The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 An Historical Romance

CHAPTER IX.

The Let­ters-​Patent.

A slight re­ac­tion in Sir Giles's favour was pro­duced by his speech, but Jo­ce­lyn quite re­gained his po­si­tion with the com­pa­ny when he ex­claimed--

“My fa­ther was mis­judged. His pros­ecu­tor was a vil­lain, and his sen­tence in­iq­ui­tous.”

“You have ut­tered your own con­dem­na­tion, Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey,” Sir Giles cried, with a sav­age laugh. “Know, to your con­fu­sion, that the High Court of Star-​Cham­ber is so ten­der of up­hold­ing the hon­our of its sen­tences, that it ev­er pun­ish­es such as speak against them with the great­est sever­ity. You have ut­tered your scan­dals open­ly.”

“Im­pru­dent young man, you have, in­deed, placed your­self in fear­ful jeop­ardy,” a gen­tle­man near him ob­served to Jo­ce­lyn. “Es­cape, if you can. You are lost, if you re­main here.”

But in­stead of fol­low­ing the friend­ly ad­vice, Jo­ce­lyn would have as­sault­ed Sir Giles, if he had not been forcibly with­held by the gen­tle­man.

The knight was not slow to fol­low up the ad­van­tage he had gained.

“Stand for­ward, Clement Lanyere,” he ex­claimed, au­thor­ita­tive­ly.

The pro­mot­er in­stant­ly ad­vanced.

“Look at this man,” Sir Giles con­tin­ued, ad­dress­ing Jo­ce­lyn; “and you will per­ceive how those who ma­lign the Star-​Cham­ber are treat­ed. This dis­fig­ured coun­te­nance was once as free from seam or scar as your own; and yet, for an of­fence lighter than yours, it hath been stamped, as you see, with in­deli­ble in­famy. An­swer, Clement Lanyere,--and an­swer ac­cord­ing to your con­science,--Was the sen­tence just of the high and hon­ourable court by which you were tried?”

“It was just,” the pro­mot­er replied, a deep flush dye­ing his ghast­ly vis­age.

“And le­nient?”

“Most le­nient. For it left my foul tongue the pow­er of speech it now en­joys.”

“By whom were you pros­ecut­ed in the Star-​Cham­ber?”

“By him I now serve.”

“That is, by my­self. Do you bear me mal­ice for what I did?”

“I have nev­er said so. On the con­trary, Sir Giles, I have al­ways de­clared I owe you a deep debt.”

“Which you strive to pay?”

“Which I _will_ pay.”

“You hear what this man says, Mounchensey?” Sir Giles cried. “You have been guilty of the same of­fence as he. Why should you not be sim­ilar­ly pun­ished?”

“If I were so pun­ished, I would stab my pros­ecu­tor to the heart,” Jo­ce­lyn replied.

At this re­join­der, Lanyere, who had hith­er­to kept his eyes on the ground, sud­den­ly raised them, with a look of sin­gu­lar ex­pres­sion at the speak­er.

“Humph!” Sir Giles ejac­ulat­ed. “I must pro­ceed to ex­trem­ities with him, I find. Keep strict watch up­on him, Lanyere; and fol­low him if he goes forth. Trace him to his lair. Now to busi­ness. Give me the let­ters-​patent, Lupo,” he added, turn­ing to the scriven­er, as Lanyere re­tired. “These Let­ters-​Patent,” con­tin­ued Sir Giles, tak­ing two parch­ment scrolls with large seals pen­dent from them from Lupo Vulp, and dis­play­ing them to the as­sem­blage, “these Roy­al Let­ters,” he re­peat­ed in his steady, stern tones, and glanc­ing round with a look of half-​de­fi­ance, “passed un­der the great seal, and bear­ing the king's sign-​man­ual, as ye see, gen­tle­men, con­sti­tute the au­thor­ity on which I act. They ac­cord to me and my co-​paten­tee, Sir Fran­cis Mitchell, ab­so­lute and un­con­trolled pow­er and dis­cre­tion in grant­ing and re­fus­ing li­cens­es to all tav­ern-​keep­ers and hos­tel-​keep­ers through­out Lon­don. They give us full pow­er to en­ter and in­spect all tav­erns and hos­tels, at any time that may seem fit to us; to pre­vent any un­law­ful games be­ing used there­in; and to see that good or­der and rule be main­tained. They al­so ren­der it com­pul­so­ry up­on all ale-​house-​keep­ers, tav­ern-​keep­ers, and inn-​keep­ers through­out Lon­don, to en­ter in­to their own rec­og­nizances with us against the non-​ob­ser­vance of our rules and reg­ula­tions for their gov­er­nance and main­te­nance, and to find two sureties: and in case of the for­fei­ture of such rec­og­nizances by any act of the par­ties, com­ing with­in the scope of our au­thor­ity, it is pro­vid­ed that one moi­ety of the sum for­feit­ed be paid to the Crown, and the oth­er moi­ety to us. Lend me your ears yet fur­ther, I pray ye, gen­tle­men. These Roy­al Let­ters em­pow­er us to in­flict cer­tain fines and penal­ties up­on all such as of­fend against our au­thor­ity, or re­sist our claims; and they en­able us to ap­pre­hend and com­mit to prison such of­fend­ers with­out fur­ther war­rant than the let­ters them­selves con­tain. In brief, gen­tle­men,” he con­tin­ued in a peremp­to­ry tone, as if in­sist­ing up­on at­ten­tion, “you will ob­serve, that the ab­so­lute con­trol of all hous­es of en­ter­tain­ment, where ex­ciseable liquors are vend­ed, is del­egat­ed to us by his most gra­cious Majesty, King James. To which end am­ple pow­ers have been giv­en us by his Majesty, who has armed us with the strong arm of the law. Will it please ye to in­spect the let­ters, gen­tle­men?” hold­ing them forth. “You will find that his Majesty hath thus writ­ten;--'_In cu­jus rei tes­ti­mo­ni­um has Lit­eras nos­tras fieri fec­imus patentes. Teste Meip­so, apud Westm. 10 die Maij, An­no Reg­ni nos­tri_,' &c. Then fol­lows the roy­al sig­na­ture. None of ye, I pre­sume, will ques­tion its au­then­tic­ity?”

A deep si­lence suc­ceed­ed, in the midst of which Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey broke forth:--

“I, for one, ques­tion it,” he cried. “I will nev­er be­lieve that a king, who, like our gra­cious sovereign, has the wel­fare of his sub­jects at heart, would sanc­tion the op­pres­sion and in­jus­tice which those war­rants, if en­trust­ed to un­scrupu­lous hands, must in­evitably ac­com­plish. I there­fore mis­trust the gen­uine­ness of the sig­na­ture. If not forged, it has been ob­tained by fraud or mis­rep­re­sen­ta­tion.”

Some mur­murs of ap­plause fol­lowed this bold speech; but the gen­tle­man who had pre­vi­ous­ly coun­selled the young man again in­ter­posed, and whis­pered these words in his ear:--

“Your rash ve­he­mence will un­do you, if you take not heed. Be­yond ques­tion, Sir Giles hath the king's sanc­tion for what he does, and to cen­sure him as you have done is to cen­sure the Crown, which is next to trea­son. Be ruled by me, my good young Sir, and med­dle no more in the mat­ter.”

Sir Giles, who had some dif­fi­cul­ty in con­trol­ling his choler, now spoke:--

“You have cast an im­pu­ta­tion up­on me, Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey,” he cried with con­cen­trat­ed fury, “which you shall be com­pelled to re­tract as pub­licly as you have made it. To in­sult an of­fi­cer of the Crown, in the dis­charge of his du­ty, is to in­sult the Crown it­self, as you will find. In the King's name, I com­mand you to hold your peace, or, in the King's name, I will in­stant­ly ar­rest you; and I for­bid any one to give you aid. I will not be trou­bled thus. Ap­point­ed by his Majesty to a cer­tain of­fice, I ex­er­cise it as much for the ben­efit of the Roy­al Ex­che­quer, as for my own per­son­al ad­van­tage. I have his Majesty's full ap­proval of what I do, and I need noth­ing more. I am ac­count­able to no man--save the King,” ad­dress­ing this men­ace as much to the rest of the com­pa­ny as to Jo­ce­lyn. “But I came not here to ren­der ex­pla­na­tion, but to act. What, ho! Madame Bonaven­ture! Where are ye, Madame? Oh! you are here!”

“_Bon jour_, sweet Sir Giles,” the land­la­dy said, mak­ing him a pro­found obei­sance. “What is your plea­sure with me, Sir? And to what am I to at­tribute the hon­our of this vis­it?”

“Tut! Madame. You know well enough what brings me hith­er, and thus at­tend­ed,” he replied. “I come in pur­suance of a no­tice, served up­on you a month ago. You will not de­ny hav­ing re­ceived it, since the of­fi­cer who placed it in your hands is here present.” And he in­di­cat­ed Clement Lanyere.

“_Au con­traire_, Sir Giles,” Madame Bonaven­ture replied. “I read­ily ad­mit the re­ceipt of a writ­ten mes­sage from you, which, though scarce­ly in­tel­li­gi­ble to my poor com­pre­hen­sion, did not seem as agree­ably word­ed as a _bil­let-​doux. Mais, ma foi_! I at­tached lit­tle im­por­tance to it. I did not sup­pose it pos­si­ble--nor do I sup­pose it pos­si­ble now”--with a cap­ti­vat­ing smile, which was to­tal­ly lost up­on Sir Giles--“that you could adopt such rig­or­ous mea­sures against me.”

“My mea­sures may ap­pear rig­or­ous, Madame,” Sir Giles cold­ly replied; “but I am war­rant­ed in tak­ing them. Nay, I am com­pelled to take them. Not hav­ing made the sat­is­fac­tion re­quired by the no­tice, you have de­prived your­self of the pro­tec­tion I was will­ing to af­ford you. I am now mere­ly your judge. The penal­ties in­curred by your ne­glect are these: Your li­cence was sus­pend­ed a month ago; the no­tice ex­press­ly stat­ing that it would be with­drawn, un­less cer­tain con­di­tions were ful­filled. Con­se­quent­ly, as ev­er since that time you have been vend­ing ex­ciseable liquors with­out law­ful per­mis­sion, you have in­curred a fine of one hun­dred marks a day, mak­ing a to­tal of three thou­sand marks now due and ow­ing from you, part­ly to his Majesty, and part­ly to his Majesty's rep­re­sen­ta­tives. This sum I now de­mand.”

“Ah! Dieu! three thou­sand marks!” Madame Bonaven­ture screamed. “What rob­bery is this!--what bar­bar­ity! 'T is ru­in--ut­ter ru­in! I may as well close my house al­to­geth­er, and re­turn to my own fair coun­try. As I am an hon­est wom­an, Sir Giles, I can­not pay it. So it is quite use­less on your part to make any such de­mand.”

“You pro­fess in­abil­ity to pay, Madame,” Sir Giles re­joined. “I can­not be­lieve you; hav­ing some knowl­edge of your means. Nev­er­the­less, I will ac­quaint you with a rule of law ap­pli­ca­ble to the con­tin­gen­cy you put. '_Quod non ha­bet in cere, luet in cor­pore_' is a de­cree of the Star-​Cham­ber; mean­ing, for I do not ex­pect you to un­der­stand Latin, that he who can­not pay in purse shall pay in per­son. Aware of the al­ter­na­tive, you will make your choice. And you may thank me that I have not ad­judged you at once--as I have the pow­er--to three months with­in the Wood Street Compter.”

“Ah, Sir Giles! what an atro­cious idea. You are worse than a sav­age to talk of such a loath­some prison to me. Ah! mon Dieu! what is to hap­pen to me! would I were back again in my love­ly Bor­deaux!”

“You will have an op­por­tu­ni­ty of re­vis­it­ing that fine city, Madame; for you will no longer be able to car­ry on your call­ing here.”

“Ciel! Sir Giles! what mean you?”

“I mean, Madame, that you are dis­abled from keep­ing any tav­ern for the space of three years.”

Madame Bonaven­ture clasped her hands to­geth­er, and screamed aloud.

“In pity, Sir Giles!--In pity!” she cried.

The in­ex­orable knight shook his head. The low mur­murs of in­dig­na­tion among the com­pa­ny which had been grad­ual­ly gath­er­ing force dur­ing the fore­go­ing di­alogue, now be­came clam­orous. “A most scan­dalous pro­ceed­ing!” ex­claimed one. “De­prive us of our best French or­di­nary!” cried an­oth­er. “In­fa­mous ex­tor­tion­er!” shout­ed a third. “We'll not per­mit such in­jus­tice. Let us take the law in­to our own hands, and set­tle the ques­tion!” shout­ed a fourth. “Ay, down with the knight!” added a fifth.

But Sir Giles con­tin­ued per­fect­ly un­moved by the tem­pest rag­ing around, and laughed to scorn these men­aces, con­tent­ing him­self with sign­ing to Cap­tain Blud­der to be in readi­ness.

“A truce to this, gen­tle­men;” he at length thun­dered forth; “the King's war­rant must be re­spect­ed.”

Again Madame Bonaven­ture be­sought his pity, but in vain. She took hold of his arm, and feigned to kneel to him; but he shook her cold­ly off.

“You are a very charm­ing wom­an, no doubt, Madame,” he said sar­cas­ti­cal­ly; “and some men might find you ir­re­sistible; but I am not made of such yield­ing stuff, and you may spare your­self fur­ther trou­ble, for all your pow­ers of per­sua­sion will fail with me. I re­new my de­mand--and for the last time. Do not com­pel me to re­sort to ex­trem­ities with you. It would grieve me,” he added with a bit­ter smile, “to drag so pret­ty a wom­an through the pub­lic streets, like a com­mon debtor, to the Compter.”

“Grace! grace! Sir Giles,” cried Madame Bonaven­ture. Then see­ing him re­main in­flex­ible, she added, in an al­tered tone, “I will nev­er sub­mit with life to such an in­dig­ni­ty--nev­er!”

“We'll all pro­tect you, Madame,” cried the as­sem­blage with one voice--“Let him lay hands up­on you, and he shall see.”

Sir Giles glanced at his myr­mi­dons. They stepped quick­ly to­wards him in a body. At the same time Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey, whom no ef­forts of the friend­ly gen­tle­man could now re­strain, sprang for­ward, and, draw­ing his sword, was just in time to place him­self be­fore Madame Bonaven­ture, as she drew hasti­ly back.

“Have no fear, Madame, you are safe with me,” the young man said, glanc­ing fierce­ly at the knight and his troop.

The great­est con­fu­sion now reigned through­out the room. Oth­er swords were drawn, and sev­er­al of the guests mount­ed up­on the bench­es to over­look the scene. Cy­prien, and the rest of the draw­ers and trades­men ranged them­selves be­hind their mis­tress, pre­pared to re­sist any at­tempt on the part of the myr­mi­dons to seize her. The cur­tain at the head of the room was part­ly drawn aside, show­ing that the dis­tin­guished per­sons at the up­per ta­ble were equal­ly ex­cit­ed.

“Gen­tle­men,” Sir Giles said, still main­tain­ing per­fect calm­ness in the midst of the tu­mult, “a word with you ere it be too late. I don't ad­dress my­self to you, Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey, for you are un­de­serv­ing of any friend­ly con­sid­er­ation--but to all oth­ers I would coun­sel for­bear­ance and non-​re­sis­tance. De­liv­er up that wom­an to me.”

“I will die up­on the spot soon­er than you shall be sur­ren­dered,” said Jo­ce­lyn, en­cour­ag­ing the host­ess, who clung to his dis­en­gaged arm.

“Oh! mer­ci! grand mer­ci, mon beau gen­til­homme!” she ex­claimed.

“Am I to un­der­stand then, that you mean to im­pede me in the law­ful ex­ecu­tion of my pur­pos­es, gen­tle­men?” Sir Giles de­mand­ed.

“We mean to pre­vent an un­law­ful ar­rest,” sev­er­al voic­es re­joined.

“Be it so,” the knight said; “I wash my hands of the con­se­quences.” Then turn­ing to his fol­low­ers, he added--“Of­fi­cers, at all haz­ards, at­tach the per­son of Dameris Bonaven­ture, and con­vey her to the Compter. At the same time, ar­rest the young man-​be­side her--Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey,--who has ut­tered trea­son­able lan­guage against our sovereign lord the King. I will tell you how to dis­pose of him anon. Do my bid­ding at once.”

But ere the or­der could be obeyed, the au­thor­ita­tive voice which had pre­vi­ous­ly been heard from the up­per ta­ble ex­claimed--“Hold!”

Sir Giles paused; looked ir­res­olute for a minute; and then checked his myr­mi­dons with a wave of the hand.

“Who is it stays the law?” he said, with the glare of a tiger from whom a bone has been snatched.

“One you must needs obey, Sir Giles,” replied Lord Roos, com­ing to­wards him from the up­per ta­ble. “You have un­con­scious­ly played a part in a com­edy--and played it very well, too--but it is time to bring the piece to an end. We are fast verg­ing on the con­fines of tragedy.”

“I do not un­der­stand you, my lord,” Sir Giles re­turned, grave­ly. “I dis­cern noth­ing com­ic in the mat­ter; though much of se­ri­ous im­port.”

“You do not per­ceive the com­edy, be­cause it has been part of our scheme to keep you in the dark, Sir Giles.”

“So there is a scheme, then, a-​foot here, my lord?--ha!”

“A lit­tle mer­ry plot; noth­ing more, Sir Giles--in the work­ing of which your wor­thy co-​paten­tee, Sir Fran­cis Mitchell, has ma­te­ri­al­ly as­sist­ed.”

“Ha!” ex­claimed Sir Giles, glanc­ing at his part­ner, who still oc­cu­pied his el­evat­ed po­si­tion up­on the ta­ble--“I pre­sume, then, I have to thank you, my lord, for the in­dig­ni­ty of­fered to my friend?”

“As you please, Sir Giles,” Lord Roos re­turned care­less­ly. “You call it an in­dig­ni­ty; but in my opin­ion the best thing to be done with a man whose head so swims with wine that his legs refuse to sup­port him, is to tie him in a chair. He may else sac­ri­fice his dig­ni­ty by rolling un­der the ta­ble. But let this pass for the nonce. Be­fore Sir Fran­cis was whol­ly over­come, he was good enough to give me his sig­na­ture. You saw him do it, gen­tle­men?” he added, ap­peal­ing to the com­pa­ny.

“Yes--yes!--we saw him write it!” was the gen­er­al re­ply.

“And to what end was this done, my lord?” Sir Giles de­mand­ed, stern­ly.

“To en­able me,” replied the im­per­turbable young no­ble­man, “to draw out a re­ceipt in full of your joint claims against Madame Bonaven­ture. I have done it, Sir Giles; and here it is. And I have tak­en care to grant a re­new­al of her li­cence from the date of your no­tice; so that no penal­ties or fines can at­tach to her for ne­glect. Take it, Madame Bonaven­ture” he con­tin­ued, hand­ing her the pa­per. “It is your full ac­quit­tance.”

“And think you, my lord, that this shal­low ar­ti­fice--to give it no harsh­er term--will avail you any thing?” Sir Giles cried scorn­ful­ly. “I set it aside at once.”

“Your par­don, Sir Giles; you will do no such thing.”

“And who will hin­der me?--You, my lord?”

“Even I, Sir Giles. Pro­ceed at your per­il.”

The young no­ble­man's as­sur­ance stag­gered his op­po­nent.

“He must have some one to up­hold him, or he would not be thus con­fi­dent,” he thought. “Whose was the voice I heard? It sound­ed like--No mat­ter! 'Tis need­ful to be cau­tious.”

“You do not, then, hold your­self bound by the acts of your part­ner, Sir Giles?” Lord Roos said.

“I de­ny this to be his act,” the knight replied.

“Bet­ter ques­tion him at once on the sub­ject,” Lord Roos said. “Set him free, Cy­prien.”

The Gas­con did as he was bid­den, and with the aid of his fel­low draw­ers, helped Sir Fran­cis from the ta­ble. To the sur­prise of the com­pa­ny, the knight then man­aged to stag­ger for­ward unas­sist­ed, and would have em­braced Sir Giles, if the lat­ter had not thrust him off in dis­gust, with some vi­olence.

“What fol­ly is this, Sir Fran­cis?” Sir Giles cried an­gri­ly. “You have for­got­ten your­self strange­ly, you have tak­en leave of your sens­es, me­thinks!”

“Not a whit of it, Sir Giles--not a whit. I nev­er was more my own mas­ter than I am at present, as I will prove to you.”

“Prove it, then, by ex­plain­ing how you came to sign that pa­per. You could not mean to run counter to me?”

“But I did,” Sir Fran­cis re­joined, high­ly of­fend­ed. “I meant to run counter to you in sign­ing it, and I mean it now.”

“'Sdeath! you be­sot­ted fool, you are play­ing in­to their hands!”

“Be­sot­ted fool in your teeth, Sir Giles. I am as sober as your­self. My hand has been put to that pa­per, and what it con­tains I stand by.”

“You de­sign, then, to ac­quit Madame Bonaven­ture? Con­sid­er what you say?”

“No need for con­sid­er­ation; I have al­ways de­signed it.”

“Ten thou­sand thanks, Sir Fran­cis!” the host­ess cried. “I knew I had an ex­cel­lent friend in you.”

The en­am­oured knight seized the hand she ex­tend­ed to­wards him, but in the at­tempt to kiss it fell to the ground, amid the laugh­ter of the com­pa­ny.

“Are you sat­is­fied now, Sir Giles?” asked Lord Roos.

“I am sat­is­fied that Sir Fran­cis has been duped,” he replied, “and that when his brain is free from the fumes of wine, he will bit­ter­ly re­gret his fol­ly. But even his dis­charge will be in­suf­fi­cient. Though it may bind me, it will not bind the Crown, which will yet en­force its claims.”

“That, Sir Giles, I leave com­pe­tent au­thor­ity to de­cide,” Lord Roos replied, re­tir­ing.

And as he with­drew, the cur­tains be­fore the up­per ta­ble were en­tire­ly with­drawn, dis­clos­ing the whole of the bril­liant as­sem­blage, and at the head of them one per­son far more bril­liant and dis­tin­guished than the rest.

“Buck­ing­ham!” Sir Giles ex­claimed. “I thought I knew the voice.”

It was, in­deed, the King's om­nipo­tent favourite. Mag­nif­icent­ly at­tired, the Mar­quis of Buck­ing­ham as far out­shone his com­pan­ions in splen­dour of ha­bil­iments as he did in state­li­ness of car­riage and beau­ty of per­son. Ris­ing from the ta­ble, and don­ning his plumed hat, looped with di­amonds, with a ges­ture wor­thy of a monarch, while all the rest re­mained un­cov­ered, as if in recog­ni­tion of his su­pe­ri­or dig­ni­ty, he de­scend­ed to where Sir Giles Mom­pes­son was stand­ing. It need scarce­ly be said that Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey had nev­er seen the su­perb favourite be­fore; but he did not re­quire to be told whom he be­held, so per­fect­ly did Buck­ing­ham re­al­ize the de­scrip­tions giv­en of him. A lit­tle above the or­di­nary height, with a fig­ure of the most per­fect sym­me­try, and fea­tures as aris­to­crat­ic and haughty as hand­some, it was im­pos­si­ble to con­ceive a proud­er or a no­bler-​look­ing per­son­age than the mar­quis. His cos­tume was splen­did, con­sist­ing of a dou­blet of white cut vel­vet, roped with pearls, which fit­ted him to ad­mi­ra­tion. Over his shoul­ders he wore a man­tle of watch­et-​coloured vel­vet; his neck was en­cir­cled by a falling band; and silken hose of the same colour as the dou­blet com­plet­ed his cos­tume. His de­port­ment was sin­gu­lar­ly dig­ni­fied; but his man­ner might have con­cil­iat­ed more if it had been less im­pe­ri­ous and dis­dain­ful.

Sir Giles made a pro­found obei­sance as Buck­ing­ham ad­vanced to­wards him. His salu­ta­tion was haugh­ti­ly re­turned.

“I have heard some­thing of your mode of pro­ceed­ing with the keep­ers of tav­erns and hos­tels, Sir Giles,” the proud mar­quis said; “but this is the first oc­ca­sion on which I have seen it put in prac­tice,--and I am free to con­fess that you deal not over gen­tly with them, if the present may be con­sid­ered a spec­imen of your or­di­nary con­duct. Those let­ters-​patent were not con­fid­ed to you by his Majesty to dis­tress his sub­jects, for your own par­tic­ular ad­van­tage and prof­it, but to ben­efit the com­mu­ni­ty by keep­ing such places of en­ter­tain­ment in bet­ter or­der than hereto­fore. I fear you have some­what abused your war­rant, Sir Giles.”

“If to de­vote my­self, heart and soul, to his Majesty's ser­vice, and to en­rich his Majesty's ex­che­quer be to abuse my war­rant, I have done so, my lord Mar­quis,--but not oth­er­wise. I have ev­er vin­di­cat­ed the dig­ni­ty and au­thor­ity of the Crown. You have just heard that, though my own just claims have been de­feat­ed by the in­ad­ver­tence of my co-​paten­tee, I have ad­vanced those of the King.”

“The King re­lin­quish­es all claims in the present case,” Buck­ing­ham replied. “His gra­cious Majesty gave me full dis­cre­tion in the mat­ter, and I act as I know he him­self would have act­ed.”

And wav­ing his hand to sig­ni­fy that he would lis­ten to no re­mon­strances, the Mar­quis turned to Madame Bonaven­ture, who in­stant­ly pros­trat­ed her­self be­fore him, as she would have done be­fore roy­al­ty it­self, warm­ly thank­ing him for his pro­tec­tion.

“You must thank my Lord Roos, and not me, Madame,” Buck­ing­ham gra­cious­ly replied, rais­ing her as he spoke. “It was at his lord­ship's in­stance I came here. He takes a warm in­ter­est in you, Madame.”

“I shall ev­er be be­hold­en to his lord­ship, I am sure,” Madame Bonaven­ture said, cast­ing down her eyes and blush­ing, or feign­ing to blush, “as well as to you, Mon­seigneur.”

“My Lord Roos avouched,” pur­sued Buck­ing­ham, “that at the Three Cranes I should find the pret­ti­est host­ess and the best wine in Lon­don; and on my faith as a gen­tle­man! I must say he was wrong in nei­ther par­tic­ular. Brighter eyes I have nev­er be­held--rar­er claret I have nev­er drunk.”

“Oh, Mon­seigneur! you quite over­whelm me. My poor house can scarce­ly hope to be hon­oured a sec­ond time with such a pres­ence; but should it so chance”--

“You will give me as good wel­come as you have done to-​day. No lack of in­duce­ment to re­peat the vis­it. Sir Giles Mom­pes­son!”

“My lord Mar­quis.”

“I lay my com­mands up­on you, good Sir Giles, that no fur­ther mo­lesta­tion be of­fered to Madame Bonaven­ture, but that you give a good re­port of her house. With­draw your fol­low­ers with­out de­lay.”

“Your com­mands shall be obeyed, my lord Mar­quis,” Sir Giles re­joined; “but be­fore I go I have an ar­rest to make. That young man,” point­ing to Jo­ce­lyn, “has been talk­ing trea­son.”

“It is false, my lord Mar­quis,” Jo­ce­lyn replied. “His Majesty hath not a more loy­al sub­ject than my­self. I would cut out my tongue rather than speak against him. I have said the King is ill served in such of­fi­cers as Giles Mom­pes­son and Sir Fran­cis Mitchell, and I abide by my words. They can re­flect no dis­hon­our on his Majesty.”

“Save that they seem to im­ply a be­lief on your part that his Majesty has cho­sen his of­fi­cers bad­ly,” Buck­ing­ham said, re­gard­ing the young man fixed­ly.

“Not so, my lord Mar­quis, These men may have been favourably rep­re­sent­ed to his Majesty, who no doubt has been kept in ig­no­rance of their in­iq­ui­tous pro­ceed­ings.”

“What are you driv­ing at, Sir?” Buck­ing­ham cried, al­most fierce­ly.

“I mean, my lord Mar­quis, that these per­sons may be the crea­tures of some pow­er­ful no­ble, whose in­ter­est it is to throw a cloak over their mal­prac­tices.”

“'Fore heav­en! some covert in­sult would seem to be in­tend­ed,” ex­claimed Buck­ing­ham. “Who is this young man, Sir Giles?”

“He is named Jo­ce­lyn Mounchensey, my lord Mar­quis; and is the son of an old Nor­folk knight baronet, who, you may re­mem­ber, was ar­raigned be­fore the Court of Star-​Cham­ber, heav­ily fined, and im­pris­oned.”

“I do re­mem­ber the case, and the share you and Sir Fran­cis had in it, Sir Giles,” Buck­ing­ham re­joined.

“I am right glad to hear that, my lord,” said Jo­ce­lyn. “You will not then won­der that I avow my­self their mor­tal en­emy.”

“We laugh to scorn these idle vapour­ings,” said Sir Giles; “and were it per­mit­ted,” he added, touch­ing his sword, “I my­self would find an easy way to si­lence them. But the froward youth, whose brains seem crazed with his fan­cied wrongs, is not con­tent with rail­ing against us, but must needs lift up his voice against all con­sti­tut­ed au­thor­ity. He hath spo­ken con­temp­tu­ous­ly of the Star-​Cham­ber,--and that, my lord Mar­quis, as you well know, is an of­fence, which can­not be passed over.”

“I am sor­ry for it,” Buck­ing­ham re­joined; “but if he will re­tract what he has said, and ex­press com­punc­tion, with promise of amend­ment in fu­ture, I will ex­ert my in­flu­ence to have him held harm­less.”

“I will nev­er re­tract what I have said against that in­iq­ui­tous tri­bunal,” Jo­ce­lyn re­joined firm­ly. “I will rather die a mar­tyr, as my fa­ther did, in the cause of truth.”

“Your kind­ness is al­to­geth­er thrown away up­on him, my lord,” Sir Giles said, with se­cret sat­is­fac­tion.

“So I per­ceive,” Buck­ing­ham re­joined. “Our busi­ness is over,” he added, to the no­bles and gal­lants around him; “so we may to our barges. You, my lord,” he added to Lord Roos, “will doubt­less tar­ry to re­ceive the thanks of our pret­ty host­ess.”

And gra­cious­ly salut­ing Madame Bonaven­ture, he quit­ted the tav­ern ac­com­pa­nied by a large train, and en­ter­ing his barge amid the ac­cla­ma­tions of the spec­ta­tors, was rowed to­wards White­hall.