"And is there now no hope?" asked Cicely.

"Hope, child? Dum spiro, spero. The hope of coming forth honourably
to him and to Elizabeth is at an end. There is another mode of
coming forth," she added with a glittering eye, "a mode which shall
make them rue that they have driven patience to extremity."

"By force of arms? Oh, madam!" cried Cicely.

"And wherefore not? My noble kinsman, Guise, is the paramount ruler
in France, and will soon have crushed the heretics there; Parma is
triumphant in the Low Countries, and has only to tread out the last
remnants of faction with his iron boot. They wait only the call,
which my motherly weakness has delayed, to bring their hosts to
avenge my wrongs, and restore this island to the true faith. Then
thou, child, wilt be my heiress. We will give thee to one who will
worthily bear the sceptre, and make thee blessed at home. The
Austrians make good husbands, I am told. Matthias or Albert would be
a noble mate for thee; only thou must be trained to more princely
bearing, my little home-bred lassie."

In spite--nay, perhaps, in consequence--of these anticipations, an
entire change began for Cicely. It was as if all the romance of her
princely station had died out and the reality had set in. Her
freedom was at an end. As one of the suite of the Queen of Scots,
she was as much a prisoner as the rest; whereas before, both at
Buxton and Sheffield, she had been like a dog or kitten admitted to
be petted and played with, but living another life elsewhere, while
now there was nothing to relieve the weariness and monotony of the
restraint.