It was said that one of the Duke of Buckingham's
companions had insulted a stranger gentleman from the country, and
that the stranger had cudgelled him soundly. A favourite, or the
companion of a favourite, is always odious to John Bull, who has,
besides, a partiality to those disputants who proceed, as lawyers term
it, _par wye du fait_, and both prejudices were in Nigel's favour. The
officers, therefore, who came to apprehend him, could learn from the
spectators no particulars of his appearance, or information concerning
the road he had taken; so that, for the moment, he escaped being
arrested.
What Lord Glenvarloch heard among the crowd as he passed along, was
sufficient to satisfy him, that in his impatient passion he had placed
himself in a predicament of considerable danger.
He was no stranger to the severe and arbitrary proceedings of the
Court of Star-Chamber, especially in cases of breach of privilege,
which made it the terror of all men; and it was no farther back than
the Queen's time that the punishment of mutilation had been actually
awarded and executed, for some offence of the same kind which he had
just committed. He had also the comfortable reflection, that, by his
violent quarrel with Lord Dalgarno, he must now forfeit the friendship
and good offices of that nobleman's father and sister, almost the only
persons of consideration in whom he could claim any interest; while
all the evil reports which had been put in circulation concerning his
character, were certain to weigh heavily against him, in a case where
much must necessarily depend on the reputation of the accused.
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