"To league with that red-haired fox, Frederick of Zeeland, for placing the northern isles in his possession, on condition that thou art viceroy thereof—a notable project!"
Bothwell coloured deeply as he replied—
"How ill my own plans sound when thus repeated to me! Yet I cannot but laugh when I imagine the expression the faces of Moray, Morton, and Lethington will assume, when those cold and calculating knaves, to whom we owe our present forfeiture and exile, hear of my Danish league. 'Twill be a masterstroke in the game of intrigue; and certes, under my circumstances, as Prince of Orkney and Shetland, holding the isles as a fief of Frederick, to wed the ward of this Norwegian knight were better than, as Bothwell, landless and penniless, to wed the untochered Jane of Huntly, and live like a trencherman or boy of the belt on the bounty of the proud earl, her brother."
"Doubtless," said Ormiston with an imperceptible sneer, "our vessel will require certain refitting, which will detain her here for some days?"
"Assuredly," replied the Earl.
"During which time we must continue to fare on raw meat, sawdust, and sour ale, by the rood! Surely we will have plenty of time to canvass our projects to-morrow; but to-night let me sleep a-God's name! for I am skinful of salt water, and wellnigh talked to death."
Ormiston was soon fast asleep, and the Earl, though of a happy and thoughtless temperament, a reckless, and often (when crossed in his pride and purposes) of a ferocious disposition, envied his ease of mind.
He too courted sleep, but in vain; for a thousand fancies and a thousand fears intruded upon his mind. The changing expression of his fine features, when viewed by the fitful light of the expiring cresset, would have formed a noble study for a painter. One moment they were all fire and animation, as his heart expanded with hope and energy; the next saw them clouded by chagrin and bitterness, when he reflected on the more than princely patrimony he had ruined by a long career of private dissipation and political intrigue—for violence, turbulence, ambition, and reckless folly, had been the leading features in the life of this headstrong noble.
The career of Earl Bothwell had been one tissue of inconsistencies.
Revolting at the ecclesiastical executions which about the period of James V.'s death so greatly disgusted the Scottish people, the Earl with his father became a reformer at an early period in life, and like all the leaders in that great movement, which was fated to convulse the land, accepted a secret pension from the English court to maintain his wild extravagance; but when blows were struck and banners displayed, when the army of the Protestants took the field against Mary of Guise, young Bothwell, in 1559, assumed the command of her French auxiliaries, and acted with vigour and valour in her cause.