“ Mary and the ladies of her court appeared at one of the large windows overlooking the quadrangle, where they waved their handkerchiefs, and bowed and smiled gaily, to those whom they recognised among the crowd below.
"That beautiful being!" said Bothwell, gazing on her with admiration; "shines like a sun among lesser stars."
"By cock and pie! her ladies are like a parterre of roses in the glory and sunshine of summer."
"His lordship's poetry is infectious," said young Bolton, with a laugh; "is not yonder dame in scarlet the Lady Herries of Terreagles?" ”

“ Oh, yes! there is an amount of love, of ardour, of agony, despair, that we feel but once, and then we become deadened and callous. Oh! who in a second love ever felt the same freshness, the same depth of anxiety, the same fear and hope and joy, that alternately filled his heart in the dawn of that first passion, that grew like a flower in Eden, and fills the whole creation with happiness, rendering us blind and oblivious of all save the object we love?"
"And since when has your volatile lordship known all this?" asked Mary, with her usual raillery. ”

“ A smile, both dubious and scornful, lit the face of the Highland Earl, who played ominously with his long dagger, while Bothwell reflected bitterly on—
"What a tangled web we weave,
When first we practise to deceive."
"I conjure your majesty not to hear her!" he urged; "and yet, why should I fear? The honour of the house of Hepburn has been sustained untarnished since old Adam of Hailes and Trapraine first unfurled his pennon by the side of Bruce! and assuredly it cannot suffer now by the artful story of a despicable gleewoman—Ha! ha!—a minion of the gallant Lord of Morton." ”

“ The Lord Darnley is my foe; but you are aware that I speak more in a sentiment of dutiful love towards your majesty, than enmity to him who stirred up John of Park, and the whole clan Elliot, to slay me. On him thou hast sacrificed a love the bravest of our Scottish peers, and the proudest princes of Europe—Charles of France, Carlos of Spain, and the Archduke of Austria—have sued for in vain. Oh, madame!" continued the Earl, with pathos in his voice, while his cheek flushed and his eye kindled as he recalled the boyish love of his early day, when he had first seen Mary at the court of France. ”

“ Past midnight? soh! a famous hour for such regular men as we to be strolling along the streets, like knights of the post; and thou, bully Hob, art without thine armour."
"I have a pyne doublet that would turn the bolt of an arblast—double quilted."
"The streets are dull, and I am very sleepy," stammered Coldinghame.
"Speak not of sleep, my Lord Privy Seal," said the Earl; "for we have a notable brawl to make yet. We must show these rascally bailies that their night-watch and captains of the thirty wards had no reference to us, who are lords and barons of Parliament." ”

“ Mass! man, but thou art an odd specimen of the tatterdemalion!"
"Sir," replied Konrad, mildly, "I am a foreigner, and must be excused if I cannot decern the politeness of your queries."
"Foreigner—eh!" rejoined the young laird of Bolton, who, though far from being ill-natured, had a blunt manner; "a fiddler, I warrant! as if we had not enow and to spare, before David Rizzio was dirked in the next room. Mass! we have Jehan d'Amiot, the French conjurer, who foretold Davy's death; we have Sebastian, the violer; Francisco Rizzio; French Paris; and the devil knoweth how many more about us. ”

“ The Earl kissed his hand as he reined back his horse.
"Courage, brave Bothwell!" cried the gay Countess of Argyle; and all the ladies clapped their hands and cried, "A Bothwell!—a Bothwell!"
"Now, ho, for Hepburn!" exclaimed the Earl, spurring his beautiful charger. "Come on, Ormiston! and we will meet all yonder tall fellows in battle à l'outrance, if they will."
"I am right well content," growled the giant; "but whom shall I encounter—yonder grasshopper, d'Elboeuff?" ”

“ I have quite a large family to feed every morning at Holyrood. Monsieur my uncle, the Cardinal de Guise, has sent me a beautiful cage full of red-legged partridges; and my kinsman, the Marquis d'Elboeuff, has brought me from Madame my aunt, the good Prioress of Rheims, a vase full of the most beautiful little fishes, which I mean to put into Lochmaben. I fear thou wilt think all this very childish in me, who am a queen—and queen of such an austere people;" and, while shaking a bunch of grapes at the leaping hound, she began to sing—
"Bon jour, mon coeur,
Bon jour, ma douce vie! ”

“ As the Earl gazed upon Mary, love filled his mind with the most glittering illusions, and cast a halo round her that dazzled bun. He almost fancied himself the husband of the beautiful being before him, and the father of the little cherub on her knee; a glow, to which his heart had yet been a stranger, swelled up within it, as the brief hallucination became more complete. His passing flame for Anna and his Countess—his schemes of power and grandeur—were all forgotten and merged in the joy that filled his bosom. ”

“ Sheet-lightning at times illumined the far horizon, and brought forward strong in relief from the lurid background, the black and towering cones of Gulane hill and Berwick's lofty law—that landmark of the German sea—but all was still, and not a branch stirring in the leafless woods, when silently and noiselessly, all well armed, masked, and muffled in their mantles, the guests of the lord of Whittinghame assembled under the sepulchral shadow of a great and venerable yew-tree, that still stands near the castle wall, and is pointed out to the curious as the scene of their meeting. ”

“ Bothan! but thou art a rare fellow, Master Konrad," said Bolton. "Loving this damsel, and yet labouring to restore her to the arms of a rival. Rare platonism—by the mass!"
"Sir, thou knowest not the pure sentiment of love that animated me. So refined was my passion for this fair being, that so far from being happy in possessing her, if she loved me not, I would have preferred to see her happiness increased by the love of a rival"——
"Mass! if I understand either this or thee," said the lieutenant of the archers, sipping his Rochelle with a face of perplexity. ”

“ I will pardon the bluntness with which thou declinest my courtesy, and will add, that thou mayest find the shadow of my banner a good protection, if the quarrels between the dainty queens of these realms end in blows; for our little dame looks sourly upon thine, deeming her little else than a false bastard and base usurper."
"Thou art mistaken, Lord Earl. I am not an Englishman."
"Then what manner of man art thou, fair sir? thou seest I have a restless curiosity. A stranger?"
"At thy service, noble lord. I understand thou art the great Earl of Morton—the foe of my foe." ”

“ At times, the red rays of the moon shot forth tremulously between the flying vapour upon that dreary spot, and the high sepulchral dwelling, throwing light and shadow fitfully upon its dark discoloured walls.
The conspirators drew close together.
They were all pale as death; but their masks concealed the trepidation that would, nevertheless, have been visible in every face, as their voices betrayed it to be in every heart.
"Hist! dost thou not hear groans?" whispered Bothwell, plucking Black Ormiston by the cloak. ”

“ Bolton, as lieutenant of the archers, stood in the recess of a window at the lower end of the room, accoutred in half armour, and having his helmet lying near him; and Bothwell, clad in black velvet, magnificently embroidered with Venetian gold, his sword and waistbelt, his poniard and bonnet blazing with jewels, as his blue velvet mantle did with spangles, stood in another, clanking his gold spurs, and pointing his well-perfumed and pomatumed mustaches; for, however deep and deadly his projects, he now never omitted an opportunity of appearing to the best advantage in Mary's presence ”

“ So you see, Monseigneur Bothwell, that whatever the Protestants say of poor Mary Stuart, she is not ungrateful for service promptly rendered."
"Oh, Madame!" said the Earl, in a thick voice, as he clasped his hands, and bent his eyes on the ground; "you overpower me! I never deemed thee otherwise than something angelic, and such I find thee now."
"Ah!" replied the Queen merrily, as she seated herself; "every pretty woman is so in the eyes of a brave gallant!" ”

“ Sharpened and attenuated by disease, Darnley's features glimmered in the subdued light, like those of a rigid corpse; and the myriad pustules incident to the hideous ailment under which he suffered, were apparent to the louring eye of Bolton, who, remembering that night in the garden of Holyrood, gazed upon him with sensations akin to those of a tigress robbed of her cubs; and the age was not one when men sat placidly under a sense of wrong, or repressed their impulses either of good or evil. ”

“ Gallant Hob! the spiders will never spin their webs on thy pennon. Well met, fair sirs!" he added, as the train lowered their long lances, and passed under the low-browed archway into the palace yard. "In what case art thou this morning, Hob?"
"A steel one, as thou seest. Mass! but I am thirsty as a dry ditch with my morning ride. But, lo! yonder cometh the queen's grace and her ladies," said Ormiston, as all the lances were lowered, and there was a ruffling on the kettle drums. ”

“ Again Bothwell knelt and kissed the hand of the queen, who glanced furtively at her husband; and in the contrast between his inertness and Bothwell's energy felt a glow of scorn within her which she struggled in vain to repress. He was still coquetting with Mariette Hubert, the same fair girl, and the Earl, whose quick eyes had followed those of Mary, said in a low voice—
"As might be expected in the consort of one so fair, his majesty is ever speaking of love." ”

“ Full upon Edina's castled rock and all her lofty hills, fell the last light of the western sun, from between glowing bars of golden cloud; and their giant shadows, broad, vast, and dewy, were thrown to the eastward, becoming, as the sun sunk, longer and longer, till they reached the ocean, that rolled upon the almost desert shore of the Figgate muir. The gradual fading of the light amid the mountain solitude that overhung the city, soothed and saddened the Earl, for the spot was wild and lonely; the black eagle and the osprey then built their nests in the craigs of Salisbury ”

“ Konrad imagined correctly, that some of the voices of his strange companions were not unfamiliar to his ear, but they conversed in low whispers; and feeling no way very comfortable in the company of men whose aspect, in armour and disguise, revealed that they were bent on some mission of darkness and danger, he thought only of escape. But, as if this very thought was divined, Black Ormiston stuck to his skirts like a burr ”

“ By studying vengeance thou keepest open thine own wounds, and pourest salt into them, so that they never heal, or are forgotten. Forgive this sinful Earl, and thou conquerest him; forgive him for the sake of the sisterly love thou bearest this Lady Anna, who loves him so well. 'Be patient,' saith a wise Arabian, 'and the leaf of the mulberry-tree will become satin.' By avoiding misery, thou wilt find happiness; for misery tormenteth itself. ”

“ Mary's Wynd was one of the most spacious and famous of the old Scottish hostellaries, and Adam Ainslie, the gudeman thereof, was as kindly a host as ever welcomed a guest beneath his roof-tree. The enormous obesity of his paunch made him resemble a turtle on its hind-legs, while his visage, by hard drinking and frequent exposure to the weather, had become as flushed and red as the lion figuring on his sign-board, that overhung the principal wynd of Edinburgh. ”

“ Elbowing his way through the mass of pages, valets, and men-at-arms, that filled the outer court, and whistling merrily as he went, the handsome young lieutenant of the royal archers, Sir John Hepburn of Bolton, was seen clad in his gayest attire—a green velvet doublet trimmed with scarlet, and laced with gold, a purple mantle, and blue bonnet garnished with a white feather. He ascended the narrow and winding staircase of the Albany tower, where Konrad was confined, and into which he was admitted by an archer of his own band, who was posted as sentinel in the corridor. ”

“ And, lo you! there goeth the Knight of Spott, without a cloak to hide his threadbare doublet. Well! were I thee, Sir Knight, I would buy me worse garments, or avoid the city. But I warrant he hath spent his last bodle on a can of Flemish beer at the Red Lion."
"He is a gentleman of my following," said the Earl with a frown. "His gudesire spent his all in the wars of King James, and fell at Flodden like a true Scottish knight, with his pennon before and his kindred behind him; his son, else, had been a richer man to-day." ”

“ Thou knowest our queen's partiality for strangers and outlandish people."
"Earl Morton, were I not pledged to another, (and I never break my work even to the most humble,) thy standard alone would I follow, to requite with my sword"——
"And to whose pennon art thou pledged?"
Here the peasant plucked Konrad by the mantle, and whispered,—"Say John of Park, and they will hang thee from that rooftree!" but Konrad was relieved from the dilemma by Douglas of Whittinghame exclaiming with a hoarse laugh—
"Ha! ha! here is James of Morton, the lord of the lion's den, turning philanthropist! ha! ha! ha!" ”

“ Hepburn, in half armour, with his visor up, entered the gardens by that ancient doorway which faces the south, and is ornamented by the Scottish arms and order of the Thistle. The clock of the chapel tolled ten, and on passing the corner of James V.'s tower, he looked up to the tall casements of the Queen's apartments, to discover the usual light in that of Mariette, though he knew she would not be visible to him to-night. Every window was dark as that of the deserted chamber in which Rizzio was murdered, and the floor of which was yet stained with his blood. ”

“ Pouring forth alternate threats of vengeance and entreaties to desist, Alison, whose well-rouged cheeks and painted brow were by turns blanched with terror and crimsoned with rage, led them reluctantly towards an apartment which, in former days, had been a little private oratory for the Lady Superior, or Reverend Mother. The pointed door was of oak, carved with the emblems of religion—the crown of thorns, and the hands and feet pierced by nails; the sacred heart and the cross were still there, but they ornamented what the change of manners had made the abode of a gleewoman. ”

“ Through the thick gratings that defended them, flakes of light streamed into the dark and gloomy wynd, while a clear and manly voice was heard to sing one of those blasphemous ballads which were so obnoxious to Queen Mary—
"Ane cursed fox hath lain in the rocks,
Hidden this many a day,
Devouring sheep; but a hunter shall scare
This cursed fox away.
"The hunter is Christ, that spurs in haste,
His hounds are St. Peter and Paul;
The Pope is the fox, and Rome is the rocks,
That rub us to the gall. ”