Darnley; or, The Field of the Cloth of Gold

by G. P. R. James

"How know you that I do so?" demanded Sir Cesar drily. "Perchance had I met any one of them in this cottage, I might have done him the same good turn. However, 'tis not so. I own I do take an interest in your fate, more than that of any mortal being. Look not surprised, young man, for I have cause: nay more--you shall know more. Mark me! our fates are united for ever in this world, and I will serve you; though I see, darkling through the obscurity of time, that the moment which crowns all your wishes and endeavours is the last that I shall draw breath of life. Yet your enemy is my enemy, your friends are my friends, and I will serve you, though I die!"

He rose and grasped Sir Osborne's hand, and fixed his dark eye upon his face. "'Tis hard to part with existence--the warm ties of life, the soft smiling realities of a world we know--and to begin it all again in forms we cannot guess. Yet, if my will could alter the law of fate, I would not delay your happiness an hour; though I know, I feel, that this thrilling blood must then chill, that this quick heart must stop, that the golden light and the glorious world must fade away; and that my soul must be parted from its fond companion of earth for ever and for ever. Yet it shall be so. It is said. Reply not! Speak not! Follow me! Hush! hush!" And proceeding to the door of the cottage, he mounted his palfrey, which stood ready, and motioned Sir Osborne to do the same. The young knight did so in silence, and rode along with him to the garden-gate, followed by the old cottagers. There Richard Heartley, as if accustomed so to do, held out his hand; Sir Cesar counted into it nine nobles of gold, and proceeded on the road in silence.

CHAPTER III.

Illusive dreams in mystic forms expressed.--Blackmore.

That which is out of the common course of nature, and for which we can see neither cause nor object, requires of course a much greater body of evidence to render it historically credible than is necessary to authenticate any event within the ordinary operation of visible agents. Were it not so, the many extraordinary tales respecting the astrologers, and even the magicians of the middle ages, would now rest as recorded truth, instead of idle fiction, being supported by much more witness than we have to prove many received facts of greater importance.

Till the last century, the existence of what is called the second sight, amongst the Scots, was not doubted: even in the present day it is not disproved; and we can hardly wonder at our ancestors having given credence to the more ancient, more probable, more reasonable superstition of the fates of men being influenced by the stars, or at their believing that the learned and wise could see into futurity, when many in this more enlightened age imagine that some of the rude and illiterate possess the same faculty.

It is not, however, my object here to defend long-gone superstitions, or to show that the predictions of the astrologers were ever really verified, except by those extraordinary coincidences for which we cannot account, and some of which every man must have observed in the course of his own life. That they were so verified on several occasions is nevertheless beyond doubt; for it is not the case that, in the most striking instances of this kind, as many writers have asserted, the prediction, if it may be so called, was fabricated after its fulfilment. On the contrary, any one who chooses to investigate may convince himself that the prophecy was, in many instances, enounced, and is still to be found recorded by contemporary writers, before its accomplishment took place. As examples might be cited the prognostication made by an astrologer to Henry the Second of France, that he should be slain in single combat; a thing so unlikely that it became the jest of his whole court, but which was afterwards singularly verified, by his being accidentally killed at a tournament by Montgomery, captain of the Scottish guards. Also the prediction by which the famous, or rather infamous, Catherine de Medicis was warned that St. Germains should be the place of her death. The queen, fully convinced of its truth, never from that moment set foot in town or palace which bore the fatal name; but in her last moments, her confessor being absent, a priest was called to her assistance, by mere accident, whose name was St. Germains, and actually held her in his arms during the dying struggle.

These two instances took place about fifty years after the period to which this history refers, and may serve to show how strongly rooted in the minds of the higher classes was this sort of superstition, when even the revival of letters, and the diffusion of mental light, for very long did not seem at all to affect them. The habits and manners of the astrologers, however, underwent great changes; and it is, perhaps, at the particular epoch of which we are now writing, namely, the reigns of Henry the Eighth of England and Francis the First of France, that this singular race of beings was in its highest prosperity.

Before that time, they had in general affected strange and retired habits, and, whether as magicians or merely astrologers, were both feared and avoided. Some exceptions, however, must be made to this, as instances are on record where, even in years long before, such studies were pursued by persons of the highest class, and won them both love and admiration; the most brilliant example of which was in the person of Tiphaine Raguenel, wife of the famous Constable du Guesclin, whose counsels so much guided her husband through his splendid career.

The magicians and astrologers, however, who were scattered through Europe towards the end of the fifteenth century, and the beginning of that which succeeded, though few in number, from many circumstances, bore a much higher rank in the opinion of the world than any who had preceded them. This must be attributed to their being in general persons of some station in society, of profound erudition, of courtly and polished manners, and also to their making but little pretension on the score of their supposed powers, and never any display thereof, except they were earnestly solicited to do so.