Unicorn Rampant (35 page)

The King narrowed those great liquid eyes of his and tapped a tattoo on the table-top. He had on more than one occasion expressed his doubts about Francis Bacon, declaring him to be too clever by half, reminding him of that other clever rogue, the Master of Gray, now happily gone where a sarcastic tongue would serve him little good.

"My Lord High Chancellor goes ower fast," he said. "We have yet to consider which sports and recreations are to be permissible on Sundays. Or better, which are not. Which would tend to be an offence in the eyes o' maist reasonable men. I do not say in the eyes o' God, mind—for, if a sport or recreation isna an offence to God during the week, I dinna see why it should be so on a Sunday, provided that the sporter or recreationist has attended his public worship and service to the Almighty beforehand. But men are apt to be less reasonable than their Creator—even such as the Lord Chancellor and Archbishop perhaps—and sadly we must legislate for men, no' God! Especially in this England! You agree, my lord Archbishop?"

Cautiously Abbot made a non-committal gesture.

"Aye, well—it seems to me that the dividing-line, as it were, must be between the individual and the crowd or concourse. What causes an assembly and heightens passions can provoke an uproar and public upset, unsuitable at any time but especially so on the Lord's Day. So no horse-racing for wager, no prize-fighting for purses. And siklike ploys. Agai
n, no public wrestling, quarter-
staffery or football—the which can arouse fell to-do. Aye, and cock-fighting. But a decent bit game o' golf, now, is guid for the soul, in that it breeds patience and a proper recognition o' a man's ain shortcomings—it does that! Likewise archery, flying a bit hawk or falcon, bowling, putting the weight—although you dinna do much o' that in England nor yet tossing the caber or even curling. Och, you're right backward at the sports, I've discovered. Aye, and there is tennis and quoiting and. . ."

"Shame! Shame on you, I say!" a quivering cry interrupted from the back of the room. "Tennis! Quoits! Bowling! On the Sabbath! Here is very damnation! To provoke the All Highest. The very promptings of Satan himself. .
.!"

There was uproar at such outburst against the monarch's observations. But not from James Stewart himself. That man appeared to find something like satisfaction in this eruption. He even grinned.

When he could make himself heard, he spread those eloquent hands. "You a' perceive now how these Puritans are without reason—for I swear yon was a Puritan. Was that Christian charity, I ask you? Some might say it was contumacious and even subversive, aye. .Subversive, if no' actually treasonable towards mysel', the Lord's Anointed.
I
'm
no' asserting so, mind. But in case some here judge the speaker to be but a puir witless loon and no' representative o' other Puritans, hear this. I call upon one Maister Edmund Troutbeck, of Bramham in Yorkshire, to give evidence."

A fine-looking elderly man, dressed in good country fashion, moved forward through the press, and bowed to the King.

"Your Majesty, my lords and gentlemen," he said, in very Yorkshire voice. "Although no trouble-maker, I deem it my simple and loyal duty to give this evidence of shameful and disgraceful conduct relative to what we have been here discussing. I squire a few acres at Bramham Manor and attend regularly at divine service at the parish church there, where the Vicar, the Reverend William Clough, is one of these Puritans. And on many occasions I have had to listen to the most distressing statements from the pulpit, to my extreme displeasure and that of other parishioners. On one occasion in especial, on the first day of August last, I was so incensed at what I heard that I went home after service and wrote down what the Vicar had said, and later had it witnessed to by a neighbour, William Oglethorpe, also present at church. Have I Your Majesty's permission to read out some part of what was said at service?"

"Aye, man Troutbeck—read you."

"I warn all, it makes ill reading, Sire. Here is some part of the Sunday's discourse from the pulpit. Thus: 'For the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, I care not for them all three a rye or brown bread toast!' Later, he went on . . ."

Squire Troutbeck thus speedily had to pause, so great was the noise provoked, some of it laughter admittedly but most shock and outrage. The King had to bang on his table for quiet.

"Later in the same discourse, Majesty, the Vicar went on: 'I am a priest after the order of Melchisideck; and you . . .' meaning, Sire, his congregation, ' . . . you are devils after the order of Beelzebub.' Hear me out, my lords and gentles —there is more. He was preaching on the text, Thou Shalt Keep my Sabbath, and said: 'Now indeed the King of Heaven doth bid you keep His Sabbath and reverence His Sunday. Now the King of England is a mortal man and he bids you break it. Choose you whether of them you will follow. Now I will tell you the reason why the King of England makes laws against God's laws in that behalf. The reason is the safety of his own body in his progresses.' Yes, Sire, so he said, and more railing than that, which I did not write down. As Will Oglethorpe here present will vouch for."

In the renewed uproar, James called upon Squire Oglethorpe to homologate.

A squat man, almost as broad as high, shouted out in what was almost a farmyard bellow that what Squire Troutbeck had said was God's own truth. He added that Vicar Clough had further said that it was more than the King could do to make such laws. And that in ancient times kings were subject to the laws of priests and not priests to the laws of kings.

More noise, after which James asked Troutbeck if he was finished.

"Only a little more, Your Majesty. When one member of the congregation, an aged lame man of good repute, rose to make protest there and then—as myself did think to do—Vicar Clough shouted him down, saying: 'Thou bald-pated buzzard, thou wilt go to the Devil like a bald buzzard! Thou goest limping upon the earth but thou wilt go leaping to the Devil!' I could say more, Sire, but believe this is sufficient."

"Sufficient indeed, Maister Troutbeck. I thank you. How say you, my lords? Do we tak cognisance o' the views o' siklike gentry in our Declaration on Sports and Recreation?"

The anticipated answer was loud and prolonged, although one or two voices could be heard asserting that such sentiments were scarcely typical of Puritan clergymen. James asked the Archbishop whether he had any comments to add.

Abbot could do no other than declare that what they had just heard was disgraceful and as offensive to Almighty God as it was to the King's Majesty and all decent men. He deplored the Puritan clement in the Church and believed that such should indeed be expelled from the Church of England. But he could not believe that there were many parish incumbents so shamefully unsuitable as this. He would write to his brother of York—unfortunately sick and so unable to be present this day—and urge him to hail the man Clough before the Ecclesiastical Commission for the archdiocese of York, where no doubt he would be duly and drastically dealt with.

"Aye, you do that, Archbishop," James nodded. "And now, my lords and friends, I jalouse that I have savoured a sufficiency o' views and advisings on this matter o' Sunday observance, to enable me to put a Declaration before yon parliament o' mine. My clerks will draw up such document, and nae doubt the good Archbishop and the Lord Chancellor and others concerned will add their supporting signatures. So—that's plenties, aye plenties, for the day. Now—refreshment awaits you. And fell needed, I swear, after a' that ill and seditious report. Set to, my lords and gentlemen, set to
..."

Ludovick of Lennox turned to his son. "I promised you that you would see how our liege-lord manages the affairs of state. I swear that the late Will Shakespeare himself could not have stage-managed this affair better! No doubt he brought these Yorkshiremen all the way down here precisely for this meeting. James gets his way, as ever. Save perhaps with parliament. We have yet to see how this English parliament will take the issue. He is constantly at war with it. Now—do you wish to make your report to him? Come, we will try him
..."

But the King was surrounded now by lofty folk and, though the Duke was able to push his way close, and indeed got Steenie Villiers to tug James's sleeve for attention, the monarch was clearly in no mood for listening to any account of his Scottish affairs. He did, however, nod briefly to John and Will Alexander, said that he had noted their presence there, and told John to wait on him next day at the hawking, if the weather permitted, when he would hear what he had to say. Then he flapped them away.

The following morning, grey but still and not raining, the royal hawking-party set off at first light—quite a small company, for falconry is no sport for large numbers and most of the court were glad to lie late in their beds. This apparently included Will Alexander, John noted.

James, in the saddle, was a different man, impatient, decisive, less wordy. He ignored John, paying more attention to his head-falconer and the men in charge of the birds than to such of his courtiers as had turned out. Indeed he set off before most others were ready and mounted— which was awkward, since nobody knew just where he was heading.

John, who was hawkless, positioned himself close behind the monarch, with two under-falconers and half-a-dozen hooded birds and a few dogs. He soon found himself out-of-sight of any others in the woodland. It looked as though this was not to be the usual competitive and wagering hawking.

They were heading south-by-west, presumably for a specific destination. There were no lochs in this part of the world and there was no point in flying hawks in woodland, where they would just disappear. So they must be making for some open space.

After three miles or so they came to an uninviting area of swamp and sedge, with only a few scrub hawthorns, the vistas sufficiently wide for falconry—part of Hadley Wood, according to the Earl of Montgomery, who along with two or three others had now caught up with them.

James apparently was out to test and compare his own hawks today, not to challenge others, and required no gallery of spectators and critics to assist, quite brusquely dismissing such of the company as had managed to follow him, flapping them away with the declaration that surely Enfield Chase was extentatious enough for them all to have their sport without ruining his?

As the courtiers departed, in some doubts, John was equally doubtful as to whether he was to stay or go. But the King told him to wait that, since his faithless dog Steenie had not seen fit to accompany him this day, too great now that he was a marquis, he would just have to make do with his mere knight Johnnie Stewart as dog, for the nonce.

It was not long before John discovered that being the King's dog—an endearment he often used for George Villiers—could have a fairly literal translation. He, in fact, with one of the under-falconers, was to act dog-handler, to take the animals and use them to beat out the scrub woodland to leeward of the swamp area to put up the game. But it had to be done carefully, he was left in no doubt, only one strip of wood roused at a time, so that all the birds did not fly up at once, and the sport was decently spaced out. So the dogs had to be kept under strict control and not allowed to go splurging off, spoiling all. It was John's turn to be flapped away.

Fortunately he was used to hunting-dogs, at Methven, and knew how to keep them approximately in order. But he was not clad for ploutering about in scrub and undergrowth, especially when it transpired that this woodland was itself not much better than swamp and he had to splash and wade much of the time—which did not do his fine new thigh-length doe-skin riding-boots any good at all. He had to quarter that covert methodically, putting up duck and other waterfowl and herons—deer too, and lesser creatures, but these could be ignored—but had to pause whenever the head-falconer blew his horn, for the hawks could not cope with constant flighting, and renew his efforts when signalled again.

It was scarcely suitable employment for a knight, and Governor of Dumbarton Castle at that; but since the King had made him both and this was the King's command, John could not very well complain.

It made a slow and slaistery business, for there was a lot of this marshy scrub; but at long last the horn blew a succession of short blasts for the recall, and thankfully the weary beaters made their way back to the monarch at the horses, heavy-footed, mud-covered and wet.

James, still in the saddle, eyed his young kinsman critically. "You sent them out ower many at a time, man," he complained. "Confusing the hawks, just. I didna want
flocks
o' ducks and the like, but ones and twos. You should have kent that. And you're right clarty, fair covered in glaur! What have you been at?"

John controlled his voice with difficulty. "Those trees are growing out of water and mud, Sire. It is all flooded. And the birds are
in
flocks, not conveniently in ones and twos! Nor do I think that the dogs can count!"

"Hey, hey—hoity-toity, eh? You'll no' speak that way wi'
me,
your liege-lord, Johnnie Stewart! Watch your words."

"Yes, Sire." That was scarcely humble, however.

James eyed him thoughtfully, then without another word, wheeled his horse round and spurred off. Hastily John had to mount and follow.