Neither good soldier nor good man was ever without love for his horse,
if he had one; and the reader may have already divined, from certain
words let fall by good Sir Harry West, that he was peculiarly careful
and attentive to the four-hoofed creatures under his care. Every man
on earth, probably, has his particular point of coxcombry, and Sir
Harry West was not without his. It showed itself in his garden and his
bowling green, in his old hall and in his old wine. In a slight degree
it was apparent in the studious simplicity of his dress; but it was
more evident than anywhere else in his stable, where six as fine
horses as England could produce, two of them being old chargers who
had borne him in battle, had as much care bestowed on their toilet and
their meals as ever court-lady and reverend alderman.
Mounted on one of the stoutest of these well-fed animals, Matthew
Lakyn, an old soldier, and an old servant, sped on towards the fair
town of Newark-upon-Trent, intrusted by the knight, as his most
confidential attendant, to carry the letter of the Lady Arabella to
the Court of King James, which was then on its progress from the land
of the monarch's birth towards the capital of his new kingdom. As
usual in those days, the good old man bore upon his arm a badge to
distinguish the family to which he belonged, representing, to use
heraldic terms, on a field, argent, a fesse dancettée, sable. A
buckler was on his shoulder, a stout sword by his side; and although,
as we have said, he was not young, yet he was hale and hearty, and
looked well capable of dealing a blow or biding a buffet.
His first day's journey went by quietly enough. For ten miles of his
road he only saw one person whom he did not know, and that was a
stout, dark-browed horseman, who passed him within five minutes after
he had left his master's gate. They exchanged a word of salutation on
the road, a courteous custom of those days, which, with many another,
has gone by in our more civilized times; and then the stranger rode
on, while old Lakyn pursued his course more slowly.
Towards three o'clock on the evening of the second day, the good
knight's messenger turned into a small village-house of entertainment,
in order to give his horse some food, and apply some of the good
things of this life to his own support. The room which Lakyn entered,
after seeing to his beast's accommodation, was not exactly like that
in which we first introduced the reader to the Lady Arabella Stuart;
but it was a small parlour, approached by two descending steps from
the road side; and this he found tenanted by two men, sitting on
either side of a small table, with a stoup of wine between them, and
their heads close together, in earnest conversation.
One of these men we shall not describe, having done so on a former
occasion, when he gave himself the name of Baron de Mardyke. The other
was one of the personages who were with him at that time, whom he had
then called his servants, and whom we did not honour with any
particular remark. We must now, however, be more particular, and state
that he was a tall, thin, black-bearded man, close-shaved, except a
small mustachio, and a tuft of hair upon the chin, neither of which
seemed to be the growth of many months. His dress, which was plain,
consisted entirely of black and grey; but he wore sword and dagger,
though there was a slouch in the shoulders, and an awkward
disjointedness about the limbs, which spoke of no long military
training. Both he and his companion were booted and spurred as if for
a journey; and the moment that Lakyn entered the room they ceased
their conversation abruptly, and looked round, as if not well pleased
with his presence. The old man, however, was in no way disturbed by
theirs; but, seating himself at another table, he stretched out his
limbs, to rest them more conveniently, and waited patiently till the
flagon was brought him. The strangers, in the meantime, sipped their
wine together, and talked of the weather, of the appearance of the
crops, and various other things, which were somewhat too evidently
distant from their thoughts.
This had gone on some quarter of an hour, when suddenly the door of
the room was again thrown open, and in strode the dark-browed horseman
who had passed the old servant on the road. He cast a glance round the
chamber as he entered, and his eye rested upon Lakyn for an instant;
after which he passed on to the table where the other two were seated,
and, bending over it, spoke with them for a few minutes in a low tone.
Sir Harry West's good servant was an old soldier, as we have said,
and had many of the qualities of his class. He recognised his
fellow-traveller immediately; but, seeing either that the other did
not remember him, or affected not to do so, he gave not the slightest
indication of having himself a better memory. He applied himself, on
the contrary, diligently to his ale; and, though it must be confessed
that he listened with all his ears, from a curious sort of mistrust or
dislike which he felt towards the whole party, yet he heard nothing
but the last words of their conversation, which were, "Find out!"
The moment these two monosyllables were pronounced by the Baron de
Mardyke, the last-comer quitted the room. After being absent for about
five minutes, he returned, and again spoke to the other two in as low
a voice as before. Matthew Lakyn, however, thought that he caught the
words, "Going on immediately;" and he said to himself, "If they are
talking of me, they speak the truth. Neither shall I lose any time
upon the road."
Thus thinking, he rose, quitted the room, paid his score, and, having
tightened his horse's girths, and replaced the bit in his mouth, he
rode on upon his way, at a more rapid pace than he had heretofore
employed during his journey. He was now just entering Rutlandshire;
and in those days a great quantity of common land, waste and dreary
enough, lay between Stamford and Grantham, especially about Witham,
where a large extent of dreary ground, some four miles across,
according to the course of the high road, and spreading to five or six
miles on either hand, presented not a single house, cottage, or hut,
as far as the eye could reach. After riding on for about an hour and a
half, Lakyn saw this wide heath extending before him, with nothing to
relieve its bare monotony but a clump of tall trees, about two miles
in advance.
Now, he was anything but a man of a faint heart; but still so many
charges had been given him regarding the letter which he bore, that he
had conceived that document to be of much greater importance than it
really was; and, as the bearer thereof, he had risen to considerable
importance in his own eyes. Those were somewhat lawless times, it must
be remembered, when, notwithstanding the wisdom with which Elizabeth
had ruled, the comparative thinness of the population, and the general
state of society, left many opportunities for violent acts, of which
there were not wanting persons to take advantage. Why or wherefore
good Matthew Lakyn had taken a strong dislike to the party he had just
left, we shall not attempt to explain to the reader, as, in truth, the
good man could not explain it to himself; but certainly he had thought
of them more than once as he rode along the highway; and, when he
reached the edge of the common which we have mentioned, he turned in
the saddle and gave a look behind him.
As he had been slightly ascending for some time, his view comprised
nearly a mile of the road, and at about half that distance he
perceived two horsemen following him at a very rapid rate.
Recollecting a warning of his master, in times of old, to be always
prepared for whatever might happen, the old man assured himself that
his sword played easily in the sheath, and then spurred on, disdaining
to quicken his pace to any great degree, but still keeping his horse
at his very quickest trot, in the hopes of coming near some house
before he was overtaken. Those who followed, however, whether out of
sport or any more serious intention, did not spare the speed or wind
of their beasts; and the moment they came upon the common ground, they
quitted the sandy road for the turf at the side, and put their horses
into a gallop. This pace soon brought them to the side of Sir Harry
West's good servant, where they seemed inclined to pull up, giving him
time to recognise the dark-browed gentleman whom he had twice before
met with, and the tall, thin, ungainly man whom he had seen in the
inn. The former now thought fit to give him a nod of recognition; and
Lakyn, whose wit was upon the stretch, exclaimed, with a laugh,
"Ah! good evening, sir. If you are riding races, my masters, I'll beat
you across the common for a stoup of wine;" and, without waiting for a
reply, he struck his spurs into his good horse's sides, and was soon
several lengths ahead. The others spurred after for some way, but did
not succeed in catching him; and he was still going at the same rapid
rate, when he approached the clump of oaks which we have already
mentioned. There, however, he drew in his rein suddenly on the little
knoll from which trees sprang, and which was covered with dry green
turf. To his very great comfort and satisfaction, he had perceived as
he approached a large party of men and women, in gay attire, seated
with baskets and panniers in the shade, apparently resting their
horses and asses--for several of both were there--and at the same time
indulging their own appetites, at the expense of sundry pasties and
cold joints of meat.
"Hallo!" cried one of the travellers, as the old servant approached,
"are you riding for your life, or has your horse run away with you?"
"Neither, neither," cried Lakyn; "'tis but a race for a stoup of wine
with those two gentlemen behind;" and with some difficulty he kept his
horse from dashing forward, determined, now that he had met with
company, not to lose sight of it again if he could help it.
"Why, you seem mighty happy, ladies and gentlemen," he continued. "May
I ask which way your steps are bent?"
"We are going to meet the king as he comes from Newark," said a
jolly-looking man. "We have got an address and petition from the town
of Oakham, drawn up by our good clerk."
"Then, by your leave," cried Lakyn, springing to the ground, "I will
go on with you. 'Tis not good riding alone in such days as these."
"Alone!" exclaimed the other. "Why, you have a queer notion of
solitude, having two companions with you."
"One may have companions that are not comrades," answered Lakyn; "and,
to say sooth, these are no friends of mine."
"Why, how now!" cried the black-browed man, riding up at this moment,
about fifty yards in advance of his fellow-traveller; "why, how now,
master serving-man, you have soon come to an end of your race. We
shall be at the other side of the common first, and make you pay your
losings."
"Ride on, then," said Lakyn, in a jeering tone. "With two such jades
as yours I don't fear you. I'll give you a start half-way to the other
side, and beat you, notwithstanding."
The man turned a grim look of a somewhat menacing character upon him,
and replied, "We will make you pay, if you lose, depend upon it."
"No fear, no fear," answered Lakyn; "ride on, and spare your horses'
wind till I come up with you. I'll make you use whip and spur before I
have done with you."
As he spoke, the other stranger joined them; but he took no part in
the conversation, only saying to his companion, "Come on, Slingsby,
come on!" and forward they rode together.
"Why, you will lose your stoup of wine," said the jolly traveller
under the trees, addressing Lakyn, while the others proceeded on their
way.
"Small payment for good deliverance," rejoined the serving-man. "I
love not the looks of those two gentlemen; and, as I am going on an
errand from good Sir Harry West, my master, to his highness the king,
I must risk nothing till it is accomplished.
"What, Sir Harry West, of Bourne?" cried a grave-looking gentleman in
ruff. "If you be one of his people, right gladly will we have you in
our company; for, in the question of the meadow at Merton, he decided
in favour of Oakham, like a worthy good gentleman, as he is."
"Those are his arms, I think," said Matthew Lakyn, pointing with pride
to the badge upon his sleeve.
"To be sure! to be sure!" replied the grave personage, putting a pair
of large horn spectacles upon the bridge of his nose. "Polly, my dear,
look, those are Sir Harry West's arms. Don't you remember how he said
to me, 'Thou art a very sedate and reverend person, Master Smallit,
and have given your evidence in a devout and proper manner?'"
The girl confirmed her father's recollection; and the good townspeople
of Oakham seemed to think that they could not show too much civility
and attention to the servant of Sir Harry West. They were rather slow,
it is true, in their motions; but, nevertheless, Matthew Lakyn was
willing to put up with a little tardiness, for the sake of the
security their company afforded, and, accordingly, he not only
proceeded in their company to Grantham that night, but begged leave to
make one of the party to Newark the next day. His patience was
somewhat tried, it is true, in the morning, by the very different
proceedings of the good people of Oakham, from the military rapidity
and precision which usually attended his master's journeys when they
took place. The hour appointed for setting out was in itself somewhat
late, being no earlier than nine; but Mrs. Polty, the wife of one of
the principal personages in the company, had a queasy stomach, and
could not travel till she had broken her fast. The morning-meal took
more time than had been expected, and half an hour was spent in
settling the landlord's score; then it was discovered that one of the
horses had a shoe loose; and then half the baskets and panniers were
still unpacked. Thus, what between eating, and drinking, and scolding,
and grumbling, and shoeing the horse, and packing the panniers, and
loading the asses, and mounting the steeds, the hand of Grantham dial
pointed to twenty minutes past eleven; and then ten minutes more were
spent in bidding good-bye to the host and hostess of the inn, and
laughing and tittering at the parting jests.
The fourteen or fifteen miles which lay between Grantham and Newark
occupied much more time than was required even by the slow pace at
which they marched, for numerous parties were on the road, either
coming or going to the good town upon Trent, where the king had
arrived during the preceding morning, and with each person who would
stop to indulge them, the good townsfolk of Oakham paused to gossip,
making manifold inquiries as to the court, and the king's appearance
and demeanour; on all of which points they received the same sort of
satisfactory information which is usually afforded by common rumour.
By some persons they were informed that the king was tall, and thin,
and fair; by another, that he was a fat, swarthy man, with trunk-hose
of prodigious dimensions, and a large Spanish hat upon his head.
Again, they were assured that the court displayed great pomp, and was
very unapproachable; and again, that all was freedom, and gaiety, and
rejoicing.
Thus proceeding, it was near four o'clock before the little party
entered Newark, and then it was with the greatest difficulty that they
found accommodation in a fourth-rate inn, at the extreme verge of the
town, on the side of Nottingham. All was bustle and confusion in the
place, notwithstanding the proclamation; the court-yard was crowded
with horses; and eating and drinking, which had begun at five in the
morning, was still going on with undiminished voracity. A buzz of
manifold voices came from every room in the house, above which arose,
from time to time, various loud and angry calls for tapsters, ostlers,
and landlord. Margery, the host's pretty daughter, had had more kisses
ravished from her in one day than ever she bestowed willingly in her
life; and the landlord, bustling about, and vowing that he should be
ruined and undone by the confusion that reigned in his establishment,
took ample care that if any one did, indeed, escape his vigilant eyes
without paying their scores, the more honest, or less fortunate,
should abundantly make up for the deficiency.
For some time it seemed, though the citizens of Oakham had acquired a
somewhat importunate appetite on the road, that no provisions were to
be had for love or money; and, leaving Masters Smallit and Polty to
settle that affair as they might, and get all ready against his
return, Matthew Lakyn, with due reverence for the business with which
he was intrusted, went out at once on feet, to deliver the letter to
Sir Robert Cecil.
Well aware of the difficulty of getting to a great man's presence in
the midst of a court, Lakyn determined, in the first place, to inquire
for one of the servants of the famous minister, with several of whom
he had been acquainted when his master had frequented the gay scenes
of the capital. On this errand he was bustling along through the
crowds which nearly blocked up the principal street of the town, when,
in a group of persons at one of the doors, he caught sight of the
well-known colours of the Cecil family, and the badge, with its barry
and escutcheoned field; and making his way through, he was soon
shaking hands with an old compotator, whom he had not seen for several
years. His business was easily explained; but, on hearing of the
letter, the serving-man put on a wise and diplomatic look, such as
official personages assume to nip a request in the bud before being
driven actually to refuse it.
"Is it a petition?" he asked; "for 'tis not easy to bring petitions to
my good master. He abhors them as a love-sick maiden hates cheese."
"Oh, dear, no," replied Lakyn, with a proud toss of the head. "My
master is much too great a man, as you well know, to make petitions.
If any one wants his services they must petition him, and are very
likely to get refused even then. I do not know, for I have not seen,
what the letter contains; but I rather think it is a civil excuse for
not coming to wait upon the King. But, you know, he is tired of
courts, and wishes to spend the rest of his life in peace, doing good
to all around him by his wonderful wisdom."
"Oh, if that be all," cried the servant, "it will soon be done. It is
of those who come to court great men are afraid, not those who stay
away from it. Come away up with me to the house yonder; and, as Sir
Robert gets off his horse after the hunting, you may deliver him the
letter yourself."
Lakyn was in the midst of his reply, telling the servant that there
was a party waiting for him at the inn, and that he would but give
them notice, and return in a minute, when there was a sudden cry of
"The King! the King!"
All was in a moment bustle and confusion. Some men on horseback,
riding forward, drove back the crowd on either side of the road,
making a lane for the royal cavalcade to pass; and, in the change of
movements which took place,--as these harbingers were careful to treat
more roughly those they did not know than those they did, it naturally
happened that the servant of Sir Robert Cecil and his friend obtained
a position in front of the rest.
"Now," said the man, "now! My master is coming just behind the King,
on this side. Step forward with me as he passes, and give him the
letter. I will tell him who you are."
Lakyn looked down the street, and, at the distance of about thirty
yards beheld a somewhat corpulent and heavy-looking man, on horseback,
riding with a slouching and uneasy air, coarse in feature, clumsy in
person, with his broad lips partly open, and the tip of his tongue
visible beneath his teeth. He had a small cap or bonnet on his head,
and a long feather, clasped by a large jewel. His dress was of a
bright, and somewhat glaring green; a hunting-horn hung at his side,
and a long knife, but no sword; and ever and anon, as the people
shouted, "God save the King! God save King James!" he bowed his head
with a sidelong inclination, which was anything but graceful, though
he seemed by his self-satisfied look to fancy it very gracious. Behind
him came a crowd of gentlemen, amongst the first of whom appeared a
personage, who, though slightly deformed, displayed the dignified
carriage of an English gentleman, and sat his fiery horse with ease
and grace. Lakyn immediately recognised Cecil, and was in the act of
stepping forward to speak to him, when, putting his hand to the black
velvet pouch, which, suspended by a belt over his shoulder, contained
the important letter, he found the fingers of a stranger, armed with a
knife, busily employed in cutting it away from his side.
Turning suddenly round, the old man caught the cut-purse by the
throat, instantly recognising the black-browed Master Slingsby. Sir
Robert Cecil's servant threw himself upon him also, having been
watching quietly for the last half minute the man's proceedings in
regard to his companion, Lakyn. Slingsby endeavoured to cast off his
opponents and make his escape, while the people gathered round,
exclaiming, "A cut-purse!--a cut-purse!--Away with him to prison, away
with him!"
The tumult thus occasioned right in the King's path could not fail to
attract his attention as he rode on; and, though several of the
officers of the court hurried up to see what was the matter, and to
remove the obstruction by driving back the crowd, in not the most
ceremonious or temperate manner, the King himself rode forward,
exclaiming, "What is it they cry? what is it?--A cut-purse?--Let the
man be brought before us: we are the best judge of such matters."
These words were pronounced with a strong Scottish accent, and many an
interjection peculiar to the monarch himself; but albeit we are not
ourselves without drops of Scottish blood in our veins, we do not
possess the tongue in sufficient purity to venture upon giving the
monarch's expressions in their original dialect.
"Hold him fast," continued the King, "hold him fast; and let him be
brought before us, with the witnesses against him. We will inquire
into the case ourselves at nine o'clock this night, after we have had
time to repose ourselves, and take some necessary sustenance."
Plenty of hands were ready to secure the unfortunate Master Slingsby,
who, seeing that he was detected in the fact, affected to treat the
matter as a jest, acknowledging that he cut the strap of the man's
pouch, but only for the purpose of seeing what it contained. He was
hurried away to prison, notwithstanding; and Sir Robert Cecil's
servant remained in the midst of the crowd with Lakyn, answering the
innumerable inquiries of the multitude, which were as vague and wide
of the point as usual.
One man demanded, in a serious tone, if the culprit did not wear a
brown beaver; and, on receiving a reply in the affirmative, shook his
head ruefully, exclaiming, "Ah, the villain!"
Another made particular inquiries as to his beard; and a third was
sure he had seen him somewhere, but could not tell where. A fourth
wished to know whether he had cut the strap with a knife or a pair of
shears, and opined that it would make a great difference in the
judgment of the King.
Drawing his friend away from the mob as soon as he could, Sir Harry
West's messenger asked in a doubtful tone, "Do you think the King will
really examine him himself?"
"Ay, that he will, Matthew," answered the servant, "and perhaps judge
him too. Nay, shake not your head: we have seen strange things done
since the court crossed the border. So, at all events, you be ready to
give your evidence; and I will call in for you at half-past eight, so
that we be not late if his Majesty inquires for us."
Lakyn promised to be ready, and, with this appointment, they parted.