8. VIII.
WHAT A PIE CONTAINED.
On the next morning I got up, buckled on my
sword, and reported for duty. Harry came up and
hugged me with ardor.
“Here's the hero of the encounter!” he cried, “the
only human being everybody talks of—”
“Even her majesty,” said a grave and courtly voice
behind me; and, turning round, I saw Lord Digby.
His lordship smiled with an air of great courtesy, and
held out his hand.
“I have come to compliment your good soldiership,
Mr. Cecil, in persistently halting me in the park last
night,” he said. “You serve her majesty as she ought
to be served, and I offer you my compliments, sir.”
He bowed, and passed on, leaving me charmed at my
sudden importance! I seemed about to become somebody!
A lucky accident had raised me from obscurity,
and I had even attracted the attention of her
majesty,—who from that moment, as the reader will
perceive, remembered my name and honored me with
her august regard.
The court returned on the same evening to Hampton
Court; but before the cortége left Oatlands an
incident of a very comic nature occurred,—one which
made everybody laugh, and introduced an afterwards
famous personage.
I had just risen from the mess-table in the guard-room,
where I had dined, when shouts of laughter from
the great hall of the palace, where her majesty was also
dining, attracted our attention. So loud and unceremonious
was this laughter that it drew us irresistibly
towards the door. I hastened thither with the rest,
glanced through the half-open door, and at first was
almost unable to believe my eyesight.
Her majesty sat at table with her maids of honor
and attendant lords, and on the broad board, immediately
in front of her plate, knelt a figure scarce two
feet in height,—a manikin clad in full cavalier costume,
with top-boots, a minute sword at his side, with a
plumed beaver in one hand, and the other hand upon
his heart.
Behind the dwarf was seen a huge pie, from which
he had popped up, I soon discovered, at the moment
when the pastry was cut. The queen had started back
in utter amazement, but the dwarf had respectfully
stepped towards her plate. There he had stopped,
fallen upon one knee, and offered his respectful homage
to her majesty, his hand resting devotedly upon his
heart.
As I reached the door and took in this odd spectacle,
the shouts of laughter, defying all ceremony,
ceased. Her majesty turned towards Lord Jermyn, and
said, in high good humor,—
“We owe this surprise to you, my lord.”
Lord Jermyn, with his bland and courtly smile, returned,—
“Your majesty has concluded justly: the comedy
comes after the melodrame. This little gentleman is
one of your majesty's most faithful subjects, and, knowing
your majesty's taste for small people, I have planned
this surprise.”
The queen gazed with suppressed smiles at the dwarf,
and then at Lord Jermyn.
“Thanks, my lord. We accept your gift, and take
into our service—how call you him?”
“Geoffrey Hudson, your majesty.”
The queen extended her hand and drew the small
sword of the manikin from its scabbard. With the
same expression of struggling merriment, she then
touched the dwarf's shoulder with the weapon, and
said,—
“Rise, Sir Geoffrey Hudson: we take you into our
service.”
The manikin rose, and made a bow so profound
that his head nearly touched the table. He was scarce
two feet, as I have said, in height.
“I thank your majesty,” he said, in a small, piping
voice, “and will endeavor to serve her faithfully, however
small my stature.”
A great laugh saluted the words, and the dwarf's
face flushed with anger, as he darted quick glances
around him.
“I recommend caution to gentlemen who would
avoid Sir Geoffrey's sword-thrust!” said Lord Jermyn,
laughing.
And Sir Geoffrey having leaped nimbly to the floor,
where he walked up and down with great gravity and
dignity, the banquet proceeded and terminated.
When her majesty set out on her return to Hampton
Court in the afternoon, I observed that the singular
manikin had been furnished with a seat among the
maids of honor in one of the coaches. The taste for
such strange beings was at that epoch a passion almost:
thus, the young ladies welcomed him warmly, instead
of betraying any aversion; and on the arrival of the
queen at Hampton Court he was supplied with an
apartment, and became formally a member of the royal
household.
He will reappear more than once in the progress of
these memoirs; and an event which I shall relate in its
place will show that, small as this strange human insect
might be, his sting was mortal.
