"I was for three years in the band of your Majesty's sister, Queen Mary," said Richard, "but I quitted it on her death to serve at sea, and I have since been in charge at Sheffield, under my Lord of Shrewsbury."
"We have heard that he hath found you a faithful servant," said the Queen, "yea, so well affected as even to have refused your daughter in marriage to this same Babington. Is this true?"
"It is, so please your Majesty."
"And it was because you already perceived his villainy?"
"There were many causes, Madam," said Richard, catching at the chance of saying a word for the unhappy lad, "but it was not so much villainy that I perceived in him as a nature that might be easily practised upon by worse men than himself."
"Not so much a villain ready made as the stuff villains are made of," said the Queen, satisfied with her own repartee.
"So please your Majesty, the metal that in good hands becomes a brave sword, in evil ones becomes a treacherous dagger."
"Well said, Master Captain, and therefore, we must destroy alike the dagger and the hands that perverted it."
"Yet," ventured Richard, "the dagger attempered by your Majesty's clemency might yet do noble service."
Elizabeth, however, broke out fiercely with one of her wonted oaths.