s of the court I could find little leisure for the muse."

"Your situation is, in many respects, enviable, Surrey," replied Wyat.
"Disturbed by no jealous doubts and fears, you can beguile the tedious
hours in the cultivation of your poetical tastes, or in study. Still, I
must needs reproach myself with being the cause of your imprisonment."

"I repeat, you have done me a service," rejoined the earl, "I would lay
down my life for my fair cousin, Anne Boleyn, and I am glad to be able
to prove the sincerity of my regard for you, Wyat. I applaud the king's
judgment in sending you to France, and if you will be counselled by me,
you will stay there long enough to forget her who now occasions you so
much uneasiness."

"Will the Fair Geraldine be forgotten when the term of your imprisonment
shall expire, my lord?" asked Wyat.

"Of a surety not," replied the earl.

"And yet, in less than two months I shall return from France," rejoined
Wyat.

"Our cases are not alike," said Surrey. "The Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald
has plighted her troth to me."

"Anne Boleyn vowed eternal constancy to me," cried Wyat bitterly; "and
you see how she kept her oath. The absent are always in danger; and few
women are proof against ambition. Vanity--vanity is the rock they
split upon. May you never experience from Richmond the wrong I have
experienced from his father."

"I have no fear," replied Surrey.

As he spoke, there was a slight noise in that part of the chamber which
was buried in darkness.

"Have we a listener here?" cried Wyat, grasping his sword.

"Not unless it be a four-legged one from the dungeons beneath," replied
Surrey. "But you were speaking of Richmond. He visited me this morning,
and came to relate the particulars of a mysterious adventure that
occurred to him last night."

And the earl proceeded to detail what had befallen the duke in the
forest.

"A marvellous story, truly!" said Wyat, pondering upon the relation. "I
will seek out the demon huntsman myself."

Again a noise similar to that heard a moment before resounded from the
lower part of the room. Wyat immediately flew thither, and drawing his
sword, searched about with its point, but ineffectually.

"It could not be fancy," he said; "and yet nothing is to be found."

"I do not like jesting about Herne the Hunter," remarked Surrey, "after
what I myself have seen. In your present frame of mind I advise you not
to hazard an interview with the fiend. He has p