Jane Seton; or, The King's Advocate: A Scottish Historical Romance
Brilliantly lighted by candles of perfumed wax, which burned in
rose-coloured globes of Venetian glass, the chamber, in which we had
the honour of introducing the reader to the foe of Henry VIII., and
the terror of the Calvinists, to the eye of the poor priest, formed a
striking contrast to his own humble dormitory at St. Giles's; but he
was not a man to permit such thoughts to dwell an instant in his
mind; and dismissing them at once, he knelt before the cardinal's
chair, to kiss the white hand which that great and luxurious prince
of the church extended graciously towards him.
He was seated in a large and easy chair of stuffed velvet; his feet
were encased in slippers of morocco, red as his stockings, and rested
on a gilded footstool. Two vases of Italian glass, exquisitely
carved, and glittering with the golden-coloured and purple wine they
contained, together with two silver baskets, one full of honied
biscuits and the other of grapes, showed that his eminence had been
solacing his solitary hour; for a gittern that lay on a chair
announced that his daughter, the Lady Margaret, had just retired, and
the young Lord Lindesay, having no occasion to remain, followed her;
thus the priest found himself alone with the cardinal, before whom
all his confidence vanished; for, despite his conscious rectitude of
heart and goodness of intention, in presence of the second man in
Scotland, the poor prebend became timid as a child.
"Welcome, Father St. Bernard!" said the cardinal, pointing to a seat
near his own: "you look pale and fatigued. Here are red and white
Italian wines, and these are better than our ordinary Rochelle or
Bordeaux. To which shall I have the pleasure of assisting you? and
then we will to business after; for I am certain thou hast come to me
on business; no one," continued the studious cardinal, closing a book
he had been reading, "no one, save my Lord Lindesay, comes near David
Beaton for mere friendship, I find. Red wine or white?"
"Either, please your eminence--the flask that is next you."
Reassured by the frank manner of the cardinal, and by the luscious
_Greco_ that moistened his tongue, which had been parched and dry,
St. Bernard was about to speak, when the cardinal again addressed him.
"Dost thou come with new tidings of this Calvinistic heresy, which
spreadeth, even as foul leprosy, over Scotland; or," he added,
re-opening his volume, which was _The Franciscan_, of George
Buchanan, "or comest thou merely here, as this arch-heretic sayeth,
to exhibit--
'The greasy shaven heart,
A gloomy friar, with flowing gown outspread!
The twisted girdle, and the hat's broad brim,
The opened shoe dressed out in monkish trim;
Below the garb, where we so oft will find
A brutal tyrant, whom no law can bind;
The robber, who oppression's armour wields,
The sensual glutton, to excess who yields,
To deck the husband's brow, the night will spend;
The faithless lover, and deceitful friend!
His modest face, though false, worn as a cloak,
To gull the plebeian, and delude the flock;
Ten hundred thousand crimes, wild, dark, and deep.
He hides beneath the clothing of the sheep!'
Holy mother of God!" exclaimed the cardinal (who had read this
passage ironically and emphatically), as he flung the volume to the
farthest end of the apartment, "and thou permittest this wretch to
encumber the earth! Holy St. Francis of Assisium! thou whose life
was a miracle of humility; who, in a glorious vision, beheld our
Saviour hanging on his cross; and thou hast permitted the heretic
dog, who writes thus of thy clergy, again to escape me!"
"I heard that he had broken forth from your eminence's archiepiscopal
castle of St. Andrew's some months ago."
"True,--while my guards (the drunken rascals!) slept; but I should
have made them answer for him body for body. Truly, the college of
St. Barbe hath reason to be proud of its professor, this learned
Buchanan, for there he is at present teaching grammar and the
humanities; and now I hear that the Earl of Cassilis (whom I know to
be an arch-heretic, traitor, and corresponder with Henry of England)
is about to secure him from me in his castle of Culzean, as a tutor
for his son, the Lord Gilbert Kennedy. By the cross, he is a rare
tutor! But let this lord beware; for though he is brother of Quentin
Kennedy, that good abbot of Crossraguell, whose pieties are those of
a saint, the people of Scotland shall see whether a cardinal's hat or
an earl's coronet will weigh the heavier in the scales of justice and
of Heaven."
The cardinal was both exasperated and satirical. Father St. Bernard
found that he had chosen an unfortunate time to prefer his request,
and while he was rallying all his thoughts to introduce a more
pleasing topic of conversation than that broached by the cardinal,
the latter said, suddenly, but in a milder tone:
"And now, my good old friend, St. Bernard, what dost thou wish me to
do for thee?"
"May it please your eminence to grant me your patience and pardon."
The cardinal put one leg over the other, laid his hand upon the
wine-cup, and nodded, as much as to say--"Good: I see the reverend
father has some request to make of me."
"My Lord Cardinal, dost thou remember the 30th of August, 1534?"
"The 30th of August, 1534!" repeated the cardinal, pondering.
"That 30th of August, when I implored your eminence not to pass
through Fife to St. Andrew's."
"I do," said the cardinal, becoming suddenly animated, "for there
were certain mysterious circumstances--but what of that now? 'tis
three years ago."
"My lord, I know not whether that which I am about to reveal be a
sin, or whether, by so doing, I am breaking the irrevocable seal of
confession; the man who told what I am about to relate, made
afterwards a public confession, when he was expiring in the streets
of Kinghorn, but of all the crowd around him, I alone understood to
what he referred--unhappy being!"
"Go on," said the cardinal, sipping his wine, "I am already all ears
and impatience."
"On the evening of the 26th of August, just the day before Straitoun
and Gourlay were burned for heresy at Greenside, I was seated in the
public confessional at St. Giles's, when a man entered in great agony
of mind, and knelt down before me. This man, my lord, was one whom
the secret orations of the Reformers and the mal-influence of his
chief, for he was a follower of old Sir John Melville of Raith, had
partly led astray from the fold of the true faith. He was James
Melville, the gudeman of Pitargie. The blessed hand of God was in
it! Like a dark cloud, remorse had descended upon this lost one, and
he informed me, that with sixteen others he had sworn to slay your
eminence as you passed along the road to St. Andrew's on the morrow;
and that this ambuscade of assassins was to be in waiting near the
tower of Seafield, to the eastward of Kinghorn. In vain did I
command him not to criminate others; but he told me, that your
deadliest enemies, John Leslie of Parkhill, Peter Carmichael of
Kilmadie, Sir James Kirkaldy of the Grange, the Melvilles of Raith
and of Carnbee, the Lord Rothes, and the Laird of Kinfawns would be
there. That Henry of England was in the plot, and had offered them
magnificent bribes; and that one of his ships lay cruizing at the
East Neuk, to secure for these seventeen conspirators a safe retreat
to his own dominions, whither they were to bring your eminence's
scarlet cope, drenched in blood, as a token that the deed was done,
that their lust of vengeance had been sated, and that thou, like
another Becket, had fallen beneath their swords.
"As the conscience-stricken assassin proceeded, I became frozen with
horror. With groans and with tears he concluded his dark narrative,
and beating his breast, implored me to make what use of his
confession I pleased, but at all risks to save your eminence. To
warn you was impossible, for the confessional sealed my lips! And I
saw you--you, the greatest hope of our sinking church, and the chief
pillar of the Scottish throne, its bulwark against English
aggression, and Henry's grasping and heretical spirit, about to fall!
Your eminence was to be shot by arquebuses, after leaving the
ferryboat at Kinghorn. After long and deep thought, the penitent
begged that I would use all my little influence to detain your
eminence for two hours upon your journey, and you may, perhaps,
remember----"
"Thy coming to me on the second day after the _auto-da-fé_ at
Greenside, and imploring me to delay by two hours my journey into
Fife," said the cardinal, as he arose and took in his the hands of
the priest. "Thou good and venerable man! I remember well thy
diffidence, confusion, and timidity; thy fear of being ridiculed and
thy dread of offending me; and how I railed and stormed at thy
superstitious presentiment, as I now remember with regret I named it!
Well?"
"At twelve o'clock, on the 30th of August, the knights and gentlemen
I have named, with others, to the number of sixteen persons, all
fleetly mounted and well armed with arquebuses and wheel-lock
calivers, posted themselves among the copsewood that overhang certain
thick hedge-rows, which lies between Kinghorn and Sir Henry
Moultray's tower at Seafield. The king of England's ship, with all
her sails set, was verging near the shore, while a Scottish flag, to
mask her nation and purpose, was displayed from her mainmast head.
The conspirators loaded their firearms with poisoned balls, and
carefully blew their matches as the bells of St. Leonard's tower
tolled twelve. It was the time at which these assassins, who were
posted eight on each side of the way, expected your eminence.
"The twelfth stroke of the hour was scarcely given, when they
perceived a man, attired exactly like your eminence, in a baretta,
cope, and stockings of scarlet, come riding up the narrow horseway,
between the dark green hedgerows----"
"What is it thou tellest me? My wraith!"
The priest smiled.
"The seeming cardinal came on, riding fast, as if in advance of his
followers! when, lo! sixteen arquebuses and calivers flashed from the
screens of thick hawthorn and dark green holly, and prone to the
earth fell horse and man, wallowing in their blood."
"_Agnus Dei!_"
"With a shout, the assassins rushed forward to imbrue their hands yet
further in blood, and found that they had slain--not David Beaton the
cardinal, but one of themselves--Raith's own kinsman, James Melville,
the gudeman of Pitargie! He was carried to Kinghorn, and there, as I
have said, he died. Without informing me of his project, further
than to delay you, he had thus been guilty of self-immolation, as
having no other method of punishing his own crime and saving your
eminence. And so you were saved. I delayed you at the pier of Leith
for two hours, and at the very moment you embarked, the mock cardinal
was shot on the shore of Fife. On returning, your eminence was
pleased to remember kindly my warning and presentiment, as you still
named it: then, my lord, you promised me, that if ever I wished a
boon that was in your power, I should consider it as already granted."
"True--true, my good friend, my reverend brother, I remember it all."
"You spoke of many a deanery, and many a rectory that were vacant in
Angus, Mearn, and Buchan; but I still find myself the poor prebend in
the parish kirk of St. Giles----"
"Yes, yes--I feel that I have been ungrateful, and thou justly
upbraidest me," said the cardinal, hastily opening a portfolio,
"there is the Benedictine Priory of St. Mary, at Fyvie, the superior
of which----"
"Nay, Lord Cardinal, nay! Our Lady forbid I should ever presume to
upbraid thee. I am but too glad that among the maze of more