the iron-grate in the inside of the lock. In short, the retreat had
been made with scrupulous attention to the security of the garrison,
and so far Christie left them nothing to complain of.

The safety of the premises was ascertained by Halbert, who instead of
catching up a gun or cross-bow, and sallying out for the day as had
been his frequent custom, now, with a gravity beyond his years, took a
survey of all around the tower, and then returned to the spence, or
public apartment, in which, at the early hour of seven, the morning
meal was prepared.

There he found the Euphuist in the same elegant posture of abstruse
calculation which he had exhibited on the preceding evening, his arms
folded in the same angle, his eyes turned up to the same cobwebs, and
his heels resting on the ground as before. Tired of this affectation
of indolent importance, and not much flattered with his guest's
persevering in it to the last, Halbert resolved at once to break the
ice, being determined to know what circumstance had brought to the
tower of Glendinning a guest at once so supercilious and so silent.

"Sir Knight," he said with some firmness, "I have twice given you good
morning, to which the absence of your mind hath, I presume, prevented
you from yielding attention, or from making return. This exchange of
courtesy is at your pleasure to give or withhold--But, as what I have
further to say concerns your comfort and your motions in an especial
manner, I will entreat you to give me some signs of attention, that I
may be sure I am not wasting my words on a monumental image."

At this unexpected address, Sir Piercie Shafton opened his eyes, and
afforded the speaker a broad stare; but as Halbert returned the glance
without either confusion or dismay, the knight thought proper to
change his posture, draw in his legs, raise his eyes, fix them on
young Glendinning, and assume the appearance of one who listens to
what is said to him. Nay, to make his purpose more evident, he gave
voice to his resolution in these words, "Speak! we do hear."

"Sir Knight," said the youth, "it is the custom of this Halidome, or
patrimony of St. Mary's, to trouble with inquiries no guests who
receive our hospitality, providing they tarry in our house only for a
single revolution of the sun. We know that both criminals and debtors
come hither for sanctuary, and we scorn to extort from the pilgrim,
whom chance may make our guest, an avowal of the cause of his
pilgrimage and penance. But when one so high above our rank as
yourself, Sir Knight, and especially one to whom the possession of
such pre-eminence is not indifferent, shows his determination to be
our guest for a longer time, it is our usage to inquire of him whence
he comes, and what is the cause of his journey?"

The English knight gaped twice or thrice before he answered, and then
replied in a bantering tone, "Truly, good villagio, your question hath
in it somewhat of embarrassment, for you ask me of things concerning
which I am not as yet altogether determined what answer I may find it
convenient to make. Let it suffice thee, kind juvenal, that thou hast
the Lord Abbot's authority for treating me to the best of that power
of thine, which, indeed, may not always so well suffice for my
accommodation as either of us would desire."

"I must have a more precise answer than this, Sir Knight," said the
young Glendinning.

"Friend," said the knight, "be not outrageous. It may suit your
northern manners thus to press harshly upon the secrets of thy
betters; but believe me, that even as the lute, struck by an unskilful
hand, doth produce discords, so----" At this moment the door of the
apartment opened, and Mary Avenel presented herself--"But who can talk
of discords," said the knight, assuming his complimentary vein and
humour, "when the soul of harmony descends upon us in the presence of
surpassing beauty! For even as foxes, wolves, and other animals void
of sense and reason, do fly from the presence of the resplendent sun
of heaven when he arises in his glory, so do strife, wrath, and all
ireful passions retreat, and, as it were, scud away, from the face
which now beams upon us, with power to compose our angry passions,
illuminate our errors and difficulties, soothe our wounded minds, and
lull to rest our disorderly apprehensions; for as the heat and warmth
of the eye of day is to the material and physical world, so is the eye
which I now bow down before to that of the intellectual microcosm."

He concluded with a profound bow; and Mary Avenel, gazing from one to
the other, and plainly seeing that something was amiss, could only
say, "For heaven's sake, what is the meaning of this?"

The newly-acquired tact and intelligence of her foster-brother was as
yet insufficient to enable him to give an answer. He was quite
uncertain how he ought to deal with a guest, who preserving a
singularly high tone of assumed superiority and importance, seemed
nevertheless so little serious in what he said, that it was quite
impossible to discern with accuracy whether he was in jest or earnest.

Forming, however, the internal resolution to bring Sir Piercie Shafton
to a reckoning at a more fit place and season, he resolved to
prosecute the matter no farther at present; and the entrance of his
mother with the damsel of the Mill, and the return of the honest
Miller from the stack-yard, where he had been numbering and
calculating the probable amount of the season's grist, rendered
farther discussion impossible for the moment.

In the course of the calculation it could not but strike the man of
meal and grindstones, that after the church's dues were paid, and
after all which he himself could by any means deduct from the crop,
still the residue which must revert to Dame Glendinning could not be
less than considerable. I wot not if this led the honest Miller to
nourish any plans similar to those adopted by Elspeth; but it is
certain that he accepted with grateful alacrity an invitation which
the dame gave to his daughter, to remain a week or two as her guest at
Glendearg.

The principal persons being thus in high good humour with each other,
all business gave place to the hilarity of the morning repast; and so
much did Sir Piercie appear gratified by the attention which was paid
to every word that he uttered by the nut-brown Mysie, that,
notwithstanding his high birth and distinguished quality, he bestowed
on her some of the more ordinary and second-rate tropes of his
elocution.

Mary Avenel, when relieved from the awkwardness of feeling the full
weight of his conversation addressed to herself, enjoyed it much more;
and the good knight, encouraged by those conciliating marks of
approbation from the sex, for whose sake he cultivated his oratorical
talents, made speedy intimation of his purpose to be more
communicative than he had shown himself in his conversation with
Halbert Glendinning, and gave them to understand, that it was in
consequence of some pressing danger that he was at present their
involuntary guest.

The conclusion of the breakfast was a signal for the separation of the
company. The Miller went to prepare for his departure; his daughter to
arrange matters for her unexpected stay; Edward was summoned to
consultation by Martin concerning some agricultural matter, in which
Halbert could not be brought to interest himself; the dame left the
room upon her household concerns, and Mary was in the act of following
her, when she suddenly recollected, that if she did so, the strange
knight and Halbert must be left alone together, at the risk of another
quarrel.

The maiden no sooner observed this circumstance, than she instantly
returned from the door of the apartment, and, seating herself in a
small stone window-seat, resolved to maintain that curb which she was
sensible her presence imposed on Halbert Glendinning, of whose quick
temper she had some apprehensions.

The stranger marked her motions, and, either interpreting them as
inviting his society, or obedient to those laws of gallantry which
permitted him not to leave a lady in silence and solitude, he
instantly placed himself near to her side and opened the conversation
as follows:--

"Credit me, fair lady" he said, addressing Mary Avenel, "it much
rejoiceth me, being, as I am, a banished man from the delights of mine
own country, that I shall find here in this obscure and silvan cottage
of the north, a fair form and a candid soul, with whom I may explain
my mutual sentiments. And let me pray you in particular, lovely lady,
that, according to the universal custom now predominant in our court,
the garden of superior wits, you will exchange with me some epithet
whereby you may mark my devotion to your service. Be henceforward
named, for example, my Protection, and let me be your Affability."

"Our northern and country manners, Sir Knight, do not permit us to
exchange epithets with those to whom we are strangers," replied Mary
Avenel.

"Nay, but see now," said the knight, "how you are startled! even as
the unbroken steed, which swerves aside from the shaking of a
handkerchief, though he must in time encounter the waving of a pennon.
This courtly exchange of epithets of honour, is no more than the
compliments which pass between valour and beauty, wherever they meet,
and under whatever circumstances. Elizabeth of England herself calls
Philip Sydney her Courage, and he in return calls that princess his
Inspiration. Wherefore, my fair Protection, for by such epithet it
shall be mine to denominate you--"

"Not without the young lady's consent, sir!" interrupted Halbert;
"most truly do I hope your courtly and quaint breeding will not so far
prevail over the more ordinary rules of civil behaviour."

"Fair tenant of an indifferent copyhold," replied the knight, with the
same coolness and civility of mien, but in a tone somewhat more lofty
than he used to the young lady, "we do not in the southern parts, much
intermingle discourse, save with those with whom we may stand on some
footing of equality; and I must, in all discretion, remind you, that
the necessity which makes us inhabitants of the same cabin, doth not
place us otherwise on a level with each other."

"By Saint Mary," replied young Glendinning, "it is my thought that it
does; for plain men hold, that he who asks the shelter is indebted to
him who gives it; and so far, therefore, is our rank equalized while
this roof covers us both."

"Thou art altogether deceived," answered Sir Piercie; "and that thou
mayst fully adapt thyself to our relative condition, know that I
account not myself thy guest, but that of thy master, the Lord Abbot
of Saint Mary's, who, for reasons best known to himself and me,
chooseth to administer his hospitality to me through the means of
thee, his servant and vassal, who art, therefore, in good truth, as
passive an instrument of my accommodation as this ill-made and rugged
joint-stool on which I sit, or as the wooden trencher from which I eat
my coarse commons. Wherefore," he added, turning to Mary, "fairest
mistress, or rather, as I said before, most lovely Protection--"
[Footnote: There are many instances to be met with in the ancient
dramas of this whimsical and conceited custom of persons who formed an
intimacy, distinguishing: each, other by some quaint epithet. In
_Every Man out of his Humour_, there is a humorous debate upon
names most fit to bind the relation betwixt Sogliardo and Cavaliero
Shift, which ends by adopting those of Countenance and Resolution.
What is more to the point is in the speech of Hedon, a voluptuary and
a courtier in _Cynthia's Revels_. "you know that I call Madam
Plilantia my _Honour,_ and she calls me her _Ambition._ Now,
when I meet her in the presence, anon, I will come to her and say,
'Sweet Honour, I have hitherto contented my sense with the lilies of
your hand, and now I will taste the roses of your lip.' To which she
cannot but blushing answer, 'Nay, now you are too ambitious;' and then
do I reply, 'I cannot be too ambitious of Honour, sweet lady. Wilt not
be good?'"--I think there is some remnant of this foppery preserved in
masonic lodges, where each brother is distinguished by a name in the
Lodge, signifying some abstract quality as Discretion, or the like.
See the poems of Gavin Wilson.]

Mary Avenel was about to reply to him, when the stern, fierce, and
resentful expression of voice and countenance with which Halbert
exclaimed, "not from the King of Scotland, did he live, would I brook
such terms!" induced her to throw herself between him and the
stranger, exclaiming, "for God's sake, Halbert, beware what you do!"

"Fear not, fairest Protection," replied Sir Piercie, with the utmost
serenity, "that I can be provoked by this rustical and mistaught
juvenal to do aught misbecoming your presence or mine own dignity; for
as soon shall the gunner's linstock give fire unto the icicle, as the
spark of passion inflame my blood, tempered as it is to serenity by
the respect due to the presence of my gracious Protection."

"You may well call her your protection, Sir Knight" said Halbert; "by
Saint Andrew, it is the only sensible word I have heard you speak! But
we may meet where her protection shall no longer afford you shelter."

"Fairest Protection," continued the courtier, not even honouring with
a look, far less with a direct reply, the threat of the incensed
Halbert, "doubt not that thy faithful Affability will be more commoved
by the speech of this rudesby, than the bright and serene moon is
perturbed by the baying of the cottage-cur, proud of the height of his
own dunghill, which, in his conceit, lifteth him nearer unto the
majestic luminary."

To what lengths so unsavoury a simile might have driven Halbert's
indignation, is left uncertain; for at that moment Edward rushed into
the apartment with the intelligence that two most important officers
of the Convent, the Kitchener and Refectioner, were just arrived with
a sumpter-mule, loaded with provisions, announcing that the Lord
Abbot, the Sub-Prior, and the Sacristan, were on their way thither. A
circumstance so very extraordinary had never been recorded in the
annals of Saint Mary's, or in the traditions of Glendearg, though
there was a faint legendary report that a certain Abbot had dined
there in old days, after having been bewildered in a hunting
expedition amongst the wilds which lie to the northward. But that the
present Lord Abbot should have taken a voluntary journey to so wild
and dreary a spot, the very Kamtschatka of the Halidome, was a thing
never dreamt of; and the news excited the greatest surprise in all the
members of the family saving Halbert alone.

This fiery youth was too full of the insult he had received to think
of anything as unconnected with it. "I am glad of it," he exclaimed;
"I am glad the Abbot comes hither. I will know of him by what right
this stranger is sent hither to domineer over us under our father's
roof, as if we were slaves and not freemen. I will tell the proud
priest to his beard--"

"Alas! alas! my brother," said Edward, "think what these words may
cost thee!"

"And what will, or what can they cost me," said Halbert, "that I should
sacrifice my human feelings and my justifiable resentment to the fear of
what the Abbot can do?"

"Our mother--our mother!" exclaimed Edward; "think, if she is deprived
of her home, expelled from her property, how can you amend what
your rashness may ruin?"

"It is too true, by Heaven!" said Halbert, striking his forehead.
Then, stamping his foot against the floor to express the full energy
of the passion to which he dared no longer give vent, he turned round
and left the apartment.

Mary Avenel looked at the stranger knight, while she was endeavouring
to frame a request that he would not report the intemperate violence
of her foster-brother to the prejudice of his family, in the mind of
the Abbot. But Sir Piercie, the very pink of courtesy, conjectured her
meaning from her embarrassment, and waited not to be entreated.

"Credit me, fairest Protection," said he, "your Affability is less
than capable of seeing or hearing, far less of reciting or
reiterating, aught of an unseemly nature which may have chanced while
I enjoyed the Elysium of your presence. The winds of idle passion may
indeed rudely agitate the bosom of the rude; but the heart of the
courtier is polished to resist them.  As the frozen lake receives not
the influence of the breeze, even so--"

The voice of Dame Glendinning, in shrill summons, here demanded Mary
Avenel's attendance, who instantly obeyed, not a little glad to escape
from the compliments and similes of this courtlike gallant. Nor was it
apparently less a relief on his part; for no sooner was she past the
threshold of the room, than he exchanged the look of formal and
elaborate politeness which had accompanied each word he had uttered
hitherto, for an expression of the utmost lassitude and ennui; and
after indulging in one or two portentous yawns, broke forth into a
soliloquy.

"What the foul fiend sent this wench hither? As if it were not
sufficient plague to be harboured in a hovel that would hardly serve
for a dog's kennel in England, baited by a rude peasant-boy, and
dependent on the faith of a mercenary ruffian, but I cannot even have
time to muse over my own mishap, but must come aloft, frisk, fidget,
and make speeches, to please this pale hectic phantom, because she has
gentle blood in her veins? By mine honour, setting prejudice aside,
the mill-wench is the more attractive of the two--But patienza,
Piercie Shafton; thou must not lose thy well-earned claim to be
accounted a devout servant of the fair sex, a witty-brained, prompt,
and accomplished courtier. Rather thank heaven, Piercie Shafton, which
hath sent thee a subject, wherein, without derogating from thy rank,
(since the honours of the Avenel family are beyond dispute,) thou
mayest find a whetstone for thy witty compliments, a strop whereon to
sharpen thine acute engine, a butt whereat to shoot the arrows of thy
gallantry.  For even as a Bilboa blade, the more it is rubbed, the
brighter and the sharper will it prove, so--But what need I waste my
stock of similitudes in holding converse with myself?--Yonder comes
the monkish retinue, like some half score of crows winging their way
slowly up the valley--I hope, a'gad, they have not forgotten my
trunk-mails of apparel amid the ample provision they have made for
their own belly-timber--Mercy, a'gad, I were finely helped up if the
vesture has miscarried among the thievish Borderers!"

Stung by this reflection, he ran hastily down stairs, and caused his
horse to be saddled, that he might, as soon as possible, ascertain
this important point, by meeting the Lord Abbot and his retinue as
they came up the glen.  He had not ridden a mile before he met them
advancing with the slowness and decorum which became persons of their
dignity and profession. The knight failed not to greet the Lord Abbot
with all the formal compliments with which men of rank at that period
exchanged courtesies. He had the good fortune to find that his mails
were numbered among the train of baggage which attended upon the
party; and, satisfied in that particular, he turned his horse's head,
and accompanied the Abbot to the Tower of Glendearg.

Great, in the meanwhile, had been the turmoil of the good Dame Elspeth
and her coadjutors, to prepare for the fitting reception of the Father
Lord Abbot and his retinue. The monks had indeed taken care not to
trust too much to the state of her pantry; but she was not the less
anxious to make such additions as might enable her to claim the thanks
of her feudal lord and spiritual father. Meeting Halbert, as, with his
blood on fire, he returned from his altercation with her guest, she
commanded him instantly to go forth to the hill, and not to return
without venison; reminding him that he was apt enough to go thither
for his own pleasure, and must now do so for the credit of the house.

The Miller, who was now hastening his journey homewards, promised to
send up some salmon by his own servant. Dame Elspeth, who by this time
thought she had guests enough, had begun to repent of her invitation
to poor Mysie, and was just considering by what means, short of giving
offence, she could send off the Maid of the Mill behind her father,
and adjourn all her own aerial architecture till some future
opportunity, when this unexpected generosity on the part of the sire
rendered any present attempt to return his daughter on his hands too
highly ungracious to be farther thought on. So the Miller departed
alone on his homeward journey.

Dame Elspeth's sense of hospitality proved in this instance its own
reward; for Mysie had dwelt too near the Convent to be altogether
ignorant of the noble art of cookery, which her father patronized to
the extent of consuming on festival days such dainties as his daughter
could prepare in emulation of the luxuries of the Abbot's kitchen.
Laying aside, therefore, her holiday kirtle, and adopting a dress more
suitable to the occasion, the good-humored maiden bared her snowy arms
above the elbows; and, as Elspeth acknowledged, in the language of the
time and country, took "entire and aefauld part with her" in the
labours of the day; showing unparalleled talent, and indefatigable
industry, in the preparation of _mortreux_, _blanc-manger_,
and heaven knows what delicacies besides, which Dame Glendinning,
unassisted by her skill, dared not even have dreamt of presenting.
Leaving this able substitute in the kitchen, and regretting that Mary
Avenel was so brought up, that she could intrust nothing to her care,
unless it might be seeing the great chamber strewed with rushes, and
ornamented with such flowers and branches as the season afforded, Dame
Elspeth hastily donned her best attire, and with a beating heart
presented herself at the door of her little tower, to make her
obeisance to the Lord Abbot as he crossed her humble threshold. Edward
stood by his mother, and felt the same palpitation, which his
philosophy was at a loss to account for. He was yet to learn how long
it is ere our reason is enabled to triumph over the force of external
circumstances, and how much our feelings are affected by novelty, and
blunted by use and habit.

On the present occasion, he witnessed with wonder and awe the approach
of some half-score of riders, sober men upon sober palfreys, muffled
in their long black garments, and only relieved by their white
scapularies, showing more like a funeral procession than aught else,
and not quickening their pace beyond that which permitted easy
conversation and easy digestion.  The sobriety of the scene was indeed
somewhat enlivened by the presence of Sir Piercie Shafton, who, to
show that his skill in the manege was not inferior to his other
accomplishments, kept alternately pressing and checking his gay
courser, forcing him to piaffe, to caracole, to passage, and to do all
the other feats of the school, to the great annoyance of the Lord
Abbot, the wonted sobriety of whose palfrey became at length
discomposed by the vivacity of its companion, while the dignitary kept
crying out in bodily alarm, "I do pray you--Sir Knight--good now, Sir
Piercie--Be quiet, Benedict, there is a good steed--soh, poor fellow"
and uttering all the other precatory and soothing exclamations by
which a timid horseman usually bespeaks the favour of a frisky
companion, or of his own unquiet nag, and concluding the bead-roll
with a sincere _Deo gratias_ so soon as he alighted in the
court-yard of the Tower of Glendearg.

The inhabitants unanimously knelt down to kiss the hand of the Lord
Abbot, a ceremony which even the monks were often condemned to. Good
Abbot Boniface was too much fluttered by the incidents of the latter
part of his journey, to go through this ceremony with much solemnity,
or indeed with much patience. He kept wiping his brow with a
snow-white handkerchief with one hand, while another was abandoned to
the homage of his vassals; and then signing the cross with his
outstretched arm, and exclaiming, "Bless ye--bless ye, my children" he
hastened into the house, and murmured not a little at the darkness and
steepness of the rugged winding stair, whereby he at length scaled the
spence destined for his entertainment, and, overcome with fatigue,
threw himself, I do not say into an easy chair, but into the easiest
the apartment afforded.




Chapter the Sixteenth.


     A courtier extraordinary, who by diet
     Of meats and drinks, his temperate exercise,
     Choice music, frequent bath, his horary shifts
     Of shirts and waistcoats, means to immortalize
     Mortality itself, and makes the essence
     Of his whole happiness the trim of court.
                                         MAGNETIC LADY.


When the Lord Abbot had suddenly and superciliously vanished from the
eyes of his expectant vassals, the Sub-Prior made amends for the
negligence of his principal, by the kind and affectionate greeting
which he gave to all the members of the family, but especially to Dame
Elspeth, her foster-daughter, and her son Edward. "Where," he even
condescended to inquire, "is that naughty Nimrod, Halbert?--He hath
not yet, I trust, turned, like his great prototype, his hunting-spear
against man!"

"O no, an it please your reverence," said Dame Glendinning, "Halbert
is up at the glen to get some venison, or surely he would not have been
absent when such a day of honour dawned upon me and mine."

"Oh, to get savoury meat, such as our soul loveth," muttered the
Sub-Prior; "it has been at times an acceptable gift.--I bid you good
morrow, my good dame, as I must attend upon his lordship the Father
Abbot."

"And O, reverend sir," said the good widow, detaining him, "if it
might be your pleasure to take part with us if there is any thing
wrong; and if there is any thing wanted, to say that it is just
coming, or to make some excuses your learning best knows how. Every
bit of vassail and silver work have we been spoiled of since Pinkie
Cleuch, when I lost poor Simon Glendinning, that was the warst of a'."

"Never mind--never fear," said the Sub-Prior, gently extricating his
garment from the anxious grasp of Dame Elspeth, "the Refectioner has
with him the Abbot's plate and drinking cups; and I pray you to believe
that whatever is short in your entertainment will be deemed amply made
up in your good-will."

So saying, he escaped from her and went into the spence, where such
preparations as haste permitted were making for the noon collation of
the Abbot and the English knight. Here he found the Lord Abbot, for
whom a cushion, composed of all the plaids in the house, had been
unable to render Simon's huge elbow-chair a soft or comfortable place
of rest.

"Benedicite!" said Abbot Boniface, "now marry fie upon these hard
benches with all my heart--they are as uneasy as the _scabella_
of our novices. Saint Jude be with us, Sir Knight, how have you
contrived to pass over the night in this dungeon? An your bed was no
softer than your seat, you might as well have slept on the stone couch
of Saint Pacomius.  After trotting a full ten miles, a man needs a
softer seat than has fallen to my hard lot."

With sympathizing faces, the Sacristan and the Refectioner ran to
raise the Lord Abbot, and to adjust his seat to his mind, which was at
length accomplished in some sort, although he continued alternately to
bewail his fatigue, and to exult in the conscious sense of having
discharged an arduous duty. "You errant cavaliers," said he,
addressing the knight, "may now perceive that others have their
travail and their toils to undergo as well as your honoured faculty.
And this I will say for myself and the soldiers of Saint Mary, among
whom I may be termed captain, that it is not our wont to flinch from
the heat of the service, or to withdraw from the good fight.  No, by
Saint Mary!--no sooner did I learn that you were here, and dared
not for certain reasons come to the Monastery, where, with as good
will, and with more convenience, we might have given you a better
reception, than, striking the table with my hammer, I called a
brother--Timothy, said I, let them saddle Benedict--let them saddle my
black palfrey, and bid the Sub-Prior and some half-score of attendants
be in readiness tomorrow after matins--we would ride to
Glendearg.--Brother Timothy stared, thinking, I imagine, that his ears
had scarce done him justice--but I repeated my commands, and said, Let
the Kitchener and Refectioner go before to aid the poor vassals to
whom the place belongs in making a suitable collation. So that you
will consider, good Sir Piercie, our mutual in commodities, and
forgive whatever you may find amiss"

"By my faith," said Sir Piercie Shafton, "there is nothing to
forgive--If you spiritual warriors have to submit to the grievous
incommodities which your lordship narrates, it would ill become me, a
sinful and secular man, to complain of a bed as hard as a board, of
broth which relished as if made of burnt wool, of flesh, which, in its
sable and singed shape, seemed to put me on a level with Richard
Coeur-de-Lion,--when he ate up the head of a Moor carbonadoed, and of
other viands savouring rather of the rusticity of this northern
region."

"By the good Saints, sir," said the Abbot, somewhat touched in point
of his character for hospitality, of which he was in truth a most
faithful and zealous professor, "it grieves me to the heart that you
have found our vassals no better provided for your reception--Yet I
crave leave to observe, that if Sir Piercie Shafton's affairs had
permitted him to honour with his company our poor house of Saint
Mary's, he might have had less to complain of in respect of
easements."

"To give your lordship the reasons," said Sir Piercie Shafton, "why I
could not at this present time approach your dwelling, or avail myself
of its well-known and undoubted hospitality, craves either some delay,
or," looking around him, "a limited audience."

The Lord Abbot immediately issued his mandate to the Refectioner: "Hie
thee to the kitchen, Brother Hilarius, and there make inquiry of our
brother the Kitchener, within what time he opines that our collation
may be prepared, since sin and sorrow it were, considering the
hardships of this noble and gallant knight, no whit mentioning
or--weighing those we ourselves have endured, if we were now either to
advance or retard the hour of refection beyond the time when the
viands are fit to be set before us."

Brother Hilarius parted with an eager alertness to execute the will of
his Superior, and returned with the assurance, that punctually at one
afternoon would the collation be ready.

"Before that time," said the accurate Refectioner, "the wafers,
flamms, and pastry-meat, will scarce have had the just degree of fire
which learned pottingers prescribe as fittest for the body; and if it
should be past one o'clock, were it but ten minutes, our brother the
Kitchener opines, that the haunch of venison would suffer in spite of
the skill of the little turn-broche whom he has recommended to your
holiness by his praises."

"How!" said the Abbot, "a haunch of venison!--from whence comes that
dainty? I remember not thou didst intimate its presence in thy hamper
of vivers."

"So please your holiness and lordship," said the Refectioner, "he is a
son of the woman of the house who has shot it and sent it in--killed
but now; yet, as the animal heat hath not left the body, the Kitchener
undertakes it shall eat as tender as a young chicken--and this youth
hath a special gift in shooting deer, and never misses the heart or
the brain; so that the blood is not driven through the flesh, as
happens too often with us.  It is a hart of grease--your holiness has
seldom seen such a haunch."

"Silence, Brother Hilarius," said the Abbot, wiping his mouth; "it is
not beseeming our order to talk of food so earnestly, especially as we
must oft have our animal powers exhausted by fasting, and be
accessible (as being ever mere mortals) to those signs of longing" (he
again wiped his mouth) "which arise on the mention of victuals to an
hungry man.--Minute down, however, the name of that youth--it is
fitting merit should be rewarded, and he shall hereafter be a
_frater ad succurrendum_ in the kitchen and buttery."

"Alas! reverend Father and my good lord," replied the Refectioner, "I
did inquire after the youth, and I learn he is one who prefers the
casque to the cowl, and the sword of the flesh to the weapons of the
spirit."

"And if it be so," said the Abbot, "see that thou retain him as a
deputy-keeper and man-at-arms, and not as a lay brother of the
Monastery--for old Tallboy, our forester, waxes dim-eyed, and hath
twice spoiled a noble buck, by hitting him unwarily on the haunch. Ah!
'tis a foul fault, the abusing by evil-killing, evil-dressing,
evil-appetite, or otherwise, the good creatures indulged to us for our
use. Wherefore, secure us the service of this youth, Brother Hilarius,
in the way that may best suit him.--And now, Sir Piercie Shafton,
since the fates have assigned us a space of well-nigh an hour, ere we
dare hope to enjoy more than the vapour or savour of our repast, may I
pray you, of your courtesy, to tell me the cause of this visit; and,
above all, to inform us, why you will not approach our more pleasant
and better furnished _hospitium_?"

"Reverend Father, and my very good lord," said Sir Piercie Shafton,
"it is well known to your wisdom, that there are stone walls which
have ears, and that secrecy is to be looked to in matters which
concern a man's head." The Abbot signed to his attendants, excepting
the Sub-Prior, to leave the room, and then said, "Your valour, Sir
Piercie, may freely unburden yourself before our faithful friend and
counsellor Father Eustace, the benefits of whose advice we may too
soon lose, inasmuch as his merits will speedily recommend him to an
higher station, in which we trust he may find the blessing of a friend
and adviser as valuable as himself, since I may say of him, as our
claustral rhyme goeth,[Footnote: The rest of this doggerel rhyme may
be found in Fosbrooke's Learned work on British Monachism.]

  'Dixit Abbas ad Prioris,
  Tu es homo boni moris,
  Quia semper sanioris
  Mihi das concilia.'

Indeed," he added, "the office of Sub-Prior is altogether beneath our
dear brother; nor can we elevate him unto that of Prior, which, for
certain reasons, is at present kept vacant amongst us. Howbeit, Father
Eustace is fully possessed of my confidence, and worthy of yours, and
well may it be said of him, _Intravit in secretis nostris_."

Sir Piercie Shafton bowed to the reverend brethren, and, heaving a
sigh, as if he would burst his steel cuirass, he thus commenced his
speech:--

"Certes, reverend sirs, I may well heave such a suspiration, who have,
as it were, exchanged heaven for purgatory, leaving the lightsome
sphere of the royal court of England for a remote nook in this
inaccessible desert--quitting the tilt-yard, where I was ever ready
among my compeers to splinter a lance, either for the love of honour,
or for the honour of love, in order to couch my knightly spear against
base and pilfering besognios and marauders--exchanging the lighted
halls, wherein I used nimbly to pace the swift coranto, or to move
with a loftier grace in the stately galliard, for this rugged and
decayed dungeon of rusty-coloured stone--quitting the gay theatre, for
the solitary chimney-nook of a Scottish dog-house--bartering the
sounds of the soul-ravishing lute, and the love-awaking viol-de-gamba,
for the discordant squeak of a northern bagpipe--above all, exchanging
the smiles of those beauties, who form a gay galaxy around the throne
of England, for the cold courtesy of an untaught damsel, and the
bewildered stare of a miller's maiden. More might I say of the
exchange of the conversation of gallant knights and gay courtiers of
mine own order and capacity, whose conceits are bright and vivid as
the lightning, for that of monks and churchmen--but it were
discourteous to urge that topic."

The Abbot listened to this list of complaints with great round eyes,
which evinced no exact intelligence of the orator's meaning; and when
the knight paused to take breath, he looked with a doubtful and
inquiring eye at the Sub-Prior, not well knowing in what tone he
should reply to an exordium so extraordinary. The Sub-Prior
accordingly stepped in to the relief of his principal.

"We deeply sympathize with you, Sir Knight, in the several
mortifications and hardships to which fate has subjected you,
particularly in that which has thrown you into the society of those,
who, as they were conscious they deserved not such an honour, so
neither did they at all desire it. But all this goes little way to
expound the cause of this train of disasters, or, in plainer words,
the reason which has compelled you into a situation having so few
charms for you."

"Gentle and reverend sir," replied the knight, "forgive an unhappy
person, who, in giving a history of his miseries, dilateth upon them
extremely, even as he who, having fallen from a precipice, looketh
upward to measure the height from which he hath been precipitated."

"Yea, but," said Father Eustace, "methinks it were wiser in him to tell
those who come to lift him up, which of his bones have been broken."

"You, reverend sir," said the knight, "have, in the encounter of our
wits, made a fair attaint; whereas I may be in some sort said to have
broken my staff across. [Footnote: _Attaint_ was a term of
tilting used to express the champion's having _attained_ his
mark, or, in other words, struck his lance straight and fair against
the helmet or breast of his adversary. Whereas to break the lance
across, intimated a total failure in directing the point of the weapon
on the object of his aim.] Pardon me, grave sir, that I speak in the
language of the tilt-yard, which is doubtless strange to your reverend
years.--Ah! brave resort of the noble, the fair and the gay!--Ah!
throne of love, and citadel of honour!--Ah! celestial beauties, by
whose bright eyes it is graced!  Never more shall Piercie Shafton
advance, as the centre of your radiant glances, couch his lance, and
spur his horse at the sound of the spirit-stirring trumpets, nobly
called the voice of war--never more shall he baffle his adversary's
encounter boldly, break his spear dexterously, and ambling around the
lovely circle, receive the rewards with which beauty honours
chivalry!"

Here he paused, wrung his hands, looked upwards, and seemed lost in
contemplation of his own fallen fortunes.

"Mad, very mad," whispered the Abbot to the Sub-Prior; "I would we
were fairly rid of him; for, of a truth, I expect he will proceed from
raving to mischief--Were it not better to call up the rest of the
brethren?"

But the Sub-Prior knew better than his Superior how to distinguish the
jargon of affectation from the ravings of insanity, and although the
extremity of the knight's passion seemed altogether fantastic, yet he
was not ignorant to what extravagancies the fashion of the day can
conduct its votaries.

Allowing, therefore, two minutes' space to permit the knight's
enthusiastic feelings to exhaust themselves, he again gravely reminded
him that the Lord Abbot had taken a journey, unwonted to his age and
habits, solely to learn in what he could serve Sir Piercie
Shafton--that it was altogether impossible he could do so without his
receiving distinct information of the situation in which he had now
sought refuge in Scotland.--"The day wore on," he observed, looking at
the window; "and if the Abbot should be obliged to return to the
Monastery without obtaining the necessary intelligence, the regret
might be mutual, but the inconvenience was like to be all on Sir
Piercie's own side."

The hint was not thrown away.

"O, goddess of courtesy!" said the knight, "can I so far have
forgotten thy behests as to make this good prelate's ease and time a
sacrifice to my vain complaints! Know, then, most worthy, and not less
worshipful, that I, your poor visitor and guest, am by birth nearly
bound to the Piercie of Northumberland, whose fame is so widely blown
through all parts of the world where English worth hath been known.
Now, this present Earl of Northumberland, of whom I propose to give
you the brief history----"

"It is altogether unnecessary," said the Abbot; "we know him to be a
good and true nobleman, and a sworn upholder of our Catholic faith, in
the spite of the heretical woman who now sits upon the throne of
England.  And it is specially as his kinsman, and as knowing that ye
partake with him in such devout and faithful belief and adherence to
our holy Mother Church, that we say to you, Sir Piercie Shafton, that
ye be heartily welcome to us, and that, and we wist how, we would
labour to do you good service in your extremity."

"For such kind offer I rest your most humble debtor," said Sir
Piercie, "nor need I at this moment say more than that my Right
Honourable Cousin of Northumberland, having devised with me and some
others, the choice and picked spirits of the age, how and by what
means the worship of God, according to the Catholic Church, might be
again introduced into this distracted kingdom of England, (even as one
deviseth, by the assistance of his friend, to catch and bridle a
runaway steed,) it pleased him so deeply to intrust me in those
communications, that my personal safety becomes, as it were, entwined
or complicated therewith. Natheless, as we have had sudden reason to
believe, this Princess Elizabeth, who maintaineth around her a sort of
counsellors skilful in tracking whatever schemes may be pursued for
bringing her title into challenge, or for erecting again the
discipline of the Catholic Church, has obtained certain knowledge of
the trains which we had laid before we could give fire unto them.
Wherefore, my Right Honourable Cousin of Northumberland, thinking it
best belike that one man should take both blame and shame for the
whole, did lay the burden of all this trafficking upon my back; which
load I am the rather content to bear, in that he hath always shown
himself my kind and honourable kinsman, as well as that my estate, I
wot not how, hath of late been somewhat insufficient to maintain the
expense of those braveries, wherewith it is incumbent on us, who are
chosen and selected spirits, to distinguish ourselves from the
vulgar."

"So that possibly," said the Sub-Prior, "your private affairs rendered a
foreign journey less incommodious to you than it might have been to the
noble earl, your right worthy cousin?"

"You are right, reverend sir," answered the courtier; "_rem
acu_--you have touched the point with a needle--My cost and
expenses had been indeed somewhat lavish at the late triumphs and
tourneys, and the flat-capp'd citizens had shown themselves unwilling
to furnish my pocket for new gallantries for the honour of the nation,
as well as for mine own peculiar glory--and, to speak truth, it was in
some part the hope of seeing these matters amended that led me to
desire a new world in England."

"So that the miscarriage of your public enterprise, with the
derangement of your own private affairs," said the Sub-Prior, "have
induced you to seek Scotland as a place of refuge?"

"_Rem acu_, once again," said Sir Piercie; and not without good
cause, since my neck, if I remained, might have been brought within
the circumstances of a halter--and so speedy was my journey northward,
that I had but time to exchange my peach-coloured doublet of Genoa
velvet, thickly laid over with goldsmith's work, for this cuirass,
which was made by Bonamico of Milan, and travelled northward with all
speed, judging that I might do well to visit my Right Honourable
Cousin of Northumberland, at one of his numerous castles. But as I
posted towards Alnwick, even with the speed of a star, which, darting
from its native sphere, shoots wildly downwards, I was met at
Northallerton by one Henry Vaughan, a servant of my right honourable
kinsman, who showed me, that as then I might not with safety come to
his presence, seeing that, in obedience to orders from his court, he
was obliged to issue out letters for my incarceration."

"This," said the Abbot, "seems but hard measure on the part of your
honourable kinsman."

"It might be so judged, my lord," replied Sir Piercie; "nevertheless,
I will stand to the death for the honour of my Right Honourable Cousin
of Northumberland. Also, Henry Vaughan gave me, from my said cousin, a
good horse, and a purse of gold, with two Border-prickers, as they are
called, for my guides, who conducted me, by such roads and by-paths as
have never been seen since the days of Sir Lancelot and Sir Tristrem,
into this kingdom of Scotland, and to the house of a certain baron, or
one who holds the style of such, called Julian Avenel, with whom I
found such reception as the place and party could afford."