Kings & rulers > Kenilworth > Volume 1

KENILWORTH.
261
“ In truth, we had forgotten his matter,” said
the Queen ; “ and it was ill done of us, who owe
justice to our meanest, as well as to our highest
subject. We are pleased, my lord, that you were
the first to recall the matter to our memory.—
Where is Tressilian, the accuser ?—let him come
before us.”
Tressilian appeared, and made a low and be¬
seeming reverence. His person, as we have else¬
where observed, had an air of grace and even of
nobleness, which did not escape Queen Elizabeth’s
critical observation. She looked at him with at¬
tention as he stood before her unabashed, but with
an air of the deepest dejection.
“ I cannot but grieve for this gentleman,” she
said to Leicester. “ I have inquired concerning
him, and his presence confirms what I heard, that
he is a scholar and a soldier, well accomplished
both in arts and arms. We women, my lord, are
fanciful in our choice—I had said now, to judge
by the eye, there was no comparison to be held
betwixt your follower and this gentleman. But
Varney is a well spoken fellow, and to speak truth,
that goes far with us of the weaker sex. Look
you, Master Tressilian, a bolt lost is not a bow
broken. Your true affection, as I will hold it to
be, hath been, it seems, but ill requited ; but you
have scholarship, and you know there have been
false Cressidas to be found, from the Trojan war
downwards. Forget, good sir, this Lady Light
a’ Love—teach your affection to see with a wiser
eye. This we say to you, more from the writings
of learned men, than our own knowledge, being,
as we are, far removed by station and will, from
the enlargement of experience in such idle toys of
humorous passion. For this dame’s father, we can
make his grief the less, by advancing his son-in-
law to such station as may enable him to give an