oud and
dignified submission to his Sovereign; then waved his forgiveness
gracefully to Ormond, accompanied with a horrible grin, which he
designed for a smile of gracious forgiveness and conciliation. "Under
the Duke's favour, then," he proceeded, "when I said a door of hope was
opened to me, I meant a door behind the tapestry, from whence issued
that fair vision--yet not so fair as lustrously dark, like the beauty of
a continental night, where the cloudless azure sky shrouds us in a
veil more lovely than that of day!--but I note your Majesty's
impatience;--enough. I followed my beautiful guide into an apartment,
where there lay, strangely intermingled, warlike arms and musical
instruments. Amongst these I saw my own late place of temporary
obscurity--a violoncello. To my astonishment, she turned around the
instrument, and opening it behind the pressure of a spring, showed
that it was filled with pistols, daggers, and ammunition made up in
bandoleers. 'These,' she said, 'are this night destined to surprise the
Court of the unwary Charles'--your Majesty must pardon my using her own
words; 'but if thou darest go in their stead, thou mayst be the saviour
of king and kingdoms; if thou art afraid, keep secret, I will myself try
the adventure.' Now may Heaven forbid, that Geoffrey Hudson were craven
enough, said I, to let thee run such a risk! You know not--you cannot
know, what belongs to such ambuscades and concealments--I am accustomed
to them--have lurked in the pocket of a giant, and have formed the
contents of a pasty. 'Get in then,' she said, 'and lose no time.'
Nevertheless, while I prepared to obey, I will not deny that some cold
apprehensions came over my hot valour, and I confessed to her, if it
might be so, I would rather find my way to the palace on my own feet.
But she would not listen to me, saying hastily, 'I would be intercepted,
or refused admittance, and that I must embrace the means she offered me
of introduction into the presence, and when there, tell the King to be
on his guard--little more is necessary; for once the scheme is known, it
becomes desperate.' Rashly and boldly, I bid adieu to the daylight
which was then fading away. She withdrew the contents of the
instrument destined for my concealment, and having put them behind the
chimney-board, introduced me in their room. As she clasped me in, I
implored her to warn the men who were to be entrusted with me, to take
heed and keep the neck of the violon