sked him to look upon
his master and see if that high fever was a condition to inflame in a
fit of temper. John Splendid cooled a little, and went to the window,
looking down with eyes of far surmise upon the pleasance and the town
below, chewing his temper between his teeth.

"You see, Elrigmore, what a happy King of the Highlands I am," said the
Marquis, despondently. "Fortunate Auchinbreac, to be all bye with it
after a moment's agony!"

"He died like a good soldier, sir," I said; "he was by all accounts a
man of some vices, but he wiped them out in his own blood."

"Are you sure of that? Is it not the old folly of the code of honour,
the mad exaltation of mere valour in arms, that makes you think so? What
if he was spilling his drops on the wrong side? He was against his king
at least, and--oh, my wits, my wits, what am I saying?... I saw you did
not drink my wine, Elrigmore; am I so low as that?"

"There is no man so low, my lord," said I, "but he may be yet exalted.
We are, the best of us, the instruments of a whimsical providence"
("What a rank doctrine," muttered the minister), "and Caesar himself
was sometimes craven before his portents. You, my lord, have the one
consolation left, that all's not bye yet with the cause you champion,
and you may yet lead it to the highest victory."

Argile took a grateful glance at me. "You know what I am," he said,
"not a man of the happy, single mood like our friend Barbreck here, but
tossed between philosophies. I am paying bitterly for my pliability, for
who so much the sport of life as the man who knows right well the gait
he should gang, and prays fervently to be permitted to follow it,
but sometimes stumbles in the ditch? Monday, oh Monday; I must be at
Edinburgh and face them all! Tis that dauntons me." His eyes seemed to
swim in blood, as he looked at me, or through me, aghast at the horror
of his situation, and sweat stood in blobs upon his brow. "That," he
went on, "weighs me down like lead. Here about me my people know me, and
may palliate the mistake of a day by the recollection of a lifetime's
honour. I blame Auchinbreac; I blame the chieftains,--they said I must
take to the galley; I blame----"

"Blame no one, Argile," said Master Gordon, standing up before him, not
a second too soon, for his lordship had his hand on the dirk M'Iver had
thrown down. Then he turned to us with ejecting arms. "Out you go," he
cried sternly, "out you go; what delight have you in