burst into a loud
laugh, exclaiming--
"Lack-a-day, Wilton, lack-a-day! Here are you and I as silent and as
meditative as two owls in a belfry: you looking as wise as if you
were a minister of state, and I as sorrowful as an unhappy lover,
when, to say the truth, I am thinking of some deep stroke of policy,
and you are meditating upon a fair maid's bright eyes. Get you gone,
Wilton; get you gone, for a sentimental, lack-a-daisical shepherd!
Now could we but get poor old King James to come back, the way to a
dukedom would be open before you in a fortnight."
"How so?" demanded Wilton, "how so? You do not suppose, Sherbrooke,
that I would ever join in overturning the religion, and the laws, and
the liberties of my country--how so, then?"
"As thus," replied Lord Sherbrooke--"I will answer you as if I had
been born the grave-digger in Hamlet. King James comes over--well,
marry go to, now--a certain duke that you wot of, who is a rank
Jacobite, by the by, instantly joins the invader; then comes King
William, drives me his fellow-king and father-in-law out of the
kingdom in five days, takes me the duke prisoner, and chops me his
head off in no time. This headless father leaves a sorrowful
daughter, who at the time of his death is deeply and desperately in
love, without daring to say it, her father's head being the only
obstacle in the way of the daughter's heart. Then comes the lover to
console the lady, and finding her without protection, offers to
undertake that very needful duty. Now see you, Wilton? Now see
you?--But there's the door of your dwelling. Get you in, man, get you
in, and try if in your dreams you can get some means of bringing it
about. By my faith, Wilton, you are in a perilous situation; but
there's one thing for your comfort,--if I can get out of all the
scrapes that at this moment surround me on every side, like the lines
of a besieging enemy, you can surely make your escape out of your
difficulties, when you have love, and youth, and hope, to befriend
you."
"Hope?" said Wilton, in bitter sadness; but at the moment he spoke,
the door of the house was opened, and, bidding Lord Sherbrooke "Good
night," he went in.

CHAPTER XIV.
During the greater part of the next day Wilton did not set eyes upon
Lord Sherbrooke. The Earl of Byerdale, however, was peculiarly
courteous and polite to his young secretary. There was much business,
Earl was obliged to be very rapid in all his movements; but the terms
in which he gave his directions were gentle