"Puir Gibbie o' Crail ended his life as I told ye, and sleeps in his hammock among the mermaids," said the boatswain, rising from the gun-carriage; "but Sandy, our messmate, hath left me a lang way astern, for he is now Sir Alexander Mathieson, Knight--_the King of the Sea_, and captain o' yonder gallant caravel, while I am only auld Archy the boatswain. And, see, yonder his barge is shoved off frae the Craig o' St. Nicholas, and pulled straight for the _Queen Margaret_." "Which shows that the king's council maun e'en be owre, and 'tis time I were awa to the Admiral," said Jamie Gair, as through an open gun-port, the gilded boat referred to, was seen to leave the rock of St. Nicholas, with a banner waving at its stern, where three or four gentlemen, wearing rich dresses, were seated; and, with sixteen bright-bladed oars flashing in the meridian sun, it was pulled across the shining river directly towards the consort of the _Yellow Frigate_. CHAPTER XI. CHAINING THE UNICORN. "Quaint old town of toil and traffick, quaint old town of art and song, Mem'ries haunt thy painted gables, like the rooks that round them throng; Mem'ries of the middle ages, when thy sovereigns rough and bold, Had their dwelling in thy castle, time-defying, centuries old." LONGFELLOW. While the boatswain was spinning his incredible yarn in the forecastle of the frigate, the king, after being at mass in the chapel of St. Salvador, which stood near the palace of St. Margaret, on a rocky eminence to the north side of the High-street and Overgaitt, proceeded to the hall of this ancient residence, where the great officers of state were to assemble, and where he was to receive the ambassadors of Louis XI.