to refresh thee
after thy close lodging."

"I tell you, my liege," said Hudson impatiently, yet in a whisper,
intended only to be audible by the King, "that if you spend overmuch
time in trifling, you will be convinced by dire experience of
Buckingham's treason. I tell you,--I asseverate to your Majesty,--two
hundred armed fanatics will be here within the hour, to surprise the
guards."

"Stand back, ladies," said the King, "or you may hear more than you will
care to listen to. My Lord of Buckingham's jests are not always, you
know, quite fitted for female ears; besides, we want a few words in
private with our little friend. You, my Lord of Ormond--you, Arlington"
(and he named one or two others), "may remain with us."

The gay crowd bore back, and dispersed through the apartment--the men to
conjecture what the end of this mummery, as they supposed it, was
likely to prove; and what jest, as Sedley said, the bass-fiddle had been
brought to bed of--and the ladies to admire and criticise the antique
dress, and richly embroidered ruff and hood of the Countess of Derby, to
whom the Queen was showing particular attention.

"And now, in the name of Heaven, and amongst friends," said the King to
the dwarf, "what means all this?"

"Treason, my lord the King!--Treason to his Majesty of England!--When I
was chambered in yonder instrument, my lord, the High-Dutch fellows who
bore me, carried me into a certain chapel, to see, as they said to each
other, that all was ready. Sire, I went where bass-fiddle never went
before, even into a conventicle of Fifth-Monarchists; and when they
brought me away, the preacher was concluding his sermon, and was within
a 'Now to apply' of setting off like the bell-wether at the head of his
flock, to surprise your Majesty in your royal Court! I heard him through
the sound-holes of my instrument, when the fellow set me down for a
moment to profit by this precious doctrine."

"It would be singular," said Lord Arlington, "were there some reality
at the bottom of this buffoonery; for we know these wild men have been
consulting together to-day, and five conventicles have held a solemn
fast."

"Nay," said the King, "if that be the case, they are certainly
determined on some villainy."

"Might I advise," said the Duke of Ormond, "I would summon the Duke of
Buckingham to this presence. His connections with the fanatics are well
known, though he affects to conceal them."

"You would not, my lord, d