“Never, Henry Darnley! mine own life sooner!” And she confronted him with flashing eyes and heightened color, her whole frame quivering with resolve and indignation. “Thinkst thou to put a stain like this upon the honor of a queen, and that queen, too, thine own much-injured wife? Out, out upon thee, for a heartless, coward thing! A man, a brute, hath some affection, hath some touch of love for those who have loved him, as I have once loved thee; of gratitude toward those who have elevated him--not, no! not as I have elevated thee--for never yet did woman lavish honor, power, kingdom, upon mortal man, as I have lavished them on thee! Away, insolent and ungrateful, hence! Thinkst thou to do murder, foul murder, in the presence of a woman, of a wife--a wife soon, wretch that she is, to be the mother of a child--of thy child, Henry? Hence, and I will forgive thee all--even this last offence! Banish these murderous ruffians from my presence; spare an honest and a noble servant--one who hath never, never wronged thee or thine! spare him, and I will take thee yet again unto my heart, and love thee, as I have loved thee ever, even when thou hast been most cruel--ever, Henry Darnley, ever!” The king was moved, his lips quivered, and he would have spoken: all might still have been explained, all might have been forgiven; but it was not so decreed. “Tush, we but dally,” cried the brutal Ruthven, “we but dally! On, gentlemen, and drag the villain from the presence!” Foremost himself, he strode to seize the unarmed wretch, who, broken in spirits, and appalled more perhaps by the recollection of the wizard’s doom than by the sordid fear of death, clung to the robe of his adored mistress, poor wretch, as though the altar itself would have been to him a sanctuary against his ruthless murderers. “Mercy!” shrieked the miserable queen; “mercy, for the love of Him that made you! mercy, Henry--mercy, for my sake, or, if not for mine, mercy for thine unborn infant’s sake! Ruthven--villain, false knight, uncourteous traitor--forego thy hold!” and she struggled madly with the assassins. “To arms!” she screamed in shriller tones, “to arms!--O God! O God! have I no guards, no friends, no husband? Oh, that I had been born a man, and ye should rue this day--ay, and ye shall rue it!” Ruthven had clutched his victim with a grasp of iron, and, whirling him from his frail tenure, cast him to the attendant murderers. “Spare him!” she shrieked once more; “spare him, and I will bless you! Ay, strike!” she continued in calmer tones, as the ruffian Ker brandished his naked dagger at her throat; “and thou, too, fire--fire upon thy mistress and thy queen!” Maddened by her resistance, and fearful that the citizens might rise in her behalf, Balantyne cocked his petronel. “Fire, thou coward! why dost thou pause? I am a woman, true--a queen, a wife--about to be a mother; but what is that to such as thee? Fire, and make your butchery complete!”