Page:The Family Legend.pdf/111

SCENE II. The garden of the castle.

Enter Argyll, Lorne, and Sir Hubert de Grey, speaking as they enter.

LORNE.

A month!—A week or two!—No, not an hour

Would I suspend our vengeance. Such atrocity
Makes e'en the little term between our summons
And the dark crowding round our martial pipes,
Of plumed bonnets nodding to the wind,
Most tedious seem; yea, makes the impatient foot
To smite the very earth beneath its tread.
For being fix'd and ertless.—

ARGYLL.

Be less impatient, John: thou canst not doubt

A father's keen resentment of such wrong:
But let us still be wise; this short delay
Will make revenge the surer; to its aim
A just direction give.

DE GREY.

The Earl is right:

We shall but work in the dark, impatient Lorne,
If we too soon begin.