"
"Madam," he replied, bowing with the deepest respect, "gladly would I
obey your commands, but they must have a victim, and let it be the
true one.--Yes, madam," he continued, addressing the Lady of
Lochleven, "I alone am guilty in this matter. If the word of a Douglas
has yet any weight with you, believe me that this boy is innocent; and
on your conscience I charge you, do him no wrong; nor let the Queen
suffer hardship for embracing the opportunity of freedom which sincere
loyalty--which a sentiment yet deeper--offered to her acceptance. Yes!
I had planned the escape of the most beautiful, the most persecuted of
women; and far from regretting that I, for a while, deceived the
malice of her enemies, I glory in it, and am most willing to yield up
life itself in her cause."
"Now may God have compassion on my age," said the Lady of Lochleven,
"and enable me to bear this load of affliction! O Princess, born in a
luckless hour, when will you cease to be the instrument of seduction
and of ruin to all who approach you? O ancient house of Lochleven,
famed so long for birth and honour, evil was the hour which brought
the deceiver under thy roof!"
"Say not so, madam," replied her grandson; "the old honours of the
Douglas line will be outshone, when one of its descendants dies for
the most injured of queens--for the most lovely of women."
"Douglas," said the Queen, "must I at this moment--ay, even at this
moment, when I may lose a faithful subject for ever, chide thee for
forgetting what is due to me as thy Queen?"
"Wretched boy," said the distracted Lady of Lochleven, "hast thou
fallen even thus far into the snare of this Moabitish woman?--hast
thou bartered thy name, thy allegiance, thy knightly oath, thy duty to
thy parents, thy country, and thy God, for a feigned tear, or a sickly
smile, from lips which flattered the infirm Francis--lured to death
the idiot Darnley--read luscious poetry with the minion
Chastelar--mingled in the lays of love which were sung by the beggar
Rizzio--and which were joined in rapture to those of the foul and
licentious Bothwell?"
"Blaspheme not, madam!" said Douglas;--"nor you, fair Queen, and
virtuous as fair, chide at this moment the presumption of thy
vassal!--Think not that the mere devotion of a subject could have
moved me to the part I have been performing.
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