THE PALACE OF ST. MARGARET.
"The weird wan moonlight looketh down,
And silvers the roofs of the silent town--
Silvers the stones of the silent street,
That ere while echoed to busy feet."
This venerable royal residence was situated at the head of a narrow
street opening off the great thoroughfare, then called St. Margaret's
Close, though by mistake the civic authorities have now given that
name to another alley in the Nethergaitt, where stood an ancient
chapel, dedicated to the Saxon Queen-Consort of Malcolm III., who had
her dowry lands in the adjacent Howe of Angus.
By her numerous virtues, the sister of Edgar Atheling was so endeared
to the Scottish people, that every spot connected with her presence
is still remembered; thus her name was long and indissolubly
connected with this little palace at Dundee. It was a gloomy and
massive building, which stood within a court or cloister, and had
over the central door, and all the windows, deep and low-browed
arches, covered with a profusion of catsheads and grotesque
sculpture. These arches sprang from short, round, and massive
pillars, having escalloped capitals and zigzag mouldings. The deeply
recessed windows were all barred with iron, glazed with lozenged
panes, painted with coats of arms and brilliant devices, designed by
Robert Cochrane, the royal architect, an artist of great taste and
talent--one of the murdered favourites of the king, who in his
foolish generosity had created him general of artillery and Earl of
Mar.
It was in this palace that in the year 1209, Alan, Lord of Galloway
and Constable of Scotland, espoused Margaret, niece of King William
the Lion.
Soon after the entrance of James III. the bells ceased to toll, and
the ship guns ceased firing; the wine and ale still poured at
intervals from the stone spouts of the Cross; but the acclamations
died away in the Nethergaitt, and soon a stillness reigned around the
small but crowded residence of the king. A stranger could not have
imagined that a monarch and a court were there--so ominous was the
silence in that grim old Scottish palace; for James mourned over the
caprices of his nobles and the insults he had endured from them,
during his nine months' captivity in the Castle of Edinburgh, from
which he was not released until Richard III. of England interfered in
his behalf, at the head of 30,000 men. Young Rothesay mourned over
domestic troubles, and a secret marriage which he dared not yet avow;
while a crowd of cunning favourites on one hand, and of ambitious
nobles on the other, watched like lynxes for the turning of any scale
that would prove of advantage to themselves.
Discontent was apparent everywhere in and about the court of James
III. It was visible in the face of the king, for the recent
slaughter of his courtiers by Angus and others, against whom he was
nursing secret plans of vengeance; it was visible in the stern eyes
of the noblesse, who, by a royal edict, had been desired to forbear
wearing swords within the royal precincts--an order which they
observed by arming themselves to the teeth, and doubling the number
of their mail-clad followers; it was visible in the faces of the
merchants, _anent_ the twenty-one years' quarrel with Flanders; and
in the faces of the people, because they saw a disastrous struggle
approaching between the feudal nobles and themselves--a struggle
which the field of battle alone would decide for their future good or
evil.
That evening the king gave a banquet to his false courtiers, ad to
Admiral Wood, to Barton, and Falconer. Lord Drummond was grand
carver, Angus grand cupbearer, and the Laird of Kyneff grand sewer,
or _asseour_; but Rothesay stole at an early period from the table,
and reached his own apartments unperceived. There be exchanged
dresses with his faithful Lord Lindesay of the Byres; and putting on
a mask, with a shirt of mail of the finest texture under his doublet,
issued by a private gate into the main street, just as the last
shadows of the mountain that overhangs Dundee were fading away upon
the river--or rather becoming blended with the general obscurity of
the summer gloaming.
The young prince wore a casquetel, and had his sword and dagger under
the scarlet cloak of Lord Lindesay, for whom he was mistaken by the
pages, yeomen, and archers, in the neighbourhood of the palace, as he
passed into the burgh.
"Oho, my merry masquer!" said Sir Hew Borthwick, who had been
loitering near the king's residence for the livelong day, in the hope
of finding some one to drink or play with him, or from whom to pick
up any stray intelligence concerning the admiral's embassy to
Flanders, and the errand of those envoys who were now at the house of
the Provost in the Howe. "By the Holy Kirk! I should know that
dainty red cloak; now, were those locks black instead of brown, and
had that casquetel a feather, and those boots silver spurs instead of
gold, I would say this gallant was my good friend Lord Lindesay of
the Byres, and _not_ the young Duke of Rothesay. But to the proof!
On my honour, I'll follow him; and if he is bent on the errand I
suppose, this night may bring another thousand of King Henry's
English pounds to my purse." Walking very quick after the young
prince, who was carefully keeping himself under the shadows of the
darkest and least frequented streets, the spy cried aloud,
"Soho! sir--I crave pardon; but can you tell me what's o'clock?"
Annoyed by this impertinent interruption, the prince paused and laid
a hand on his sword; but being anxious to avoid a brawl, turned and
walked on at a quicker pace. Borthwick, who was now close at his
heels, came abreast of him just at the corner of Fish-street, which
was then quite dark and destitute of lamps.
"Sir--thou with the mask," continued Borthwick; "when I ask questions
I expect to receive replies. Will you please to give me one?"
"_There_, blockhead!" retorted the prince, furiously, as he gave him
a blow with his clenched hand which levelled the intruder in the
kennel; and as it was dealt skilfully, right under the left ear, it
was a full minute before he recovered.
Then, from the muddy street, Borthwick rose with a heart full of rage
and vengeance. His first thought was of his soiled cloak; his second
of something else.
"'Twas the prince's voice!" said he; "I was right! Oho!--let me
watch, and watch well. How fortunate! the more so as I keep tryst at
Broughty to-night."
After knocking this fellow down, Rothesay hurried along the street in
the twilight.
Borthwick saw him cross it near the great mansion of Lord Drummond,
which, with its dark façade and round towers, overshadowed the narrow
way. There he disappeared under the arcades, but whether he was
lurking among them, or had been received into some secret door,
Borthwick could not discover; yet for more than an hour he lingered
there, watching to make sure that Rothesay had really entered the
house, which he dared not approach, lest a thrust from a sword,
unseen, might reward his impertinence, from behind one of the columns
on which the superstructure stood.
At last eleven tolled from the tower of St. Mary's Church, and
remembering his appointment (of which more anon), the swashbuckler
muffled his cloak about him, and set off at a rapid pace along the
eastern road, which by the margin of the river led towards the Castle
of Broughty, the lights of which could be seen twinkling on the low
flat promontory that approaches the mouth of the Firth of Tay.