excuse herself from an honour at once
arrogant and invidious, though too innocent to perceive the cunning
so characteristic of the queen; for, under the guise of a special
compliment, Anne had received the royal request to have her female
attendants chosen from the court, and Elizabeth now desired to
force upon her a selection which could not fail to mortify those not
preferred. But glancing timidly round the circle, the noble damsel's eye
rested on one fair face, and in that face there was so much that awoke
her own interest, and stirred up a fond and sad remembrance, that she
passed involuntarily to the stranger's side, and artlessly took her
hand. The high-born maidens, grouped around, glanced at each other with
a sneer, and slunk back. Even the queen looked surprised; but recovering
herself, inclined her head graciously, and said, "Do we read your
meaning aright, Lady Anne, and would you this gentlewoman, Mistress
Sibyll Warner, as one of your chamber?"

"Sibyll, ah, I knew that my memory failed me not," murmured Anne; and,
after bowing assent to the queen, she said, "Do you not also recall,
fair demoiselle, our meeting, when children long years ago?"

"Well, noble dame," [The title of dame was at that time applied
indiscriminately to ladies whether married or single, if of high birth.]
answered Sibyll. And as Anne turned, with her air of modest gentleness,
yet of lofty birth and breeding, to explain to the queen that she had
met Sibyll in earlier years, the king approached to monopolize his
guest's voice and ear. It seemed natural to all present that Edward
should devote peculiar attention to the daughter of Warwick and the
sister of the Duchess of Clarence; and even Elizabeth suspected no
guiltier gallantry in the subdued voice, the caressing manner, which
her handsome lord adopted throughout that day, even to the close of the
nightly revel, towards a demoiselle too high (it might well appear) for
licentious homage.

But Anne herself, though too guileless to suspect the nature of Edward's
courtesy, yet shrank from it in vague terror. All his beauty, all his
fascination, could not root from her mind the remembrance of the exiled
prince; nay, the brilliancy of his qualities made her the more averse
to him. It darkened the prospects of Edward of Lancaster that Edward
of York should wear so gracious and so popular a form. She hailed with
delight the hour when she was conducted to her chamber, and dismissing
gently