ling?--what do ye all here,
knaves, in place of attending to your duties?"

Instead of answering this question, the terrified domestics were now
endeavouring to make off in all directions; but the querist's curiosity,
or perhaps suspicion, having been excited by what he had seen, he
instantly arrested their progress, by calling on them, in a voice of
increased severity and vehemence, to stop.

"Come hither, Johnstone," he exclaimed, addressing one of the
fugitives--"I must know what you have been all about." And, without
waiting for an answer, "Who occupies this apartment?" he inquired,
pointing to that in which was Chatelard.

"And please ye, my lord," replied Johnstone, bowing with the most
profound respect--"ane that we think's no very wise. He's been bletherin
awa there to himsel, saving yer honour's presence, like a bubbly-jock,
for this half-hour back, and we can neither mak tap, tail, nor mane o'
what he's sayin."

"What! a madman, Johnstone?" said the Earl of Murray, the queen's
half-brother, for it was no less a personage; then hurriedly added, "Who
is he?--what is he?--where is he from?--when came he hither?"

The man answered categorically--

"I dinna ken, my lord, wha he is; but, frae the thinness o' his chafts,
I tak him to be ane o' your French laun-loupers. He cam to the palace
about twa hours syne."

The earl's curiosity was now still further excited, and, without saying
a word more, he drew near to the door of Chatelard's apartment, and
became also an auditor of the poor poet's unguarded language; but not
such as it was in the case of the listeners who had preceded him; to him
that language was perfectly intelligible--at least to the extent of
informing him of Chatelard's ambitious love. To Murray this was a secret
worth knowing; and, in the hope that he might discover this attachment
to be reciprocal, and thus acquire an additional influence over the
queen, his sister, at the expense of her reputation, he considered it a
singularly fortunate incident. Perhaps he expected that it would do even
more for him than this: that it would eventually help him to the
accomplishment of certain daring views towards the crown itself, of
which he was not unsuspected. Whether, however, he was able to trace, in
distinct and definite lines, any consequences favourable to himself from
the fact which had just come to his knowledge, it is certain he was
pleased with the discovery, and considered it as an important