“Your Grace seems to be in very handsome plight,” said Chiffinch; “and you know his Majesty is gracious enough to make allowances.”
“True,” said the Duke, not a little anxious in his mind, touching the cause of this unexpected summons—“True—his Majesty is most gracious—I will order my coach.”
“Mine is below,” replied the royal messenger; “it will save time, if your Grace will condescend to use it.”
Forced from every evasion, Buckingham took a goblet from the table, and requested his friends to remain at his palace so long as they could find the means of amusement there. He expected, he said, to return almost immediately; if not, he would take farewell of them with his usual toast, “May all of us that are not hanged in the interval, meet together again here on the first Monday of next month.”
This standing toast of the Duke bore reference to the character of several of his guests; but he did not drink it on the present occasion without some anticipation concerning his own fate, in case Christian had betrayed him. He hastily made some addition to his dress, and attended Chiffinch in the chariot to Whitehall.
CHAPTER XLV
High feasting was there there—the gilded roofs
Rung to the wassail-health—the dancer’s step
Sprung to the chord responsive—the gay gamester
To fate’s disposal flung his heap of gold,
And laugh’d alike when it increased or lessen’d:
Such virtue hath court-air to teach us patience
Which schoolmen preach in vain.
—WHY COME YE NOT TO COURT?
Upon the afternoon of this eventful day, Charles held his Court in the Queen’s apartments, which were opened at a particular hour to invited guests of a certain lower degree, but accessible without restriction to the higher classes of nobility who had from birth, and to the courtiers who held by office the privilege of the entrée.
It was one part of Charles’s character, which unquestionably rendered him personally popular, and postponed to a subsequent reign the precipitation of his family from the throne, that he banished from his Court many of the formal restrictions with which it was in other reigns surrounded. He was conscious of the good-natured grace of his manners, and trusted to it, often not in vain, to remove evil impressions arising from actions, which he was sensible could not be justified on the grounds of liberal or national policy.