Come, come, my lord, you do less than
justice to your gallant kinsman, in wishing him a bride bred up under
the milk-pail; for this girl is a peasant wench in all but the
accident of birth. I thought you had more deep respect for the honour
of the Douglasses."
"The honour of the Douglasses is safe in my keeping," answered Morton,
haughtily; "that of other ancient families may suffer as well as the name
of Avenel, if rustics are to be matched with the blood of our ancient
barons."
"This is but idle talking," answered Lord Murray; "in times like these,
we must look to men and not to pedigrees. Hay was but a rustic before
the battle of Loncarty--the bloody yoke actually dragged the plough ere
it was emblazoned on a crest by the herald. Times of action make princes
into peasants, and boors into barons. All families have sprung from one
mean man; and it is well if they have never degenerated from his virtue
who raised them first from obscurity."
"My Lord of Murray will please to except the house of Douglas," said
Morton, haughtily; "men have seen it in the tree, but never in the
sapling--have seen it in the stream, but never in the fountain.
[Footnote: The late excellent and laborious antiquary, Mr. George
Chalmers, has rebuked the vaunt of the House of Douglas, or rather of
Hume of Godscroft, their historian, but with less than his wonted
accuracy. In the first volume of his Caledonia, he quotes the passage
in Godscroft for the purpose of confuting it.
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