destruction. But it is strange that thus a last blow should have
been aimed at that family, once so great and strong, which James's
resentment had pursued to the end. A little while before, Archibald
Douglas of Kilspindie had thrown himself upon James's mercy--the only
member of the Douglas family who can be in any way identified with the
noble Douglas of _The Lady of the Lake_.

"'Tis James of Douglas, by St. Serle,
The uncle of the banished Earl."

But Archibald of Kilspindie did not meet the same forgiveness with which
his prototype in the poem was received. He was sent back into banishment
unforgiven, the King's word having been passed to forgive no one
condemned by the law. Perhaps the same stern fidelity to a stern promise
was the reason why Lady Glamis was allowed to go to the stake unrescued.
But we speculate in vain on subjects so veiled in ignorance and
uncertainty. Perhaps his counsellors acted on their own authority in
respect to a crime the reprobation and horror of which were universal,
and did not disturb the King in the first shock of his mourning. In the
same week the fair and fragile Magdalen of France was carried to her
burial, and Lady Glamis was burned at the other extremity of Edinburgh.
Perhaps it was supposed that something in the incantations of the one
had a fatal influence upon the young existence of the other. At all
events these two sensations fell to the populace of Edinburgh and all
the strangers who were constantly passing through her gates, at the same
time. Life in those days was full of pictorial circumstances which do
not belong to ours. One is inclined to wonder sometimes whether the many
additional comforts we possess make up for that perpetual movement in
the air, the excitement, the communication of new ideas, the strange
sights both pleasant and terrible. The burning of a witch or a heretic
is perhaps too tremendous a sensation to be desired by the most heroic
spectator; but the perpetual drama going on thus before the eyes of all
the world, and giving to the poorest an absolute share in every new and
strange thing, must have added a reality to national life which no
newspapers can give. That the people remain always eager for this share
in historical events, the crowds that never weary of gazing at passing
princes, the innumerable audience of the picture papers, the endless
reproduction of every insignificant public event, from a procession of
aldermen to the simplest