west thou this woman?"

As, at the blast of that last trumpet, the guilty shall call upon the
mountains to cover them, Leicester's inward thoughts invoked the stately
arch which he had built in his pride to burst its strong conjunction,
and overwhelm them in its ruins. But the cemented stones, architrave and
battlement, stood fast; and it was the proud master himself who, as
if some actual pressure had bent him to the earth, kneeled down before
Elizabeth, and prostrated his brow to the marble flag-stones on which
she stood.

"Leicester," said Elizabeth, in a voice which trembled with passion,
"could I think thou hast practised on me--on me thy Sovereign--on me thy
confiding, thy too partial mistress, the base and ungrateful deception
which thy present confusion surmises--by all that is holy, false lord,
that head of thine were in as great peril as ever was thy father's!"

Leicester had not conscious innocence, but he had pride to support him.
He raised slowly his brow and features, which were black and swoln with
contending emotions, and only replied, "My head cannot fall but by the
sentence of my peers. 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 throwin