"By the total absence of an apothegar—yes. Hah! yonder is a gay dame, followed by an esquire with the argent and gules in his bonnet, crossing the Abbey Close. My faith! 'tis Lady Anne of Arran, whom rumour says thou lovest, Leslie."
"How! that muirland-meg, Anne Hamilton? Ah! what a taste I must have!" replied Leslie.
"Nay, thou wrongest him, Vipont," said Sir John of Corstorphine; "'tis Marion Logan of Restalrig, who hath thy heart; is it not, lieutenant of mine?"
Leslie laughed, and coloured as he replied—
"'Tis Marion whom we see, and not the Lord Arran's daughter." The three gallants hastened to the window, as a lady, holding up her brocaded skirt in that fashion which the witty Knight of the Mount reprehended in his satires, passed into a door of the palace.
"Hast thou seen what Lindesay's new poem says of yonder fashion of skirt-bearing?" said Forrester:—
"I trow St. Bernard, nor St. Blaise,
Caused never man bear up their claise;
Nor Peter, Paul, nor St. Andrew,
Bore up their tails like these, I trow;
But I laugh most to see a nun
Cause bear her tail——
"The rest is vile ribaldry," said Vipont.
"And by St. Bernard, and St. Blaise to boot, Sir David deserves to be run through the body for so severely satirizing the ladies of Holyrood. Ha! who cometh next?—the cardinal!"
As he spoke, Beaton, with a cavalcade of horsemen, passed through the Abbey Close on an evening ride.