CHAPTER XXXI.
Nay, this is matter for the month of March, When hares are maddest. Either speak in reason, Giving cold argument the wall of passion, Or I break up the court. --BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.
It is by no means our purpose to detail minutely all the princelyfestivities of Kenilworth, after the fashion of Master Robert Laneham,whom we quoted in the conclusion of the last chapter. It is sufficientto say that under discharge of the splendid fireworks, which wehave borrowed Laneham's eloquence to describe, the Queen entered thebase-court of Kenilworth, through Mortimer's Tower, and moving onthrough pageants of heathen gods and heroes of antiquity, who offeredgifts and compliments on the bended knee, at length found her way tothe Great Hall of the Castle, gorgeously hung for her reception with therichest silken tapestry, misty with perfumes, and sounding to strainsof soft and delicious music. From the highly-carved oaken roof hunga superb chandelier of gilt bronze, formed like a spread eagle, whoseoutstretched wings supported three male and three female figures,grasping a pair of branches in each hand. The Hall was thus illuminatedby twenty-four torches of wax. At the upper end of the splendidapartment was a state canopy, overshadowing a royal throne, and besideit was a door, which opened to a long suite of apartments, decoratedwith the utmost magnificence for the Queen and her ladies, whenever itshould be her pleasure to be private.
The Earl of Leicester having handed the Queen up to her throne, andseated her there, knelt down before her, and kissing the hand which sheheld out, with an air in which romantic and respectful gallantry washappily mingled with the air of loyal devotion, he thanked her, in termsof the deepest gratitude, for the highest honour which a sovereign couldrender to a subject. So handsome did he look when kneeling before her,that Elizabeth was tempted to prolong the scene a little longer thanthere was, strictly speaking, necessity for; and ere she raised him,she passed her hand over his head, so near as almost to touch his long,curled, and perfumed hair, and with a movement of fondness that seemedto intimate she would, if she dared, have made the motion a slightcaress.
[To justify what may be considered as a high-coloured picture, theauthor quotes the original of the courtly and shrewd Sir James Melville,being then Queen Mary's envoy at the court of London.
"I was required," says Sir James, "to stay till I had seen him madeEarle of Leicester, and Baron of Denbigh, with great solemnity; herself(Elizabeth) helping to put on his ceremonial, he sitting on his kneesbefore her, keeping a great gravity and a discreet behaviour; but shecould not refrain from putting her hand to his neck to kittle (i.e.,tickle) him, smilingly, the French Ambassador and I standing besideher."--MELVILLE'S MEMOIRS, BANNATYNE EDITION, p. 120.]
She at length raised him, and standing beside the throne, he explainedto her the various preparations which had been made for her amusementand accommodation, all of which received her prompt and graciousapprobation. The Earl then prayed her Majesty for permission that hehimself, and the nobles who had been in attendance upon her during thejourney, might retire for a few minutes, and put themselves into a guisemore fitting for dutiful attendance, during which space those gentlemenof worship (pointing to Varney, Blount, Tressilian, and others), whohad already put themselves into fresh attire, would have the honour ofkeeping her presence-chamber.
"Be it so, my lord," answered the Queen; "you could manage a theatrewell, who can thus command a double set of actors. For ourselves, wewill receive your courtesies this evening but clownishly, since it isnot our purpose to change our riding attire, being in effect somethingfatigued with a journey which the concourse of our good people hathrendered slow, though the love they have shown our person hath, at thesame time, made it delightful."
Leicester, having received this permission, retired accordingly, andwas followed by those nobles who had attended the Queen to Kenilworthin person. The gentlemen who had preceded them, and were, of course,dressed for the solemnity, remained in attendance. But being most ofthem of rather inferior rank, they remained at an awful distancefrom the throne which Elizabeth occupied. The Queen's sharp eye soondistinguished Raleigh amongst them, with one or two others who werepersonally known to her, and she instantly made them a sign to approach,and accosted them very graciously. Raleigh, in particular, the adventureof whose cloak, as well as the incident of the verses, remained onher mind, was very graciously received; and to him she most frequentlyapplied for information concerning the names and rank of those whowere in presence. These he communicated concisely, and not without sometraits of humorous satire, by which Elizabeth seemed much amused. "Andwho is yonder clownish fellow?" she said, looking at Tressilian, whosesoiled dress on this occasion greatly obscured his good mien.
"A poet, if it please your Grace," replied Raleigh.
"I might have guessed that from his careless garb," said Elizabeth."I have known some poets so thoughtless as to throw their cloaks intogutters."
"It must have been when the sun dazzled both their eyes and theirjudgment," answered Raleigh.
Elizabeth smiled, and proceeded, "I asked that slovenly fellow's name,and you only told me his profession."
"Tressilian is his name," said Raleigh, with internal reluctance, forhe foresaw nothing favourable to his friend from the manner in which shetook notice of him.
"Tressilian!" answered Elizabeth. "Oh, the Menelaus of our romance. Why,he has dressed himself in a guise that will go far to exculpate his fairand false Helen. And where is Farnham, or whatever his name is--my Lordof Leicester's man, I mean--the Paris of this Devonshire tale?"
With still greater reluctance Raleigh named and pointed out to herVarney, for whom the tailor had done all that art could perform inmaking his exterior agreeable; and who, if he had not grace, had a sortof tact and habitual knowledge of breeding, which came in place of it.
The Queen turned her eyes from the one to the other. "I doubt," shesaid, "this same poetical Master Tressilian, who is too learned, Iwarrant me, to remember whose presence he was to appear in, may be oneof those of whom Geoffrey Chaucer says wittily, the wisest clerks arenot the wisest men. I remember that Varney is a smooth-tongued varlet. Idoubt this fair runaway hath had reasons for breaking her faith."
To this Raleigh durst make no answer, aware how little he should benefitTressilian by contradicting the Queen's sentiments, and not at allcertain, on the whole, whether the best thing that could befall himwould not be that she should put an end at once by her authority to thisaffair, upon which it seemed to him Tressilian's thoughts were fixedwith unavailing and distressing pertinacity. As these reflectionspassed through his active brain, the lower door of the hall opened, andLeicester, accompanied by several of his kinsmen, and of the nobles whohad embraced his faction, re-entered the Castle Hall.
The favourite Earl was now apparelled all in white, his shoes being ofwhite velvet; his under-stocks (or stockings) of knit silk; his upperstocks of white velvet, lined with cloth of silver, which was shown atthe slashed part of the middle thigh; his doublet of cloth ofsilver, the close jerkin of white velvet, embroidered with silver andseed-pearl, his girdle and the scabbard of his sword of white velvetwith golden buckles; his poniard and sword hilted and mounted with gold;and over all a rich, loose robe of white satin, with a border of goldenembroidery a foot in breadth. The collar of the Garter, and the azuregarter itself around his knee, completed the appointments of the Earlof Leicester; which were so well matched by his fair stature, gracefulgesture, fine proportion of body, and handsome countenance, that at thatmoment he was admitted by all who saw him as the goodliest person whomthey had ever looked upon. Sussex and the other nobles were also richlyattired, but in point of splendour and gracefulness of mien Leicesterfar exceeded them all.
Elizabeth received him with great complacency. "We have one piece ofroyal justice," she said, "to attend to. It is a piece of justice, too,which interests us as a woman, as well as in the character of mother andguardian of the English people."
An involuntary shudder came over Leicester as he bowed low, expres
siveof his readiness to receive her royal commands; and a similar cold fitcame over Varney, whose eyes (seldom during that evening removed fromhis patron) instantly perceived from the change in his looks, slight asthat was, of what the Queen was speaking. But Leicester had wroughthis resolution up to the point which, in his crooked policy, he judgednecessary; and when Elizabeth added, "it is of the matter of Varneyand Tressilian we speak--is the lady here, my lord?" his answer wasready--"Gracious madam, she is not."
Elizabeth bent her brews and compressed her lips. "Our orders werestrict and positive, my lord," was her answer--
"And should have been obeyed, good my liege," replied Leicester, "hadthey been expressed in the form of the lightest wish. But--Varney, stepforward--this gentleman will inform your Grace of the cause why thelady" (he could not force his rebellious tongue to utter the words--HISWIFE) "cannot attend on your royal presence."
Varney advanced, and pleaded with readiness, what indeed he firmlybelieved, 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, whoseskill and honour are well known to my good Lord of Leicester, and froman honest and devout Protestant, a man of credit and substance, oneAnthony Foster, the gentleman in whose house she is at present bestowed,that she now labours under an illness which altogether unfits her forsuch a journey as betwixt this Castle and the neighbourhood of Oxford."
"This alters the matter," said the Queen, taking the certificates inher hand, and glancing at their contents.--"Let Tressilian comeforward.--Master Tressilian, we have much sympathy for your situation,the rather that you seem to have set your heart deeply on this AmyRobsart, or Varney. Our power, thanks to God, and the willing obedienceof a loving people, is worth much, but there are some things which itcannot compass. We cannot, for example, command the affections of agiddy young girl, or make her love sense and learning better than acourtier's fine doublet; and we cannot control sickness, with which itseems 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 thetestimonials of the physician who hath her under his charge, and thegentleman in whose house she resides, so setting forth."
"Under your Majesty's favour," said Tressilian hastily, and in his alarmfor the consequence of the imposition practised on the Queen forgettingin part at least his own promise to Amy, "these certificates speak notthe 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 ofour subjects shall be heard against the proudest, and the least knownagainst the most favoured; therefore you shall be heard fairly, butbeware you speak not without a warrant! Take these certificates in yourown hand, look at them carefully, and say manfully if you impugn thetruth of them, and upon what evidence."
As the Queen spoke, his promise and all its consequences rushed on themind of the unfortunate Tressilian, and while it controlled his naturalinclination to pronounce that a falsehood which he knew from theevidence of his senses to be untrue, gave an indecision and irresolutionto his appearance and utterance which made strongly against him inthe mind of Elizabeth, as well as of all who beheld him. He turnedthe papers over and over, as if he had been an idiot, incapable ofcomprehending their contents. The Queen's impatience began to becomevisible. "You are a scholar, sir," she said, "and of some note, as Ihave heard; yet you seem wondrous slow in reading text hand. How sayyou, are these certificates true or no?"
"Madam," said Tressilian, with obvious embarrassment and hesitation,anxious to avoid admitting evidence which he might afterwards havereason to confute, yet equally desirous to keep his word to Amy, and togive her, as he had promised, space to plead her own cause in her ownway--"Madam--Madam, your Grace calls on me to admit evidence which oughtto be proved valid by those who found their defence upon them."
"Why, Tressilian, thou art critical as well as poetical," said theQueen, bending on him a brow of displeasure; "methinks these writings,being produced in the presence of the noble Earl to whom this Castlepertains, and his honour being appealed to as the guarantee of theirauthenticity, might be evidence enough for thee. But since thou listestto be so formal--Varney, or rather my Lord of Leicester, for the affairbecomes yours" (these words, though spoken at random, thrilled throughthe Earl's marrow and bones), "what evidence have you as touching thesecertificates?"
Varney hastened to reply, preventing Leicester--"So please your Majesty,my young Lord of Oxford, who is here in presence, knows Master AnthonyFoster's hand and his character."
The Earl of Oxford, a young unthrift, whom Foster had more than onceaccommodated with loans on usurious interest, acknowledged, on thisappeal, that he knew him as a wealthy and independent franklin, supposedto be worth much money, and verified the certificate produced to be hishandwriting.
"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 heremembered his repulse from Sayes Court, and thought that his presenttestimony might gratify Leicester, and mortify the Earl of Sussex andhis faction), acknowledged he had more than once consulted with DoctorAlasco, and spoke of him as a man of extraordinary learning and hiddenacquirements, though not altogether in the regular course of practice.The Earl of Huntingdon, Lord Leicester's brother-in-law, and the oldCountess of Rutland, next sang his praises, and both remembered thethin, 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 theQueen. "We will do something ere the night is older to reconcile old SirHugh Robsart to the match. You have done your duty something more thanboldly; but we were no woman had we not compassion for the wounds whichtrue love deals, so we forgive your audacity, and your uncleansedboots withal, which have well-nigh overpowered my Lord of Leicester'sperfumes."
So spoke Elizabeth, whose nicety of scent was one of the characteristicsof her organization, as appeared long afterwards when she expelled Essexfrom her presence, on a charge against his boots similar to that whichshe now expressed against those of Tressilian.
But Tressilian had by this time collected himself, astonished as he hadat first been by the audacity of the falsehood so feasibly supported,and placed in array against the evidence of his own eyes. He rushedforward, 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 havefair hearing (which God grant you) at that last bar at which we must allplead, 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 thatbrief space, produce evidence which will show to demonstration thatthese certificates, which state this unhappy lady to be now ill at easein Oxfordshire, are false as hell!"
"Let go my train, sir!" said Elizabeth, who was startled at hisvehemence, though she had too much of the lion in her to fear; "thefellow must be distraught. That witty knave, my godson Harrington, musthave 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-twentyhours, thou canst not confute a fact so solemnly proved as this lady'sillness?"
"I will lay down my head on the block," answered Tressilian.
"Pshaw!" replied the Queen, "God's light! thou speakest like a fool.What head falls in England but by just sentence of English law? I askthee, man--if thou hast sense to understand me--wilt thou, if thoushalt fail in this improbable attempt of thine, render me a good andsufficient reason why thou dost undertake it?"
Tressilian paused, and again hesitated; because he felt convinced thatif, within the interval demanded, Amy should become reconciled to herhusband, he would in that case do her
the worst of offices by againripping up the whole circumstances before Elizabeth, and showinghow that wise and jealous princess had been imposed upon by falsetestimonials. The consciousness of this dilemma renewed his extremeembarrassment of look, voice, and manner; he hesitated, looked down, andon the Queen repeating her question with a stern voice and flashingeye, he admitted with faltering words, "That it might be--he could notpositively--that is, in certain events--explain the reasons and groundson which he acted."
"Now, by the soul of King Henry," said the Queen, "this is eithermoonstruck madness or very knavery!--Seest thou, Raleigh, thy friend isfar too Pindaric for this presence. Have him away, and make us quit ofhim, or it shall be the worse for him; for his flights are too unbridledfor any place but Parnassus, or Saint Luke's Hospital. But come backinstantly thyself, when he is placed under fitting restraint.--We wishwe had seen the beauty which could make such havoc in a wise man'sbrain."
Tressilian was again endeavouring to address the Queen, when Raleigh, inobedience to the orders he had received, interfered, and with Blount'sassistance, half led, half forced him out of the presence-chamber, wherehe himself indeed began to think his appearance did his cause more harmthan good.
When they had attained the antechamber, Raleigh entreated Blount to seeTressilian safely conducted into the apartments allotted to the Earl ofSussex's followers, and, if necessary, recommended that a guard shouldbe mounted on him.
"This extravagant passion," he said, "and, as it would seem, the news ofthe lady's illness, has utterly wrecked his excellent judgment. But itwill pass away if he be kept quiet. Only let him break forth again atno rate; for he is already far in her Highness's displeasure, andshould she be again provoked, she will find for him a worse place ofconfinement, and sterner keepers."
"I judged as much as that he was mad," said Nicholas Blount, lookingdown upon his own crimson stockings and yellow roses, "whenever I sawhim wearing yonder damned boots, which stunk so in her nostrils. I willbut see him stowed, and be back with you presently. But, Walter, did theQueen ask who I was?--methought she glanced an eye at me."
"Twenty--twenty eye-glances she sent! and I told her all--how thou werta brave soldier, and a--But for God's sake, get off Tressilian!"
"I will--I will," said Blount; "but methinks this court-haunting is nosuch 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 God's sake, begone!"
Tressilian, without further resistance or expostulation followed, orrather suffered himself to be conducted by Blount to Raleigh's lodging,where he was formally installed into a small truckle-bed placed in awardrobe, and designed for a domestic. He saw but too plainly thatno remonstrances would avail to procure the help or sympathy of hisfriends, until the lapse of the time for which he had pledged himselfto remain inactive should enable him either to explain the wholecircumstances to them, or remove from him every pretext or desire offurther interference with the fortunes of Amy, by her having found meansto place herself in a state of reconciliation with her husband.
With great difficulty, and only by the most patient and mildremonstrances with Blount, he escaped the disgrace and mortification ofhaving two of Sussex's stoutest yeomen quartered in his apartment.At last, however, when Nicholas had seen him fairly deposited in histruckle-bed, and had bestowed one or two hearty kicks, and as heartycurses, on the boots, which, in his lately acquired spirit of foppery,he considered as a strong symptom, if not the cause, of his friend'smalady, he contented himself with the modified measure of locking thedoor on the unfortunate Tressilian, whose gallant and disinterestedefforts to save a female who had treated him with ingratitude thusterminated for the present in the displeasure of his Sovereign and theconviction of his friends that he was little better than a madman.