The Last Of The Barons, Volume 9.

his slumbers, and he saw the earl before him, with a countenance so changed from its usual open

hou hatest Ed

e my last

de fast to young Sir Robert Welles with this letter. Bid him not be dismayed; bid him hold out, for ere many days are past, Lord Warwick, and it may be also the Duke of Clarence, will join their force w

ich had long notoriously subsisted between Edward and the earl, and rejoiced that the prophecy that he had long so shrewdly hazarded was at last fulfilled. Descending the stairs he

said Marmaduke; "I li

ogether! Mount!-our wa

ou go into Lincolnshi

tfo

Hilyard, as he sprang upon his hor

es

ck is chang

la

r l

l de

I ask n

goodly troop, armed to the teeth, emerge from the earl's house and fol

ive to all that touched the honour of his House; and his indignation at the deadly i

oodville worthy of his throne, and to see in

never schemed before! You are right,-honesty is a fool's policy! Would I had known this but an hour before the news reached me! I have already dismissed our friends to their different districts, to support King Edward's cause-he is still king,-a lit

ow

to make his peace with me,- churchmen are not fathers! Marmaduke Nevile hath my orders; a hundred armed men,

ward, I dare not say the w

is the m

face to the p

traversed worlds since daybreak! True! all commotion to be successful must have a cause that men can understand. Neverth

o them Edwa

Bourdour with song and roundel of Anne's virgin shame! how King Edward stole to her room at the dead of night, and wooed and pressed, and swore, and-God of Heaven, t

nder of the court for the abrupt disappearance of his guest, he saw that the person who could best originate and circulate such a tale was the queen; and he sought her at once, with the resolution to choose his confidant in the connection most rarely honoured by marital trust in similar offences. He, however, so softened his narrative as to leave it but a venial error. He had been indulging over-freely in the wine-cup, he had walked into the corridor for the refreshing coolness of the air, he h

ch between Edward and his minister, she could not, as queen, wife, and woman, but be anxious that some cause more honourable in Edward, and less odious to the people, should be assigned for quarrel, she earnestly recommended the king to repair at once to the More, as had been before arranged, and to spare no pains, disdain no expressions of penitence and humiliation, to secure the mediation of the archbishop. His mind somewhat relieved by this interview and counsel, the king kissed Elizabeth with affectionate gratitude, and returned to his chamber to prepare for his departure to the archbishop's palace. But then, remembering that Adam and Sibyll possessed his secret, he resolved at once to banish them from the Tower. For a moment he thought of the dungeons of his fortress, of the rope of his doomsman; but his conscience at that hour was sore and vexed. His fierceness humbled by the sense of shame, he shrank from a new

t summoned before him the warder of the gate, learned that he alone was privy to the mode of his guest's flight, and deeming it best to leave at large no commentator on the tale he had invented, sentenc

upon them, that Edward beheld, on entering the hall, only countenances of cheerful loyalty and respectful welcome. After the first greetings, the prelate,

s prelate was to mount to the papal throne seemed to crumble into the dust. The king and the earl were equally necessary to the schemes of George Nevile. He chid the royal layman with mo

ur Highness's mother, our noble kinswoman. Permit me to despatch to her grace a le

nd dipping his hands in a perfumed ewer; "I shall not know r

ed to this royal visit to the More,-a date we have here adopted, not, as Sharon Turner and others place (namely, upon the authority of Hearne's Fragm., 302, which subsequent events disprove), aft

the trees below this tower, the gleam of steel; I have crept through the foliage, and counted

his bold face fell, "comes

'The door of the Garden Tower is unguarded,-wait the signal!

e foliage grew thick and dark around the wall; he saw a

, Ratcliffe! F

to a door on the inner court; there I have already a steed in

ight through a crowd assembled by the gate, galloped alone and fast, untracked by human enemy, but goaded by the foe that mounts the ride