“Blow the bugle for the banquet,” cried the impatient Earl, seating himself at the head of the table. “Sit thee down, Mariota, on my right hand here; and do thou, Sir Patrick Hepborne, sit here on my left. The boys and the rest may find places for themselves.”
“But where is thy gentle page, Sir Knight?” said the Lady Mariota to Hepborne. “I pray thee let him sit down with us. [[212]]Certes, he doth appear to be come of no mean blood. Make me to know how the doced youth is hight, I do beseech thee?”
“Lady,” said Sir Patrick, smiling, “he is called Maurice de Grey, a truant boy of a good English house. His father is a gallant knight, who governs the border strength of Werk. Tired of soft service as a page of dames, he left his indulgent mother to roam into the world, and chancing to encounter me, I adopted him as my page. In truth, though young, he is prudent, and perdie, he hath more than once showed a good mettle, and some spirit, too, though his thewes and muscles have hardly strength enow, as yet, to bear it out.”
“Oh, fye on thee, Maurice de Grey,” said the lady, smiling graciously on the page, as he entered among the crowd—“fye on thee, Maurice, I say. Art thou so naughty as to wish to shun the converse of women at thine age? Oh, shame to thy youth-hed. Parfay, I shall myself undertake thy punishment, so sit thee down by me here, that I may school thee for thy folly and want of gallantry.”
Maurice bowed respectfully, and immediately occupied the proffered seat, where the lady did all in her power to gratify him by putting the nicest dainties on his plate, and prattling many a kind and flattering speech in his ear. Sir Alexander Stewart placed himself next to Sir Patrick, and, though naturally fierce and haughty in his air, showed every disposition to exert hospitable and knightly courtesy towards his father’s guest. Below them, on both sides of the table, sat his brothers; and the rest of the long board was filled up by the esquires and other retainers, who each individually occupied the first room he could find. For some time there was but little conversation, and nothing interrupted the clinking of knives upon the trenchers but an occasional pledge called for by the Wolfe, who, as he ate largely and voraciously, drank long draughts too, to promote the easy descent of the food into his capacious stomach. He continued to eat long after every one else at table had ceased.
“Ha!” said he at length, as he laid down his implements of carving; “quick! clear away those offensive fragments. Hey! what stand ye all staring at? Remove the assiettes and trenchers, I say—Are ye deaf, knaves?”
Every servile hand was upon the board in an instant, and the dishes and plates disappeared as if by magic.
“Wine—Rhenish!—Malvoisie! Wine, I say!” vociferated the Wolfe. “What, ye rogues, are we to perish for thirst?”
The silver flagons, stoups, and black-jacks were replenished [[213]]with equal celerity, and deep draughts went round, and the carouse became every moment more fierce and frequent. The Lady Mariota Athyn rose to retire to her own private quarter of the pavilion.
“Young Sir Page,” said she to Maurice de Grey, “wine wassail is not for thee, I ween; thou shalt along with my boys and me, thou naughty youth; thou shalt with me, I say. Verily, I condemn thee to do penance with me and my damsels until the hour of couchee. Come along, Sir Good-for-Nothing.”