The Knight of the Golden Melice | Page 5

the walls, and which were occupied by various persons. At one end of the apartment the floor was raised a few inches, and the chair standing on this elevation differed from the others in having arms at the sides, and in being of ampler proportions, as if by its appearance to vindicate a claim to superior position. But unpretending as was the room, it was a place of no little importance, being no less than the Court Hall and Council Chamber of the "Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay, in New England." At the moment of which we are speaking, it was appropriated to a meeting of the Court of Assistants of the Colony.
The person occupying the arm-chair, on the platform, was a man of not unpleasing appearance, somewhat less than fifty years of age, and dressed with considerable precision in the style prevailing among gentlemen of distinction at that day. His face was rather long, and surmounted by a high and well developed forehead, from the top of which, dark, parted hair fell in curls down the temples over a white ruff, fringed with costly lace, that encircled his neck. His eyes were blue; his eye-brows highly arched; his nose large; beard covered the upper lip and chin; and so far as an opinion could be formed, from his sitting posture, he was tall and well-made. The expression of his countenance was gentle, and there was an air of introspection and abstraction about it as if he were much in the habit of communing with his own thoughts. The upper part of his person, which only was visible, the rest being hid by the table and depending cloth, was clothed in a black coat or doublet, without ornament or even the appearance of a button, and at his side he wore a rapier, evidently more as a badge of his rank than for use.
Seated at his right hand, and below the platform, was a man a dozen years at least his elder, whose stout look and fiery glances indicated that if time had grizzled his thick and close cut hair, it had not quenched the heat of his spirit. Like the gentleman first described, he was dressed in sad-colored garments, differing but little from them, except that instead of a ruff, he wore a plain white band, falling upon his breast, cut somewhat like those worn by clergymen at the present day, but longer, and passing round the neck and covering the collar of the coat. Although the oldest of the company, he seemed to have himself the least under control, continually moving in his chair, drawing forward and pushing away the sheets of paper that lay before him, and now and then darting an impatient glance at the person in the arm-chair, from whom it would wander over his companions, and then fasten on the door.
The third and last gentleman whom we think proper to describe, was a man of about the age of the first, but utterly unlike him. His head was covered with a black skull cap, (probably to protect his baldness,) beneath which, rose ears more prominent than ornamental, being very little relieved by the hair, which was cropped short. His complexion was florid, and the parts of the face, about the chin and jaws, full and heavy, giving an appearance of great roundness to the countenance. His features were regular, the mouth small and compressed, and on the upper lip he wore a moustache, parted in the centre, and brushed out horizontally, balanced by a tuft on the chin, four or five inches long. An adventurous spirit gazed out of his clear steady eyes, and altogether he looked like a man of determined temper, and one who, having once formed a resolution, would find it difficult to relinquish it. Around his neck he also had a broad band, divided in the middle, and falling half way down his breast. The remainder of the persons around the table bore the same general resemblance to these three, in dress, that one gentleman ordinarily does to another, and all were engaged in conversation.
Presently the gentleman in the arm-chair, who was evidently the President, took up a small bell that was placed before him, and sounding it, the summons was replied to by the entrance of a man from a side-door. He was the servitor or beadle of the Court, and moving to the end of the table opposite the President, he stood facing him and waiting his commands.
"Bring in the prisoner," said the President, in a low tone, but so distinct that it was heard all over the room.
The beadle noiselessly glided out, and in a few moments returned, leading a man, whose wrists were fastened with gyves, whom he conducted to the end of the