Penshurst Castle in the Time of Sir Philip Sidney

'Nay, Madam,' Lucy said, with kindling eyes. 'I crave pardon; but the unattainable may yet be a reality. Because the sun is set on high in the heavens, it is yet our own when warmed by its beams and brightened by its shining. True, many share in this, but yet it is – we cannot help it – ours by possession when we feel its influence. Methinks,' the girl said, her face shining with a strange light – 'methinks I would sooner worship – ay, and love – the unattainable, if pure, noble and good, than have part and lot with the attainable that did not fulfil my dream of all that a true knight and noble gentleman should be.'

Lady Pembroke drew Lucy towards her, and, looking into her face, said, —

'May God direct you aright, dear child! You have done me and mine good service, and the day, when it comes, that I lose you will be no day of rejoicing for me. When first you entered my household I looked on you as a gay and thoughtless maiden, and felt somewhat fearful how you would bear yourself in the midst of temptations, which, strive as we may, must beset those who form the household of a nobleman like the Earl, my husband. He makes wise choice, as far as may be, of the gentlemen attached to his service; but there is ever some black sheep in a large flock, and discretion is needed by the gentlewomen who come into daily intercourse with them. You have shown that discretion, Lucy, and it makes me happy to think that you have learned much that will be of use to you in the life which lies before you.'

'Dear Madam,' Lucy said, 'I owe you everything – more than tongue can tell; and as long as you are fain to keep me near you, I am proud to stay.'

'I feel a strange calm and peace to-day,' Lady Pembroke said, as she leaned out of the casement and looked down on the scene familiar to her from childhood. 'It is the peace of the autumn,' she said; 'and I am able to think of my father – my noble father and dear mother at rest in Paradise – gathered in like sheaves of ripe corn into the garner – meeting Ambrosia and the other younger children, whom they surrendered to God with tears, but not without hope. I am full of confidence that Philip will win fresh laurels, and I only grieve that the parents, who would have rejoiced at his success, will never know how nobly he has borne himself in this war. There will be news soon, and good Sir Francis Walsingham is sure to send it hither post haste. Till it comes, let us be patient.'

It was the afternoon of the following day that Lucy Forrester crossed the Medway by the stepping-stones, and went up the hill to Ford Manor.

It was her custom to do so whenever Lady Pembroke was at Penshurst. Her stepmother was greatly softened by time, and subdued by the yoke which her Puritan husband, who was now lord and master of the house and all in it, had laid upon her.

As Lucy turned into the lane, she met Ned coming along with a calf, which he was leading by a strong rope, to the slaughter-house in the village.

Ned's honest face kindled with smiles as he exclaimed, —

'Well-a-day, Mistress Lucy, you are more like an angel than ever. Did I ever see the like?'

'Have you heard the good news, Ned?' Lucy asked. 'Mistress Gifford has her boy safe and sound at Arnhem.'

Ned opened eyes and mouth with astonishment which deprived him of the power of speech.

'Yes,' Lucy continued, 'and she is a free woman now, Ned, for her husband is dead.'

'And right good news that is, anyhow,' Ned gasped out at last. 'Dead; then there's one rogue the less in the world. But to think of the boy. What is he like, I wonder? He was a young torment sometimes, and I've had many a chase after him when he was meddling with the chicks. The old hen nearly scratched his eyes out one day when he tapped the end of an egg to see if he could get the chick out. Lord, he was a jackanapes, surely; but we all made much of him.'

'He has been very sick with fever,' Lucy said, 'and, I dare say, marvellously changed in four years. You are changed, Ned,' Lucy said; 'you are grown a big man.'

'Ay,' Ned said, tugging at the mouth of the calf, which showed a strong inclination to kick out, and butt with his pretty head against Ned's ribs. 'Ay; and I am a man, Mistress Lucy. I have courted Avice; and – well – we were asked in church last Sunday.'

'I am right glad to hear it, Ned; and I wish you happiness. I must go forward now to the house.'

'I say! – hold! Mistress Lucy!' Ned said, with shamefaced earnestness. 'Don't think me too free and bold – but are you never going to wed? You are a bit cruel to one I could name.'

This was said with such fervour, mingled with fear lest Lucy should be offended, that she could not help smiling as she turned away, saying, —

'The poor calf will kick itself wild if you stay here much longer. So, good-day to you, good Ned; and I will send Avice a wedding gift. I have a pretty blue kerchief that will suit her of which I have no need; for we are all in sombre mourning garments for the great and good lord and lady of Penshurst.'

Lucy found her stepmother seated in the old place on the settle, but not alone. 'Her master,' as she called him with great truth, was with her, and two of 'the chosen ones,' who were drinking mead and munching cakes from a pile on the board.

He invited Lucy to partake of the fare, but she declined, and, having told her stepmother the news about Mary, she did not feel much disposed to remain.

'The boy found, do you say?' snarled her stepmother's husband. 'It would have been a cause of thankfulness if that young limb of the Evil One had never been found. You may tell your sister, Mistress Lucy, that neither her boy nor herself will ever darken these doors. We want no Papists here.'

'Nay, nay, no Papists,' echoed one of the brethren, with his mouth full of cake.

'Nay, nay,' chimed in another, as he set down the huge cup of mead after a prolonged pull. 'No Papists here to bring a curse upon the house.'

Lucy could not help feeling pity for her stepmother, who sat knitting on the settle – her once voluble tongue silenced, her mien dejected and forlorn. Lucy bent down and kissed her, saying in a low voice, —

'You are glad, I know, Mary has found her child.'

And the answer came almost in a whisper, with a scared glance in the direction of her husband and his guests, —

'Ay, ay, sure I am glad.'

Lucy lingered on the rough ground before the house, and looked down upon the scene before her, trying in vain to realise that this had ever been her home.

The wood-crowned heights to the left were showing the tints of autumn, and a soft haze lay in the valley, and brooded over the home of the Sidneys, the stately walls of the castle and the tower of the church clearly seen through the branches of the encircling trees, which the storm of a few days before had thinned of many of their leaves.

The mist seemed to thicken every minute, and as Lucy turned into the road she gave up a dim idea she had of going on to Hillside to pay her respects to Madam Ratcliffe, and hastened toward the village. The mist soon became a fog, which crept up the hillside, and, before she had crossed the plank over the river, it had blotted out everything but near objects. There seemed a weight over everything, animate and inanimate. The cows in the meadow to the right of the bridge stood with bent heads and depressed tails. They looked unnaturally large, seen through the thick atmosphere; and the melancholy caw of some belated rooks above Lucy's head, as they winged their homeward way, deepened the depression which she felt creeping over her, as the fog had crept over the country side. The village children had been called in by their mothers, and there was not the usual sound of boys and girls at play in the street. The rumble of a cart in the distance sounded like the mutter and mumble of a discontented spirit; and as Lucy passed through the square formed by the old timbered houses by the lych gate, no one was about.

The silence and gloom were oppressive, and Lucy's cloak was saturated with moisture. She entered the house by the large hall, and here, too, was silence. But in the President's Court beyond, Lucy heard voices, low and subdued. She listened, with the foreshadowing of evil tidings upon her, and yet she stood rooted to the spot, unwilling to turn fears into certainty, suspense into the reality of some calamity.

Presently a gentleman, who had evidently ridden hard, came into the hall, his cloak and buskins bespattered with mud. He bowed to Lucy, and said, —

'I am a messenger sent post haste from Mr Secretary Walsingham, with despatches for the Countess of Pembroke. I have sent for one Mistress Crawley, who, I am informed, is the head of the Countess's ladies. My news is from the Netherlands.'

'Ill news?' Lucy asked.

'Sir Philip Sidney is sorely wounded in the fight before Zutphen, I grieve to say.'

'Wounded!' Lucy repeated the word. 'Sore wounded!' Then, in a voice so low that it could scarcely be heard, she added, 'Dead! is he dead?'

'Nay, Madam; and we may hope for better tidings. For – '

He was interrupted here by the entrance of Mistress Crawley.

'Ill news!' she exclaimed. 'And who is there amongst us who dare be the bearer of it to my lady? Not I, not I! Her heart will break if Sir Philip is wounded and like to die.'

Several young maidens of Lady Pembroke's household had followed Mistress Crawley into the hall, regardless of the reproof they knew they should receive for venturing to do so.

'I cannot tell my lady – nay, I dare not!' Mistress Crawley said, wringing her hands in despair.

'Here is the despatch which Sir Francis Walsingham has committed to me,' the gentleman said. 'I crave pardon, but I must e'en take yonder seat. I have ridden hard, and I am well-nigh exhausted,' he continued, as he threw himself on one of the benches, and called for a cup of sack.

Lucy meanwhile stood motionless as a statue, her wet cloak clinging to her slender figure, the hood falling back from her head, the long, damp tresses of hair rippling over her shoulders.

'I will take the despatch to my lady,' she said, in a calm voice, 'if so be I may be trusted to do so.'

'Yes, yes!' Mistress Crawley said. 'Go – go, child, and I will follow with burnt feathers and cordial when I think the news is told,' and Mistress Crawley hurried away, the maidens scattering at her presence like a flock of pigeons.

Lucy took the despatch from the hand of the exhausted messenger, and went to perform her task.

Lady Pembroke was reading to her boy Will some passages from the Arcadia, which, in leisure moments, she was condensing and revising, as a pleasant recreation after the work of sorting the family letters and papers, and deciding which to destroy and which to keep.

When Lucy tapped at the door, Will ran to open it.

Even the child was struck by the white face which he saw before him, and he exclaimed, —

'Mistress Lucy is sick, mother.'

'No,' Lucy said, 'dear Madam,' as Lady Pembroke turned, and, seeing her, rose hastily. 'No, Madam, I am not sick, but I bring you a despatch from Sir Francis Walsingham. It is ill news, dearest lady, but not news which leaves no room for hope.'

'It is news of Philip – Philip!' Lady Pembroke said, trying with trembling fingers to break the seal and detach the silk cord which fastened the letter. 'Take it, Lucy, and – and tell me the contents. I cannot see. I cannot open it!'

Then, while the boy nestled close to his mother, as if to give her strength by putting his arms round her, Lucy obeyed her instructions, and opening it, read the Earl of Leicester's private letter, which had accompanied the official despatch, giving an account of the investment of Zutphen and the battle which had been fought before its walls. This private letter was enclosed for Lady Pembroke in that to his Right Honourable and trusted friend Sir F. Walsingham.

'In the mist of the morning of the 23d, my incomparably brave nephew and your brother, Philip Sidney, with but five hundred foot and seven hundred horsemen, advanced to the very walls of Zutphen.

'It was hard fighting against a thousand of the enemy. Philip's horse was killed under him, and alas! he heightened the danger by his fearless courage; for he had thrown off his cuisses to be no better equipped than Sir William Pelham, who had no time to put on his own, and, springing on a fresh horse, he went hotly to the second charge. Again there was a third onset, and our incomparable Philip was shot in the left leg.

'They brought him near me, faint from loss of blood, and he called for water. They brought him a bottle full, and he was about to raise it to his parched lips, when he espied a poor dying soldier cast greedy, ghastly eyes thereon. He forbore to drink of the water, and, handing the bottle to the poor wretch, said, —

'"Take it – thy need is greater than mine."'

'Oh! Philip! Philip!' Lady Pembroke said, 'in death, as in life, self-forgetting and Christ-like in your deeds.'

Lucy raised her eyes from the letter and they met those of her mistress with perfect sympathy which had no need of words.

'Doth my uncle say more, Lucy? Read on.'

'And,' Lucy continued, in the same low voice, which had in it a ring of mingled pride in her ideal hero and sorrow for his pain, 'my nephew would not take on himself any glory or honour when Sir William Russel, also sorely wounded, exclaimed, —

'"Oh, noble Sir Philip, never did man attain hurt so honourably or so valiantly as you," weeping over him as if he had been his mistress.

'"I have done no more," he said, "than God and England claimed of me. My life could not be better spent than in this day's service." I ordered my barge to be prepared, and, the surgeons doing all they could to stanch the blood, Philip was conveyed to Arnhem. He rests now in the house of one Madam Gruithuissens, and all that love and care can do, dear niece, shall be done by his and your sorrowing uncle,

Leicester.

'Pardon this penmanship. It is writ in haste, and not without tears, for verily, I seem now to know, as never before, what the world and his kindred possess in Philip Sidney.

R. L.

'To my dear niece, Mary, Countess of Pembroke, from before Zutphen, on the twenty-second day of September, in the year of grace 1586. Enclosed in despatch to the Right Honourable Sir Francis Walsingham.'

When Lucy had finished reading, the Countess took the letter, and rising, left the room, bidding Will to remain behind.

Mistress Crawley, who was waiting in the corridor to be called in with cordials and burnt feathers, was amazed to see her lady pass out with a faint, sad smile putting aside the offered cordial.

'Nay, good Crawley, my hurt lies beyond the cure of aught but that of Him who has stricken me. I would fain be alone.'

'Dear heart!' Mistress Crawley exclaimed, as she bustled into the room where Lucy still sat motionless, while Will, with childlike intolerance of suspense, ran off to seek someone who would speak, and not sit dumb and white like Lucy. 'Dear heart! I daresay it is not a death-wound. Sure, if there is a God in heaven, He will spare the life of a noble knight like Sir Philip. He will live,' Mistress Crawley said, taking a sudden turn from despair and fear to unreasonable hope. 'He will live, and we shall see him riding into the Court ere long, brave and hearty, so don't pine like that, Mistress Lucy; and I don't, for my part, know what right you have to take on like this; have a sup of cordial, and let us go about our business.'

But Lucy turned away her head, and still sat with folded hands where Lady Pembroke had left her.

Mistress Crawley finished by emptying the silver cup full of cordial herself, and, pressing her hand to her heart, said, – 'She felt like to swoon at first, but it would do no good to sit moping, and Lucy had best bestir herself, and, for her part, she did not know why she should sit there as if she were moon-struck.'

The days were long over since Mistress Crawley had ordered Lucy, in the same commanding tones with which she often struck terror into the hearts of the other maidens, threatening them with dismissal and report of their ill-conduct to Lady Pembroke.

Lucy had won the place she held by her gentleness and submission, and, let it be said, by her quickness and readiness to perform the duties required of her.

So Mistress Crawley, finding her adjurations unheeded, bustled off to see that the maidens were not gossiping in the ante-chamber, but had returned to their work.

Lucy was thus left alone with her thoughts, and, in silence and solitude, she faced the full weight of this sorrow which had fallen on the house of Sidney, yes, and on her also.

'What right had she to sit and mourn? What part was hers in this great trouble?' Mistress Crawley's words were repeated again and again in a low whisper, as if communing with her own heart.

'What right have I? No right if right goes by possession. What right? Nay, none.'

Then, with a sudden awaking from the trance of sorrow, Lucy rose, the light came back to her eyes, the colour to her cheeks.

'Right? What right? Yes, the right that is mine, that for long, long years he has been as the sun in my sky. I have gloried in all his great gifts, I have said a thousand times that there were none like him, none. I have seen him as he is, and his goodness and truth have inspirited me in my weakness and ignorance to reach after what is pure and noble. Yes, I have a right, and oh! if, indeed, I never see him again, to my latest day I shall thank God I have known him, Philip, Sir Philip Sidney, true and noble knight.'

There was now a sound of more arrivals in the hall, and Lucy was leaving the room, fearing, hoping, that there might be yet further tidings, when the Earl of Pembroke came hastily along the corridor.

'How fares it with my lady, Mistress Forrester? I have come to give her what poor comfort lies in my power.'

The Earl's face betrayed deep emotion and anxiety.

Will came running after his father, delighted to see him; and in this delight forgetting what had brought him.

'Father! father! I have ridden old black Joan, and I can take a low fence, father.'

'Hush now, my son, thy mother is in sore trouble, as we all must be. Take me to thy mother, boy.'

'Uncle Philip will soon be well of his wound,' the child said, 'the bullet did not touch his heart, Master Ratcliffe saith.'

The Earl shook his head.

'It will be as God pleases, boy,' and there, in the corridor, as he was hastening to his wife's apartments, she came towards him with outstretched arms.

'Oh! my husband,' she said, as he clasped her to his breast. 'Oh! pity me, pity me! and pray God that I may find comfort.'

'Yes, yes, my sweetheart,' the Earl said, and then husband and wife turned into their own chamber, Will, subdued at the sight of his mother's grief, not attempting to follow them, and Lucy was again alone.

CHAPTER XV

THE PASSING OF PHILIP

'Oh, Death, that hast us of much riches reft,Tell us at least what hast thou with it done?What has become of him whose flower here leftIs but the shadow of his likeness gone?Scarce like the shadow of that which he was,Nought like, but that he like a shade did pass.But that immortal spirit which was deckedWith all the dowries of celestial grace,By sovereign choice from heavenly choirs selectAnd lineally derived from angel's race;Oh, what is now of it become aread?Ah me, can so divine a thing be dead!Ah no, it is not dead, nor can it die,But lives for aye in blissful Paradise,Where, like a new-born babe it soft doth lieIn bed of lilies wrapped in tender wise,And dainty violets from head to feet,And compassed all about with roses sweet.'From the Lament of Sir Philip by Mary, Countess of Pembroke.

'At Arnhem, in the month of October 1586; this to my dear sister, Lucy Forrester.' This was the endorsement of a letter from Mary Gifford, which was put into Lucy's hands on the day when a wave of sorrow swept over the country as the news was passed from mouth to mouth that Sir Philip Sidney was dead.

There had been so many alternations of hope and fear, and the official reports from the Earl of Leicester had been on the hopeful side, while those of Robert Sidney and other of his devoted friends and servants, had latterly been on the side of despair.

Now Mary Gifford had written for Lucy's information an account of what had passed in these five-and-twenty days, when Sir Philip lay in the house of Madame Gruithuissens, ministered to by her uncle, Master George Gifford.

The letter was begun on the seventeenth of October, and finished a few days later, and was as follows: —

'After the last news that I have sent you, dear sister, it will not be a surprise to you to learn that our watching is at an end. The brave heart ceased to beat at two of the clock on this seventeenth of October in the afternoon.

'It has been a wondrous scene for those who have been near at hand to see and hear all that has passed in the upper chamber of Madame Gruithuissens' house.

'I account it a privilege of which I am undeserving, that I was suffered, in ever so small a way, to do aught for his comfort by rendering help to Madame Gruithuissens in the making of messes to tempt the sick man to eat, and also by doing what lay in my power to console those who have been beside themselves with grief – his two brothers.

'What love they bore him! And how earnestly they desire to follow in his steps I cannot say.

'Mr Robert was knighted after the battle which has cost England so dear, and my uncle saith that when he went first to his brother's side with his honour fresh upon him, Sir Philip smiled brightly, and said playfully, —

'"Good Sir Robert, we must see to it that we treat you with due respect now," and then, turning to Mr Thomas, he said, "Nor shall your bravery be forgot, Thomas, as soon as I am at Court again. I will e'en commend my youngest brother to the Queen's Highness. So we will have three knights to bear our father's name."

'At this time Sir Philip believed he should live, and, indeed, so did most of those who from day to day watching his courage and never-failing patience; the surgeon saying those were so greatly in his favour to further his recovery. But from that morning when he himself discerned the signs of approaching death, he made himself ready for that great change. Nay, Lucy, methinks this readiness had been long before assured.

'My uncle returned again and again from the dying bed to weep, as he recounted to me and my boy the holy and beautiful words Sir Philip spake.

'Of himself, only humbly; of all he did and wrote, as nothing in God's sight. His prayers were such that my uncle has never heard the like, for they seemed to call down the presence of God in the very midst of them.

'He was troubled somewhat lest his mind should fail him through grievous wrack of pain of body, but that trouble was set at rest.

'To the very end his bright intelligence shone, even more and more, till, as we now believe, it is shining in the perfectness of the Kingdom of God.

'On Sunday evening last, he seemed to revive marvellously, and called for paper and pencil. Then, with a smile, he handed a note to his brother, Sir Robert, and bade him despatch it to Master John Wier, a famous physician at the Court of the Duke of Cleves.

'This note was wrote in Latin, and begged Master Wier to come, and come quick. But soon after he grew weaker, and my good uncle asking how he fared, he replied sorrowfully that he could not sleep, though he had besought God to grant him this boon. But when my uncle reminded him of One who, in unspeakable anguish, prayed, as it would seem to our poor blind eyes, in vain, for the bitter cup did not pass, said, —

'"Nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt!" he exclaimed.'

'"I am fully satisfied and resolved with this answer. No doubt it is even so."

'There were moments yet of sadness, and he reproached himself for cherishing vain hopes in sending for Master Wier, but my uncle comforted him so much that at length he pronounced these memorable words, "I would not change my joy for the empire of the world."

'I saw him from time to time as I brought to the chamber necessary things. Once or twice he waved his hand to me, and said, oh, words ne'er to be forgot, —

'"I rejoice you have your boy safe once more, Mistress Gifford. Be wary, and train him in the faith of God, and pray that he be kept from the trammels with which Papacy would enthral the soul."