deals from our old pine-woods of Aggerhuis--hazel cuts and
harrowbills"----
"Ay, ay; and had stowed on board my new lading, being crammed to the
hatches with tanned leather, earthenware, and Scottish beer, wheat and
malt, for which I expect to realize a goodly sum in round dollars among
the cities on the Sound, where I would long since have furled my
topsails, but for a rascally English pirate that hath cruised off the
mouth of the fiord (or frith as the Scots call it), and I dared not put
to sea, though ready to sail, with the free cocquet of the queen's
conservator in my pouch, and my ship hove short upon her cable; for this
is my last venture, and under hatches I carry all that must make or mar
for ever the fortune of old Hans Knuber."
"Thou didst tell me some news from old Norway, I now remember, on that
night Earl Bothwell's page led me here."
"Why, thou wert like the spectre of a drowned man--St. Erick be with us!
But here--drain thy cup of barley ptisan, and I will tell thee more in
good time."
Konrad drank the decoction prescribed by the physician, and impatiently
said--
"Thou sawest my good friend, the old knight Rosenkrantz, I warrant?"
"I did," replied Hans gravely.
"And how looked he?"
"Stiff enow, Master Konrad; for he was lying in his coffin, with his
spurs on his heels, and his sword girt about him."
Konrad was thunderstruck, and barely able to articulate; he gazed
inquiringly at Hans.
"True it is, this sad story," said the seaman, wiping a tear away with
the back of his brawny hand; "thou knowest well how all the province
loved the bluff old knight, who was never without a smile or a kind word
for the humblest among us; and faith he never allowed old Hans Knuber to
pass his hall door without putting a long horn of dricka under his belt.
But Sir Erick is gone now, and the king's castle of Bergen (ah! thou
rememberest _that_) is a desolate place enough. And honest Sueno
Throndson, that most puffy and important of chamberlains, he is gone to
his last home too. He went to Zealand in the ship of Jans Thorson, to
hang Sir Erick's shield, with all his arms fairly emblazoned thereon,
among those of other dead Knights of the Elephant, in the subterranean
chapel of Fredericksborg; but Jans, as thou knowest, could never keep a
good reckoning, and, by not allowing duly for variation and leeway, was
sucked by the moskenstrom, with all his crew, right down into the bowels
of the earth. St. Olaus sain them!"
"Poor Sir Erick!" said Konrad, heedless of the fate of Jans, while his
tears fell fast.
"Dost thou not know that King Frederick had created him Count of Bergen,
and Lord of Welsoeoe, for his services in the old Holstein war?"
"Of all these passages, I have heard nothing."
"His niece, the Lady Anna, will be a countess now, as well as the
richest heiress in the kingdom. Baggage that she is! Her uncle never
recovered her desertion of his home for the arms of that Scottish lord,
whom, if I had him here, I would string up to my gaff peak. By the
mass! the old knight's heart was broken, for he loved thee as a son, and
Anna as a daughter; but to the devil say I with women, for they all yaw
in their course somehow, and require a strong hand at the tiller to make
them lie well to the wind. This Anna, God's murrain"----
"Hold thee, Hans Knuber!" said Konrad, with something of his old air of
dignity and authority; "for, nevertheless all thy kindness, I will not
permit thee to breathe one word that is ungracious of Anna."
"As thou pleasest, lad," replied the seaman, taking off his fur cap to
wipe his capacious head; "I thought 'twould relieve thee somewhat to
hear one who had so shamefully misused thee roundly cursed."
"Oh no! never!" replied the young man in a low voice; "Oh, Hans! thou
knowest not the depth and the enthusiasm of this passion that hath
bewitched me. It banishes every angry thought from my mind, and leaves
only a sense of desolation and agony, that can never die but with
myself."
"Now, by the bones of Lodbrog! but I have no patience with this. How! a
bold fellow like thee to be caterwauling thus, like a cat on a gutter?
Go to! The Lubeckers and Holsteiners are again displaying their banners
on the Elbe and Weser. Assume thy sword and helmet again. Thou hast
the world before thee, with a fair wind; and what matters it leaving a
false woman and a slighted love behind? Cheerily, ho! Master Konrad; a
love that is easily won is lightly lost."
"False as this girl has been to me, Hans, there are times when her
bright smile and her winning voice, and all the memory of our happy
early days, come back to me in their first freshness and joy, and my
soul melts within me. _Then_, Hans--in moments like these--I feel that,
were she repentant, I could love her as of old. Oh, yes! I could
forgive her--I could press her to my breast, and worship her as I did
even in those days that have passed to return no more.
"Well, well--as thou pleasest. Take another gulp of this barley
drench--thy ptisan. Get strong and healthy ere we see old Norway, where
she is gone before thee with Christian Alborg, in the _Biornen_, and who
knoweth what the clouds of futurity may conceal? An old love is easily
rekindled, I have heard, though, by the mass! I know little of such
gear; though _this_ I know, that the castle of Bergen, with the young
countess's lordship of Welsoeoe, would make a very snug roadstead to
drop one's anchor in;" and, with a leering wink, Hans Knuber once more
clambered to the upper deck, where he drew his fur cap over his bushy
brows, thrust his hands into his pockets, and scowled defiance at the
small white speck that, near the Isle of May, still marked where the
English pirate lay cruising in the offing.
*CHAPTER XI.*
*HOW BOTHWELL MADE USE OF THE BOND.*
I love you better--oh! better far than
Woman was ever loved. There's not an hour
Of day or dreaming night, but I am with thee;
There's not a wind but whispers of thy name,
And not a flower that sleeps beneath the moon,
But in its hues or fragrance tells a tale
Of thee, my love!
_Mirandola, a Tragedy._
It was the 23rd of April, four days after the great supper described in
chapter 9th, when the queen, without her guard of archers, and
accompanied only by a slender retinue, passed along the Stirling road
towards Edinburgh. She was mounted on her celebrated white palfrey,
with its bridle and housings covered with silver bosses and elaborate
embroidery; and with surpassing grace she managed it, the stately animal
bowing its arched neck, and champing the burnished bit, as if proud of
its beautiful rider.
Mary wore a long and flowing riding-habit of dark cloth, laced with
silver about the neck and sleeves. It came close up to her dimpled
chin, where a thick frill, or little ruff, stuck stiffly out all round.
She had her glossy hair drawn back from her snow-white temples, under
her lace cap of widowhood (the far-famed Queen Mary cap), that drooped
over her brow, while cocked jauntily a little on one side, she wore one
of those small sugar-loaf hats which were then so fashionable. A
diamond band encircled it, and a veil of the richest lace danced from it
in the evening wind, as she caricoled along the old narrow horseway that
wound among the fields near the ancient manor of Sauchton.
She was accompanied by only five attendants, among whom were Huntly,
Lethington the secretary, and Sir James Melville of Halhill. With her
colour brightened by the exercise of riding, and her eyes sparkling with
animation and pleasure, (for she had just been paying a visit to the
infant prince at Stirling--a visit fated to be her last,) when her veil
was wafted aside, Mary's face seemed to glow with a beauty and vivacity,
to which her smart beaver hat lent additional piquancy; and she
conversed with more than her usual gaiety and thoughtlessness to the
politic Melville, the subtle secretary, and their better man, the
stately young chieftain of the house of Gordon. On her wrist sat the
gift of her father's aged falconer, (James Lindesay of Westschaw,) one
of those beautiful falcons which made their eyry in a perpendicular rock
on the West-hill of Alva, where, says the Magister Absalom, never more
than one pair have been known to build a nest, even unto this time.
The day was serene; the sun was verging westward, and large masses of
shadow lay deepening on the Pentland hills, while the bright flush of
the sunlight beamed upon their steep acclivities and heather-brows with
a golden tint. The sky was cloudless, and the whole of that magnificent
plain, which spreads from the western gates of Edinburgh to those of
Glasgow, was clad in all the rural beauty of an early summer. Warmed by
the April showers, the trees were putting forth their greenest leaves,
and the pink foxglove and blue-bells were bordering the highway; while
the wildbrier, the mountain thyme, and the rose of Gueldres, filled the
air with perfume.
"Oh joy! how beautiful!" said Mary, as she checked her palfrey on the
high and ancient bridge that crossed the Leith near the old baronial
manor of the Elphinstones, whose broad dark chimneys were seen peeping
above a grove of beeches. "See! yonder is the town, with its castle and
St. Giles' spire shining blood-red in the light of the sunset, above the
bright green copsewood. And look, Monsieur Huntly, what a delightful
little cottage by the side of that river! The green ivy, the wild roses,
and the woodbine, are all clambering about its thatched roof--nothing is
visible but its little door. Ah, Jane, _ma bonne_!" she exclaimed to her
sister Argyle, "how I should love to live there, with nothing to attend
to but my flowers and music, and a nice little cow to milk."
"I fear your majesty would soon be ennueeyed to death, and longing for
Holyrood, with its floors of oak and walls of velvet tapestry, with your
archers at the gate and pages in the corridor," replied the grave
Lethington, with a smile of something between amusement and sarcasm at
the simplicity of the young queen.
At the cottage door an old woman was sprinkling water on a herd of
cattle, with broom dipped from time to time in a tub, at the bottom of
which lay a perforated stone, which was deemed a sovereign remedy
against all witchcraft; but, suddenly ceasing her employment, she
curtsied lowly to the lady, of whose exalted rank she was ignorant.
The scenery was very fine, for the country was then more thickly wooded
almost than now, and afar off shone the rugged outline of Edinburgh,
rearing up on its ridgy hills, with the great square spire of its
cathedral, and the lofty towers and bastel-houses of its castle,
clustering on lofty and perpendicular rocks. Close by the road, arose
the double peaks of Craiglockhart; one covered with pastures of emerald
green, the other bluff with whin-tufted basalt, and crowned with gloomy
firs; while, following its winding and devious course, the Leith brawled
and gurgled over its pebbled bed. Brightly the sunlight danced upon the
dimpled water; already in blossom, the lilac groves that shaded it were
filling the air with fragrance; their white and purple flowers being at
times relieved by the pale green of the willow, the golden laburnum, and
the pink cups of the wild-roses; while every flower and blade of grass
were glittering in the early dew of the April evening. Unseen, amid the
thick foliage that bordered the highway, a thousand birds were filling
the air with a melody, that died away even as the sun's rays died upon
the distant hills, and the saffron glow of the west assumed the sombre
tint of the gloaming.
The young Highland earl, who rode by Mary's side, was charmed with her
vivacity, and conversed with her alone; while the more phlegmatic
Lethington and Melville jogged together a few paces behind, very intent
on their own intrigues and correspondence with Elizabeth of England,
with Cecil, and with Killigrew; both of whom, though able statesmen and
subtle politicians, will be found, if tried by the rules of justice and
honour, the greatest villains that ever breathed. The beauty of the
scenery, and the buoyancy of the air, raised Mary's vivacity, and
increased her brilliant wit; and she often made the thickets echo with
her musical laugh, or a verse of a merry French song; till a sudden turn
of the road brought them full in view of a sight that made her utter a
faint cry of alarm, rein up her palfrey with one hand, and with the
other grasp the arm of Huntly, who instantly drew his sword.
Right across that narrow path was drawn up the imposing line of a
thousand horsemen in close array, all sheathed in armour, with the
points of their uplifted lances, their breastplates, and conical
helmets, glittering in the setting sun. Their flanks, which extended
into the fields on each side, were well thrown forward, so as completely
to encircle the terrified queen and her little retinue. A few yards in
front were two knights with their visors up; one bore a standard
displaying two Scottish lions rending a red rose, and by his sable
armour, his negro-like visage, and colossal frame, all recognised Hob of
Ormiston; but in the other, whose light suit of mail, engrained with
gold, was white as winter frost, and reached only to the knees of his
scarlet hose, they knew the Earl of Bothwell. He leaped from his horse,
and, drawing off his right gauntlet, advanced reverentially towards the
queen on foot.
"What foul treason is meditated here?" asked Huntly sternly, as the Earl
passed him.
"None; but thou shalt see," replied the other with a smile, "that I will
now wed the queen--yea, _whether she will or not_!"[*]
[*] See Melville.
"Now by my father's soul!" began Huntly furiously.
"How!" said Secretary Lethington, with one of his cold and placid
smiles; "has your lordship already forgotten the supper, and the bond?"
"Jesu Maria!" muttered Huntly; "I foresaw not this!"
"Your grace will hold me excused," said the Earl of Bothwell, grasping
the bridle of Mary's palfrey; "but your own safety and the commonweal
require that I should, without a moment's delay, lead you to my castle
of Dunbar."
"Mother of God! How--why?" asked Mary in an agitated voice, as she
gazed on the face of the Earl, which was pale as death; for the
magnitude of the crime he contemplated, had for a moment appalled even
himself. "With what am I menaced? Is there a raid among the Lennox
men--an invasion of the English--or what? Who is my enemy?"
"James of Bothwell, as this sword shall prove!" exclaimed the young Earl
of Huntly, making a furious blow at the noble's tempered helmet--a blow
that must have cloven him to the chin, had not Bolton and Hob Ormiston
crossed their lances, and interfered with the speed of light; but Hob's
tough ash standard pole was cut in two.
"Mass!" he exclaimed; "now hold thee, Earl Huntly, or, with my jeddart
staff, I will deal thee a dirl on the crown that will hang a scutcheon
on the gate of castle Gordon for the next year."
The horsemen closed up with levelled lances, and the gentlemen of the
queen's train were immediately disarmed.
"To Dunbar! to Dunbar!" cried Bothwell, leaping on horseback, but still
retaining the queen's bridle.
"For what end, Lord Earl, and for what purpose, am I to be thus
escorted, or made captive, I know not which? Tell me, I implore--nay, I
demand of thee as my liegeman and vassal?"
"I refer your majesty to my advisers here present, to the Earl of Huntly
and the Knight of Lethington; but fear not, dearest madam, for I am
devoted to you in body and in soul, and I swear to you by the four
blessed gospels, that I have only your weal at heart. Oh, come with
me--come without resistance; for resistance would be vain!"
"Darest thou to say so?"
"Pardon me; but once within the gates of Dunbar, that stately castle
with which thou didst so graciously gift me, I will tell thee all. On,
on--knights and horsemen! for the night is closing fast, and I can
foresee that, natheless the beauty of this April eve, we shall have a
storm of no common potency."
Mary's pride, which never for a moment deserted her, impelled
resistance; her dark eyes filled with fire; she grew very pale; her
beautiful mouth expressed all the scorn and anger that swelled up in her
breast, and she endeavoured to snatch her bridle from the hand of the
Earl; but at that moment the soft persuasive voice of Secretary Maitland
addressed her, and his hand touched her arm lightly. He spoke in an
under tone, and what he said was unheard by the Earl; but his wily
eloquence was never exercised in vain, and that tact which bent the most
stubborn nobles to his purpose, was not likely to prove ineffectual upon
the too facile and gentle Mary.
"Be it so!" she replied with hauteur. "_De tout, mon coeur_! I will
bide my time; but, Sir William of Lethington, if this raid should prove
as my mind misgiveth me, by every blessed saint my vengeance will be
terrible!"
The cold statesman bowed with one of his inexplicable smiles as he
reined back his horse; and then, by the command of Bothwell, the whole
train set forward at a furious pace, which the Earl had no wish to
diminish, for the double purpose of avoiding the alternate questions,
threats, and intreaties of the queen, and escaping the fury of a sudden
storm, that, with singular rapidity, had converted that beautiful
evening into one of darkness and gloom.
Agitated, by turns, with astonishment, vexation, indignation, and fear,
the queen rode on, reserving her enquiries till they should reach
Dunbar.
But why to Dunbar, and not to Holyrood?
A thousand terrors and fancies flitted across her mind. Perhaps the
principal nobles had again leagued to slay her, as they had done when
her brother rose in rebellion; perhaps he was again in arms, with
Lindesay, Glencairn, and all the furious upholders of that new doctrine,
which she openly feared and secretly abhored.
The clank of a thousand suits of armour, and the rush of four times that
number of galloping hoofs on the hard dusty road, stunned and confused
her; while the figures of the mail-clad riders, their tall lances, and
Bothwell's rustling banner, the hills and copsewood that overhung their
way, grew darker and duskier as the sky became veiled by the heavy
clouds that came up in masses from the German sea.
The summits of the mountains were veiled in descending mist; the air
became close and still, and afar off the broad red gleams of the sheet
lightning brightened in the sky, revealing in bold outline the ridges of
the distant hills, and the waving woods that crowned their summits.
Edinburgh, with its walls and gates, was left behind in night and
obscurity; the marshes of Restalrig, where every moment their chargers
floundered to the girths; the dreary Figgate whins, where every pace was
encumbered with roots and other remains of an old primeval forest; and
the ruined chapel of Mary Magdalene--were passed; and the captive queen,
with her escort, were galloping along that far expanse of sandy beach,
where the white-crested waves rolled with a sullen boom on the desert
shore.
Now the clanging hoofs rang like thunder on the broad flagged pavement
of the ancient Roman way, that led directly over the picturesque old
bridge built by the soldiers of Agricola, and where a strong iron gate,
erected transversely across the centre arch, closed the passage after
nightfall. But a blast from Ormiston's bugle-horn summoned the
gateward, cowering and shivering from his seat by the ingle; for now,
from the darkened sky, the heavy rain was pattering upon the hurrying
river. At the imperious command, to "make way for the Lord Earl of
Bothwell!" the barrier was instantly unclosed, and on swept the train in
all its military show, each horseman stooping his helmeted head, and
lowering the point of his long Scottish spear, as he passed under the
low-browed gate, and wheeled to the left, by the base of the mound,
where still the Roman trenches lay, as strong and as visible as when the
cohorts of the empire raised there a temple to "Apollo, the
long-haired."
Then Musselburgh, the chapel of Loretto, with its demolished tombs and
desecrated shrines, old Pinkiecleugh, with its woods and tower, where
Abbot Durie dwelt, were left behind, and once more the train was
sweeping along the echoing shore, by the margin of the midnight
sea--with the thunder rumbling among the hills, and the rain and the
storm adding spurs to their headlong speed. By midnight they reined up
before the castle of Dunbar, where broad and vast, in all their ancient
strength and feudal pride, the strong round towers of Bothwell's
princely dwelling stood in clusters on the sea-beaten rocks.
Despite the darkness of the night, and the fury of the storm, which was
pouring the German sea in waves of snow-white foam against the castle
cliffs, the roar of three salvoes of brass culverins from the lower
battlements, burst like peals of thunder on the air; while, red and
forky, the flashes shot forth between the strong embrasures and
deep-mouthed gun-ports of curtain-wall and flanking tower, as the
drawbridge fell, the portcullis ascended, and the glare of twenty
blazing torches flashed under its iron teeth, displaying a court-yard
crowded with the Earl's retainers in jack and morion, his servitors in
livery, and pages glittering in lace and embroidery, grouped beneath the
strong-ribbed archway to receive the queen.
Somewhat assured by this display of loyalty, respect, and security, the
queen permitted Bothwell to kiss her hand as he assisted her to alight,
and led her half sinking from fatigue to the hall, where every thing
appeared as if prepared for her reception; for, thanks to the
forethought of Hob of Ormiston, nothing was ever wanting to complete
those dangerous dramas in which the Earl was now the leading actor; and,
by his contrivance, while the Earl led Mary up the great staircase,
French Paris conducted Sir James Melville and the other gentlemen of her
retinue to a detached tower, where some of his vassals guarded them till
daybreak, when they were expelled from the castle, the gates closed, and
they were left (as Sir James tells us in his memoirs) somewhat
unceremoniously to shift for themselves, and to bear to Edinburgh and
its astonished citizens, the tidings of Bothwell's daring and the
queen's captivity.
*CHAPTER XII.*
*LOVE AND SCORN.*
This gushing life
Is all that I can give in reparation
Of all the wrongs I have done thee.
We shall lie down together in the grave;
And, when the sound of Heaven shall rouse the dead,
We shall awake in one another's arms.
_Shiels' Apostate._
Though the ardour of Bothwell's daring and ambitious passion for Mary
was increased almost to a frenzy, on finding her completely in his
power, within the strong gates and stronger walls of that magnificent
fortress, of which, in an unfortunate moment of liberality, she had made
him governor; he felt his courage sink when the moment came for
revealing the bond of the nobles, the hopes he had cherished, and the
deed of which he had been guilty.
Three great chandeliers of wax candles, which hung from the arched roof
of the lofty hall, shed a blaze of light upon the gobeline tapestry that
covered its walls, from the base to the spring of the vault, which was
profusely decorated with the richest fresco work, where the royal cipher
and the _fleur-de-lys_ were prominently seen. Four gothic pillars
sustained the carved arch of the fireplace, where an enormous grate,
standing on four knobs of brass, was filled with blazing coal. The
floor was covered with thick rush matting; and a magnificent collation
of fruit, confections, and dainties, in baskets of chased silver, flasks
of crystal, and jasper vases, were laid upon the tables by French Paris,
little Calder, and other attendants.