Of a very great tempest, it is
said, in the south of Scotland, that it rains Jeddart staffs, as in
England the common people talk of its raining cats and dogs.] in our
very ante-chamber."
"What your Majesty says," replied Prince Charles, "is marked with your
usual wisdom--the precincts of palaces must be sacred as well as the
persons of kings, which are respected even in the most barbarous
nations, as being one step only beneath their divinities. But your
Majesty's will can control the severity of this and every other law,
and it is in your power, on consideration of his case, to grant the
rash young man a free pardon."
"_Rem acu tetigisti, Carole, mi puerule,_" answered the king; "and
know, my lords, that we have, by a shrewd device and gift of our own,
already sounded the very depth of this Lord Glenvarloch's disposition.
I trow there be among you some that remember my handling in the
curious case of my Lady Lake, and how I trimmed them about the story
of hearkening behind the arras. Now this put me to cogitation, and I
remembered me of having read that Dionysius, King of Syracuse, whom
historians call Tyrannos, which signifieth not in the
Greek tongue, as in ours, a truculent usurper, but a royal king who
governs, it may be, something more strictly than we and other lawful
monarchs, whom the ancients termed Basileis--Now this Dionysius of
Syracuse caused cunning workmen to build for himself a _lugg_--D'ye
ken what that is, my Lord Bishop?"
"A cathedral, I presume to guess," answered the Bishop.
Pages:
635
636
637
638
639
640
641
642
643
644
645
646
647
648
649
650
651
652
653
654
655
656
657
658
659