"Ascend!" reiterated Morton with astonishment—"Where?"
"At the gate of thy castle of Dalkeith, perhaps; thou art thought to dabble a little in spell and philtre—like draweth to like."
"As the deil said to the collier," added old Lindesay. Several laughed at the hit, but Morton frowned.
This famous supper at Ainslie's hostel—a supper which has been fated to live for ever in Scottish history—was marked by all that barbaric profusion that characterised the feasts of those days, when men feasted seldom. Under the superintendence of a notable French chef de cuisine, the first course consisted of ling, pike, haddocks, and gurnards, dressed with eggs, cream, and butter; but there was no salmon, that being esteemed as fitted only for servants. The chief dish of all was a grand pie of salt herrings, minced, and prepared with almond paste, milts, and dates; a grated manchet, sugar, sack, rose-water, and saffron; preserved gooseberries, barberries, currants, and Heaven knows what more; but the curious or the epicurean may still find the recipe in worthy Master Robert May's "Accomplished Cooke, 1685."
This delightful mess threw the Marquis d'Elboeuff into as great an ecstasy as the artificial hens—which formed part of the second course, and were made of puff-paste—seated upon large eggs of the same material, each of which contained a plump mavis, seasoned with pepper and ambergris; and, to him, these proved infinitely more attractive than the haunches of venison, the chines of beef, and roasted pigs, that loaded the table. To suit the palates of Lindesay, Glencairn, and other sturdy Scots, who disdained such foreign kickshaws, there were sottens of mutton, platters of pouts, Scottish collops, tailyies of beef, and sea-fowl. Every description of French wine was to be had in abundance—ale and old Scots beer, seasoned with nutmeg; and it would have been a fair sight for the effeminate descendants of these doughty earls and bearded barons, to have witnessed how they did honour to this great repast, eating and drinking like men who rose with the lark and eagle, whose armour was seldom from their breasts, whose swords were never from their sides, and whose meals depended often on the dexterity with which they bent the bow, or levelled the arquebuss.
On each side of the Earl sat four bishops; and all his real and pretended friends were present except Moray, who had suddenly departed to France, "that he might seem to be unconcerned in what was going forward: he failed not in this journey to circulate every injurious report to the prejudice of his unhappy sovereign, who, in the mean time, was destitute of every faithful friend and proper councillor."
The Archbishop of St. Andrew's—the last Catholic primate of Scotland (the same noble prelate whom, for his loyalty, Moray so savagely hanged over Stirling bridge five years after)—now arose, and, stretching his hands over the board, uttered the brief grace then fashionable:—"Soli Deo honor et gloria," whereat the Lord Lindesay muttered something under his beard, "anent the idolatry of Latin."
Instead of that calm, cold, and polite reserve, that marks the modern dinner table, their nut-brown faces shone with the broad good-humour that shook their buirdly frames with laughter, and they became boisterous and jocose as the night drew on; and the blood red wines of old France and Burgundy, and the stiff usquebaugh of their native hills, fired their hearts and heads.
Lord Lindesay had prevailed on d'Elboeuff to partake of a haggis, and he was laughing under his thick beard at the grimaces of the French noble, whose complaisance compelled him to sup a dish he abhorred.
"Thou findest it gude, Lord Marquis?"