"
Or Omphale's spindle," said a voice at the lower end of the hall, which, issuing from a mask, closely fitted, sounded wondrously hollow and portentous. A profound silence ensued—all eyes being turned towards the speaker, who was no less a personage than the first household god, attired in his proper suit. He approached the king's table, waving his hand in token of attention—
"The knight ye speak of, mark me well,
I've just drawn from the castle-well!"
"Mercy on us," cried Sir Richard Hoghton. "The draw-well is more than eighty yards deep. Thou art a lying deity, and shalt be banished from this bright Olympus."
But the deity, nothing abashed, thus continued—
"How came he thus, I dare not tell;
My brother may the mystery dispel."
He stooped down—rising again to the astonished eyes of the fair dames and nobles at the upper bench, in the forester's habit of Kendal green, with cloak and doublet of the same colour.
"What's now?" said James. "Witchery and fause negromancie, o' my troth. 'Tis treason, Sir Richard, to use glamour in the king's presence."
But the sylvan god continued in the doggerel of his predecessor—
"Sir John to be forgiven would hope;
He had been drowned, but for the rope!"