tter will I shoot to Edward's camp;
And now, ere midnight, I'm revenged--revenged!

[LADY SETON _appears from the window of the castle_, as
ELLIOT _is fixing a letter on an arrow_.

_Lady Seton_ [_from the window_].--Hold, traitor! hold,
Or, by the powers above us, this very hour
Your body o'er these battlements shall hang
For your fair friends to shoot at!

[ELLIOT _drops the bow_.

_Elliot_ [_aside_].--Now fleet destruction seize the
lynx-eyed fiend--
Trapped in the moment that insured success!
Thank fate--my dagger's left!--she has a son!

_Lady Seton_.--Go, worthless recreant, and in thickest fight
Blot out thy guilty purpose: know thy life
Depends on this day's daring; and its deeds
And wounds alone, won in the onset's brunt,
Secures my silence.

_Elliot_.--You wrong me, noble lady.

_Lady Seton_.--Away! I'll hear thee not, nor let my ears
List to the accents of a traitor's tongue. [_Exit_ ELLIOT.

SCENE III.--_An Apartment in_ KING EDWARD'S _Tent._

_Enter_ EDWARD _and_ PERCY.

_Edward_.--Well, my Lord Percy, thou hast made good speed.
What say these haughty burghers to our clemency?

_Percy_.--In truth, your Grace, they are right _haughty_
burghers.
One wondrous civil gentleman proposed
To write his answer on your servant's tongue--
Using his sword as clerks might do a quill--
Then thrust it on an arrow for a post-boy!

_Edward_.--Such service he shall meet. What said their
governor?

_Percy_.--Marry! the old boy said I was no gentleman,
And bade me read my answer in the eyes
Of--Heaven defend me!--such a squalid crew!
One looked like death run from his winding sheet;
Another like an ague clothed in rags;
A third had something of the human form,
But every bone was cursing at its fellow.
Now, though I vow that I could read my fate
In every damsel's eyes that kissed a moonbeam,
I've yet to learn the meaning of the words
Wrote on the eyeballs of his vellum-spectres,
But the old man is henpecked!

_Edward_.--Prythee, Lord Percy, lay thy fool's tongue by,
And tell thy meaning plainly.

_Percy_.--Nay, pardon me, your majesty; I wot
Your servant is the fool his father made him,
And the most dutiful of all your subjects.

_Edward_.--We know it, Percy. But what of his wife?

_Percy_.--Why, if the men but possess half her spirit,
You might besiege these walls till you have counted
The grey hairs on the child that's born next June.

_Edward_.--And was this all?

_Percy_.--Nay,