human
Davie, cried James, pausing in the middle of the street,
gpt
Indeed, your majesty, replied the poet earnestly,
human
Davie, you are hiding something from me.
gpt
That I am not, your majesty. I am quite ready to answer truly any question your majesty cares to ask.
human
The trouble is, Davie, that my majesty has not yet got a clue which will lead to shrewd questioning, but as a beginning, I ask you, what is the meaning of all this court stir in the old town of Stirling?
gpt
How should I know, your majesty?
human
There now, Davie, there now! The very first question I propound gets an evasive answer. The man who did not know would have replied that he did not. I dislike being juggled with, and for the first time in my life, Sir David Lyndsay, I am angered with you.
gpt
In this matter I am sworn to secrecy.
human
All secrets reveal themselves at the king's command, replied James sternly.
gpt
Speak out; speak fully, and speak quickly.
human
There is no guilt in the secret, your majesty. I doubt if any of your court would hesitate to tell you all, were it not that they fear ridicule, which is a thing a Scottish noble is loth to put up with whether from the king or commoner.
gpt
Get on, and waste not so much time in the introduction,
human
Well, there came some time since to Stirling, an Italian chemist, who took up his abode and set up his shop in the abandoned refectory of the old Monastery. He is the author of many wonderful inventions, but none interests the court so much as the compounding of pure gold in a crucible from the ordinary earth of the fields.
gpt
I can well believe that, cried the king.
human
I have some stout fighters in my court who fear neither man nor devil in battle, yet who would stand with mouth agape before a juggler's tent. But surely, Davie, you, who have been to the colleges, and have read much from learned books, are not such a fool as to be deluded by that ancient fallacy, the transmutation of any other metals into gold?
gpt
I did not say I believed it, your majesty, still, a man must place some credence in what his eye sees done, as well as in what he reads from books; and after all, the proof of the cudgel is the rap on the head. I have beheld the contest, beginning with an empty pot and ending with a bar of gold.
human
Doubtless. I have seen a juggler swallow hot iron, but I have never believed it went down his throttle, although it appeared to have done so. Did you get any share of the transmuted gold? That's the practical test, my Davie.
gpt
That is exactly the test your barons applied. I doubt if their nobilities would take much interest in a scientific experiment were there no profit at the end of it. Each man entering the laboratory pays what he pleases to the money taker at the table, but it must not be less than one gold bonnet-piece. When all have entered, the doors are closed and locked. The amount of money collected is weighed against small bars of gold which the alchemist places in the opposite scale until the two are equally balanced. This bar of gold he then throws into the crucible.
human
Oh, he puts gold into the crucible, does he? Where then is the profit? I thought these necromancers made gold from iron.
gpt
Signor Farini's method is different, your majesty. He asserts that like attracts like, and that the gold in the crucible will take to itself the minute unseen particles which he believes exists in all soils; the intense heat burning away the dross and leaving the refined gold.
human
I see; and how ends this experiment?
gpt
The residue is cooled and weighed. Sometimes it is double the amount of gold put in, sometimes treble; and I have known him upon occasion take from the crucible quadruple the gold of the bar, but never have I known a melting fall below double the amount collected by the man at the table. At the final act each noble has returned to him double or treble the gold he relinquished on entering.
human
Where then arises the profit to your Italian? I never knew these foreigners to work for nothing.
gpt
He says he does it for love of Scotland and hatred of England; an ancient enemy. Were but the Scottish nation rich, he thinks they could the better withstand incursions from the south.
human
Well, Davie, that seems to me a most unsubstantial reason. Scotland's protection has been her poverty in all except hard knocks. Were she as wealthy as France it would be the greater temptation for Englishers to overrun the country. My grandfather, James the Third, had a black chest full of gold and jewels, yet he was murdered flying from defeat in battle. When does this golden wizard fire his cauldron, Davie?
gpt
To-night, your majesty. That is the reason the nobles of your court were making sly haste to his domicile.
human
Ah, and Sir David Lyndsay was hurrying to the same spot so blindly that he nearly overran his monarch.
gpt
It is even so, your majesty.
human
Then am I hindering you from much profit, and you must even blame yourself for being so long in the telling. However, it is never too late to turn one bonnet-piece into two. So, Davie, lead the way, for I would see this alchemist turn out gold from a pot as a housewife boils potatoes.
gpt
I fear, your majesty, that the doors will be shut.
human
If they are, Davie, the king's name will open them. Lead the way; lead the way.