"
"I tell thee, Father Ambrosius," replied the gardener, "the patience
of the best saint that ever said pater-noster, would be exhausted by
the trials to which you have put mine--What I have been, it skills not
to speak at present-no one knows better than yourself, father, what I
renounced, in hopes to find ease and quiet during the remainder of my
days--and no one better knows how my retreat has been invaded, my
fruit-trees broken, my flower-beds trodden down, my quiet frightened
away, and my very sleep driven from my bed, since ever this poor
Queen, God bless her, hath been sent to Lochleven.--I blame her not;
being a prisoner, it is natural she should wish to get out from so
vile a hold, where there is scarcely any place even for a tolerable
garden, and where the water-mists, as I am told, blight all the early
blossoms--I say, I cannot blame her for endeavouring for her freedom;
but why I should be drawn into the scheme--why my harmless arbours,
that I planted with my own hands, should become places of privy
conspiracy-why my little quay, which I built for my own fishing boat,
should have become a haven for secret embarkations--in short, why I
should be dragged into matters where both heading and hanging are like
to be the issue, I profess to you, reverend father, I am totally
ignorant."
"My brother," answered the Abbot, "you are wise, and ought to
know--"
"I am not--I am not--I am not wise," replied the horticulturist,
pettishly, and stopping his ears with his fingers--"I was never called
wise but when men wanted to engage me in some action of notorious
folly.
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