CHAPTER VIII.

The virtue of her lively looks Excels the precious stone, I wish to have none other books To read or look upon.

The modest mirth that she doth use Is mixed with shamefacedness.

_Attributed to Lord Rockford, Anne Boleyn's brother._

Although they differed widely in politics, the Duke of Montrose was one of the persons whom Lord Nithsdale looked upon as a true patriot, and a young man of great promise. He was the grandson of the great marquis, and had been by Queen Anne lately raised to the dignity of Duke of Montrose.

The family of the Earl of Nithsdale was, through Douglas, Earl of Moreton, nearly connected with that of the duke; and also, through the marriage of Lord Nithsdale's sister, the Lady Mary Maxwell, to the Earl of Traquhair, with that of his young duchess, the Lady Christian Carnegie, daughter to the Earl of Northesk.

This double connexion had assisted to foster a friendship, which the opposite tendency of their political opinions might otherwise have prevented from attaining maturity; and consequently, when the young Duke of Montrose first brought his fair bride and cousin into Scotland, he failed not to present her to a family with which they were mutually connected.

The duke was a zealous supporter of the Protestant succession, and was at that period high in favour with Queen Anne. His youthful wife had shone as one of the most brilliant stars at her court; and gay, lovely, and volatile, she had not failed to adopt the style and manners then in vogue; she was esteemed the most modish lady about the court; the furbelow of her petticoat was no sooner seen than it was copied; her commode attracted all eyes, the jaunty air of her hoop was envied by all the sex, and she no sooner appeared in one of the small muffs which we sometimes see represented in pictures of the time, than all the muffs about town were cut in half.

She enjoyed the admiration she excited, as was natural to one who was aware, though not vain, of her powers of fascination; and there was a grace in her harmless coquetries, and a joyous good-humour, a frankness, piercing through the court airs, which had become as it were second nature to her, that took captive the hearts of all.

The young duchess would sometimes rally Lady Nithsdale on her antiquated notions, her housewife-like avocations, her retired habits; she would try to persuade her to follow the fashion of the day, and would urge her to taste with her the exciting pleasure of being swiftly borne by a spirited steed over hill and vale, dell and dingle: but Lady Nithsdale, unaccustomed to such exertions, would shrink from the very idea, and trembled when she saw her fair friend mounted on her palfrey, and, dressed according to the mode which has excited the indignation of cotemporary writers, dash from the hall-door like an arrow from the bow; then, turning gaily back, laugh at her timid cousin's fears. Her hair, which was suffered to hang at some length on her shoulders, was loosely tied by a scarlet riband, which played like a streamer behind her; her small hat was edged with silver; her dress was of green camlet embroidered with the same material; and a cravat of the finest lace completed the toilet of the _élégante_ of the year 1711. The horse, as though it were proud of so fair a rider, seemed to share in her vanity: he was adorned after the same airy manner; and tossed and shook his pretty head, as if he despised the silken rein which hung loosely upon his neck.

Lady Nithsdale watched the party of equestrians as long as they continued in sight; and Amy, whose blighted hopes enabled her to give her undivided affection to her lady, and her undivided thoughts to her dress, had not allowed this opportunity to escape of enlarging her notions upon the subject of the prevailing mode. Presuming upon her favour with her mistress, she had stolen away from Annie Bell and Jeannie Scott, and glided to the oriel window of the hall, that she might see the great London bride in her new-fangled garb.

"By my troth, madam, but her grace is very fair, and wears a goodly dress, and mounts a jennet such as might befit a lady in one of my old ballads!"

"Yes, Amy," replied Lady Nithsdale, "the dress is strange, but graceful, and well does it suit my gay and sprightly cousin: yet she must have a marvellous good courage; I think I never could mount any horse, much less a pawing prancing steed such as delights her grace. It is strange thus to peril one's life for pleasure!"

"And yet, my lady, such a close-fitting jaunty coat as that would right well set off your ladyship's slender waist. Trust me, madam, but I should like to have the curling of your soft brown hair, and the shaking in a thought of powder, (her grace's maid showed me the powder-puffs they use now,) and the making it just hang in such ringlets as my lady duchess's."

"Nay, Amy, such flighty doings are not for me!"

In the evening, when the company were sipping their chocolate, and the servants were preparing the ombre-tables, the lively duchess again rallied the Lady Nithsdale upon her taste for staying at home.

"Now we will put you upon your trial," she said, playfully tapping her with her fan; "and you, my lord duke, and the Earl of Nithsdale himself, and Sir Hector M'Gregor, and Mr. M'Kenzie, and my fair cousin Crawford of Kilbirny, and young Mistress Rose Scott of Murdiston, shall sit in judgment, and pronounce whether I have not passed a more profitable morning than our demure hostess there! Now stand forth, Countess of Nithsdale, and answer the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth!"

The Lady Nithsdale smiled, while the slight colour mounted to her cheek, at being called into notice; but she professed her willingness to submit to the verdict of so goodly a tribunal.

"After our morning meal," resumed the duchess, "which I grant you was somewhat to the credit of the housewife--there was no fault to be found with the bannocks, nor with the saffron-cakes, nor the honey, nor the marmalade, nor the Finnan haddocks, nor any of the other delicacies for which our good land of Scotland is renowned,--after this meal, what were my lady countess's avocations!"

"Even such household duties as your grace must needs attend to when you reach your own castle of Kincarn. I visited the 'still-room, and gave the housekeeper directions for making of some mint-water, and some julap, and other simple medicines, which the neighbouring poor are used to procure at the castle. And, moreover, this is the season when the distilled waters for the year must be made; the elder-flowers and the roses are all in bloom."

"Oh, stop, my dear countess! This last employment was most vain and useless! for who could endure such homely scents? It is impossible now to use anything but orange-flower water; so you have indeed mis-spent your time most shamefully! Now you, by your own confession, did only one thing at a time, while I cultivated my mind and improved my beauty at one and the same moment. I studied Locke on the Human Understanding, while my woman curled my hair; after which I read two chapters on the properties of the loadstone, and--I would fain have studied the mathematics, only my wicked lord"--and she shook her fan at the duke--"would not give me the lesson he promised." She put on the prettiest pout of her ruby lips, while her gay eyes laughed through their fringe of eye-lashes, as she looked down her cheeks with a mock air of pettish anger; then raising them suddenly on the duke, she continued in a reproachful tone, "You know, my lord, you would not wish your wife to be quite out of the fashion; and every lady now talks of the mathematics, and speaks but in words with a Latin derivation; and I will learn these things too, in spite of you!"

The duke looked upon her with delight and love, while he replied, "Learn of our fair hostess how to make a sack-posset, Christian!"

"Not unless your grace will teach me the mathematics! Now promise, and it shall be a bargain, and I will let you kiss my hand upon it."

The duke most gladly availed himself of her permission to imprint on the fair hand she extended more than one kiss.

"Nay, you are too bold!" she added, withdrawing her hand suddenly, and frowning for a moment, while she expressed a pretty anger in the eloquent language of the fan, by quickly opening and shutting the sticks so as to produce a somewhat sharp noise. "But, my lord duke, you interrupt the trial. Silence in the court! The Lady Nithsdale had not made an end, when I, to my shame be it spoken, somewhat rudely interrupted her. Proceed, fair countess."

"I visited my children for a while, and then I practised to my new spinet some of the songs your grace showed me last night; for my lord loves sweet sounds so well, that he will sometimes listen to such poor music as I can make."

"That is well. But now, fair countess, how did you pass your time while I, having duly attended both to my understanding and my person, now took heed to my health, by galloping in the clear fresh air, many and many a mile, over sweet heath and thymy downs?"

"Why, after seeing my maidens at their embroidery, I wrote and despatched a letter to my dear sister Lucy at Bruges."

"Useless! still vain and useless! If your letter had been addressed to some court lady, who might have informed you in return of what colour was Mrs. Masham's new hood, and whether the queen had yet adopted the fashion of my last commode, and whether her grace of Marlborough had yet left off the philomot-coloured petticoat of which we are all so weary,--well! But what news can your devout sister send you from her dull convent?"

"Nay, your grace is jesting now! Every word that comes from Bruges, and tells me of the dear, dear friends of my childhood, is precious to me."

"I can well believe it," replied the duchess with a winning frankness; "for dearly do I love a letter from old Eupheme Stuart, the sister of our minister at Ethy; and I would often rather sit and con over her prosy epistle, than dress myself for a court-ball. But you know, Lady Nithsdale, that all other considerations must give way before our loyalty to our monarch."

"Most true, your grace," answered the Lady Nithsdale, in a tone of voice which showed she thought of the "king over the water," while the volatile duchess watched her with a laughing and malicious countenance.

"Oh, my dearest countess!" she exclaimed, "do you know you have patched yourself in the most factious manner! For Heaven's sake, remove that shocking patch on the wrong side of your face! it might lead to much mischief. It is an old saying, that extremes meet; and they say that some of the discomfited Whigs are even now plotting with the Jacobites. This is a season when it behoves every one to be most discreet in such tokens of their sentiments, and your imprudent patching might bring suspicion on your good lord."

"Does your grace speak of the mole on my right temple?"

"Is it indeed a mole? I pray your pardon, dearest cousin. But this is very sad! quite a misfortune! Do you not know we all of late express our political opinions after this fashion? You may perceive I always wear a patch on the left side of my chin, to evince my loyalty."

"If such be the case, my loyalty is born with me, and cannot cease but with my life!" replied the Countess of Nithsdale, whose feelings were so strong and so devoted she could not jest or banter on the subject.

"Treason! treason!" exclaimed the duchess: "we shall have to put you on your trial for still higher crimes and misdemeanours."

"A prisoner cannot be tried for two offences at once, and your grace has not brought the first accusation to an end," interposed the Earl of Nithsdale, somewhat anxious to give the conversation another turn.

"To tell the honest truth, my lord, I thought the evidence seemed likely to go against myself, and I was not sorry to drop the prosecution. We will let judgment go by default! Is that good law, my Lord Privy Seal, for you should understand these matters?" she continued, turning to her husband with an air of mock solemnity.

"You are a mad-cap, Christian!" replied the duke, who, while he half attempted to repress her lively sallies, listened to them with pleased amusement, and, like the mother of a spoiled child, looked round upon the company to see if they also did not applaud her wit and grace.

In truth, though she was somewhat the spoiled child of fortune, no one could wish her other than she was. What in another would have been frivolous or impertinent, in her was graceful and most fitting. She was in the vein for playful malice, and with an air of mock penitence replied, "Well, then, my lord, I will be most staid and serious. I will not play one single game at ombre to-night, but I will sit by my gentle cousin's side, and learn of her to ply my needle as good housewives and virtuous matrons should;" and seating herself on a low stool in the window, she fell to sorting and choosing shades of silks, till she had confused and mixed them all.

"I must look at you, fair cousin," she added suddenly, "to learn how I should begin;--but methinks you have not chosen your colours with that taste which all admire in whatever else you do. Surely a white rose on that pale blue ground lacks contrast: a red rose, or a tulip, or a peony, would better please the eye; a white rose is, to my mind, but a mean and insipid flower," she added, with a sidelong glance at Lady Nithsdale.

"In my eyes it is the fairest flower that blows," replied the countess. "This stool is for my mother; and well may the white rose be dear to the widow, and the daughter, of the Duke of Powis!"

"Well, may it be dear, for it has cost you dear, or rather it might have cost you dear, had it not been for our gracious sovereign's clemency in restoring to your brother his estates. Now own, sweet coz, that never was Old England so great or so glorious as she is at present; our navies triumphant, our armies crowned with laurels, our commerce flourishing, our colonies prospering, our negotiations successful----Anything else, my lord duke? for I often hear a recapitulation of our glories, and I ought to know them by heart."

"Nay, dearest cousin, I do not understand such things; but I know full well that adverse fortune cannot loose us from our allegiance."

"Nay, nay, constancy to a falling cause is treason, not allegiance; for you know

'Treason doth never prosper. What's the reason? That when it prospers, none dare call it treason.'"

"Methinks, if any are guilty of treason, it is not those who through weal and through woe, through danger and distress, at the risk of their fortunes and their persons, preserve their fidelity to the king of their ancestors!"

The Earl of Nithsdale turned a warning glance upon his wife, whose feelings had for a moment outrun her prudence. The blood rushed into her face; her eyes filled with tears.

"Nay, dearest cousin, you are moved. Forgive my giddy bantering, and trust me, that whether Whig or Tory, Protestant or Catholic, Jacobite or not, I love you dearly; and if ever there should arise occasion to prove it, you shall not find your cousin Christian Montrose wanting:" and she threw her arms around her neck, and embraced Lady Nithsdale with a warm-hearted frankness which caused their playful dispute to draw still closer the bonds of affection between them.

Although the earl would not have denied his attachment to the exiled family, he wished not to be unnecessarily forward in expressing his sentiments. He respected the sincere patriotism of the Duke of Montrose--he did him the justice to believe that it was from firm conviction that he was so strenuous a supporter of the Protestant succession; and it was no matter of surprise to him when, two years afterwards, the duke retired from the ministry, rather than support the Earl of Oxford in measures of which his conscience did not approve.