"Well, I had half-promised Don that I would take him there this autumn. Perhaps we can persuade your father and mother to spare you girls another week, and we will all go together. Eh! what do you think?" and the doctor playfully pulled Marjorie's tam.
The children were so excited over this that they were in front of Holyrood Palace before they knew it.
Of course, the first part they visited were the rooms where once lived the beautiful Mary, Queen of Scots, who was beheaded by the order of her cousin Elizabeth, then Queen of England.
Queen Mary had many faults, no doubt; but surely she did not merit such a cruel death.
"Isn't it strange what wee bits of rooms kings and queens lived in? Why, this bedroom is not nearly so large as our room at home, and the little room out of it, which she used as a sitting-room, is hardly large enough for a doll," said Marjorie.
For a fact, they did seem small for a great queen. There was the very bed she had slept on and other furniture of her time. The children peered down the narrow stairs up which had stolen the murderers of poor Rizzio, the queen's faithful friend.
"I should not have liked to have lived in Queen Mary's time," said Janet, shaking her head, and the little girls shuddered when the guide pointed out what are said to be the blood-stains of Rizzio.
The girls would not go near the place, but Don and Sandy went boldly up, and declared that they saw the stains; but it is just possible that their imaginations helped them out a little, for it was many hundreds of years ago that all this happened, and, besides, it is too dark in that particular corner behind the door to see anything. Some day when you are older you will read about Queen Mary and her sad fate.
Afterward the little party went into the great hall of the palace, where are hung the portraits of all the Scottish kings. They all look alike, having been painted by some bold artist from imagination; which seems a strange thing to have done, does it not? Don said he could paint as good pictures himself.