would not speak; but the well-known olding of colour-from the tawny yellow of

air spoke for her, for it said, as plain as words could say:

"A North Country maid up to London had
strayed,

Although with her nature it did not agree;
She wept, and she sighed, and she bitterly

་

cried,

'I wish once again in the North I could be!

"I think," continued Tita, in measured tones, "that he is a very agreeable and trustworthy young man-not very polished perhaps; but then he is a German. I look forward with great interest to see in what light our English country life will strike him; and I hope, Bell, that he will not have to complain of the want of courtesy shown him by English women."

This was getting serious; so, being to some small and undefined extent master in my own house, I commanded Bell to sing the song she was petulantly strumming. That "fetched" Tita. Whenever Bell began to sing one of those old English ballads, which she did for the most part from morning till night, there was a strange and tremulous thrill in her voice that would have disarmed her bitterest enemy; and straightway my Lady would be seen to draw over to the girl, and put her arm round her shoulder, and then reward her, when the last chord of the accompaniment had been struck, wth a grateful kiss. In the present instance, the charm worked as usual; but no soner had these two young people been reonciled than they turned on their mutual benefactor. Indeed, an observant stranger might have remarked in this household, that when anything remotely bearing on a quarrel was made up between ary two of its members, the third, the pacemaker, was expected to propose a dimer at Greenwich. The custom would have been more becoming had the cost bee equally distributed; but there were thre losers to one payer.

Well, when we got into the yard of the Old Bell, the Buckinghamshire omnibus was being loaded; and among the first objec we saw was the stalwart figure of Von Rosen, who was talking to Mr. Thorough;ood as if he had known him all his life, and examining with a curious and critical eye the construction and accommodation of the venerable old vehicle. We saw with some satisfaction that he was now dressed in a suit of grey garments, with a wide-awake hat; and, indeed, there was little to distinguish him from an Englishman but the curious blend

his moustache to the deep brown of his cropped beard-which is seldom absent from the hirsute decoration of a Prussian face. He came forward with a grave and ceremonious politeness to Queen Titania, maternal fashion; and then he shook who received him in her dignified, quaint, hands with Bell with an obviously unconscious air of indifference. Then, not noticing her silence, he talked to her, after we had gone inside, of the old-fashioned air of homeliness and comfort noticeable in the inn, of the ancient portraits, and the quaint fireplace, and the small busts placed about. We had not been in the snug little parlour a couple of minutes before he seemed to have made himself familiar with every feature of it; and yet he spoke in a light way, as if he had not intended to make a study of the place, or as if he fancied his companion would care very little what he thought of it. Bell seemed rather vexed that he should address himself to her, and uttered scarcely a word in reply.

as

But when our plain and homely meal was served, this restraint gradually wore away; and in the talk over our coming adventures, Bell abandoned herself to all sorts of wild anticipations. She forgot the presence of the German lieutenant. Her eyes were fixed on the North Country, and on summer nights up amid the Westmoreland hills, and on bright mornings up by the side of the Scotch lochs; and while the young soldier looked gravely at her, and even seemed a trifle surprised, she told us of all the dreams and visions she had had of the journey, for weeks and months back, and how the pictures of it had been with her night and day until she was almost afraid the reality would not bear them out. Then she described if she were gifted with second sight -- the various occupations we should have to follow during the long afternoons in the North; and how she had brought her guitar that Queen Titania might sing Spanish songs to it; and how we should go down on river-banks towards nightfall, and listen to the nightingales; and how she would make studies of all the favorite places we came to, and perhaps might even construct a picture of our phaeton and Castor and Pollux - with a background of half-a-dozen counties-for some exhibition; and how, some day in the far future, when the memory of our long excursion had grown dim, Tita would walk into a room in Pall Mall, and there, with the picture before her, would turn round

with wonder in her eyes, as if it were along and perilous a voyage; Queen Titarevelation.

66

"That is when she is listening to you singing?" said the Lieutenant, gravely and politely; and at this moment Bell seemed to become conscious that we were all amused by her vehemence, blushed prodigiously, and was barely civil to our Uhlan for half-an-hour after.

nia has arranged that she shall sit behind, to show the young Prussian all the remarkable things on our route; and Bell, as she gets up in front, begs to have the reins given her so soon as we get away from the crowded thoroughfares. There are still a few loiterers on the pavement who had assembled to see the Wendover omnibus leave; and these regard with a languid sort of curiosity the setting-out of the party in the big dark-green phaeton.

Because," said Bell, turning seriously to the young Uhlan, and addressing him as though she had talked familiarly to him for years, 66 you mustn't suppose that our Tita is anything but an impostor. All her coldness and affectation of grandeur are only a pretence; and sometimes, if you watch her eyes and she is not looking at you- you will see something come up to the surface of them as if it were her real heart and soul there, looking out in wonder and softness and delight at some beau- A little tossing of heads and prancing, tiful thing-just like a dabchick, you a little adjustment of the reins, and a know, when you are watching among final look round, and then we glide into bushes by a river, and are quite still; and the wild and roaring stream of vehicles then, if you make the least remark, if you that mighty current of rolling vans, rustle your dress, snap! down goes the and heavy waggons, and crowded Baysdabchick, and you see nothing, and my water omnibuses, of dexterous hansoms Lady turns to you quite proudly and coldly and indolent four-wheelers, of brewers' though there be tears in her eyes-and drays and post-office carts and costermondares you to think that she has shown any gers' barrows. Over the great thoroughemotion." fare, with its quaint and huddled houses, and its innumerable shops, in which silver watches, and stockings, and sausages form prominent features, there dwell a fine blue sky and white clouds that seem oddly discoloured. The sky, seen through a curious pall of mist and smoke, is only gray, and the clouds are distant and dusky and Nevertheless, she had every reason to yellow, like those of an old landscape that be in a good humour; for we had resolved has lain for years in a broker's shop. to limit our travels that day to Twicken- Then there is a faint glow of sunlight ham, where, in the evening, Tita was to shining along the houses on the northern see her two boys who were at school there. side of the street; and here and there And as the young gentleman of the Tem- the window of some lobster-shop or tavern ple, who has already been briefly men- glints back the light. As we get farther tioned in this narrative, is a son of the westward, the sky overhead gets clearer, school-master with whom the boys were and the character of the thoroughfare then living; and as he was to be of the alters. Here we are at the street leading farewell party assembled in Twickenham up to the British Museum a Mudie and at night, Bell had no unpleasant prospect a Moses on each hand- and it would albefore her for that day at least. And of most seem as if the Museum had sent out one thing she was probably by that time rays of influence to create around it a sethoroughly assured: no fires of jealousy ries of smaller collections. In place of the were in danger of being kindled in any humble fishmonger and the familiar hosier, sensitive breast by the manner of Count we have owners of large windows filled von Rosen towards her. Of course he with curious treasures of art - old-fashwas very courteous and obliging to a ioned jewellery, knick-knacks of furniture, pretty young woman; but he talked al- silver spoons and kettles, and stately pormost exclusively to my Lady; while, to traits of the time of Charles II., in which state the plain truth, he seemed to pay the women have all beaded black eyes, more attention to his luncheon than to yellow curls, and a false complexion, while both of them together. the men are fat, pompous, and wigged. Westward still, and we approach the huge

Behold, then, our phaeton ready to start! The pair of pretty bays are paw-shops and warehouses of Oxford Street, ing the hard stones and pricking their ears at the unaccustomed sounds of Holborn; Sandy is at their head, regarding them rather dolefully, as if he feared to let them slip from his care to undertake so

where the last waves of fashionable life, seeking millinery, beat on the eastern barriers that shut out the rest of London. Regent Street is busy on this quiet afternoon; and Bell asks in a whisper whether

the countryman of Blücher, now sitting the Edinburgh press will be welcome. behind us, does not betray in his eyes what They are at once cheap and faithfully he thinks of this vast show of wealth. Lis- edited; and will go far to satisfy the histening for a moment, we hear that Queen torical student on the points referred to. Titania, instead of talking to him about They may also revive, although it can be the shops, is trying to tell him what Lon- but for a moment, a name which was once don was in the last century, and how Col- a power in Scotland, second only to Knox's, onel Jack and his associates, before that in forming the opinions and shaping the enterprising youth started to walk from destinies of the nation. Mr. David Laing, London to Edinburgh to avoid the law, their editor, is the first of Scottish antiused to waylay travellers in the fields be- quaries. His edition of Dunbar, in 1834, tween Gray's Inn and St. Pancras, and kindled a hope in many a lover of the old how, having robbed a coach between Hyde Scots poets, that they should yet behold a Park Gate and Knightsbridge, they "went worthy edition of them—a hope unfortuover the fields to Chelsea." This display nately never realized. His exhaustive ediof erudition on the part of my Lady has tion of Knox laid more than one ghost evidently been prepared beforehand; for which had haunted the great reformer's she even goes the length of quoting dates fame. As secretary of the Bannatyne and furnishing a few statistics -a thing Club; in his connection with the Wodrow which no woman does inadvertently. How- Society; and by the generous use of his ever, when we get into Pall Mall, her igno- own researches and collections, he has conrance of the names of the clubs reveals the tributed much, more than is generally superficial nature of her acquirements; known, to clear the air of vague and false for even Bell is able to recognize the Re- historical notions. And now in the mellow form, assisted, doubtless, by the polished evening of his long life, he purposes to pillars of the Carlton. The women are, give us what he says he has long wished to of course, eager to know which is the give, a new series of the Early Scottish Prince of Wales's Club; and then look Poets," after the English Aldine style. with quite a peculiar interest on the brick May he have his wish! These two volwall of Marlborough House. umes are the first instalment of this series "Now," says our bonny Bell, as we get Dunbar coming next and are to be into the quiet of St. James's Park, where speedily followed by a three-volume library the trees of the long avenue and the shrub-edition! bery around the ponds look quite pleasant For these we need not wait. They will and fresh even under the misty London delight, we may be sure, every antiquary's sunlight, "now you must let me have the heart by their full information and accureins. I am wearying to get away from rate text. We are, meanwhile, content the houses, and be really on the road to with those before us, and have considerScotland. Indeed, I shall not feel that we able pleasure in introducing them to our have actually set out until we leave Twick-readers. It is no presumption to suppose enham, and are fairly on the old coach-road at Hounslow."

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that an introduction is needed. Most of our readers have never seen a copy of Lyndsay, and at the most only know of him by name. Since the Union, when the

vernacular Scotch ceased to be a written language, he has been all but unknown; and what interest is being shown in him at present and that is considerable, for the Early English Text Society are also issuing an edition of his works is mainly owing to the strong historical bent of our day. Unlike Chaucer and Spenser, whose language is also grown archaic, he has no pictures which take captive every generation: it is only to the student of his age, who wants to see what were its range and style of thought and language, its passions and its vices, who wants to get a clear notion of the life of the Scottish people just before the Reformation, that he presents undivided attractions. Here the student feels himself on solid historical ground.

He gets what no History of Scotland as | world's story untold. With all the mateyet gives him. In short, he finds these rials needed for the telling thereof, lying poems to be true materials of history, with prodigally around him- ballad and lejust enough of imaginative warmth to kin- gend, haunted ruin and charter chest dle our sympathy, and make us feel more and bringing to these, so natural to one as contemporaries than as critics. cradled and reared in their midst, a proPoems, "true materials of history!" ex- found sympathy with the spirit of the past, claim some of my readers. Yes, surely. he created for us those wonderful historiThe poems of the olden time, sacred and cal pictures, the Waverley Novels, which profane, are our truest and freshest pic- made a new era in Scottish civilization, tures of it. The Imagination, whatever and gave us a new idea concerning historithe vulgar say, is not the priestess of cal writing. It seemed a startling enough Falsehood, but of Truth, and twin-sister of thing that so much real general interest Faith. As we see in our great poets, it is should be evoked about times and places, the deepest and truest sighted of faculties, of which historians had written without far transcending in range and sureness of exciting an emotion; and that a whole vision the wit or guess of the metaphy- world of life should have lain so long hid sician. It is the same in the old histori- in them. It was instantly felt that the Imans. The sagacity of Thucydides, the in-agination, the esemplastic power, as Colesight of Tacitus, is not born of knowledge, ridge calls it, working on these materials, but of intuition: the result of an open, had produced a truer history, a more lifehighly sympathetic, imaginative mind, like picture, than the professed historian, which has freely mixed among men. Arnold who had drawn his facts from copious pacalled it the historical imagination;" and pers, but had only power to deal with it is precisely in proportion as the poet or dates and names. The anachronisms, as the historian has this, that he is able to con- in Shakespeare, did not mar the general ceive and reproduce the Past. It is the same truthfulness of the delightful pictures in our great modern historical writers. which slowly rose before us which linWhat wearisomeness, what drivel, has been ger with us still, though corrected throughmeasured out under the name of History, out by our better-informed judgment. As by men who have lacked this gift! What Thackeray, in his admirable lecture on inveterate dulness! Worse still, what Steele, while speaking on this same substupidity and unimaginativeness, and con- ject, so well says: "I take up a volume sequent misrepresentation! of Dr. Smollett and a volume of the Spectator, and say the fiction carries a greater amount of truth in solution than the vol

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of the fictitious book I get the expression of the life of the time; of the manners, of the movement, the dress, the pleasures the laughter, the ridicules of society the old times live again, and I travel in the old country of England. Can the heaviest historian do more for me?"

Shakespeare might have taught us how differently history should be written, if it would be true. His Englishmen and wo-ume which purports to be all true. Out men, as we all feel at once, are real human beings, with like passions as ourselves: no "mere creatures of the imagination." As we read their lives in his dramas, those miracles of human art, we are again and again struck with the surprising truth of Marlborough's notion of them, that they were the true History of England. And the truer is this felt to be the more we know of the actual life of the Middle Ages. What passions were at play in those burly Plantagenet and Tudor times! What cross purposes, what craft and dissimulation, what untamed force of nature! But where did our fathers see these reflected? Not in the "classic" page of Hume at any rate. For this purpose the prime end of all history one or two of Shakespeare's or Ben Jonson's plays are worth all the chapters of the philosopher.

It was reserved for Scott to help us to definite conclusions on this. He found Scottish history, and much of English history too, to be all but unknown to literature; a bit, yet a most stirring bit, of the

The old times live again." Rare delight! What more do we want than this from any historical writer? To be a spectator of the past is the height of the student's ambition: alas! how seldom gratified. The poet and annalist in ancient and in modern times are often his best helps to this. Take English history. You read the splendid Saga Burnt Njal, and that old Scandinavian life, political and social, the fountain of much of our modern life, rises clear before us in all its force of brain and hand. You cannot read Chaucer and Froissart, and not come to know, as your own neighbours almost, the pilgrims and yeomen of those Lancastrian days, and to understand their notions, and see along their glimmering line of thought,

was done and said in other lands. His estimates were not narrow national ones. Like two other famous laymen of his day, Erasmus* and George Buchanan, he formed his opinions on the great question of the time from personal observation in different countries: not as a philosopher, nor as a recluse, nor as one who had, as we say, "vested interests at stake, but as an observer of the spirit of his age, open-eyed to see its character and tendency, and open-hearted to be personally moved thereby.

as they bowed at the shrine of A'Becket, | ions were thus the opinions of a travelled or chose their stoutest shafts to strike man, who saw and heard for himself what hard with at France. Spend an hour with Pepys, in turning the leaves of his journal, or with Addison over "those little, diurnal essays "* of his, and you are pretty accurately acquainted with the modes of living, the points of etiquette, and the current morals and fashions of the London circles of Charles and of Anne. Read Burns's half-dozen larger poems, and forthwith living pictures rise on your vision of Scotland as it was a hundred years ago, nowhere else to be seen. "The old times live again." And so it should be with Lyndsay if he really was, as usually called, the Poet of the Scottish Reformation. His pages should reflect the light of that day. We should see with our own eyes the men of that fierce time, and hear enough to give us a sure notion of their tempers and thoughts. It is the object of this paper to see if he does this.

Lyndsay lived during the first half of the sixteenth century, and was most of that time in the service of the court. Born in the reign of James IV., and a member of his household for some years before his untimely end at Flodden; then the guardian and tutor of the young Prince James during his boyhood; chief herald, or, as it was called, Lyon King of Arms, during his lifetime; and dying shortly after the murder of Cardinal Beaton, he saw and shared in the scenes and spirit which introduced the Reformation. He mixed with the courtiers and clergy of his own country; and as a member of foreign embassies, he mixed with those of others. Travel in those days had a magical effect, of which we know nothing in these of disenchanting opinion and hastening conclusions. Luther thirsted to see Rome, the city of saints and martyrs. He saw it, and would not have missed the sight for a hundred thousand florins. Very many more in that age, we may safely conjecture, experienced the same they saw, and would not have missed the sight. The observant Fifeshire laird, of whom we write, could hardly visit the Netherlands in 1531 without hearing of the Emperor's persecutions during the preceeding ten years; † nor witness grand ceremonials in Notre Dame in 1537, and be uncritical: Rome, he would see, was in these countries the same masterful power she was at home. His opin

The great question of the day was Lutheranism. That word meant different things to different men. To some it was a living terror, on which every sense was to be closed; to others it was a debatable matter, as to which there might fairly be two opinion; while to others it was a gladsome beam of light, showing which was the Way of Life, and how it could be reached. The stouter hearts and heads felt the force of the brave German monk's example; and, without two thoughts as to doctrinal specialities, were heartily willing to join in the Great Revolt against priestly insolence. It did not mean, at this time, separation from Rome; and the House of Guise had not yet invented that wickedest of fictions whence flowed such rivers of blood in France and the Netherlands that opposition to the Church meant opposition to the State, and that heresy, therefore, was treason. These notions came later in the century, when the sword was brought in to decide. As yet, what was called Lutheranism was to many fraught with no danger at all to the Church, but was simply the supposed right of every good Catholic to speak of open and known wrong doings, which were grievously hurting the Church herself, and as to the nature and effects of which there couid not surely be two opinions.f

--

This was the stage of development of the "new opinions "for the first thirty years of the sixteenth century in Scotland. Curiosity was excited. Luther's name had sounded over the seas; and the clergy at least the Beatons, who knew much more than those around them of the real state of things abroad-taking alarm, had got an Act of Parliament passed forbidding the holding of his books or opinions.

A layman he was at least during the most imof his monastic vows in 1506. portant thirty years of his life, having been relieved

† See The Monastery, chaps. v. and viii. for a pretty good picture of this condition of things.