Distinguishing from among the nobles the stout and portly admiral, whom he knew by the silver whistle which hung at his neck, the venerable ambassador of Charles VIII. entered into an animated conversation with Sir Andrew Wood, which was a fresh source of irritation to some of the jealous peers, who thereby felt themselves slighted. The hum of voices again pervaded the large and stately hall, and James, after exchanging a few words with the Duke of Montrose, reclined his brow upon his hand, and with his face overshadowed by a bitterness which he could not conceal, at the affront so publicly given to him by the nobles, suddenly and abruptly arose to withdraw. Angus, who at times was not ungenerous, perceived his deep emotion, and as the acknowledged leader of the peers, approached and said in a low voice,—
"Your majesty may feel that we have wronged you; but I beseech you to rest assured, that at heart your nobles love you."
"And hate all else who have a claim on my friendship," replied James, bitterly, "or all who deserve my affection; is it not so, lord earl?"
"Yes, if bestowed upon the ignoble and unworthy," replied the earl, haughtily, while his deep, dark, glassy eyes bestowed on his sovereign one of those daring, fixed, and penetrating glances which even he at times found almost insupportable.
"Yet would I hope, Angus, that with our great banquet in Castle of Edinburgh—that friendly feast of which I have spoken so often—all these feuds and bitternesses will cease," said James, as he bowed low to Concressault, the ambassador, lower still to the ladies, and retired, leaning on the arm of his most faithful friend and counsellor, the Duke of Montrose.
"Poor king!" said the admiral to Barton, as they also departed; "between his peers and his people, he is like one between the devil and the deep sea."
CHAPTER XIII.
TO SEA!
"All hands unmoor! proclaims a boisterous cry;
All hands unmoor! the caverned rocks reply;
Roused from repose, aloft the sailors swarm,
And with their levers soon the windlass arm."
FALCONER'S Shipwreck, Canto i.
On leaving the hall, Sir Andrew Wood was received at the palace-gate by his usual body-guard; the crew of his barge, under the command of Cuddie, the coxswain, armed with their boat-stretchers, and clad in their spotless white gaberdines, girdled by broad black belts, in which each had his Scottish knife or dudgeon-dagger, and all wearing broad blue bonnets, having red cherries on the top and white St. Andrew's crosses in front. They were sixteen of the smartest men in the ship's company, and Cuddie—or Cuthbert—the coxswain, marched in front.