Brighter and sunnier June came on; but such and so close were the measures of the cardinal, and his able second, the king's advocate, that no tidings reached that lonely little isle of the events which were taking place so near it. CHAPTER XXI. JOHN OF THE SILVERMILLS. "I never met with an adept, or saw such a medicine, though I had fervently prayed for it. Then, I said, 'Surely you are a learned physician?' 'No,' said he, 'I am a brass-founder, and lover of chemistry.'"--BRANDE. The king was seated in one of the apartments of that stately tower of Holyrood, that still bears his name, which until recently was visible on the front thereof, carved and gilt in gothic letters,-- Jac. Rex. V. Scotorum. One window opened towards the abbey hill, an eminence then covered with apple-trees and other wood in full foliage; a path ran round its base, and another crossed its summit. The first led to the castle of Restalrig and St. Margaret's gifted well: the second was the ancient Easter-road to Leith. It was then, and for long after, destitute of houses; Gordon, in his View of Edinburgh, taken in 1617, represents only eight small dwellings on this now populous eminence and the Croft-an-Righ that lay between it and the walls of the abbey church. The other window afforded a view of the Calton with its rocks of basalt, then bare, desolate, and unfrequented, with the eagle hovering over their summits, as if to show that his prey, the ptarmigan, the red grouse, and the black cock, were not far off. The sun was setting, and its warm light fell aslant upon the waving orchards of Holyrood; the square towers and magnificent doorway of its church, and the green coppice on which the king was gazing listlessly, with one hand resting on the neck of his favourite old hound Bash, and the other thrust among the thick curls of his auburn hair, as a support to his head. The passers were few. A mendicant friar, with his begging-box and staff, came slowly over the hill; a knight, armed nearly cap-à-pié for travelling, spurred from the Watergate, and his armour was seen flashing in the sunbeams, among the foliage as he rode towards Restalrig. The king was lost in reverie, and sat with his eyes fixed on the sparrows that twittered on the massive gratings of the large window.