"Thou hast honestly confessed, like a brave man, that thou art a coward, John Alward; and so it shall be a bargain between us. I will take your message. I fear not Paul Kelpy--he has been down with that stake through his body, ever too fast to walk abroad."

"There's my hand to it," said the groom, "and thanks to boot. I am no coward, Derrick,--but have an infirmity which will not endure to look by night in the lonesome woods, upon a spirit which walks with a great shaft through it. w.i.l.l.y of the Flats saw it, in that fashion, as he went home from the Viewer's feast on the eve of St. Agnes."

"w.i.l.l.y had seen too much of the Viewer's hollands that night," said Derrick; "and they are spirits worth a dozen Paul Kelpys, even if the whole dozen were trussed upon the same stake, like herrings hung up to smoke. In spite of the fisherman and his bolt, I warrant you I pa.s.s unchallenged betwixt this and Mattapany."

The secretary, soon after this, entered the hall and confirmed the arrangements which had just been made. He accordingly delivered the letters intended for Colonel Talbot and Nicholas Sewall to the falconer, and that for Mr. Notley, the late lieutenant general of the province, to John Alward. To the Indian was committed the duty of bearing the missions to such members of the council as resided either in the town or within a few miles of it. Holding it matter of indifference whether he despatched this duty by night or by day, the Knife took it in hand at once, and set forth, on foot, with a letter for Colonel Digges, who lived about five miles off, at the same time that the other two couriers mounted their horses for their lonesome journeys through the forest.

CHAPTER VI.

If we should wait till you, in solemn council With due deliberation had selected The smallest out of four and twenty evils, 'I faith we should wait long.

Dash and through with it--that's the better watchword, Then after, come what may come.

PICCOLOMINI.

On the following day, the council, consisting of some four or five gentlemen, were a.s.sembled at the Proprietary Mansion. About noon their number was rendered complete, by the arrival of Colonel George Talbot, who, mounted on a spirited, milk-white steed that smoked with the hot vigour of his motion, dashed through the gate and alighted at the door.

A pair of pistols across his saddle-bow, and a poniard, partially disclosed under his vest, demonstrated the precautions of the possessor to defend himself against sudden a.s.sault, and no less denoted the quarrelsome aspect of the times. His frame was tall, athletic, and graceful; his eye hawk-like, and his features prominent and handsome, at the same time indicative of quick temper and rash resolve. There was in his dress a manifestation of the consciousness of a good figure--it was the costume of a gallant of the times; and his bearing was characteristic of a person accustomed to bold action and gay companionship.

Talbot was a near kinsman of the Baltimore family, and besides being a member of the Proprietary's council, he held the post of Surveyor General, and commanded, also, the provincial militia on the northern frontier, including the settlements on the Elk River, where he owned a large manor, upon which he usually resided. At the present time he was in the temporary occupation of a favourite seat of the Proprietary, at Mattapany on the Patuxent, whither the late summons had been despatched to call him to the council.

This gentleman was a zealous Catholic, and an ardent personal friend of his kinsman, the Proprietary, whose cause he advocated with that peremptory and, most usually, impolitic determination which his imperious nature prompted, and which served to draw upon him the peculiar hatred of Fendall and Coode, and their partisans. He was thus, although a sincere, it may be imagined, an indiscreet adviser in state affairs, little qualified to subdue or allay that jealous spirit of proscription which, from the epoch of the Protectorate down to this date, had been growing more intractable in the province.

Such was the individual who now with the firm stride and dauntless carriage of a belted and booted knight of chivalry, to which his picturesque costume heightened the resemblance, entered the apartment where his seniors were already convened.

"Well met!" he exclaimed, as he flung his hat and gloves upon a table and extended his hand to those who were nearest him. "How fares it, gentlemen? What devil of mutiny is abroad now? Has that pimpled fellow of fustian, that swiller of the leavings of a tap room, the worshipful king of the Burgesses, master Jack Coode, got drunk again and begun to bully in his cups? The falconer who hammered at my door last night, as if he would have beaten your Lordship's house about my ears, could tell me nothing of the cause of this sudden convocation, save that Driving d.i.c.k had come in hot haste from James Town with letters that had set the mansion here all agog, from his Lordship's closet down to the scullery."

"With proper abatement for the falconer's love of gossip," said the Proprietary, "he told you true. The letters are there on the table.

When you have read them, you will see that with good reason I might make some commotion in my house."

Talbot ran his eye over the papers. "Well, and well--an old story!" he said, as he threw one letter aside and took up another.

"Antichrist--the Red Lady of Babylon--the Jesuits--and the devil: we have had it so often that the lecture is somewhat stale. The truculent Papists are the authors of all evil! We had the Geneva band in fashion for a time; but that wore out with old Noll. And then comes another flight of kestrels, and we must have the thirty-nine articles served up for a daily dish. That spider, Master Yeo, has grown to be a crony of his grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, and is busy to knit his web around every poor catholic fly of the province."

"This must be managed without temper," said Darnall, the oldest member present, except the Chancellor. "Our adversaries will find their advantage in our resolves, if made in the heat of pa.s.sion."

"You say true," replied Talbot. "I am a fool in my humour; but it doth move me to the last extremity of endurance to be ever goaded with this shallow and hypocritical pretence of sanct.i.ty. They prate of the wickedness of the province, forsooth! our evil deportment, and loose living, and notorious scandal! all will be cured, in the opinion of these solemn Pharisees, by turning that good man, Lord Charles and his friends out of his own province, and by setting up parson Yeo in a fat benefice under the wing of an established church."

"Read on," said Lord Baltimore, "and you shall see the sum of all, in the argument that it is not fit Papists should bear rule over the free-born subjects of the English crown; and, as a conclusion to that, a summary order to discharge every friend of our holy church from my employ."

Talbot read the letter to the end.

"So be it!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, as he threw the letter from him, and flung himself back into his chair. "You will obey this high behest? With all humbleness, we will thank these knaves for their many condescensions, and their good favours. Your uncle, the Chancellor here, our old frosted comrade, is the first that your Lordship will give bare-headed to the sky. As for myself, I have been voted an incarnate devil in a half dozen conclaves--and so Fendall shall be the surveyor. I hope your Lordship will remember that I have a military command--a st.u.r.dy stronghold in the fort of Christina--and some stout fellows with me on the border. It might be hard to persuade them to part company with me."

"Peace, I pray you, peace!" interrupted the Proprietary; "you are nettled, Talbot, and that is not the mood for counsel."

"These pious cut-throats here," said Talbot, "who talk of our degeneracy, slander us to the whole world: and, faith, I am not of the mind to bear it! I speak plainly what I have thought long since--and would rather do than speak. I would arrest the ring-leaders upon a smaller scruple of proof than I would set a vagrant in the stocks. You have Fendall now, my Lord--I would have his fellows before long: and the s.p.a.ce between taking and trying should not add much to the length of their beards:--between trying and hanging, still less."

"As to that," said the Proprietary, "every day brings us fresh testimony of the sedition afoot, and we shall not be slow to do justice on the parties. We have good information of the extent of the plot against us, and but wait until an open act shall make their guilt unquestionable. Master Coode is now upon bail only because we were somewhat too hasty in his arrest. There are a.s.sociates of Fendall's at work who little dream of our acquaintance with their designs."

"When does your provincial court hold its sessions?" inquired the Surveyor.

"In less than a month."

"It should make sure work and speedy," said Talbot. "Master Fendall should find himself at the end of his tether at the first sitting."

"Ay, and Coode too," said one of the council: "notwithstanding that the burgesses have stepped forward to protect him. The House guessed well of the temper against your Lordship in England, when they stood up so hardily, last month, in favour of Captain Coode, after your Lordship had commanded his expulsion. It was an unnatural contumacy."

"In truth, we have never had peace in the province," said another, "since Fendall was allowed to return from his banishment. That man hath set on hotter, but not subtler spirits than his own. He has a quiet craftiness which never sleeps nor loses sight of his purpose of disturbance."

"Alas!" said the Proprietary, "he has not lacked material to work with.

The burgesses have been disaffected ever since my father's death. I know not in what point of kindness I have erred towards them. G.o.d knows I would cherish affection, not ill-will. My aim has ever been to do justice to all men."

"Justice is not their aim, my Lord," exclaimed Talbot. "Oh, this zeal for church is a pretty weapon! and honest Captain Coode, a dainty champion to handle it! I would cut the spurs from that fowl, if I did it with a cleaver!"

"He is but the fool in the hands of his betters," interposed Darnall.

"This discontent has a broad base. There are many in the province who, if they will not take an open part against us, will be slow to rebuke an outbreak--many who will counsel in secret who dare not show their faces to the sun."

"These men have power to do us much harm," said Lord Baltimore, "and I would entreat you, gentlemen, consider, how, by concession to a moderate point, which may comport with our honour, we may allay these irritations. Leaving that question for your future advis.e.m.e.nt, I ask your attention to the letters. The King has commanded--for it is scarce less than a royal mandate."

"Your Lordship," said Talbot, sarcastically, "has fallen under his Majesty's disfavour. You have, doubtless, failed somewhat in your courtesies to Nell Gwynn, or the gay d.u.c.h.ess; or have been wanting in some observance of respect to old Tom Killigrew, the King's fool. His Majesty is not wont to look so narrowly into state affairs."

"Hold, Talbot!" interrupted the Proprietary. "I would not hear you speak slightingly of the King. He hath been friendly to me, and I will not forget it. Though this mandate come in his name, King Charles, I apprehend, knows but little of the matter. He has an easy conscience for an importunate suitor. Oh, it grieves me to the heart, after all my father's care for the province--and surely mine has been no less--it grieves me to see this wayward fortune coming over our hopes like a chill winter, when we looked for springtide, with its happy and cheerful promises. I am not to be envied for my prerogative. Here, in this new world, I have made my bed, where I had no wish but to lie in it quietly: it has become a bed of thorns, and cannot bring rest to me, until I am mingled with its dust. Well, since rebellion is the order of the times, I must e'en myself turn rebel now against this order."

"Wherein might it be obeyed, my Lord?" asked Darnall. "You have already given all the rights of conscience which the freemen could ask, and the demand now is that you surrender your own. What servant would your Lordship displace? Look around you: is Anthony Warden so incapable, or so hurtful to your service that you might find plea to dismiss him?"

"There is no better man in the province than Anthony Warden," replied the Proprietary, with warmth; "a just man; a good man in whatever duty you scan him; an upright, faithful servant to his post. My Lords of the Ministry would not and could not, if they knew him, ask me to remove that man. I will write letters back to remonstrate against this injustice."

"And say you will not displace a man, my Lord, come what may!"

exclaimed Talbot. "This battle must be fought--and the sooner the better! Your Lordship will find your justification in the unanimous resolve of your council."

This sentiment was echoed by all present, and by some of the more discreet an admonition was added, advising the Proprietary to handle the subject mildly with the ministry, in a tone of kind expostulation, which, as it accorded with Lord Baltimore's own feeling, met his ready acquiescence.

After despatching some business of less concern, the members of the council dispersed.

CHAPTER VII.

An old worshipful gentleman who had a great estate, That kept a brave old house at a bountiful rate.

THE OLD AND YOUNG COURTIER.

But who the countless charms can draw That grac'd his mistress true?

Such charms the old world seldom saw, Nor oft, I ween, the new.