The monastery; The abbot.

122 WAVERLEY NOVELS.
"0, goddess of courtesy!" said the knight, " can I so far have forgotten
thy behests as to make this good prelate's ease and time a sacrifice to my vain
complaints'! Know, then, most worthy, and not less worshipful, that I, your
poor visitor and guest, am by birth nearly bound to the Piercie of Northumberland, whose fame is so widely blown through all parts of the world where
English worth hath been known. Now, thjs present Earl of Northumberland, of whom I propose to give you the brief history "
" It is altogether unnecessary," said the Abbot; " we know him to be a
good and true nobleman, and a sworn upholder of our Catholic faith, in the
spite of the heretical woman who now sits upon the throne of England.
And it is specially as his kinsman, and as knowing that ye partake with him
in such devout and faithful belief and adherence to our holy Mother Church,
that we say to you, Sir Piercie Shafton, that ye be heartily welcome to-us,
and that, and we wist how, we would labour to do you good service in your
extremity.'
"For such kind offer I rest your most humble debtor," said Sir Piercie,
"'nor need I at this moment say more than that my Right Honourable
Cousin of Northumberland, having devised with me and some others, the
choice and picked spirits of the age, how and by what means the worship
of God, according to the Catholic Church, might be again introduced into
this distracted kingdom of England, (even as one deviseth, by the assistance
of his friend, to catch and bridle a runaway steed,) it pleased him so deeply
to intrust me in those communications, that my personal safety becomes, as
it were, entwined or complicated therewith. Natheless, as we have had
sudden reason to believe, this Princess Elizabeth, who maintaineth around
her a sort of counsellors'skilful in tracking whatever schemes may be pursued for bringing her title into challenge, or for erecting again the discipline
of the Catholic Church, has obtained certain knowledge of the trains which
we had laid before we could give fire unto them. Wherefore, my Right
Honourable Cousin of Northumberland, thinking it best belike that one
man should take both blame and shame for the whole, did lay the burden
of all this trafficking upon. my back; which load I am the rather content to
bear, in that he hath always shown himself my kind and honourable kinsman, as well as that my estate, I wot not how, hath of late been somewhat
insufficient to maintain the expense of those braveries, wherewith it is
incumbent on us, who are chosen and selected spirits, to distinguish ourselves from the vulgar."
" So that possibly," said the Sub-Prior, "your private affairs rendered a
foreign journey less incommodious to you than it might have been to. the
noble earl, your right worthy cousin?"
"You are right, reverend sir," answered the courtier; "rem acu-you
have touched the point with a needle-My cost and expenses had been
indeed somewhat lavish at the late triumphs and tourneys, and. the flatcapp'd citizens had shown themselves unwilling to furnish my pocket for
new gallantries for the honour of the nation, as well as for mine own peculiar glory-and, to speak truth, it was in some part the hope of seeing these
matters amended that led me to desire a new world in England."
"So that the miscarriage of your public enterprise, with the derangement
of your own private affairs," said the Sub-Prior, "have induced you to seek
Scotland as a place of refuge?"
" Rem acu, once again," said Sir Piercie; and not without good cause,
since my neck, if I remained, might have been brought within the circumstances of a halter —and so speedy was my journey northward, that I had
but time to exchange my peach-coloured doublet of Genoa velvet, thickly
laid over with goldsmith's work, for this cuirass, which was made by Bonamico of Milan, and travelled northward with all speed, judging that I
might do well to visit my Right Honourable Cousin of Northumberland, at
one of his numerous castles. But as I posted towards Alnwick, even with