a heart. He speaks to it when alone—he parts not from it when he sleeps—no heathen ever worshipped an idol with such devotion.'
'Thou art a prying knave to watch thy master so closely,' said Elizabeth, blushing, but not with anger; 'and a tattling knave to tell over again his fooleries.—What colour might the braid of hair be that thou pratest of?'
Varney replied, 'A poet, madam, might call it a thread from the golden web wrought by Minerva; but to my thinking it was paler than even the purest gold—more like the last parting sunbeam of the softest day of spring.'
'Why, you are a poet yourself, Master Varney,' said the Queen, smiling. 'But I have not genius quick enough to follow your rare metaphors. Look round these ladies—is there'—(she hesitated, and endeavoured to assume an air of great indifference)—'is there here, in this presence, any lady, the colour of whose hair reminds thee of that braid? Methinks, without prying into my Lord of Leicester's amorous secrets, I would fain know what kind of locks are like the thread of Minerva's web, or the—what was it?—the last rays of the May-day sun.'
Varney looked round the presence-chamber, his eye travelling from one lady to another, until at length it rested upon the Queen herself, but with an aspect of the deepest veneration. 'I see no tresses,' he said, 'in this presence, worthy of such similies, unless where I dare not look on them.'
'How, sir knave?' said the Queen; 'dare you intimate—'
'Nay, madam,' replied Varney, shading his eyes with his hand, 'it was the beams of the May-day sun that dazzled my weak eyes.'
'Go to—go to,' said the Queen; 'thou art a foolish fellow'—and turning quickly from him she walked up to Leicester.
Intense curiosity, mingled with all the various hopes, fears, and passions which influence court faction, had occupied the presence-chamber during the Queen's conference with Varney, as if with the strength of an Eastern talisman. Men suspended every, even the slightest external motion, and would have ceased to breathe, had Nature permitted such an intermission of her functions. The atmosphere was contagious, and Leicester, who saw all around wishing or fearing his advancement or his fall forgot all that love had previously dictated, and saw nothing for the instant but the favour or disgrace which depended on the nod of Elizabeth and the fidelity of Varney. He summoned himself hastily, and prepared to play his part in the scene which was like to ensue, when, as he judged from the glances which the Queen threw towards him, Varney's communications, be they what they might, were operating in his favour. Elizabeth did not long leave him in doubt; for the more than favour with which she accosted him decided his triumph in the eyes of his rival, and of the assembled court of England. 'Thou hast a prating servant of this same Varney, my lord,' she said; 'it is lucky you trust him with nothing that can hurt you in our opinion, for believe me, he would keep no counsel.'
'From your Highness,' said Leicester, dropping gracefully on one knee, 'it were treason he should. I would that my heart itself lay before you, barer than the tongue of any servant could strip it.'
'What, my lord,' said Elizabeth, looking kindly upon him, 'is there no one little corner over which you would wish to spread a veil? Ah! I see you are confused at the question, and your Queen knows she should not look too deeply into her servants' motives for their faithful duty, lest she see what might, or at least ought to, displease her.'
Relieved by these last words, Leicester broke out into a torrent of expressions of deep and passionate attachment, which perhaps, at that moment, were not altogether fictitious. The mingled emotions which had at first overcome him had now given way to the energetic vigour with which he had determined to support his place in the Queen's favour; and never did he seem to Elizabeth more eloquent, more handsome, more interesting, than while, kneeling at her feet, he conjured her to strip him of all his power, but to leave him the name of her servant.—'Take from the poor Dudley,' he exclaimed, 'all that your bounty has made him, and bid him be the poor gentleman he was when your Grace first shone on him; leave him no more than his cloak and his sword, but let him still boast he has—what in word or deed he never forfeited—the regard of his adored Queen and mistress!'
'No, Dudley!' said Elizabeth, raising him with one hand, while she extended the other that he might kiss it. 'Elizabeth hath not forgotten that, whilst you were a poor gentleman, despoiled of your hereditary rank, she was as poor a princess, and that in her cause you then ventured all that oppression had left you—your life and honour. Rise, my lord, and let my hand go—rise, and be what you have ever been, the grace of our court and the support of our throne! Your mistress may be forced to chide your misdemeanours, but never without owning your merits. —And so help me God,' she added, turning to the audience, who, with various feelings, witnessed this interesting scene—'so help me God, gentlemen, as I think never sovereign had a truer servant than I have in this noble Earl!'
A murmur of assent rose from the Leicestrian faction, which the friends of Sussex dared not oppose. They remained with their eyes fixed on the ground, dismayed as well as mortified by the public and absolute triumph of their opponents. Leicester's first use of the familiarity to which the Queen had so publicly restored him was to ask her commands concerning Varney's offence, 'although,' he said, 'the fellow deserves nothing from me but displeasure, yet, might I presume to intercede—'
'In truth, we had forgotten his matter,' said the Queen; 'and it was ill done of us, who owe justice to our meanest as well as to our highest subject. We are pleased, my lord, that you were the first to recall the matter to our memory.—Where is Tressilian, the accuser?—let him come before us.'
Tressilian appeared, and made a low and beseeming reference. His person, as we have elsewhere observed, had an air of grace and even of nobleness, which did not escape Queen Elizabeth's critical observation. She looked at him with, attention as he stood before her unabashed, but with an air of the deepest dejection.
'I cannot but grieve for this gentleman,' she said to Leicester. 'I have inquired concerning him, and his presence confirms what I heard, that he is a scholar and a soldier, well accomplished both in arts and arms. We women, my lord, are fanciful in our choice—I had said now, to judge by the eye, there was no comparison to be held betwixt your follower and this gentleman. But Varney is a well-spoken fellow, and, to say truth, that goes far with us of the weaker sex.—look you, Master Tressilian, a bolt lost is not a bow broken. Your true affection, as I will hold it to be, hath been, it seems, but ill requited; but you have scholarship, and you know there have been false Cressidas to be found, from the Trojan war downwards. Forget, good sir, this Lady Light o' Love—teach your affection to see with a wiser eye. This we say to you, more from the writings of learned men than our own knowledge, being, as we are, far removed by station and will from the enlargement of experience in such idle toys of humorous passion. For this dame's father, we can make his grief the less by advancing his son-in-law to such station as may enable him to give an honourable support to his bride. Thou shalt not be forgotten thyself, Tressilian—follow our court, and thou shalt see that a true Troilus hath some claim on our grace. Think of what that arch-knave Shakespeare says—a plague on him, his toys come into my head when I should think of other matters. Stay, how goes it?
You smile, my Lord of Southampton—perchance I make your player's verse halt through my bad memory. But let it suffice let there be no more of this mad matter.'
And as Tressilian kept the posture of one who would willingly be heard, though, at the same time, expressive of the deepest reverence, the Queen added with some impatience, 'What would the man have? The wench cannot wed both of you? She has made her election—not a wise one perchance—but she is Varney's wedded wife.'
'My suit should sleep there, most gracious Sovereign,' said Tressilian, 'and with my suit my revenge. But I hold this Varney's word no good warrant for the truth.'
'Had that doubt been elsewhere urged,' answered Varney, 'my sword—'
