“Still is thy name in high account
And still thy verse has charms,—
Sir David Lindsay of the Mount,
Lord Lion King-at-arms!”
Sir David was in the first half of the sixteenth century the leading poet in Scotland. When a boy he was page of honour to the infant king, James V.,—carrying him on his back,—his playmate, and, in a sense, his tutor. Sir David addresses the king, giving some early reminiscences:—
“And the first words that thou gan’st mute
Were, ’pay Da Lin;” upon the lute
Then played I twenty springs and three,—
With whilk richt pleasurt thou would be.”
The suite of apartments occupied by Queen Mary are still left, with a portion of the old furniture and hangings. As we wander through the rooms, we can, in fancy, see Mary in the audience chamber, in one of her distressing interviews with the leaders of the Reformation,—when most unjustifiable demands were made on her that, against conscience and conviction, she should renounce the faith in which she had been nurtured,—should change her religion to accommodate the popular change. Or, in the private supper-room, see her and her ladies at their needlework; or hear one of these ladies sing an old Scots ballad of loves gone astray, and with a sad ending. Then Rizzio’s rich baritone rises in an Italian strain; and then there is on these stairs the trampling of armed men, and foul murder is done before the eyes of a queen and an expectant mother; and her life is never the same again.