"Nay, call it not unfortunate, foolish fellow," replied the lady. "You young men, the moment they cannot have all their own way, look at nothing but the evil, though it be no bigger than a grain of seed, and forget to thank God for the good, though there be a mountain of it. We have more need to rejoice at our luck, than cry out upon fortune, even if it were but that we have escaped detection. But there's a great deal more than that; and it is altogether the luckiest turn that matters could have taken. I wish to heaven you could have seen this upstart Overbury, this minion's minion, with his wit and his wisdom, and how he helped to take himself in, both last night and this morning. 'Twas a rare sight, I can assure you. Here's my lord will tell you how I played the youth, as a skilful angler does a mighty trout; and how he floundered and spent his strength, till he was fain to let me land him on the bank, completely at my mercy. We spoke of all things, Arabella and you, and his own plans and purposes; and I explained to him in good set terms what I should expect for my niece, if ever she condescended to give her hand to Robert Carr. First, he must make her a duchess. There he was ready to meet me; he was sure the King would consent to that. Did he not make Philip Herbert knight, baron, viscount, and earl, in one day? and what could he refuse to Carr? Then I declared that I must have three thousand pounds per annum settled on the lady. This staggered him a little, the treasury being empty; but he ended by saying, that my Lord of Rochester's estates might well bear that; whereat I smiled upon him most graciously, fell into thought, and smiled again; after which he asked the meaning of my looks. I answered that he brought to my mind a bold ambassador, who, once suing to a king for something on which his master had set his heart, made no scruple to promise everything required as an equivalent. First, it was the hand of his sovereign's daughter; then an enormous dowry; then a province of the kingdom; and, when the other party asked in jest an island in the Indian Ocean, belonging to heaven knows whom, he replied, it too should be given--if it could be procured. Thereat he laughed, and said that he could assure me all he promised he could perform." "What answered you to that, lady?" asked Seymour. "I said--now for the island in the Indian Ocean," answered the Countess; "there is one thing more, good Sir Thomas Overbury, before I suffer my niece to be moved in this suit: I must see her freed entirely from the shackles with which the King has been pleased to fetter her. I must have in my hand the King's consent to her marrying a subject; otherwise she may be trifled with, her expectations raised, her affections gained, and then a flat refusal come at length, and all her hopes be blighted." "But, dear lady," exclaimed Seymour; "methinks you were but showing him the road to travel to his object."