which I see they are even now preparing, put forth on the lake. Here are
enough of witnesses--your ladies--this bold youth--myself, when it can
serve your cause effectually, for I would not hastily stand committed in
this matter--but even without me here is evidence enough to show, that
you have yielded to the demands of the Council through force and fear,
but from no sincere and unconstrained assent. Their boats are already
manned for their return--oh! permit your old servant to recall them.”
“Melville,” said the Queen, “thou art an ancient courtier--when didst
thou ever know a Sovereign Prince recall to his presence subjects who
had parted from him on such terms as those on which these envoys of
the Council left us, and who yet were recalled without submission or
apology?--Let it cost me both life and crown, I will not again command
them to my presence.”
“Alas! madam, that empty form should make a barrier! If I rightly
understand, you are not unwilling to listen to real and advantageous
counsel--but your scruple is saved--I hear them returning to ask your
final resolution. Oh! take the advice of the noble Seyton, and you may
once more command those who now usurp a triumph over you. But hush! I
hear them in the vestibule.”
As he concluded speaking, George Douglas opened the door of the
apartment, and marshalled in the two noble envoys.
“We come, madam,” said the Lord Ruthven, “to request your answer to the
proposal of the Council.”
“Your final answer,” said Lord Lindesay; “for with a refusal you must
couple the certainty that you have precipitated your fate, and renounced
the last opportunity of making peace with God, and ensuring your longer
abode in the world.”
“My lords,” said Mary, with inexpressible grace and dignity, “the evils
we cannot resist we must submit to--I will subscribe these parchments
with such liberty of choice as my condition permits me. Were I on yonder
shore, with a fleet jennet and ten good and loyal knights around me,
I would subscribe my sentence of eternal condemnation as soon as the
resignation of my throne. But here, in the Castle of Lochleven, with
deep water around me--and you, my lords, beside me,--I have no freedom
of choice.--Give me the pen, Melville, and bear witness to what I do,
and why I do it.”
“It is our hope your Grace will not suppose yourself compelled by any
apprehensions from us,” said the Lord Ruthven, “to execute what must be
your own voluntary deed.”
The Queen had already stooped towards the table, and placed the
parchment before her, with the pen between her fingers, ready for the
important act of signature. But when Lord Ruthven had done speaking, she
looked up, stopped short, and threw down the pen. “If,” she said, “I am
expected to declare I give away my crown of free will, or otherwise than
because I am compelled to renounce it by the threat of worse evils to
myself and my subjects, I will not put my name to such an untruth--not
to gain full possession of England, France, and Scotland!--all once my
own, in possession, or by right.”
“Beware, madam,” said Lindesay, and, snatching hold of the Queen's arm
with his own gauntleted hand, he pressed it, in the rudeness of his
passion, more closely, perhaps, than he was himself aware of,--“beware
how you contend with those who are the stronger, and have the mastery of
your fate!”
He held his grasp on her arm, bending his eyes on her with a stern
and intimidating look, till both Ruthven and Melville cried shame; and
Douglas, who had hitherto remained in a state of apparent apathy, had
made a stride from the door, as if to interfere. The rude Baron then
quitted his hold, disguising the confusion which he really felt
at having indulged his passion to such extent, under a sullen and
contemptuous smile.
The Queen immediately began, with an expression of pain, to bare the
arm which he had grasped, by drawing up the sleeve of her gown, and it
appeared that his gripe had left the purple marks of his iron fingers
upon her flesh--“My lord,” she said, “as a knight and gentleman, you
might have spared my frail arm so severe a proof that you have the
greater strength on your side, and are resolved to use it--But I thank
you for it--it is the most decisive token of the terms on which this
day's business is to rest.--I draw you to witness, both lords and
ladies,” she said, showing the marks of the grasp on her arm, “that I
subscribe these instruments in obedience to the sign manual of my Lord
of Lindesay, which you may see imprinted on mine arm.”
[Footnote: The details of this remarkable event are, as given in
the preceding chapter, imaginary; but the outline of the events is
historical. Sir Robert Lindesay, brother to the author of the Memoirs,
was at first intrusted with the delicate commission of persuading the
imprisoned queen to resign her crown. As he flatly refused to interfere,
they determined to send the Lord Lindesay, one of the rudest and most
violent of their own faction, with instructions, first to use fair
persuasions, and if these did not succeed, to enter into harder terms.
Knox associates Lord Ruthven with Lindesay in this alarming commission.
He was the son of that Lord Ruthven who was prime agent in the murder
of Rizzio; and little mercy was to be expected from his conjunction with
Lindesay.
The employment of such rude tools argued a resolution on the part of
those who had the Queen's person in their power, to proceed to the
utmost extremities, should they find Mary obstinate. To avoid this
pressing danger, Sir Robert Melville was despatched by them to
Lochleven, carrying with him, concealed in the scabbard of his sword,
letters to the Queen from the Earl of Athole, Maitland of Lethington,
and even from Throgmorton, the English Ambassador, who was then
favourable to the unfortunate Mary, conjuring her to yield to the
necessity of the times, and to subscribe such deeds as Lindesay should
lay before her, without being startled by their tenor; and assuring her
that her doing so, in the state of captivity under which she was placed,
would neither, in law, honour, nor conscience, be binding upon her when
she should obtain her liberty. Submitting by the advice of one part of
her subjects to the menace of the others, and learning that Lindesay
was arrived in a boasting, that is, threatening humour, the Queen,
“with some reluctancy, and with tears,” saith Knox, subscribed one deed
resigning her crown to her infant son, and another establishing the Earl
of Murray regent. It seems agreed by historians that Lindesay behaved
with great brutality on the occasion. The deeds were signed 24th July,
1567.]
Lindesay would have spoken, but was restrained by his colleague Ruthven,
who said to him, “Peace, my lord. Let the Lady Mary of Scotland ascribe
her signature to what she will, it is our business to procure it, and
carry it to the Council. Should there be debate hereafter on the manner
in which it was adhibited, there will be time enough for it.”
Lindesay was silent accordingly, only muttering within his beard,
“I meant not to hurt her; but I think women's flesh be as tender as
new-fallen snow.”
The Queen meanwhile subscribed the rolls of parchment with a hasty
indifference, as if they had been matters of slight consequence, or of
mere formality. When she had performed this painful task, she arose,
and, having curtsied to the lords, was about to withdraw to her chamber.
Ruthven and Sir Robert Melville made, the first a formal reverence, the
second an obeisance, in which his desire to acknowledge his sympathy was
obviously checked by the fear of appearing in the eyes of his colleagues
too partial to his former mistress. But Lindesay stood motionless, even
when they were preparing to withdraw. At length, as if moved by a sudden
impulse, he walked round the table which had hitherto been betwixt them
and the Queen, kneeled on one knee, took her hand, kissed it, let it
fall, and arose--“Lady,” he said, “thou art a noble creature, even
though thou hast abused God's choicest gifts. I pay that devotion to thy
manliness of spirit, which I would not have paid to the power thou hast
long undeservedly wielded--I kneel to Mary Stewart, not to the Queen.”
“The Queen and Mary Stewart pity thee alike, Lindesay,” said
Mary--“alike thee pity, and they forgive thee. An honoured soldier hadst
thou been by a king's side--leagued with rebels, what art thou but a
good blade in the hands of a ruffian?--Farewell, my Lord Ruthven, the
smoother but the deeper traitor.--Farewell, Melville--Mayest thou find
masters that can understand state policy better, and have the means
to reward it more richly, than Mary Stewart.--Farewell, George of
Douglas--make your respected grand-dame comprehend that we would be
alone for the remainder of the day--God wot, we have need to collect our
thoughts.”
All bowed and withdrew; but scarce had they entered the vestibule, ere
Ruthven and Lindesay were at variance. “Chide not with me, Ruthven,”
Lindesay was heard to say, in answer to something more indistinctly
urged by his colleague--“Chide not with me, for I will not brook it! You
put the hangman's office on me in this matter, and even the very hangman
hath leave to ask some pardon of those on whom he does his office. I
would I had as deep cause to be this lady's friend as I have to be her
enemy--thou shouldst see if I spared limb and life in her quarrel.”
“Thou art a sweet minion,” said Ruthven, “to fight a lady's quarrel, and
all for a brent brow and a tear in the eye! Such toys have been out of
thy thoughts this many a year.”
“Do me right, Ruthven,” said Lindesay. “You are like a polished corslet
of steel; it shines more gaudily, but it is not a whit softer--nay,
it is five times harder than a Glasgow breastplate of hammered iron.
Enough. We know each other.”
They descended the stairs, were heard to summon their boats, and the
Queen signed to Roland Graeme to retire to the vestibule, and leave her
with her female attendants.
Chapter the Twenty-Third.
Give me a morsel on the greensward rather,
Coarse as you will the cooking--Let the fresh spring
Bubble beside my napkin--and the free birds
Twittering and chirping, hop from bough to bough,
To claim the crumbs I leave for perquisites--
Your prison feasts I like not.
THE WOODSMAN, A DRAMA.
A recess in the vestibule was enlightened by a small window, at which
Roland Graeme stationed himself to mark the departure of the lords. He
could see their followers mustering on horseback under their respective
banners--the western sun glancing on their corslets and steel-caps
as they moved to and fro, mounted or dismounted, at intervals. On the
narrow space betwixt the castle and the water, the Lords Ruthven and
Lindesay were already moving slowly to their boats, accompanied by the
Lady of Lochleven, her grandson, and their principal attendants. They
took a ceremonious leave of each other, as Roland could discern by their
gestures, and the boats put oft from their landing-place; the boatmen
stretched to their oars, and they speedily diminished upon the eye
of the idle gazer, who had no better employment than to watch their
motions. Such seemed also the occupation of the Lady Lochleven and
George Douglas, who, returning from the landing-place, looked frequently
back to the boats, and at length stopped as if to observe their progress
under the window at which Roland Graeme was stationed.--As they gazed on
the lake, he could hear the lady distinctly say, “And she has bent her
mind to save her life at the expense of her kingdom?”
“Her life, madam!” replied her son; “I know not who would dare to
attempt it in the castle of my father. Had I dreamt that it was with
such purpose that Lindesay insisted on bringing his followers hither,
neither he nor they should have passed the iron gate of Lochleven
castle.”
“I speak not of private slaughter, my son, but of open trial,
condemnation, and execution; for with such she has been threatened, and
to such threats she has given way. Had she not more of the false Gusian
blood than of the royal race of Scotland in her veins, she had bidden
them defiance to their teeth--But it is all of the same complexion,
and meanness is the natural companion of profligacy.--I am discharged,
forsooth, from intruding on her gracious presence this evening. Go
thou, my son, and render the usual service of the meal to this unqueened
Queen.”
“So please you, lady mother,” said Douglas, “I care not greatly to
approach her presence.”
“Thou art right, my son; and therefore I trust thy prudence, even
because I have noted thy caution. She is like an isle on the ocean,
surrounded with shelves and quicksands; its verdure fair and inviting to
the eye, but the wreck of many a goodly vessel which hath approached it
too rashly. But for thee, my son, I fear nought; and we may not, with
our honour, suffer her to eat without the attendance of one of us. She
may die by the judgment of Heaven, or the fiend may have power over her
in her despair; and then we would be touched in honour to show that
in our house, and at our table, she had had all fair play and fitting
usage.”
Here Roland was interrupted by a smart tap on the shoulders, reminding
him sharply of Adam Woodcock's adventure of the preceding evening.
He turned round, almost expecting to see the page of Saint Michael's
hostelry. He saw, indeed, Catherine Seyton; but she was in female
attire, differing, no doubt, a great deal in shape and materials from
that which she had worn when they first met, and becoming her birth
as the daughter of a great baron, and her rank as the attendant on a
princess. “So, fair page,” said she, “eaves-dropping is one of your
page-like qualities, I presume.”
“Fair sister,” answered Roland, in the same tone, “if some friends of
mine be as well acquainted with the rest of our mystery as they are with
the arts of swearing, swaggering, and switching, they need ask no page
in Christendom for farther insight into his vocation.”
“Unless that pretty speech infer that you have yourself had the
discipline of the switch since we last met, the probability whereof I
nothing doubt, I profess, fair page, I am at a loss to conjecture your
meaning. But there is no time to debate it now--they come with the
evening meal. Be pleased, Sir Page, to do your duty.”
Four servants entered bearing dishes, preceded by the same stern old
steward whom Roland had already seen, and followed by George Douglas,
already mentioned as the grandson of the Lady of Lochleven, and who,
acting as seneschal, represented, upon this occasion, his father, the
Lord of the Castle. He entered with his arms folded on his bosom, and
his looks bent on the ground. With the assistance of Roland Graeme, a
table was suitably covered in the next or middle apartment, on which
the domestics placed their burdens with great reverence, the steward and
Douglas bending low when they had seen the table properly adorned, as if
their royal prisoner had sat at the board in question. The door opened,
and Douglas, raising his eyes hastily, cast them again on the earth,
when he perceived it was only the Lady Mary Fleming who entered.
“Her Grace,” she said, “will not eat to-night.”
“Let us hope she may be otherwise persuaded,” said Douglas; “meanwhile,
madam, please to see our duty performed.”
A servant presented bread and salt on a silver plate, and the old
steward carved for Douglas a small morsel in succession from each of the
dishes presented, which he tasted, as was then the custom at the tables
of princes, to which death was often suspected to find its way in the
disguise of food.
“The Queen will not then come forth to-night?” said Douglas.
“She has so determined,” replied the lady.
“Our farther attendance then is unnecessary--we leave you to your
supper, fair ladies, and wish you good even.”
He retired slowly as he came, and with the same air of deep dejection,
and was followed by the attendants belonging to the castle. The two
ladies sate down to their meal, and Roland Graeme, with ready alacrity,
prepared to wait upon them. Catherine Seyton whispered to her companion,
who replied with the question spoken in a low tone, but looking at the
page--“Is he of gentle blood and well nurtured?”
The answer which she received seemed satisfactory, for she said to
Roland, “Sit down, young gentleman, and eat with your sisters in
captivity.”
“Permit me rather to perform my duty in attending them,” said Roland,
anxious to show he was possessed of the high tone of deference
prescribed by the rules of chivalry towards the fair sex, and especially
to dames and maidens of quality.
“You will find, Sir Page,” said Catherine, “you will have little time
allowed you for your meal; waste it not in ceremony, or you may rue your
politeness ere to-morrow morning.”
“Your speech is too free, maiden,” said the elder lady; “the modesty of
the youth may teach you more fitting fashions towards one whom to-day
you have seen for the first time.”
Catherine Seyton cast down her eyes, but not till she had given a single
glance of inexpressible archness towards Roland, whom her more grave
companion now addressed in a tone of protection.
“Regard her not, young gentleman--she knows little of the world, save
the forms of a country nunnery--take thy place at the board-end, and
refresh thyself after thy journey.”
Roland Graeme obeyed willingly, as it was the first food he had that day
tasted; for Lindesay and his followers seemed regardless of human wants.
Yet, notwithstanding the sharpness of his appetite, a natural gallantry
of disposition, the desire of showing himself a well-nurtured gentleman,
in all courtesies towards the fair sex, and, for aught I know, the
pleasure of assisting Catherine Seyton, kept his attention awake, during
the meal, to all those nameless acts of duty and service which gallants
of that age were accustomed to render. He carved with neatness and
decorum, and selected duly whatever was most delicate to place before
the ladies. Ere they could form a wish, he sprung from the table, ready
to comply with it--poured wine--tempered it with water--removed the
exchanged trenchers, and performed the whole honours of the table, with
an air at once of cheerful diligence, profound respect, and graceful
promptitude.
When he observed that they had finished eating, he hastened to offer to
the elder lady the silver ewer, basin, and napkin, with the ceremony and
gravity which he would have used towards Mary herself. He next, with the
same decorum, having supplied the basin with fair water, presented it
to Catherine Seyton. Apparently, she was determined to disturb his
self-possession, if possible; for, while in the act of bathing her
hands, she contrived, as it were by accident, to flirt some drops of
water upon the face of the assiduous assistant. But if such was her
mischievous purpose she was completely disappointed; for Roland Graeme,
internally piquing himself on his self-command, neither laughed nor was
discomposed; and all that the maiden gained by her frolic was a severe
rebuke from her companion, taxing her with mal-address and indecorum.
Catherine replied not, but sat pouting, something in the humour of a
spoilt child, who watches the opportunity of wreaking upon some one or
other its resentment for a deserved reprimand.
The Lady Mary Fleming, in the mean-while, was naturally well pleased
with the exact and reverent observance of the page, and said to
Catherine, after a favourable glance at Roland Graeme,--“You might well
say, Catherine, our companion in captivity was well born and gentle
nurtured. I would not make him vain by my praise, but his services
enable us to dispense with those which George Douglas condescends not to
afford us, save when the Queen is herself in presence.”
“Umph! I think hardly,” answered Catherine. “George Douglas is one of
the most handsome gallants in Scotland, and 'tis pleasure to see
him even still, when the gloom of Lochleven Castle has shed the same
melancholy over him, that it has done over every thing else. When he was
at Holyrood who would have said the young sprightly George Douglas would
have been contented to play the locksman here in Lochleven, with no
gayer amusement than that of turning the key on two or three helpless
women?--a strange office for a Knight of the Bleeding Heart--why does he
not leave it to his father or his brothers?”
“Perhaps, like us, he has no choice,” answered the Lady Fleming. “But,
Catherine, thou hast used thy brief space at court well, to remember
what George Douglas was then.”
“I used mine eyes, which I suppose was what I was designed to do, and
they were worth using there. When I was at the nunnery, they were very
useless appurtenances; and now I am at Lochleven, they are good for
nothing, save to look over that eternal work of embroidery.”
“You speak thus, when you have been but a few brief hours amongst
us--was this the maiden who would live and die in a dungeon, might she
but have permission to wait on her gracious Queen?”
“Nay, if you chide in earnest, my jest is ended,” said Catherine Seyton.
“I would not yield in attachment to my poor god-mother, to the gravest
dame that ever had wise saws upon her tongue, and a double-starched ruff
around her throat--you know I would not, Dame Mary Fleming, and it is
putting shame on me to say otherwise.”
“She will challenge the other court lady,” thought Roland Graeme; “she
will to a certainty fling down her glove, and if Dame Mary Fleming hath
but the soul to lift it, we may have a combat in the lists!”--but the
answer of Lady Mary Fleming was such as turns away wrath.
“Thou art a good child,” she said, “my Catherine, and a faithful;
but Heaven pity him who shall have one day a creature so beautiful to
delight him, and a thing so mischievous to torment him--thou art fit to
drive twenty husbands stark mad.”
“Nay,” said Catherine, resuming the full career of her careless
good-humour, “he must be half-witted beforehand, that gives me such
an opportunity. But I am glad you are not angry with me in sincerity,”
casting herself as she spoke into the arms of her friend, and
continuing, with a tone of apologetic fondness, while she kissed her
on either side of the face; “you know, my dear Fleming, that I have to
contend with both my father's lofty pride, and with my mother's high
spirit--God bless them! they have left me these good qualities, having
small portion to give besides, as times go--and so I am wilful and
saucy; but let me remain only a week in this castle, and oh, my dear
Fleming, my spirit will be as chastised and humble as thine own.”
Dame Mary Fleming's sense of dignity, and love of form, could not
resist this affectionate appeal. She kissed Catherine Seyton in her turn
affectionately; while, answering the last part of her speech, she said,
“Now Our Lady forbid, dear Catherine, that you should lose aught that
is beseeming of what becomes so well your light heart and lively humour.
Keep but your sharp wit on this side of madness, and it cannot but be
a blessing to us. But let me go, mad wench--I hear her Grace touch her
silver call.” And, extricating herself from Catherine's grasp, she went
towards the door of Queen Mary's apartment, from which was heard the low
tone of a silver whistle, which, now only used by the boatswains in the
navy, was then, for want of bells, the ordinary mode by which ladies,
even of the very highest rank, summoned their domestics. When she had
made two or three steps towards the door, however, she turned back, and
advancing to the young couple whom she left together, she said, in a
very serious though a low tone, “I trust it is impossible that we can,
any of us, or in any circumstances, forget, that, few as we are, we form
the household of the Queen of Scotland; and that, in her calamity, all
boyish mirth and childish jesting can only serve to give a great triumph
to her enemies, who have already found their account in objecting to her
the lightness of every idle folly, that the young and the gay practised
in her court.” So saying, she left the apartment.