Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 5.djvu/142

202 part of the evening in playing chess with one of his knights, whom, for his remarkable devotion to the fair sex he humorously nicknamed the King of Love. The king was in high spirits during the progress of the game, and indulged in a number of jokes at the expense of his brother king ; but the dark hints which he had had of his fate, seemed, as it were in spite of himself, to have made an impression upon him, and were always present to him even in his merriest moods, and it was evidently under this feeling that he said more in earnest than in joke, though he endeavoured to give it the latter character to his antagonist in the game, " Sir King of Love, it is not long since I read a prophecy which foretold that in this year a king should be slain in this land, and ye know well, sir, that there are no kings in this realm but you and I. I therefore advise you to look carefully to your own safety, for I give you warning that I shall see that mine is sufficiently provided for." Shortly after this a number of lords and knights thronged into the king's chamber, and the mirth, pastime, and joke went on with increased vigour. In the midst of the revelry, however, the king received another warning of his approaching fate. "My lord," said one of his favourite squires, tempted probably by the light tone of the conversation which was going forward, "I have dreamed that Sir Robert Graham should have slain you." The earl of Orkney, who was present, rebuked the squire for the impropriety of his speech, but the king, differently affected, said that he himself had dreamed a terrible dream on the very night of which his attendant spoke.

In the mean time, the night wore on, and all still remained quiet in and around the monastery; but at this very moment, Graham, with three hundred fierce Highlanders, was lurking in the neighbourhood, waiting the midnight hour to break in upon the ill-fated monarch. The mirth and pastime in the king's chamber continued until supper was served, probably about nine o'clock at night. As the hour of this repast approached, however, all retired excepting the earl of Athol and Robert Stuart, the king's nephew, and one of his greatest favourites, considerations which could not bind him to the unfortunate monarch, for he too was one of the conspirators, and did more than any one of them to facilitate the murderous intentions of his colleagues, by destroying the fastenings of the king's chamber door. After supper the amusements of the previous part of the evening were resumed, and chess, music, singing, and the reading of romances, wiled away the next two or three hours. On this fatal evening another circumstance occurred, which might have aroused the suspicious of the king, if he had not been most unaccountably insensible to the frequent hints and indirect intimations which he had received of some imminent peril hanging over him. The same woman who had accosted him before crossing the firth again appeared, and knocking at his chamber door at a late hour of the night, sought to be admitted to the presence of the king. "Tell him," she said to the usher who came forth from the apartment when she knocked, "that I am the same woman who not long ago desired to speak with him when he was about to cross the sea, and that I have something to say to him." The usher immediately conveyed the message to the king, but he being wholly engrossed by the game in which he was at the instant engaged, merely ordered her to return on the morrow. "Well," replied the disappointed soothsayer, as she at the first interview affected to be, "ye shall all of you repent that I was not permitted just now to speak to the king." The usher laughing at what he conceived to be the expressions of a fool, ordered the woman to begone, and she obeyed The night was now wearing late, and the king, having put an end to the evening's amusements, called for the parting cup. This drunk, the party broke up, and James retired to his bed-chamber, where he found the queen and her ladies amusing themselves with cheerful conversation. The king, now in his