’You shall, my good girl:  hearken:  I will read:—­’My dear Heart,’—­Who is it from, think’st thou, Dorothy?  Canst guess?—­’My dear Heart, I hope these will prevent any news shall come unto you of me since my commitment to the Castle of Dublin, to which I assure thee I went as cheerfully and as willingly as they could wish, whosoever they were by whose means it was procured; and should as unwillingly go forth, were the gates both of the Castle and Town open unto me, until I were cleared:  as they are willing to make me unserviceable to the king, and lay me aside, who have procured for me this restraint; when I consider thee a Woman, as I think I know you are, I fear lest you should be apprehensive.  But when I reflect that you are of the House of Thomond, and that you were once pleased to say these words unto me, That I should never, in tenderness of you, desist from doing what in honour I was obliged to do, I grow confident, that in this you will now show your magnanimity, and by it the greatest testimony of affection that you can possibly afford me; and am also confident, that you know me so well, that I need not tell you how clear I am, and void of fear, the only effect of a good conscience; and that I am guilty of nothing that may testify one thought of disloyalty to his Majesty, or of what may stain the honour of the family I come of, or set a brand upon my future posterity.’

The countess paused, and looked a general illumination at Dorothy.

‘I told you so, madam,’ returned Dorothy, rather stupidly perhaps.

‘Little fool!’ rejoined the countess, half-angered:  ’dost suppose the wife of a man like my Ned needs to be told such things by a green goose like thee?  Thou wouldst have had me content that the man was honest—­me, who had forgotten the word in his tenfold more than honesty!  Bah, child! thou knowest not the love of a woman.  I could weep salt tears over a hair pulled from his noble head.  And thou to talk of telling me so, hussy!  Marry, forsooth!’

And taking Dorothy to her bosom, she wept like a relenting storm.

One sentence more she read ere she hurried with the letter to her father-in-law.  The sentence was this: 

’So I pray let not any of my friends that’s there, believe anything, until ye have the perfect relation of it from myself.’

The pleasure of receiving news from his son did but little, however, to disperse the cloud that hung about the marquis.  I do not know whether, or how far, he had been advised of the provision made for the king’s clearness by the anticipated self-sacrifice of Glamorgan, but I doubt if a full knowledge thereof gives any ground for disagreement with the judgment of the marquis, which seems, pretty plainly, to have been, that the king’s behaviour in the matter was neither that of a Christian nor a gentleman.  As in the case of Strafford, he had accepted the offered sacrifice, and, in view of possible chances, had in Glamorgan’s commission pretermitted the usual authoritative formalities, thus keeping it in his power, with Glamorgan’s connivance, it must be confessed, but at Glamorgan’s expense, to repudiate his agency.  This he had now done in a message to the parliament, and this the marquis knew.