"
"The friend thanks you," replied Lord Dalgarno, "for your just
opinion; but, my dear Glenvarloch--or rather, for titles are too
formal between us of the better file--what is your Christian name?"
"Nigel," replied Lord Glenvarloch.
"Then we will be Nigel and Malcolm to each other," said his visitor,
"and my lord to the plebeian world around us. But I was about to ask
you whom you suppose your enemy?"
"No less than the all-powerful favourite, the great Duke of
Buckingham."
"You dream! What could possess you with such an opinion?" said
Dalgarno.
"He told me so himself," replied Glenvarloch; "and, in so doing, dealt
frankly and honourably with me."
"O, you know him not yet," said his companion; "the duke is moulded of
an hundred noble and fiery qualities, that prompt him, like a generous
horse, to spring aside in impatience at the least obstacle to his
forward course. But he means not what he says in such passing heats--I
can do more with him, I thank Heaven, than most who are around him;
you shall go visit him with me, and you will see how you shall be
received."
"I told you, my lord," said Glenvarloch firmly, and with some
haughtiness, "the Duke of Buckingham, without the least offence,
declared himself my enemy in the face of the Court; and he shall
retract that aggression as publicly as it was given, ere I will make
the slightest advance towards him.
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