To them I will plead, and not to a princess who thus requites my faithful service." "What! my lords," said Elizabeth, looking around, "we are defied, I think--defied in the Castle we have ourselves bestowed on this proud man!--My Lord Shrewsbury, you are Marshal of England, attach him of high treason." "Whom does your Grace mean ?" said Shrewsbury, much surprised, for he had that instant joined the astonished circle.
"Whom should I mean, but that traitor Dudley, Earl of Leicester!--Cousin of Hunsdon, order out your band of gentlemen pensioners, and take him into instant custody.

I say, villain, make haste!" Hunsdon, a rough old noble, who, from his relationship to the Boleyns, was accustomed to use more freedom with the Queen than almost any other dared to do, replied bluntly, "And it is like your Grace might order me to the Tower to-morrow for making too much haste.

I do beseech you to be patient." "Patient--God's life!" exclaimed the Queen--"name not the word to me; thou knowest not of what he is guilty!" Amy, who had by this time in some degree recovered herself, and who saw her husband, as she conceived, in the utmost danger from the rage of an offended Sovereign, instantly (and alas! how many women have done the same) forgot her own wrongs and her own danger in her apprehensions for him, and throwing herself before the Queen, embraced her knees, while she exclaimed, "He is guiltless, madam--he is guiltless; no one can lay aught to the charge of the noble Leicester!" "Why, minion," answered the Queen, "didst not thou thyself say that the Earl of Leicester was privy to thy whole history ?" "Did I say so ?" repeated the unhappy Amy, laying aside every consideration of consistency and of self-interest.

"Oh, if I did, I foully belied him.

May God so judge me, as I believe he was never privy to a thought that would harm me!" "Woman!" said Elizabeth, "I will know who has moved thee to this; or my wrath--and the wrath of kings is a flaming fire--shall wither and consume thee like a weed in the furnace!" As the Queen uttered this threat, Leicester's better angel called his pride to his aid, and reproached him with the utter extremity of meanness which would overwhelm him for ever if he stooped to take shelter under the generous interposition of his wife, and abandoned her, in return for her kindness, to the resentment of the Queen.