[Sidenote: 1574-5.]
His own personal extravagances were not less remarkable. He erected
at Dalkeith a magnificent palace, richly adorned with tapestries and
pictures, and fitter for a king than a subject. Here he lived in an
appropriate style. All this he did at the expense of his enemies. He
kept a fool named Patrick Bonny, who, seeing him one day pestered by a
concourse of beggars, advised him to have them all burnt in one fire.
‘What an impious idea!’ said the Regent. ‘Not at all,’ replied the
jester; ‘if the whole of these poor people were consumed, you would
soon make more poor people out of the rich.’--_Jo. R. B. Hist._
* * * * *
[Sidenote: 1575.