On this measure he was frequently urged by Black Hob.
"Cock and pie!" that worthy would frequently exclaim; "were this young cub once strangled _too_, thou mightst be king of broad Scotland, and I a belted earl."
"Tempter, begone!" replied the Earl, grasping his poniard; "far enough hast thou driven me on this desperate career—but another whisper of this, and thou diest!"
The armed combination soon made the Earl and his knights rush to arms; and, of all who followed his banner, there were none who hailed the approaching civil war with greater ardour than Ormiston and Bolton. The first, because, by a long career of profligacy, he had utterly ruined an ancient patrimony; the second, with a stern joy, because he was reckless, tired of life, and longing only for an honourable death, that in the oblivion of the grave he might for ever forget Mariette, and that remorse which rendered him miserable.
But Mary’s surrender to the peers, and Bothwell’s flight, frustrated their hopes for a time.
On the hill of Carberry, within view of the adverse lines, Mary and the Earl were parted to meet no more; and it is recorded that he bade her adieu with more sincerity of sorrow than might have been expected in one so long hardened by private and political profligacy.
"Farewell to thee, Lord Earl!" said the Queen kindly, for she was ever gentle; "nathless all that hath passed, Mary Stuart can still with kindness say farewell, and God attend thee."
"Farewell to your grace!" replied the Earl, as he kissed her hand with tenderness. "Adieu, Mary! thou who hast been the light, the hope, the pole-star of my life, and whom, more than that life, I have held dear. A long good-night to thee, and all the visions my ambition so vainly pictured, and so ruthlessly attempted to grasp. I go; but, while life remains, I will bear in sad remembrance thy goodness, thy beauty, and thy wrongs. I go—to exile and despair!"
And turning his horse’s head, attended only by Ormiston and Bolton, he galloped down the hill to his castle of Dunbar, never once daring to look back towards that fair being whom a reverse of fortune had delivered to his enemies; and, save a message she sent to Denmark on her escape from Lochleven, never once from that hour did the name of Bothwell sully the lips of Mary. In one week from that day he was a pirate among the Isles of Orkney, while Mary was a captive in the hands of the confederates, and led through the streets of her own capital, where—