‘Knights were dancing by three and three,
There was revel, game, and play;
Lovely ladies, fair and free,
Dancing with them in rich array.’
Floods of light were again streaming through the lofty halls of
Holyrood. Music was pealing loud and harmonious above the ringing
of wine-cups, the clatter of a banquet and the merry din of voices.
Massive plate, emblazoned with the royal arms of Scotland, glittered
on the board; silks, satins, and jewels shone and sparkled around
it. In goblets of gold the red wine bubbled to the brim, and stately
heads were bent, and bright eyes glistened while gallants laughed and
whispered, and ladies blushed and smiled. All that luxury could lavish,
all that refinement could require, enhanced the splendour of the feast.
Tall, elaborate devices of architecture, mythology, and fancy, peering
from amongst winter plants and flowers, decked the tables; whilst the
very claws of the pheasants and moor-fowl were gilt ere they were
served; the peacock roasted, yet not despoiled of his sleek plumage,
offered a lordly delicacy; and the boar’s head, garnished with
rosemary, grinned its fierce welcome with the customary apple in its
mouth.
At a cross-table, behind a huge candelabra, shedding a refulgent light
on her features, and in front of a sideboard piled with rich plate
and burnished trenchers, till she seemed literally enshrined in gold,
sat the Queen, with the most distinguished of her nobility on either
hand. Her face was radiant with animation, for pomp and pleasure were
not without their charms to her impressible nature; and her manner, as
her guests could not but observe, combined inimitably the cordiality
of the hostess with the dignity of the sovereign. Her Maries were
placed at the adjoining tables, and more fortunate than their mistress,
had at least the chance of sitting next those individuals in whose
conversation they took especial pleasure. These lotteries, however, are
very apt to turn up an unreasonable proportion of blanks, and while
Mary Carmichael could not even see where Walter Maxwell was supping,
and Mistress Beton, to her dismay, found herself placed three seats off
from the English Ambassador, Mary Hamilton alone saw the seat next her
occupied by the person whose society she liked best in the world, and
none but herself knew how she trembled when her cup was filled by the
poet Chastelâr.
Is it not always so? We take incalculable pains to prepare for our
festivities; how anxious we are that they should _go off_ well; how
engrossed is the butler with his plate-basket and his ice-pail; how
concerned the host that my lord’s venison should not be overdone. Every
plait must be laid to a hair’s-breadth in the glistening tresses of the
lady of the house. Two mirrors satisfy her, at last, that folds and
flounces and flowers are still adjusted to a nicety, but still there
weighs on her mind the list of precedence, and the probable contingency
that the most important guest may not turn up at all. Perhaps it may
come across even her conventional mind that there are games for which
it is scarce worth while to purchase such expensive candles, and that a
two o’clock dinner with the children is a more agreeable repast, after
all. Ay! even at the best, there is a speck on the _épergne_, an earwig
in the flower-basket, a flavour of wormwood in the liquid amber called
champagne. _Surgit amari_ over and over again! Perhaps it was not so
in that banquet of which the halt and the maimed and the blind were
invited to partake. Perhaps there are no insects in a dinner of herbs;
no heart-burnings in the crust we share with hunger; no bitter drop in
that cup, though it be but cold water, wherewith we pledge celestial
charity, and ‘entertain an angel unawares.’
Chastelâr was flushed and preoccupied; thus much was apparent to the
eyes that watched him with such eager interest. Ever and anon he
glanced uneasily towards the royal table, but ere long something he
noticed there seemed to give him intense satisfaction, and filling his
goblet to the brim, he devoted himself, like an accomplished gallant,
to his fair neighbour. Such is the nature of his sex. A woman always
feels a little humbled when she thinks she has been too gracious, even
towards a favourite; a man, on the contrary, though his affections may
be fixed elsewhere, considers it due to himself to be as captivating
as he can. And then they talk of female vanity and female love of
admiration.
‘I was sorry for my young knight to-day,’ said Mary Hamilton, not, it
must be confessed, very truthfully, and without raising her eyes to her
companion’s face. ‘Poor boy! he would have been so pleased to win. I
wish he had carried off the prize.’
Chastelâr could not forbear giving her a meaning look.
‘And yet you did not choose him,’ he said. ‘He was given you by
the Queen. Did he really carry your good wishes with him, Mistress
Hamilton? I marvel his lance could fail; if I had thought that, mine
would hardly have been so steady.’
He scarce knew what he was saying. Flushed with success; intoxicated
with his own wild happiness; excited as such imaginative natures are
by music, lights, wine, and beauty, he was in that reckless mood which
drains pleasure eagerly from every cup, and thinks not of to-morrow.
‘You are jesting with me,’ she answered, in a low, trembling voice.
Oh! had he known how these light words of his thrilled to that kind
unsuspecting heart, he would have spared her for very pity’s sake.
‘Nay, fair mistress,’ he replied, gaily, ‘I do not jest with _you_;
there are some with whom to break jests is like breaking lances,
sharp-pointed ones, too, and ending in a combat _à l’outrance_. I am
afraid of you, Mistress Hamilton.’
‘Why so?’ she asked, looking up at him with her clear, guileless eyes.
‘Am I so very formidable? You do not seem much afraid of anything
to-night.’
A gleam of triumph shot from his eyes, and once more he glanced towards
the upper end of the hall, then lowering his voice, he whispered--
‘There are contests in which to win is as perilous as to lose. There
are lists in which the true knight fights unarmed whilst his adversary
is clothed in steel. Give me my _coup-de-grâce_, Mistress Hamilton,’
he added, with a bright smile, ‘I must depart now to prepare for the
masque. Before I go I yield me “rescue or no rescue.”’
‘You have a merciful jailer,’ was all she could trust herself to reply;
but as he rose from his seat and left the hall, Mary Hamilton’s eyes
followed him with a wistful, longing gaze, and Mary Hamilton’s heart
thrilled in her bosom, with a keen sense of pleasure that was not far
removed from pain.
Meanwhile the banquet progressed merrily, not uncheered by those
lively strains that have made Scotch music, from time immemorial, so
appropriate to all scenes of merry-making or excitement. Wine, too,
flowed freely, for the stalwart barons would, indeed, have deemed
themselves wanting in respect to their sovereign had they stinted their
accustomed measure because they sat at a queen’s table. Thirsty souls
they were, some of those iron old paladins, and quaffed such mighty
draughts as their degenerate descendants would scarce believe; but
it was observed that those among them who were most liberal in their
potations, became also graver, more dignified and sententious, in
proportion to the quantity they imbibed.
Here and there a vacant seat might be perceived, as several gallants
quitted the feast by stealth to prepare for the coming pageant, which
was tacitly conceded to be a surprise.
Ere long the lower tables, at the extremity of the hall, were drawn,
and their occupants, gathering round the royal circle, began to display
that flutter of expectation which pervades all assemblies when there is
anything to be seen.
Presently two grave ushers with white wands threw open the
folding-doors, and, amidst peals of laughter from the men, and
exclamations of astonishment, not without a shriek or two, from the
ladies, in rushed a troop of satyrs, and commenced clearing a space in
the middle of the hall for the further exhibition of the performances.
These masquers were in uncouth and fantastic disguise: their
flesh-coloured coverings were adorned with wreaths of oak-leaf and ivy;
horns sprouted from their brows; goat-skins covered their nether limbs,
which terminated in cloven feet; and long tails depended from their
backs, which they brandished in their hands, and used as whips to clear
a passage in the throng.
The Queen clapped her hands, and laughed aloud. ‘None but Sebastian
could have plotted this,’ she exclaimed. ‘Come hither, ’Bastian, that
we may thank thee for thine ingenious device.’
The satyr thus summoned, who seemed indeed the leader of the rest, and
no mean representative of the god Pan, approached the royal presence
with quaint reverence, beating a measured dance with his cloven feet,
and brandishing his tail the while.
James Geddes, the fool, in an irrepressible state of excitement, could
not forbear imitating his gestures with a grotesque fidelity that
provoked shouts of laughter.
Sebastian, somewhat irritated, and taking advantage of his position,
struck at him viciously with his tail; but the fool, familiar with such
salutes, dodged it adroitly, and the blow fell across the shapely leg
of the English ambassador, who winced, and turned crimson with the pain.
Mr Randolph, however, had far too much self-command to betray his
anger, which was little alleviated by the laughter that the Queen could
not repress.
‘How now?’ quoth the statesman, trying hard to force a smile; ‘is Pan
like Atropos, that he spares neither Wisdom nor Folly, but smites down
all alike?’
‘It’s the knave aye gets the fule’s arles,’[7] remarked James; ‘or he
wadna be siccan a knave; an’ it’s the fule aye tynes[8] them, or he
wadna be siccan a fule!’
[7] Wages.
[8] Losses.
And so speaking, he sat composedly down at the Queen’s feet, pulling a
grimace at the same time that was too much even for the Earl of Moray’s
gravity.
The satyrs then proceeded to enclose a space for the coming masque. So
thorough was their disguise as to baffle even the keen eyes of those
who were most interested in their identity; and as the sylvan monsters
ranged themselves on each side the hall, soft voices behind them
whispered--
‘Are you Sholto?’ or, ‘It _must_ be Archibald!’ to receive no more
satisfactory answer than a stifled laugh.
A flourish of music now announced the continuation of the pageant, and
the three planets, Mercury, Mars, and Venus, made their appearance,
habited in robes of silver gauze and spangles: the first, winged
strictly according to mythology at head and heel; the God of War, armed
with glittering helmet, flashing buckler, and greaves of burnished
gold; and the Queen of Beauty, represented by young George Douglas,
extremely embarrassed with her draperies, and blushing as Venus surely,
save on one memorable occasion, never blushed in her life.
These representations of the starry host were then succeeded by the
Nine Muses, all in different colours, and, notwithstanding their
beardless faces and classical folds, displaying legs unusually muscular
for Muses, and also a good deal more limb than is customary with that
sex to which the ‘tuneful Nine’ are supposed to belong.
Melpomene, too, could not forbear laughing outright; Clio, albeit
the daughter of memory, forgot whether she was herself or Urania;
and Terpsichore, somewhat flushed with sack, caught her feet in her
petticoats, and narrowly escaped the indignity of entering the royal
presence on her head. They trooped off, however, after making their
obeisance to the Queen, and ranged themselves in front of the satyrs on
either side the hall.
After them a score of cavaliers, mounted on the well-known hobby-horse,
of which the sweeping housings concealed its rider’s real legs, whilst
his false ones dangled outside in ludicrous union with its gambols,
plunged and frolicked into the apartment. Half were represented
as huntsmen, half as heathen Turks, and they blew their horns, or
brandished their scimitars, with an energetic gravity edifying to
behold. One truculent-looking Saracen earned immortal honour by the
life like manner in which he backed his hobby-horse the whole length
of the hall, and then caused it to rear straight on end ere he took up
his position, counterfeiting inimitably the coquetry of the practised
rider, and the repressed mettle of the unwilling yet obedient steed.
Some of the courtiers whispered that it was Lord John Stuart; others,
the Grand Falconer; not a few believed it to be the Warden of the
Marches in disguise; but the better informed were all the time aware
that it was no less a personage than Her Majesty’s head cook.
Then came pilgrims decked with sandals and scalloped shell, leading
with them bears, wolves, tigers, and an occasional unicorn; all these
quadrupeds presenting alike the anomaly of a pair of hind legs jointed
the wrong way, but performing their parts in other respects with
decorous fidelity, and an obvious difficulty in keeping up with their
leaders. These were succeeded by musicians bearing lutes, harps, wind
instruments, and guitars, dumb indeed in reality, but going through all
the motions of a lively measure, which the Queen’s real musicians were
playing for their encouragement.
Next came two little cupids armed with silver bows and baldricks, their
rosy limbs uncovered, and their golden curls mingling with the wings of
gauze that stood from their shoulders. Pretty urchins they were, but
somewhat too young for their task, and already rubbing their sleepy
eyes with dimpled little fists. Hand in hand, they trotted into the
hall boldly enough, but ere half the distance was accomplished their
hearts failed them; they stopped, looked about them, and one began
to cry. This was too much for his little companion’s philosophy, who
incontinently followed his example, but both were immediately caught up
by some of the ladies, and quickly caressed into composure. The Queen,
too, had them brought to her forthwith, and soothing them with kind
words and sweetmeats, sent them to bed happy and consoled.
During this unexpected interlude, the principal feature of the pageant,
and one which had tasked to the utmost the ingenuity of its contrivers,
now entered the hall. It consisted of a fleet of ships constructed of
light wicker-work, and moved upon wheels, which were worked unseen
from within. The sides of these galleys were formed of cloth, coloured
to represent beams of cedar, fastened and inlaid with gold; the masts
and spars were gilt, the tackle of silver tissue, and the sails of
gauze. A murmur of admiration greeted the pageant as it glided up the
hall with the stately motion of ships sailing over a smooth sea.
On the deck of each bark stood an unknown lord, dressed with the utmost
magnificence, and closely-masked. So resolved were these silken pirates
not to be identified, that their doublets, their hose, and even their
gloves, were padded so as to conceal the shape of their figures, their
limbs, and their very hands. They were known to be gallants of the
Court, but that was all. The nobles laughed and applauded, their dames
whispered and speculated, when, with a burst of music rising into loud,
triumphant tones, the ships increased their speed, and the leading
galley, closely followed by the rest, bore swiftly down upon the circle
which contained the Queen and her ladies, with obvious intention of a
capture.
Each masquer took a partner by the hand, and courteously entreated
her in dumb show to enter his gorgeous bark. The Queen first set the
example of compliance, and amidst shouts of admiration the barks veered
round, and, doubly freighted, floated once more proudly down the hall.
Then the squadron divided, the sails were furled, the voyagers
disembarked, and each gallant kneeling low as he gave his hand to his
companion and helped her to alight, unmasked at the same instant,
while the music changing to a merry lilt, the couples found themselves
arranged in due order to tread a well-known measure called ‘the
Purpose,’ on the polished floor.
This ‘Purpose,’ as it was called--a word which signified confidential
conversation--was a dance resembling the cotillon so popular with our
grandmothers, and not entirely despised to-day when lights are waning
after a night of festivity, and gloves are soiled, and flowers faded,
and cheeks begin to pale before the coming dawn. Then is the moment
to infuse fictitious vigour borrowed from excitement into the closing
scene--then the careful mother at the emptying doorway, with shawl and
wrapper on her braceleted arm, waves her unwelcome summons to the
bounding damsel, warmed up into bloom once more, and every turn is
precious now because every turn must be the last. Then shall the prey,
which has been playing round it all night, gorge the glittering bait
for good and all. Wind up the reel, in with the tackle, out with the
landing-net--goldfish or gudgeon, he is gasping helpless on the bank;
but had it not been for the cotillon, he might have been wriggling
his tail even now in derision through the elusive waters, might have
despised the fire and ignored the frying-pan to this day.
The ‘Purpose’ was so called because the figure exacted that at stated
intervals the couples should dance together through the doorway into an
adjoining room, and having made the circuit of that apartment, should
return, unbosomed of any secrets they might have had to interchange, to
the rest of the laughing company. It was a figure obviously adopted for
the triumph of coquetry, and the discomfiture of mankind.
The leading pirate had dutifully borne off the Queen, and when he
unmasked, Mary discovered that Chastelâr was to be her partner in the
dance. The poet’s manner was more full of deference than usual, but
there was a light of unearthly happiness in his eye.
Randolph had secured Mary Beton, nothing loth. That very morning the
ambassador had received instructions from his Government to leave no
stone unturned till he had discovered the Queen’s predilections amongst
the numerous marriages that were proposed to her, all and each of which
gave Elizabeth such disquiet. He proceeded now deliberately to sound
her principal maid-of-honour, under cover of making fierce love to her
himself.
With the loud music and the long intervals of inaction there was ample
opportunity for the process.
‘We shall soon have nobler doings even than these,’ observed Mr
Randolph, whispering confidentially to his partner, ‘when another
royal wedding gladdens the walls of Holyrood. Shall we dance the
Spaniard’s bolero, or the Austrian’s gavolte, or our own old English
brawl? Whatever be the measure, Mistress Beton, my only hope is that we
may dance it together.’
Randolph looked very tenderly at her while he spoke, and his partner’s
ruff heaved visibly.
‘Nay; you statesmen are too premature,’ she replied. ‘Ladies are not
to be thus wooed and won in a day, much less queens. The Archduke, Don
Carlos, Lord Robert--which of them can be called a fitting mate for our
Sovereign? You must not hurry us thus, Mr Randolph; you are indiscreet.’
‘And cannot you guess why I am so anxious for your mistress to marry?’
whispered the insidious statesman, pressing nearer to his listener.
‘Is it not that alone which will free her beautiful maidens from their
self-imposed celibacy? Till that auspicious day even our thoughts are
not our own, and a man of honour must be tongue-tied on the subject
nearest his heart.’
Mary Beton blushed and trembled. It was almost a declaration, and from
that impenetrable and capable man! The staid maid-of-honour was losing
her head every moment.
‘It may come sooner than any of us think,’ she murmured, giving him
her hand to lead her, as the dance demanded, on their tour through
the rooms. ‘Sooner than any of us desire,’ she added, with a sudden
resumption of her usual stateliness.
He pressed the hand affectionately, and his voice became exceedingly
trusting and confidential. Mr Randolph was a man who never hesitated to
waste a sprat for the purpose of catching a salmon.
‘It will not be Lord Robert,’ said he; ‘I can tell you that, though it
is as much as my life is worth. But I would trust you with my head,
beautiful Mistress Beton--far rather than my heart,’ he added, in a low
fond voice; ‘were it not indeed too late to make that reservation.’
The light seemed to swim in Mary Beton’s eyes, and the music was like
surging water in her ears. A true woman, despite her natural caution
and her court education, she returned confidence for confidence.
‘They do talk of a bridegroom,’ she whispered. ‘It is a secret, Mr
Randolph; but I feel I am safe with you. The Countess of Lennox has
already suggested her son, and I think the Queen is not averse to the
idea. If it _should_ ever be,’ she added, with rising colour and some
hesitation, ‘we shall be differently circumstanced, of course; and, in
short, the future must always be uncertain for us all.’
He replied with less warmth than she perhaps expected; but his
commonplaces were extremely polite, nay complimentary, and when he led
her back to the company, there was that complacent expression on his
countenance, which is worn by a man who finds in the hand dealt him the
leading card of the game.
Far different was the ‘Purpose’ entertained by Walter Maxwell and
Mary Carmichael, in their interval of conversation. With the frank
kindliness of his nature, that honest gentleman had determined at least
to ask an explanation, ere he condemned at once and for ever the woman
he felt he still loved only too well.
With this intention he had joined the merry band of masquers, though
his heart was sadly out of tune for mirth, and had carried off his
mistress without hesitation from the fair circle who were waiting to
be abducted. Nay, when he unmasked, and Mistress Carmichael, who had
recognised him from the first, stole a look at his face, it wore its
usual grave but kindly expression, and the displeasure which had so
discomfited her all day, and spoilt her gaiety all night, had entirely
disappeared. He was determined to be just and kind and temperate in his
dealing with her, though more than life depended on the result.
When he spoke it was in a low, soft voice, but every syllable was
strangely emphatic and distinct.
‘I behaved unkindly in the Queen’s Park,’ said he, ‘but I was hurt and
offended at your conduct. Had I not cause?’
She blushed, yet her eye was bright with repressed exultation.
‘How have I offended you?’ she asked, quickly. ‘I would not do so
willingly, you know.’
‘I thought you different from the others,’ he resumed, with more
agitation. ‘In common charity I ask to be undeceived. Did I not see you
in the Abbey garden the night before last?’
She trembled all over, but looked him full in the face nevertheless,
yet so scared, so startled.
‘What then?’ she murmured, in obvious agitation.
‘You were not alone,’ he continued, with a severe brow; ‘who was your
companion?’
She drew a long breath as if immensely relieved, nay, she almost smiled
as she replied--
‘Then, you do not know? you cannot even guess?’
‘Had I known,’ he answered, significantly, ‘it would not have been the
lady I should have questioned.’
She raised her head haughtily.
‘And by what right do you question the lady now?’ she exclaimed. ‘Am
I answerable to Walter Maxwell for my conduct? I take leave to think,
sir, you might be better employed than in watching my movements.’
He was growing very angry and consequently calmer every second.
‘You had rather give no explanation?’ he said, with studied politeness.
She bowed her head in silence, but the colour was fading faster and
faster from her cheek.
‘You decline it,’ he added, still very low, but through his set teeth.
‘Distinctly!’ answered the lady, adding, as only a woman would at such
a moment, ‘You are neglecting the figure, the dance is going on without
you.’
After this the pair derived but small gratification, we imagine,
from the amusements of the evening. Walter Maxwell took the earliest
opportunity of departing to cool his irritation in the night air,
whither, as we dislike seeing a strong man wrestling with pain, we will
not follow him. Mary Carmichael, however, bore her part bravely to the
end; and although her answers were at times a little absent, and her
laughter somewhat misplaced, none could have guessed by her outward
bearing that she had so recently seen the great stake of her life’s
happiness set, played for, and lost. She was not the only gambler in
the hall. There was one heart amongst those dancers within a few yards
of her that had resolved to-night to play the great game in which
the odds were incalculably against it, and which to lose was ruin
entire and irretrievable. There were a couple now gracefully moving
through the figure of ‘the Purpose,’ as the music swelled and sank in
triumphant harmony or pleading sweetness, of whom one was enjoying
unconsciously the gratification of the moment, gay, kindly, generous,
and impressionable, yet calm and dignified because thinking no evil,
and the other with beating heart and swimming brain was steeped to the
lips in the intoxication of that madness which comes but once in a
lifetime, and seems to have but one fatal and invariable result.
Woe to the idolater! It is written on the tables of stone: Woe to
the idolater! Be the image what it may, wood brass, or marble, or
one ‘a little lower than the angels,’ whom the worshipper must needs
exalt above the Being to whom the heavenly Host itself is but as dust
in the hollow of a man’s hand. The punishment shall not come from
abroad; it shall not be wrought by foreign enmity, nor owe its keenest
pang to foreign injustice. If so, the sting would be extracted; the
vengeance incomplete. No; Dagon alone shall crush the deluded votary
who grovelled at Dagon’s pedestal. It is the hand he trusted that shall
strike him to the heart, the feet he kissed that shall spurn him in the
dust. When he shall have stripped himself of all to do his false god
service; when he shall have lost his friends, his wealth, his fame,
his self-respect, and forfeited his honour, and pawned his birthright,
then, and not till then, shall the image of stone rock and totter and
fall upon him and crush him to powder. Were there no world but this, it
would indeed be better for that man that he had never been born.
The Dagon of to-night was fair to look on, queenly and graceful and
gloriously beautiful. It seemed unnatural to refuse her homage; it
seemed ecstasy to kneel and supplicate and adore. The worshipper was in
the wildest stage of his idolatry. He looked for no greater glory than
to lay down life and heart and soul at her feet.
What good results could come from such a link between the lovely Queen
of Scotland and the infatuated minstrel of France?