Dorothy ran to do the marquis’s pleasure.  As she ran, it seemed as if some new spring of life had burst forth in her heart.  The king! the king actually coming!  The God-chosen monarch of England!  The head of the church!  The type of omnipotence!  The wronged, the saintly, the wise!  He who fought with bleeding heart for the rights, that he might fulfil the duties to which he was born!  She would see him! she would breathe the same air with him! gaze on his gracious countenance unseen until she had imprinted every feature of his divine face upon her heart and memory!  The thought was too entrancing.  She wept as she ran to find the master of the horse and the master of the fish-ponds.

At length, on the evening of the third of July, a pursuivant, accompanied by an advanced guard of horsemen, announced the king, and presently on the north road appeared the dust of his approach.  Nearer they came, all on horseback, a court of officers.  Travel-stained and weary, with foam-flecked horses, but flowing plumes, flashing armour, and ringing chains, they arrived at the brick gate, where lord Charles himself threw the two leaves open to admit them, and bent the knee before his king.  As they entered the marble gate, they saw the marquis descending the great white stair to meet them, leaning for his lameness on the arm of his brother sir Thomas of Troy, and followed by all the ladies and gentlemen and officers in the castle, who stood on the stair while he approached the king’s horse, bent his knee, kissed the royal hand, and, rising with difficulty, for the gout had aged him beyond his years, said: 

‘Domine, non sum dignus.’

I would I had not to give this brief dialogue; but it stands on record, and may suggest something worth thinking to him who can read it aright.

The king replied: 

’My lord, I may very well answer you again:  I have not found so great faith in Israel; for no man would trust me with so much money as you have done.’

‘I hope your majesty will prove a defender of the faith,’ returned the marquis.

The king then dismounted, ascended the marble steps with his host, nearly as stiff as he from his long ride, crossed the moat on the undulating drawbridge, passed the echoing gateway, and entered the stone court.

The marquis turned to the king, and presented the keys of the castle.  The king took them and returned them.

’I pray your majesty keep them in so good a hand.  I fear that ere it be long I shall be forced to deliver them into the hands of who will spoil the compliment’, said the marquis.

‘Nay,’ rejoined his majesty, ’but keep them till the King of kings demand the account of your stewardship, my lord.’

’I trust your majesty’s name will then be seen where it stands therein,’ said the marquis, ’for so it will fare the better with the steward.’

In the court, the garrison, horse and foot, a goodly show, was drawn up to receive him, with an open lane through, leading to the north-western angle, where was the stair to the king’s apartment.  At the draw-well, which lay right in the way, and around which the men stood off in a circle, the king stopped, laid his hand on the wheel, and said gaily: