Ah me! the flower and blossom of your house,
The wind hath blown away to other towers.
--JOANNA BAILLIE'S FAMILY LEGEND.
The ancient seat of Lidcote Hall was situated near the village of
the same name, and adjoined the wild and extensive forest of Exmoor,
plentifully stocked with game, in which some ancient rights belonging to
the Robsart family entitled Sir Hugh to pursue his favourite amusement
of the chase. The old mansion was a low, venerable building, occupying
a considerable space of ground, which was surrounded by a deep moat. The
approach and drawbridge were defended by an octagonal tower, of ancient
brickwork, but so clothed with ivy and other creepers that it was
difficult to discover of what materials it was constructed. The angles
of this tower were each decorated with a turret, whimsically various
in form and in size, and, therefore, very unlike the monotonous stone
pepperboxes which, in modern Gothic architecture, are employed for
the same purpose. One of these turrets was square, and occupied as
a clock-house. But the clock was now standing still; a circumstance
peculiarly striking to Tressilian, because the good old knight, among
other harmless peculiarities, had a fidgety anxiety about the exact
measurement of time, very common to those who have a great deal of that
commodity to dispose of, and find it lie heavy upon their hands--just
as we see shopkeepers amuse themselves with taking an exact account of
their stock at the time there is least demand for it.
The entrance to the courtyard of the old mansion lay through an archway,
surmounted by the foresaid tower; but the drawbridge was down, and one
leaf of the iron-studded folding-doors stood carelessly open. Tressilian
hastily rode over the drawbridge, entered the court, and began to
call loudly on the domestics by their names. For some time he was only
answered by the echoes and the howling of the hounds, whose kennel lay
at no great distance from the mansion, and was surrounded by the same
moat. At length Will Badger, the old and favourite attendant of the
knight, who acted alike as squire of his body and superintendent of his
sports, made his appearance. The stout, weather-beaten forester showed
great signs of joy when he recognized Tressilian.
“Lord love you,” he said, “Master Edmund, be it thou in flesh and fell?
Then thou mayest do some good on Sir Hugh, for it passes the wit of
man--that is, of mine own, and the curate's, and Master Mumblazen's--to
do aught wi'un.”
“Is Sir Hugh then worse since I went away, Will?” demanded Tressilian.
“For worse in body--no; he is much better,” replied the domestic; “but
he is clean mazed as it were--eats and drinks as he was wont--but sleeps
not, or rather wakes not, for he is ever in a sort of twilight, that is
neither sleeping nor waking. Dame Swineford thought it was like the dead
palsy. But no, no, dame, said I, it is the heart, it is the heart.”
“Can ye not stir his mind to any pastimes?” said Tressilian.
“He is clean and quite off his sports,” said Will Badger; “hath neither
touched backgammon or shovel-board, nor looked on the big book of
harrowtry wi' Master Mumblazen. I let the clock run down, thinking the
missing the bell might somewhat move him--for you know, Master Edmund,
he was particular in counting time--but he never said a word on't, so
I may e'en set the old chime a-towling again. I made bold to tread on
Bungay's tail too, and you know what a round rating that would ha' cost
me once a-day; but he minded the poor tyke's whine no more than a madge
howlet whooping down the chimney--so the case is beyond me.”
“Thou shalt tell me the rest within doors, Will. Meanwhile, let this
person be ta'en to the buttery, and used with respect. He is a man of
art.”
“White art or black art, I would,” said Will Badger, “that he had any
art which could help us.--Here, Tom Butler, look to the man of art;--and
see that he steals none of thy spoons, lad,” he added in a whisper to
the butler, who showed himself at a low window, “I have known as honest
a faced fellow have art enough to do that.”
He then ushered Tressilian into a low parlour, and went, at his desire,
to see in what state his master was, lest the sudden return of his
darling pupil and proposed son-in-law should affect him too strongly.
He returned immediately, and said that Sir Hugh was dozing in his
elbow-chair, but that Master Mumblazen would acquaint Master Tressilian
the instant he awaked.
“But it is chance if he knows you,” said the huntsman, “for he has
forgotten the name of every hound in the pack. I thought, about a week
since, he had gotten a favourable turn. 'Saddle me old Sorrel,' said he
suddenly, after he had taken his usual night-draught out of the great
silver grace-cup, 'and take the hounds to Mount Hazelhurst to-morrow.'
Glad men were we all, and out we had him in the morning, and he rode to
cover as usual, with never a word spoken but that the wind was south,
and the scent would lie. But ere we had uncoupled'the hounds, he began
to stare round him, like a man that wakes suddenly out of a dream--turns
bridle, and walks back to Hall again, and leaves us to hunt at leisure
by ourselves, if we listed.”
“You tell a heavy tale, Will,” replied Tressilian; “but God must help
us--there is no aid in man.”
“Then you bring us no news of young Mistress Amy? But what need I
ask--your brow tells the story. Ever I hoped that if any man could or
would track her, it must be you. All's over and lost now. But if ever I
have that Varney within reach of a flight-shot, I will bestow a forked
shaft on him; and that I swear by salt and bread.”
As he spoke, the door opened, and Master Mumblazen appeared--a withered,
thin, elderly gentleman, with a cheek like a winter apple, and his
grey hair partly concealed by a small, high hat, shaped like a cone,
or rather like such a strawberry-basket as London fruiterers exhibit at
their windows. He was too sententious a person to waste words on mere
salutation; so, having welcomed Tressilian with a nod and a shake of the
hand, he beckoned him to follow to Sir Hugh's great chamber, which the
good knight usually inhabited. Will Badger followed, unasked, anxious to
see whether his master would be relieved from his state of apathy by the
arrival of Tressilian.
In a long, low parlour, amply furnished with implements of the chase,
and with silvan trophies, by a massive stone chimney, over which hung
a sword and suit of armour somewhat obscured by neglect, sat Sir Hugh
Robsart of Lidcote, a man of large size, which had been only kept within
moderate compass by the constant use of violent exercise, It seemed to
Tressilian that the lethargy, under which his old friend appeared to
labour, had, even during his few weeks' absence, added bulk to his
person--at least it had obviously diminished the vivacity of his eye,
which, as they entered, first followed Master Mumblazen slowly to a
large oaken desk, on which a ponderous volume lay open, and then rested,
as if in uncertainty, on the stranger who had entered along with him.
The curate, a grey-headed clergyman, who had been a confessor in the
days of Queen Mary, sat with a book in his hand in another recess in the
apartment. He, too, signed a mournful greeting to Tressilian, and laid
his book aside, to watch the effect his appearance should produce on the
afflicted old man.
As Tressilian, his own eyes filling fast with tears, approached more
and more nearly to the father of his betrothed bride, Sir Hugh's
intelligence seemed to revive. He sighed heavily, as one who awakens
from a state of stupor; a slight convulsion passed over his features;
he opened his arms without speaking a word, and, as Tressilian threw
himself into them, he folded him to his bosom.
“There is something left to live for yet,” were the first words he
uttered; and while he spoke, he gave vent to his feelings in a paroxysm
of weeping, the tears chasing each other down his sunburnt cheeks and
long white beard.
“I ne'er thought to have thanked God to see my master weep,” said Will
Badger; “but now I do, though I am like to weep for company.”
“I will ask thee no questions,” said the old knight; “no
questions--none, Edmund. Thou hast not found her--or so found her, that
she were better lost.”
Tressilian was unable to reply otherwise than by putting his hands
before his face.
“It is enough--it is enough. But do not thou weep for her, Edmund. I
have cause to weep, for she was my daughter; thou hast cause to rejoice,
that she did not become thy wife.--Great God! thou knowest best what is
good for us. It was my nightly prayer that I should see Amy and Edmund
wedded,--had it been granted, it had now been gall added to bitterness.”
“Be comforted, my friend,” said the curate, addressing Sir Hugh, “it
cannot be that the daughter of all our hopes and affections is the vile
creature you would bespeak her.”
“Oh, no,” replied Sir Hugh impatiently, “I were wrong to name broadly
the base thing she is become--there is some new court name for it, I
warrant me. It is honour enough for the daughter of an old Devonshire
clown to be the leman of a gay courtier--of Varney too--of Varney, whose
grandsire was relieved by my father, when his fortune was broken, at
the battle of--the battle of--where Richard was slain--out on my
memory!--and I warrant none of you will help me--”
“The battle of Bosworth,” said Master Mumblazen--“stricken between
Richard Crookback and Henry Tudor, grandsire of the Queen that now is,
PRIMO HENRICI SEPTIMI; and in the year one thousand four hundred and
eighty-five, POST CHRISTUM NATUM.”
“Ay, even so,” said the old knight; “every child knows it. But my poor
head forgets all it should remember, and remembers only what it would
most willingly forget. My brain has been at fault, Tressilian, almost
ever since thou hast been away, and even yet it hunts counter.”
“Your worship,” said the good clergyman, “had better retire to your
apartment, and try to sleep for a little space. The physician left
a composing draught; and our Great Physician has commanded us to use
earthly means, that we may be strengthened to sustain the trials He
sends us.”
“True, true, old friend,” said Sir Hugh; “and we will bear our trials
manfully--we have lost but a woman.--See, Tressilian,”--he drew from
his bosom a long ringlet of glossy hair,--“see this lock! I tell thee,
Edmund, the very night she disappeared, when she bid me good even, as
she was wont, she hung about my neck, and fondled me more than usual;
and I, like an old fool, held her by this lock, until she took her
scissors, severed it, and left it in my hand--as all I was ever to see
more of her!”
Tressilian was unable to reply, well judging what a complication of
feelings must have crossed the bosom of the unhappy fugitive at that
cruel moment. The clergyman was about to speak, but Sir Hugh interrupted
him.
“I know what you would say, Master Curate,--After all, it is but a lock
of woman's tresses; and by woman, shame, and sin, and death came into
an innocent world.--And learned Master Mumblazen, too, can say scholarly
things of their inferiority.”
“C'EST L'HOMME,” said Master Mumblazen, “QUI SE BAST, ET QUI CONSEILLE.”
“True,” said Sir Hugh, “and we will bear us, therefore, like men who
have both mettle and wisdom in us.--Tressilian, thou art as welcome
as if thou hadst brought better news. But we have spoken too long
dry-lipped.--Amy, fill a cup of wine to Edmund, and another to me.” Then
instantly recollecting that he called upon her who could not hear,
he shook his head, and said to the clergyman, “This grief is to my
bewildered mind what the church of Lidcote is to our park: we may lose
ourselves among the briers and thickets for a little space, but from
the end of each avenue we see the old grey steeple and the grave of my
forefathers. I would I were to travel that road tomorrow!”
Tressilian and the curate joined in urging the exhausted old man to lay
himself to rest, and at length prevailed. Tressilian remained by his
pillow till he saw that slumber at length sunk down on him, and then
returned to consult with the curate what steps should be adopted in
these unhappy circumstances.
They could not exclude from these deliberations Master Michael
Mumblazen; and they admitted him the more readily, that besides what
hopes they entertained from his sagacity, they knew him to be so great
a friend to taciturnity, that there was no doubt of his keeping counsel.
He was an old bachelor, of good family, but small fortune, and distantly
related to the House of Robsart; in virtue of which connection, Lidcote
Hall had been honoured with his residence for the last twenty years. His
company was agreeable to Sir Hugh, chiefly on account of his profound
learning, which, though it only related to heraldry and genealogy, with
such scraps of history as connected themselves with these subjects,
was precisely of a kind to captivate the good old knight; besides the
convenience which he found in having a friend to appeal to when his
own memory, as frequently happened, proved infirm and played him false
concerning names and dates, which, and all similar deficiencies, Master
Michael Mumblazen supplied with due brevity and discretion. And,
indeed, in matters concerning the modern world, he often gave, in his
enigmatical and heraldic phrase, advice which was well worth attending
to, or, in Will Badger's language, started the game while others beat
the bush.
“We have had an unhappy time of it with the good knight, Master Edmund,”
said the curate. “I have not suffered so much since I was torn away from
my beloved flock, and compelled to abandon them to the Romish wolves.”
“That was in TERTIO MARIAE,” said Master Mumblazen.
“In the name of Heaven,” continued the curate, “tell us, has your
time been better spent than ours, or have you any news of that
unhappy maiden, who, being for so many years the principal joy of this
broken-down house, is now proved our greatest unhappiness? Have you not
at least discovered her place of residence?”
“I have,” replied Tressilian. “Know you Cumnor Place, near Oxford?”
“Surely,” said the clergyman; “it was a house of removal for the monks
of Abingdon.”
“Whose arms,” said Master Michael, “I have seen over a stone chimney in
the hall,--a cross patonce betwixt four martlets.”
“There,” said Tressilian, “this unhappy maiden resides, in company with
the villain Varney. But for a strange mishap, my sword had revenged all
our injuries, as well as hers, on his worthless head.”
“Thank God, that kept thine hand from blood-guiltiness, rash young man!”
answered the curate. “Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, and I will
repay it. It were better study to free her from the villain's nets of
infamy.”
“They are called, in heraldry, LAQUEI AMORIS, or LACS D'AMOUR,” said
Mumblazen.
“It is in that I require your aid, my friends,” said Tressilian. “I
am resolved to accuse this villain, at the very foot of the throne, of
falsehood, seduction, and breach of hospitable laws. The Queen shall
hear me, though the Earl of Leicester, the villain's patron, stood at
her right hand.”
“Her Grace,” said the curate, “hath set a comely example of continence
to her subjects, and will doubtless do justice on this inhospitable
robber. But wert thou not better apply to the Earl of Leicester, in the
first place, for justice on his servant? If he grants it, thou dost save
the risk of making thyself a powerful adversary, which will certainly
chance if, in the first instance, you accuse his master of the horse and
prime favourite before the Queen.”
“My mind revolts from your counsel,” said Tressilian. “I cannot brook
to plead my noble patron's cause the unhappy Amy's cause--before any one
save my lawful Sovereign. Leicester, thou wilt say, is noble. Be it so;
he is but a subject like ourselves, and I will not carry my plaint to
him, if I can do better. Still, I will think on what thou hast said; but
I must have your assistance to persuade the good Sir Hugh to make me his
commissioner and fiduciary in this matter, for it is in his name I must
speak, and not in my own. Since she is so far changed as to dote upon
this empty profligate courtier, he shall at least do her the justice
which is yet in his power.”
“Better she died CAELEBS and SINE PROLE,” said Mumblazen, with more
animation than he usually expressed, “than part, PER PALE, the noble
coat of Robsart with that of such a miscreant!”
“If it be your object, as I cannot question,” said the clergyman, “to
save, as much as is yet possible, the credit of this unhappy young
woman, I repeat, you should apply, in the first instance, to the Earl
of Leicester. He is as absolute in his household as the Queen in her
kingdom, and if he expresses to Varney that such is his pleasure, her
honour will not stand so publicly committed.”
“You are right, you are right!” said Tressilian eagerly, “and I thank
you for pointing out what I overlooked in my haste. I little thought
ever to have besought grace of Leicester; but I could kneel to the proud
Dudley, if doing so could remove one shade of shame from this unhappy
damsel. You will assist me then to procure the necessary powers from Sir
Hugh Robsart?”
The curate assured him of his assistance, and the herald nodded assent.
“You must hold yourselves also in readiness to testify, in case you are
called upon, the openhearted hospitality which our good patron exercised
towards this deceitful traitor, and the solicitude with which he
laboured to seduce his unhappy daughter.”
“At first,” said the clergyman, “she did not, as it seemed to me, much
affect his company; but latterly I saw them often together.”
“SEIANT in the parlour,” said Michael Mumblazen, “and PASSANT in the
garden.”
“I once came on them by chance,” said the priest, “in the South wood,
in a spring evening. Varney was muffled in a russet cloak, so that I saw
not his face. They separated hastily, as they heard me rustle amongst
the leaves; and I observed she turned her head and looked long after
him.”
“With neck REGUARDANT,” said the herald. “And on the day of her flight,
and that was on Saint Austen's Eve, I saw Varney's groom, attired in his
liveries, hold his master's horse and Mistress Amy's palfrey, bridled
and saddled PROPER, behind the wall of the churchyard.”
“And now is she found mewed up in his secret place of retirement,” said
Tressilian. “The villain is taken in the manner, and I well wish he may
deny his crime, that I may thrust conviction down his false throat! But
I must prepare for my journey. Do you, gentlemen, dispose my patron to
grant me such powers as are needful to act in his name.”
So saying, Tressilian left the room.
“He is too hot,” said the curate; “and I pray to God that He may grant
him the patience to deal with Varney as is fitting.”
“Patience and Varney,” said Mumblazen, “is worse heraldry than metal
upon metal. He is more false than a siren, more rapacious than a
griffin, more poisonous than a wyvern, and more cruel than a lion
rampant.”
“Yet I doubt much,” said the curate, “whether we can with propriety ask
from Sir Hugh Robsart, being in his present condition, any deed deputing
his paternal right in Mistress Amy to whomsoever--”
“Your reverence need not doubt that,” said Will Badger, who entered as
he spoke, “for I will lay my life he is another man when he wakes than
he has been these thirty days past.”
“Ay, Will,” said the curate, “hast thou then so much confidence in
Doctor Diddleum's draught?”
“Not a whit,” said Will, “because master ne'er tasted a drop on't,
seeing it was emptied out by the housemaid. But here's a gentleman, who
came attending on Master Tressilian, has given Sir Hugh a draught that
is worth twenty of yon un. I have spoken cunningly with him, and a
better farrier or one who hath a more just notion of horse and dog
ailment I have never seen; and such a one would never be unjust to a
Christian man.”
“A farrier! you saucy groom--and by whose authority, pray?” said the
curate, rising in surprise and indignation; “or who will be warrant for
this new physician?”
“For authority, an it like your reverence, he had mine; and for warrant,
I trust I have not been five-and-twenty years in this house without
having right to warrant the giving of a draught to beast or body--I who
can gie a drench, and a ball, and bleed, or blister, if need, to my very
self.”
The counsellors of the house of Robsart thought it meet to carry this
information instantly to Tressilian, who as speedily summoned before
him Wayland Smith, and demanded of him (in private, however) by what
authority he had ventured to administer any medicine to Sir Hugh
Robsart?
“Why,” replied the artist, “your worship cannot but remember that I told
you I had made more progress into my master's--I mean the learned Doctor
Doboobie's--mystery than he was willing to own; and indeed half of his
quarrel and malice against me was that, besides that I got something too
deep into his secrets, several discerning persons, and particularly a
buxom young widow of Abingdon, preferred my prescriptions to his.”
“None of thy buffoonery, sir,” said Tressilian sternly. “If thou hast
trifled with us--much more, if thou hast done aught that may prejudice
Sir Hugh Robsart's health, thou shalt find thy grave at the bottom of a
tin-mine.”
“I know too little of the great ARCANUM to convert the ore to
gold,” said Wayland firmly. “But truce to your apprehensions, Master
Tressilian. I understood the good knight's case from what Master William
Badger told me; and I hope I am able enough to administer a poor dose
of mandragora, which, with the sleep that must needs follow, is all that
Sir Hugh Robsart requires to settle his distraught brains.”
“I trust thou dealest fairly with me, Wayland?” said Tressilian.
“Most fairly and honestly, as the event shall show,” replied the artist.
“What would it avail me to harm the poor old man for whom you are
interested?--you, to whom I owe it that Gaffer Pinniewinks is not even
now rending my flesh and sinews with his accursed pincers, and probing
every mole in my body with his sharpened awl (a murrain on the hands
which forged it!) in order to find out the witch's mark?--I trust to
yoke myself as a humble follower to your worship's train, and I only
wish to have my faith judged of by the result of the good knight's
slumbers.”
Wayland Smith was right in his prognostication. The sedative draught
which his skill had prepared, and Will Badger's confidence had
administered, was attended with the most beneficial effects. The
patient's sleep was long and healthful, and the poor old knight awoke,
humbled indeed in thought and weak in frame, yet a much better judge of
whatever was subjected to his intellect than he had been for some time
past. He resisted for a while the proposal made by his friends that
Tressilian should undertake a journey to court, to attempt the recovery
of his daughter, and the redress of her wrongs, in so far as they might
yet be repaired. “Let her go,” he said; “she is but a hawk that goes
down the wind; I would not bestow even a whistle to reclaim her.” But
though he for some time maintained this argument, he was at length
convinced it was his duty to take the part to which natural affection
inclined him, and consent that such efforts as could yet be made
should be used by Tressilian in behalf of his daughter. He subscribed,
therefore, a warrant of attorney, such as the curate's skill enabled him
to draw up; for in those simple days the clergy were often the advisers
of their flock in law as well as in gospel.
All matters were prepared for Tressilian's second departure, within
twenty-four hours after he had returned to Lidcote Hall; but one
material circumstance had been forgotten, which was first called to the
remembrance of Tressilian by Master Mumblazen. “You are going to
court, Master Tressilian,” said he; “you will please remember that your
blazonry must be ARGENT and OR--no other tinctures will pass current.”
The remark was equally just and embarrassing. To prosecute a suit at
court, ready money was as indispensable even in the golden days of
Elizabeth as at any succeeding period; and it was a commodity little at
the command of the inhabitants of Lidcote Hall. Tressilian was himself
poor; the revenues of good Sir Hugh Robsart were consumed, and even
anticipated, in his hospitable mode of living; and it was finally
necessary that the herald who started the doubt should himself solve it.
Master Michael Mumblazen did so by producing a bag of money, containing
nearly three hundred pounds in gold and silver of various coinage, the
savings of twenty years, which he now, without speaking a syllable upon
the subject, dedicated to the service of the patron whose shelter
and protection had given him the means of making this little hoard.
Tressilian accepted it without affecting a moment's hesitation, and a
mutual grasp of the hand was all that passed betwixt them, to express
the pleasure which the one felt in dedicating his all to such a purpose,
and that which the other received from finding so material an obstacle
to the success of his journey so suddenly removed, and in a manner so
unexpected.
While Tressilian was making preparations for his departure early
the ensuing morning, Wayland Smith desired to speak with him, and,
expressing his hope that he had been pleased with the operation of his
medicine in behalf of Sir Hugh Robsart, added his desire to accompany
him to court. This was indeed what Tressilian himself had several times
thought of; for the shrewdness, alertness of understanding, and variety
of resource which this fellow had exhibited during the time they had
travelled together, had made him sensible that his assistance might be
of importance. But then Wayland was in danger from the grasp of law; and
of this Tressilian reminded him, mentioning something, at the same time,
of the pincers of Pinniewinks and the warrant of Master Justice Blindas.
Wayland Smith laughed both to scorn.
“See you, sir!” said he, “I have changed my garb from that of a farrier
to a serving-man; but were it still as it was, look at my moustaches.
They now hang down; I will but turn them up, and dye them with a
tincture that I know of, and the devil would scarce know me again.”
He accompanied these words with the appropriate action, and in less
than a minute, by setting up, his moustaches and his hair, he seemed
a different person from him that had but now entered the room. Still,
however, Tressilian hesitated to accept his services, and the artist
became proportionably urgent.
“I owe you life and limb,” he said, “and I would fain pay a part of the
debt, especially as I know from Will Badger on what dangerous service
your worship is bound. I do not, indeed, pretend to be what is called
a man of mettle, one of those ruffling tear-cats who maintain their
master's quarrel with sword and buckler. Nay, I am even one of those who
hold the end of a feast better than the beginning of a fray. But I know
that I can serve your worship better, in such quest as yours, than any
of these sword-and-dagger men, and that my head will be worth an hundred
of their hands.”
Tressilian still hesitated. He knew not much of this strange fellow, and
was doubtful how far he could repose in him the confidence necessary
to render him a useful attendant upon the present emergency. Ere he
had come to a determination, the trampling of a horse was heard in the
courtyard, and Master Mumblazen and Will Badger both entered hastily
into Tressilian's chamber, speaking almost at the same moment.
“Here is a serving-man on the bonniest grey tit I ever see'd in my
life,” said Will Badger, who got the start--“having on his arm a silver
cognizance, being a fire-drake holding in his mouth a brickbat, under
a coronet of an Earl's degree,” said Master Mumblazen, “and bearing a
letter sealed of the same.”
Tressilian took the letter, which was addressed “To the worshipful
Master Edmund Tressilian, our loving kinsman--These--ride, ride,
ride--for thy life, for thy life, for thy life.” He then opened it, and
found the following contents:--
“MASTER TRESSILIAN, OUR GOOD FRIEND AND COUSIN, “We are at present
so ill at ease, and otherwise so unhappily circumstanced, that we are
desirous to have around us those of our friends on whose loving-kindness
we can most especially repose confidence; amongst whom we hold our good
Master Tressilian one of the foremost and nearest, both in good will and
good ability. We therefore pray you, with your most convenient speed, to
repair to our poor lodging, at Sayes Court, near Deptford, where we will
treat further with you of matters which we deem it not fit to commit
unto writing. And so we bid you heartily farewell, being your loving
kinsman to command,
“RATCLIFFE, EARL OF SUSSEX.” “Send up the messenger instantly, Will
Badger,” said Tressilian; and as the man entered the room, he exclaimed,
“Ah, Stevens, is it you? how does my good lord?”
“Ill, Master Tressilian,” was the messenger's reply, “and having
therefore the more need of good friends around him.”
“But what is my lord's malady?” said Tressilian anxiously; “I heard
nothing of his being ill.”
“I know not, sir,” replied the man; “he is very ill at ease. The
leeches are at a stand, and many of his household suspect foul
practice-witchcraft, or worse.”
“What are the symptoms?” said Wayland Smith, stepping forward hastily.
“Anan?” said the messenger, not comprehending his meaning.
“What does he ail?” said Wayland; “where lies his disease?”
The man looked at Tressilian, as if to know whether he should
answer these inquiries from a stranger, and receiving a sign in the
affirmative, he hastily enumerated gradual loss of strength, nocturnal
perspiration, and loss of appetite, faintness, etc.
“Joined,” said Wayland, “to a gnawing pain in the stomach, and a low
fever?”
“Even so,” said the messenger, somewhat surprised.
“I know how the disease is caused,” said the artist, “and I know the
cause. Your master has eaten of the manna of Saint Nicholas. I know
the cure too--my master shall not say I studied in his laboratory for
nothing.”
“How mean you?” said Tressilian, frowning; “we speak of one of the first
nobles of England. Bethink you, this is no subject for buffoonery.”
“God forbid!” said Wayland Smith. “I say that I know this disease, and
can cure him. Remember what I did for Sir Hugh Robsart.”
“We will set forth instantly,” said Tressilian. “God calls us.”
Accordingly, hastily mentioning this new motive for his instant
departure, though without alluding to either the suspicions of Stevens,
or the assurances of Wayland Smith, he took the kindest leave of Sir
Hugh and the family at Lidcote Hall, who accompanied him with prayers
and blessings, and, attended by Wayland and the Earl of Sussex's
domestic, travelled with the utmost speed towards London.