Kenilworth Part 50

Varney advanced, and pleaded with readiness, what indeed he firmly believed, the absolute incapacity of the party (for neither did he dare, in Leicester's presence, term her his wife) to wait on her Grace.

"Here," said he, "are attestations from a most learned physician, whose skill and honour are well known to my good Lord of Leicester, and from an honest and devout Protestant, a man of credit and substance, one Anthony Foster, the gentleman in whose house she is at present bestowed, that she now labours under an illness which altogether unfits her for such a journey as betwixt this Castle and the neighbourhood of Oxford."

"This alters the matter," said the Queen, taking the certificates in her hand, and glancing at their contents.--"Let Tressilian come forward.--Master Tressilian, we have much sympathy for your situation, the rather that you seem to have set your heart deeply on this Amy Robsart, or Varney. Our power, thanks to G.o.d, and the willing obedience of a loving people, is worth much, but there are some things which it cannot compa.s.s. We cannot, for example, command the affections of a giddy young girl, or make her love sense and learning better than a courtier's fine doublet; and we cannot control sickness, with which it seems this lady is afflicted, who may not, by reason of such infirmity, attend our court here, as we had required her to do. Here are the testimonials of the physician who hath her under his charge, and the gentleman in whose house she resides, so setting forth."

"Under your Majesty's favour," said Tressilian hastily, and in his alarm for the consequence of the imposition practised on the Queen forgetting in part at least his own promise to Amy, "these certificates speak not the truth."

"How, sir!" said the Queen--"impeach my Lord of Leicester's veracity!

But you shall have a fair hearing. In our presence the meanest of our subjects shall be heard against the proudest, and the least known against the most favoured; therefore you shall be heard fairly, but beware you speak not without a warrant! Take these certificates in your own hand, look at them carefully, and say manfully if you impugn the truth of them, and upon what evidence."

As the Queen spoke, his promise and all its consequences rushed on the mind of the unfortunate Tressilian, and while it controlled his natural inclination to p.r.o.nounce that a falsehood which he knew from the evidence of his senses to be untrue, gave an indecision and irresolution to his appearance and utterance which made strongly against him in the mind of Elizabeth, as well as of all who beheld him. He turned the papers over and over, as if he had been an idiot, incapable of comprehending their contents. The Queen's impatience began to become visible. "You are a scholar, sir," she said, "and of some note, as I have heard; yet you seem wondrous slow in reading text hand. How say you, are these certificates true or no?"

"Madam," said Tressilian, with obvious embarra.s.sment and hesitation, anxious to avoid admitting evidence which he might afterwards have reason to confute, yet equally desirous to keep his word to Amy, and to give her, as he had promised, s.p.a.ce to plead her own cause in her own way--"Madam--Madam, your Grace calls on me to admit evidence which ought to be proved valid by those who found their defence upon them."

"Why, Tressilian, thou art critical as well as poetical," said the Queen, bending on him a brow of displeasure; "methinks these writings, being produced in the presence of the n.o.ble Earl to whom this Castle pertains, and his honour being appealed to as the guarantee of their authenticity, might be evidence enough for thee. But since thou listest to be so formal--Varney, or rather my Lord of Leicester, for the affair becomes yours" (these words, though spoken at random, thrilled through the Earl's marrow and bones), "what evidence have you as touching these certificates?"

Varney hastened to reply, preventing Leicester--"So please your Majesty, my young Lord of Oxford, who is here in presence, knows Master Anthony Foster's hand and his character."

The Earl of Oxford, a young unthrift, whom Foster had more than once accommodated with loans on usurious interest, acknowledged, on this appeal, that he knew him as a wealthy and independent franklin, supposed to be worth much money, and verified the certificate produced to be his handwriting.

"And who speaks to the Doctor's certificate?" said the Queen. "Alasco, methinks, is his name."

Masters, her Majesty's physician (not the less willingly that he remembered his repulse from Sayes Court, and thought that his present testimony might gratify Leicester, and mortify the Earl of Suss.e.x and his faction), acknowledged he had more than once consulted with Doctor Alasco, and spoke of him as a man of extraordinary learning and hidden acquirements, though not altogether in the regular course of practice.

The Earl of Huntingdon, Lord Leicester's brother-in-law, and the old Countess of Rutland, next sang his praises, and both remembered the thin, beautiful Italian hand in which he was wont to write his receipts, and which corresponded to the certificate produced as his.

"And now, I trust, Master Tressilian, this matter is ended," said the Queen. "We will do something ere the night is older to reconcile old Sir Hugh Robsart to the match. You have done your duty something more than boldly; but we were no woman had we not compa.s.sion for the wounds which true love deals, so we forgive your audacity, and your uncleansed boots withal, which have well-nigh overpowered my Lord of Leicester's perfumes."

So spoke Elizabeth, whose nicety of scent was one of the characteristics of her organization, as appeared long afterwards when she expelled Ess.e.x from her presence, on a charge against his boots similar to that which she now expressed against those of Tressilian.

But Tressilian had by this time collected himself, astonished as he had at first been by the audacity of the falsehood so feasibly supported, and placed in array against the evidence of his own eyes. He rushed forward, kneeled down, and caught the Queen by the skirt of her robe.

"As you are Christian woman," he said, "madam, as you are crowned Queen, to do equal justice among your subjects--as you hope yourself to have fair hearing (which G.o.d grant you) at that last bar at which we must all plead, grant me one small request! Decide not this matter so hastily.

Give me but twenty-four hours' interval, and I will, at the end of that brief s.p.a.ce, produce evidence which will show to demonstration that these certificates, which state this unhappy lady to be now ill at ease in Oxfordshire, are false as h.e.l.l!"

"Let go my train, sir!" said Elizabeth, who was startled at his vehemence, though she had too much of the lion in her to fear; "the fellow must be distraught. That witty knave, my G.o.dson Harrington, must have him into his rhymes of Orlando Furioso! And yet, by this light, there is something strange in the vehemence of his demand.--Speak, Tressilian, what wilt thou do if, at the end of these four-and-twenty hours, thou canst not confute a fact so solemnly proved as this lady's illness?"

"I will lay down my head on the block," answered Tressilian.

"Pshaw!" replied the Queen, "G.o.d's light! thou speakest like a fool.

What head falls in England but by just sentence of English law? I ask thee, man--if thou hast sense to understand me--wilt thou, if thou shalt fail in this improbable attempt of thine, render me a good and sufficient reason why thou dost undertake it?"

Tressilian paused, and again hesitated; because he felt convinced that if, within the interval demanded, Amy should become reconciled to her husband, he would in that case do her the worst of offices by again ripping up the whole circ.u.mstances before Elizabeth, and showing how that wise and jealous princess had been imposed upon by false testimonials. The consciousness of this dilemma renewed his extreme embarra.s.sment of look, voice, and manner; he hesitated, looked down, and on the Queen repeating her question with a stern voice and flashing eye, he admitted with faltering words, "That it might be--he could not positively--that is, in certain events--explain the reasons and grounds on which he acted."

"Now, by the soul of King Henry," said the Queen, "this is either moonstruck madness or very knavery!--Seest thou, Raleigh, thy friend is far too Pindaric for this presence. Have him away, and make us quit of him, or it shall be the worse for him; for his flights are too unbridled for any place but Parna.s.sus, or Saint Luke's Hospital. But come back instantly thyself, when he is placed under fitting restraint.--We wish we had seen the beauty which could make such havoc in a wise man's brain."

Tressilian was again endeavouring to address the Queen, when Raleigh, in obedience to the orders he had received, interfered, and with Blount's a.s.sistance, half led, half forced him out of the presence-chamber, where he himself indeed began to think his appearance did his cause more harm than good.

When they had attained the antechamber, Raleigh entreated Blount to see Tressilian safely conducted into the apartments allotted to the Earl of Suss.e.x's followers, and, if necessary, recommended that a guard should be mounted on him.

"This extravagant pa.s.sion," he said, "and, as it would seem, the news of the lady's illness, has utterly wrecked his excellent judgment. But it will pa.s.s away if he be kept quiet. Only let him break forth again at no rate; for he is already far in her Highness's displeasure, and should she be again provoked, she will find for him a worse place of confinement, and sterner keepers."

"I judged as much as that he was mad," said Nicholas Blount, looking down upon his own crimson stockings and yellow roses, "whenever I saw him wearing yonder d.a.m.ned boots, which stunk so in her nostrils. I will but see him stowed, and be back with you presently. But, Walter, did the Queen ask who I was?--methought she glanced an eye at me."

"Twenty--twenty eye-glances she sent! and I told her all--how thou wert a brave soldier, and a--But for G.o.d's sake, get off Tressilian!"

"I will--I will," said Blount; "but methinks this court-haunting is no such bad pastime, after all. We shall rise by it, Walter, my brave lad.

Thou saidst I was a good soldier, and a--what besides, dearest Walter?"

"An all unutterable-codshead. For G.o.d's sake, begone!"

Tressilian, without further resistance or expostulation followed, or rather suffered himself to be conducted by Blount to Raleigh's lodging, where he was formally installed into a small truckle-bed placed in a wardrobe, and designed for a domestic. He saw but too plainly that no remonstrances would avail to procure the help or sympathy of his friends, until the lapse of the time for which he had pledged himself to remain inactive should enable him either to explain the whole circ.u.mstances to them, or remove from him every pretext or desire of further interference with the fortunes of Amy, by her having found means to place herself in a state of reconciliation with her husband.

With great difficulty, and only by the most patient and mild remonstrances with Blount, he escaped the disgrace and mortification of having two of Suss.e.x's stoutest yeomen quartered in his apartment.

At last, however, when Nicholas had seen him fairly deposited in his truckle-bed, and had bestowed one or two hearty kicks, and as hearty curses, on the boots, which, in his lately acquired spirit of foppery, he considered as a strong symptom, if not the cause, of his friend's malady, he contented himself with the modified measure of locking the door on the unfortunate Tressilian, whose gallant and disinterested efforts to save a female who had treated him with ingrat.i.tude thus terminated for the present in the displeasure of his Sovereign and the conviction of his friends that he was little better than a madman.

CHAPTER x.x.xII.

The wisest Sovereigns err like private men, And royal hand has sometimes laid the sword Of chivalry upon a worthless shoulder, Which better had been branded by the hangman.

What then?--Kings do their best; and they and we Must answer for the intent, and not the event.--OLD PLAY.

"It is a melancholy matter," said the Queen, when Tressilian was withdrawn, "to see a wise and learned man's wit thus pitifully unsettled. Yet this public display of his imperfection of brain plainly shows us that his supposed injury and accusation were fruitless; and therefore, my Lord of Leicester, we remember your suit formerly made to us in behalf of your faithful servant Varney, whose good gifts and fidelity, as they are useful to you, ought to have due reward from us, knowing well that your lordship, and all you have, are so earnestly devoted to our service. And we render Varney the honour more especially that we are a guest, and, we fear, a chargeable and troublesome one, under your lordship's roof; and also for the satisfaction of the good old Knight of Devon, Sir Hugh Robsart, whose daughter he hath married, and we trust the especial mark of grace which we are about to confer may reconcile him to his son-in-law.--Your sword, my Lord of Leicester."

The Earl unbuckled his sword, and taking it by the point, presented on bended knee the hilt to Elizabeth.

She took it slowly drew it from the scabbard, and while the ladies who stood around turned away their eyes with real or affected shuddering, she noted with a curious eye the high polish and rich, damasked ornaments upon the glittering blade.

"Had I been a man," she said, "methinks none of my ancestors would have loved a good sword better. As it is with me, I like to look on one, and could, like the Fairy of whom I have read in some Italian rhymes--were my G.o.dson Harrington here, he could tell me the pa.s.sage--even trim my hair, and arrange my head-gear, in such a steel mirror as this is.--Richard Varney, come forth, and kneel down. In the name of G.o.d and Saint George, we dub thee knight! Be Faithful, Brave, and Fortunate.

Arise, Sir Richard Varney."

[The incident alluded to occurs in the poem of Orlando Innamorato of Boiardo, libro ii. canto 4, stanza 25.

"Non era per ventura," etc.

It may be rendered thus:--

As then, perchance, unguarded was the tower, So enter'd free Anglante's dauntless knight.

No monster and no giant guard the bower In whose recess reclined the fairy light, Robed in a loose cymar of lily white, And on her lap a sword of breadth and might, In whose broad blade, as in a mirror bright, Like maid that trims her for a festal night, The fairy deck'd her hair, and placed her coronet aright.

Elizabeth's attachment to the Italian school of poetry was singularly manifested on a well-known occasion. Her G.o.dson, Sir John Harrington, having offended her delicacy by translating some of the licentious pa.s.sages of the Orlando Furioso, she imposed on him, as a penance, the task of rendering the WHOLE poem into English.]

Varney arose and retired, making a deep obeisance to the Sovereign who had done him so much honour.