the queen's presence, the wherry at the same time dropping to the rear. The youth underwent the gaze of majesty not the less gracefully that his self-possession was mingled with embarrassment. The mud-dyed cloak still hung upon his arm, and formed the natural topic with which the queen introduced the conversation..

"You have this day spoiled a gay mantle in our behalf, though the manner of offering it was unusual, and somewhat bold."

"In a sovereign's need," answered the youth, "it is each liegeman's duty to be bold."

"Well, young man," said the queen, "your gallantry shall not go unrewarded. Go to the wardrobe keeper, and he shall have orders to replace the suit which you cast away in our service. Thou shalt have a suit, and that of the newest cut, I promise thee, on the word of a princess."

"May it please your grace," said Walter, hesitating, "it is not for so humble a servant of your majesty to measure out your bounties; but if it became me to choose

"Thou wouldst have gold, I warrant me," said the queen, interrupting him. "I take shame to say that, in our capital, such and so various are the means of thriftless folly, that to give gold to youth is giving fuel to fire, and furnishing them with the means of self-destruction."

Walter waited patiently until the queen had done, and then modestly assured her that gold was still less his wish than the raiment her majesty had before offered.

"How, boy!" rejoined the queen, "neither gold nor garment? What is't thou wouldst have of me, then?"

"Only permission, madam—if it is not asking too high an honor-permission to wear the cloak which did you this trifling service."

66

Permission to wear thine own cloak, thou silly boy?"

said the queen.

66

It is no longer mine," said Walter.

"When your

majesty's foot touched it, it became a fit mantle for a prince, but far too rich a one for its former owner.

The queen again blushed; and endeavored to cover, by laughing, a slight degree of not unpleasing surprise and confusion.

"The youth's head is turned with reading romances. I must know something of him that I may send him safe to his friends. What art thou?"

"A gentleman of the household of the Earl of Sussex, so please your grace, sent hither, with his master of horse, upon a message to your majesty."

In a moment the gracious expression which Elizabeth's face had hitherto maintained gave way to an expression of haughtiness and severity.

"My Lord Sussex," she said, "has taught us how to regard his messages by the value he places upon ours. We sent but this morning the physician-in-ordinary of our chamber, and that at no usual time, understanding his lordship's illness to be more dangerous than he had before apprehended. He found the gate of Say's Court defended by men with culverins, as if it had been on the borders of Scotland, not in the vicinity of our court; and when he demanded admittance in our name, it was stubbornly refused. For this slight of a kindness, which had but too much of condescension in it, we will receive

-at present, at least no excuse; and some such we suppose to have been the purport of my Lord of Sussex's message."

This was uttered in a tone and with a gesture which made Lord Sussex's friends who were within hearing tremble. He to whom the speech was addressed, however, trembled not; but with great deference and humility, as soon as the queen's passion gave him opportunity, he replied: "So please your most gracious majesty, I was charged with no apology from the Earl of Sussex."

"With what were you then charged, sir?" inquired. the queen, with the impetuosity which, amid noble qualities, strongly marked her character. "Was it with a justification or with a defiance?"

"Madam," said the young man, "my Lord of Sussex knew the offense approached toward treason, and could think of nothing save of securing the offender, and placing him in your majesty's hands, and at your mercy. The noble earl was fast asleep when your most gracious message reached him, a potion having been administered to that purpose by his physician; and his lordship knew not of the ungracious repulse your majesty's royal and most comfortable message had received, until after he awoke this morning."

"And which of his domestics, then, presumed to reject my message?" asked the queen, much surprised.

"The offender, madam, is before you," replied Walter, bowing very low. "The full and sole blame is mine; and my lord has most justly sent me to abide the consequences of a fault, of which he is as innocent as a sleeping man's dreams can be of a waking man's actions."

"What! was it thou thou thyself that repelled my thyself—that messenger and my physician from Say's Court?" said the queen. "What could occasion such boldness in one who seems devoted to his sovereign?"

"Madam," answered the youth, "we say in our country, that the physician is for the time the liege sovereign of his patient. Now, my noble master was then under dominion of a leech, who had issued his commands that his patient should not be disturbed on the peril of his life. This morning my master awakened, much refreshed and strengthened from the only sleep he hath had for many hours."

The queen answered hastily, and without affecting to disguise her satisfaction, "By my word, I am glad he is better. But thou wert over bold to deny access of my Doctor Masters. Young man, what is thy name and birth?"

tion.

Raleigh is my name, most gracious queen, the youngest son of a large but honorable family of Devonshire." "Raleigh?" said Elizabeth, after a moment's recollec“Have we not heard of your service in Ireland?" "I have been so fortunate as to do some service there, madam," replied Raleigh; "scarce, however, of consequence sufficient to reach your grace's ears."

"Hark ye, Master Raleigh," said the queen, "see thou fail not to wear thy muddy cloak, in token of penitence, till our pleasure be further known. And here," she added, giving him a jewel of gold in the form of a chessman, "I give thee this to wear at the collar."

Raleigh knelt, and as he took from her hand the jewel, kissed the fingers which gave it. He knew, perhaps

better than almost any of her courtiers who surrounded her, how to mix the devotion claimed by the queen with the gallantry due to her personal beauty; and in this, his first attempt to unite them, he succeeded so well as at once to gratify Elizabeth's personal vanity and her love of power.

"THE

ANGLO-NORMAN DAYS

From "Ivanhoe"

SIR WALTER SCOTT

HE curse of St. Withold upon these infernal porkers!" said the swineherd, after blowing his horn obstreperously, to collect together the scattered herd of swine, which, answering his call with notes equally melodious, made, however, no haste to remove themselves from the luxurious banquet of beech nut and acorns on which they had fattened, or to forsake the marshy banks of the rivulet, where several of them, half plunged in mud, lay stretched at their ease, altogether regardless of the voice of their keeper.

"The curse of St. Withold upon them and upon me!" said Gurth. "If the two-legged wolf snap not up some of them ere nightfall, I am no true man. Here, Fangs! Fangs!" he ejaculated at the top of his voice to a ragged, wolfish-looking dog, a sort of lurcher, half mastiff, half greyhound, which ran limping about as if with the purpose of seconding his master in collecting the refractory grunters; but which, in fact, from misapprehension of