“Enter!” he cried, turning towards the door.
He had hardly turned round, when the door was pushed open, and a servant, attired in a plain but tasteful livery, the colours of his household, entered the chamber.
“Sir Robert Cecil would speak a while with your worship,” said the lackey.
It is often imagined, that, in the hour of adversity, a visit from one whom we consider a friend, unsolicited by ourselves, is among the most welcome things that we would aspire to. But let the cold hand of misfortune only seize us; and, in this conceived relief, the proud heart, which sorrow could not subdue, will be most effectually humbled. It has to own its fair prospects blighted; it has to acknowledge, in its own degradation, the superiority of its consoler; it has to smart under his inquiries, and writhe under his expressions of pity. What torture!—what excruciating torment! To be recommended, in our low estate, to take another path, to confess that we have failed—that our best efforts, our mightiest energies, our long suffering, our glorious and surpassing struggles, which embraced our every thought, hope, and wish, and the bare memory of which makes us even to commiserate our own selves—to confess that all these have been thrown away, that we have been poor, lost, thoughtless dreamers—oh! this is the very bound and extreme of human anguish!
Yet Sir Walter could endure the trial. He knew that, in his course upward, the man who seeks an uncommon fortune, must meet and surmount uncommon difficulties; and though acutely sensible to the bitter influences referred to, he was manned for the ordeal. Keenly as he felt every mortification, how utterly pointless and contemptible, on reflection, did the disdainful slights and opinions of the world appear to him! The galling sneer of envy, the cutting look of pride, or the thoughtless inquisitiveness of pity, itself an affront, might affect him at the moment; but how soon did his heart recover its dignity, and his mind its evenness! He felt the pang, but he did not shrink from its minister; and in the nobleness of his own feelings, and the purity of his motives, he found a most soothing consolation.
On the present occasion, he paused a space before he replied to the servant’s announcement. His hesitation, however, was but momentary, and he then directed him to bring Sir Robert Cecil to his presence.
The servant, with a dutiful bow, proceeded to obey him, and shortly introduced Sir Robert to the study. He thereupon retired, and left the two courtiers, whose characters were so widely different, and so opposed to each other, to themselves.
There was a thoughtful melancholy on Cecil’s brow, whether real or assumed, that at once informed Sir Walter that his fall in the royal favour was known to that person. This was a relief; and though Sir Robert, on the whole, had no great hold of his esteem, he was rather cheered than otherwise by the sympathy expressed in his countenance. A mere glance served him to survey Sir Robert’s aspect; and by the time that the servant, on his way out, had closed the door behind him, and left them to themselves, he was prepared to accost him.
“Give thee a fair morning, Sir Robert!” he cried. “Thou art with me betimes; and yet, by my lady’s hand, I scarce looked for any visiters to-day!”
“An’ that were thy thought, thou didst wrong to me, at the least, Sir Walter Raleigh,” answered Cecil, with much earnestness. “’Tis not in thy reverses that I would forsake thee.”