“Why, I love this poor exiled king with all my heart; and my father was an old Killiecrankie man, and I long to see some amends on the Unionist courtiers, that have bought and sold old Scotland, whose crown has been so long independent.”
“And for the sake of these shadows,” said his monitor, “you are going to involve your country in war and yourself in trouble?”
“I involve? No!—but, trouble for trouble, I had rather it came to-morrow than a month hence. COME, I know it will; and, as your country folks say, better soon than syne—it will never find me younger—and as for hanging, as Sir John Falstaff says, I can become a gallows as well as another. You know the end of the old ballad;
“Sae dauntonly, sae wantonly,
Sae rantingly gaed he,
He play’d a spring, and danced a round,
Beneath the gallows tree.”
“Mr. Mareschal, I am sorry for you,” said his grave adviser.
“I am obliged to you, Mr. Ratcliffe; but I would not have you judge of our enterprise by my way of vindicating it; there are wiser heads than mine at the work.”
“Wiser heads than yours may lie as low,” said Ratcliffe, in a warning tone.
“Perhaps so; but no lighter heart shall; and, to prevent it being made heavier by your remonstrances, I will bid you adieu, Mr. Ratcliffe, till dinner-time, when you shall see that my apprehensions have not spoiled my appetite.”