On reaching the foot of King Robert’s throne, both youths knelt and laid their sheathed swords at his feet.  Their armor-bearers then approached, and the ceremony of clothing the candidates in steel commenced; the golden spur was fastened on the left foot of each by his respective godfather, while Athol, Hay, and other nobles advanced to do honor to the youths, by aiding in the ceremony.  Nor was it warriors alone.

“Is this permitted, lady?” demanded the king, smiling, as the Countess of Buchan approached the martial group, and, aided by Lennox, fastened the polished cuirass on the form of her son.  “Is it permitted for a matron to arm a youthful knight?  Is there no maiden to do such inspiring office?”

“Yes, when the knight be one as this, my liege,” she answered, in the same tone; “let a matron arm him, good my liege,” she added, sadly—­“let a mother’s hand enwrap his boyish limbs in steel, a mother’s blessing mark him thine and Scotland’s, that those who watch his bearing in the battle-field may know who sent him there, may thrill his heart with memories of her who stands alone of her ancestral line, that though he bears the name of Comyn, the blood of Fife flows reddest in his veins.”

“Arm him and welcome, noble lady,” answered the king, and a buzz of approbation ran through the hall; “and may thy noble spirit and dauntless loyalty inspire him; we shall not need a trusty follower while such as he are round us.  Yet, in very deed, my youthful knight must have a lady fair for whom he tilts to-day.  Come hither, Isoline; thou lookest verily inclined to envy thy sweet friend her office, and nothing loth to have a loyal knight thyself.  Come, come, my pretty one, no blushing now.  Lennox, guide those tiny hands aright.”

Laughing and blushing, Isoline, the daughter of Lady Campbell, a sister of the Bruce, a graceful child of some thirteen summers, advanced, nothing loth, to obey her royal uncle’s summons, and an arch smile of real enjoyment irresistibly stole over the countenance of Alan, dispersing the emotion his mother’s words produced.

“Nay, tremble not, sweet one,” the king continued, in a lower and yet kinder tone, as he turned from the one youth to the other, and observed that Agnes, overpowered by emotion, had scarcely power to perform her part, despite the whispered words of encouraging affection Nigel murmured in her ear.  Imaginative to a degree, which, by her quiet, subdued manners, was never suspected, the simple act of those early flowers withering in her grasp, fresh as they were from the hand of her betrothed, had weighed down her spirits as with an indefinable sense of pain, which she could not combat.  The war of the elements, attending as it did the vigil of her lover, had not decreased these feelings, and the morning found her dispirited and shrinking in sensitiveness from the very scene she had anticipated with joy.

“It must not be with a trembling hand the betrothed of a Bruce arms her chosen knight, fair Agnes,” continued the king, cheeringly.  “She must inspire him with valor and confidence.  Smile, then, gentlest and loveliest; we would have all smiles to-day.”