the issue of his exploit, just rose in time to receive the ironical congratulations of his uncle, upon a single combat worthy to be commemorated by Ossian himself," since," said the Antiquary, "your magnanimous opponent hath fled, though not upon eagle's wings, from the foe that was low- Egad, she walloped away with all the grace of triumph, and has carried my stick off also, by way of spolia opima." M'Intyre had little to answer for himself, except that a Highlander could never pass a deer, a seal, or a salmon, where there was a possibility of having a trial of skill with them, and that he had forgot one of his arms was in a sling. He also made his fall an apology for returning back to Monkbarns, and thus escaped the farther raillery of his uncle, as well as his lamentations for his walkingstick. "I cut it," he said, "in the classic woods of Hawthornden, when I did not expect always to have been a bachelor-I would not have given it for an ocean of seals-O Hector! Hector-thy namesake was born to be the prop of Troy, and thou to be the plague of Monkbarns!" THE Antiquary, being now alone, hastened his pace, which had been retarded by these various discussions, and the rencontre which had closed them, and soon arrived before the half-dozen cottages at Mussel-crag. They now had, in addition to their usual squalid and uncomfortable appearance, the melancholy attributes of the house of mourning. The boats were all drawn up on the beach; and, though the day was fine, and the season favourable, the chant, which is used by the fishers when at sea, was silent, as well as the prattle of the children, and the shrill song of the mother, as she sits mending her nets by the door. A few of the neighbours, some in their antique and well-saved suits of black, others in their ordinary clothes, but all bearing an expression of mournful sympathy with distress so sudden and unexpected, stood gathered around the door of Mucklebackit's cottage, waiting till "the body was lifted." As the Laird of Monkbarns approached, they made way for him to enter, doffing their hats and bonnets as he passed, with an air of melancholy courtesy, and he returned their salutes in the same manner. In the inside of the cottage, was a scene which our Wilkie alone could have painted, with that exquisite feeling of nature that characterises his enchanting productions. The body was laid in its coffin within the wooden bedstead which the young fisher had occupied while alive. At a little distance stood the father, whose rugged weather-beaten countenance, shaded by his grizzled hair, had faced many a stormy night and night-like day. He was apparently revolving his loss in his mind, with that strong feeling of painful grief peculiar to harsh and rough characters, which VOL. I. No. XXIX. 443 almost breaks forth into hatred against the world, and all that remain in it, after the beloved object is withdrawn. The old man had made the most desperate efforts to save his son, and had only been withheld by main force from renewing them at a moment when, without the possibility of assisting the sufferer, he must himself have perished. All this apparently was boiling in his recollection. His glance was directed sidelong towards the coffin, as to an object on which he could not steadfastly look, and yet from which he could not withdraw his eyes. His answers to the necessary questions which were occasionally put to him, were brief, harsh, and almost fierce. His family had not yet dared to address to him a word, either of sympathy or consolation. His masculine wife, virago as she was, and absolute mistress of the family, as she justly boasted herself, on all ordinary occasions, was, by this great loss, terrified into silence and submission, and compelled to hide from her husband's observation the bursts of her female sorrow. As he had rejected food ever since the disaster had happened, not daring herself to approach him, she had that morning, with affectionate artifice, employed the youngest and favourite child to present her husband with some nourishment. His first action was to push it from him with an angry violence that frightened the child; his next, to snatch up the boy and devour him with kisses. "Ye'll be a bra' fallow, an ye be spared, Patie, but ye'll never-never can be-what he was to me!-He has sailed the coble wi' me since he was ten years auld, and there wasna the like o' him drew a net betwixt this and Buchan-nessThey say folks maun submit-I will try." And he had been silent from that moment until compelled to answer the necessary questions we have already noticed. Such was the disconsolate state of the father. In another corner of the cottage, her face covered by her apron, which was flung over it, sat the mother-the nature of her grief sufficiently indicated by the wringing of her hands, and the convulsive agitation of the bosom, which the covering could not conceal. Two of her gossips, officiously whispering into her ear the common-place topic of resignation under irremediable misfortune, seemed as if they were endeavouring to stun the grief which they could not console. The sorrow of the children was mingled with wonder at the preparations they beheld around them, and at the unusual display of wheaten bread and wine, which the poorest peasant, or fisher, offers to the guests on these mournful occasions; and thus their grief for their brother's death was almost already lost in admiration of the splendour of his funeral. But the figure of the old grandmother was the most remarkable of the sorrowing group. Seated on her accustomed chair, with her usual air of apathy, and want of interest in what surrounded her, she seemed every now and then mechanically to resume the motion of twirling her spindle; then to look towards her bosom for the distaff, although both had been laid aside. She would then cast her eyes about, as if surprised at missing the usual implements of her industry, and appear struck by the black colour of the gown in which they had dressed her, and embarrassed by the number of persons by whom she was surrounded. Then, finally, she would raise her head with a ghastly look, and fix her eyus 2 F upon the bed which contained the coffin of her grandson, as if she had at once, and for the first time, acquired sense to comprehend her inexpressible calamity. These alternate feelings of embarrassment, wonder, and grief, seemed to succeed each other more than once upon her torpid features. But she spoke not a word-neither had she shed a tear-nor did one of the family understand, either from look or expression, to what extent she comprehended the uncommon bustle around her. Thus she sat among the funeral assembly like a connecting link between the surviving mourners and the dead corspe which they bewailed-a being in whom the light of existence was already obscured by the encroaching shadows of death. When Oldbuck entered this house of mourning, he was received by a general and silent inclination of the head, and, according to the fashion of Scotland on such occasions, wine and spirits and bread were offered round to the guests. Elspeth, as these refreshments were presented, surprised and startled the whole company by motioning to the person who bore them to stop; then, taking a glass in her hand, she rose up, and, as the smile of dotage played upon her shrivelled features, she pronounced, with a hollow and tremulous voice, "Wishing a' your healths, sirs, and often may we hae such merry meetings!" All shrunk from the ominous pledge, and set down the untasted liquor with a degree of shuddering horror, which will not surprise those who know how many superstitions are still common on such occasions among the Scottish vulgar. But as the old woman tasted the liquor, she suddenly exclaimed with a sort of shriek, "What's this?-this is wine -how should there be wine in my son's house?— Ay," she continued with a suppressed groan, "I mind the sorrowful cause now," and, dropping the glass from her hand, she stood a moment gazing fixedly on the bed in which the coffin of her grandson was deposited, and then sinking gradually into her seat, she covered her eyes and forehead with her withered and pallid hand. At this moment the clergyman entered the cottage. Mr Blattergowl, though a dreadful proser, particularly on the subject of augmentations, localities, teinds, and overtures in that session of the General Assembly, to which, unfortunately for his auditors, he chanced one year to act as moderator, was nevertheless a good man, in the old Scottish presbyterian phrase, God-ward and man-ward. No divine was more attentive in visiting the sick and afflicted, in catechizing the youth, in instructing the ignorant, and in reproving the erring. And hence, notwithstanding impatience of his prolixity and prejudices, personal or professional, and notwithstanding, moreover, a certain habitual contempt for his understanding, especially on affairs of genius and taste, on which Blattergowl was apt to be diffuse, from his hope of one day fighting his way to a chair of rhetoric or belles lettres,-notwithstanding, I say, all the prejudices excited against him by these circumstances, our friend the Antiquary looked with great regard and respect on the said Blattergowl, though I own he could seldom, even by his sense of decency and the remonstrances of his womankind, be hounded out, as he called it, to hear him preach. But he regularly took shame to himself for his abFence when Blattergowl came to Monkbarns to dinner, to which he was always invited of a Sunday, a mode of testifying his respect which the proprietor probably thought fully as agreeable to the clergyman, and rather more congenial to his own habits. To return from a digression which can only serve to introduce the honest clergyman more particularly to our readers, Mr Blattergowl had no sooner entered the hut, and received the mute and melancholy salutations of the company whom it contained, than he edged himself towards the unfortunate father, and seemed to endeavour to slide in a few words of condolence or of consolation. But the old man was incapable as yet of receiving either; he nodded, however, gruffly, and shook the clergyman's hand in acknowledgment of his good intentions, but was either unable or unwilling to make any verbal reply. The minister next passed to the mother, moving along the floor as slowly, silently, and gradually, as if he had been afraid that the ground would, like unsafe ice, break beneath his feet, or that the first echo of a footstep was to dissolve some magic spell, and plunge the hut, with all its inmates, into a subterranean abyss. The tenor of what he had said to the poor woman could only be judged by her answers, as, half-stifled by sobs ill-repressed, and by the covering which she still kept over her countenance, she faintly answered at each pause in his speech-"Yes, sir, yes!-Ye're very gude-ye're very gude!-Nae doubt, nae doubt!-It's our duty to submit!-But, O dear! my poor Steenie! the pride o' my very heart, that was sae handsome and comely, and a help to his family, and a comfort to us a', and a pleasure to a' that lookit on him!-0 my bairn! my bairn! my bairn! what for is thou lying there!-and eh! what for am I left to greet for ye!" There was no contending with this burst of sorrow and natural affection. Oldbuck had repeated recourse to his snuff-box to conceal the tears which, despite his shrewd and caustic temper, were apt to start on such occasions. The female assistants whimpered, the men held their bonnets to their faces, and spoke apart with each other. The cler gyman, meantime, addressed his ghostly consolation to the aged grandmother. At first she listened, or seemed to listen, to what he said, with the apathy of her usual unconsciousness. But as, in pressing this theme, he approached so near to her ear that the sense of his words became distinctly intelligible to her, though unheard by those who stood more distant, her countenance at once assumed that stern and expressive cast which characterised her intervals of intelligence. She drew up her head and body, shook her head in a manner that showed at least impatience, if not scorn of his counsel, and waved her hand slightly, but with a gesture so expressive, as to indicate to all who witnessed it a marked and disdainful rejection of the ghostly consolation proffered to her. The minister stepped back as if repulsed, and, by lifting gently and dropping his hand, seemed to show at once wonder, sorrow, and compassion for her dreadful state of mind. The rest of the company sympathized, and a stifled whisper went through them, indicating how much her desperate and determined manner impressed them. with awe, and even horror. In the meantime the funeral company was com pleted, by the arrival of one or two persons who had been expected from Fairport. The wine and spirits again circulated, and the dumb show of greeting was anew interchanged. The grandame a second time took a glass in her hand, drank its contents, and exclaimed, with a sort of laugh,— "Ha! ha! I hae tasted wine twice in ae dayWhan did I that before, think ye, cummers?Never since"-And the transient glow vanishing from her countenance, she set the glass down, and sunk upon the settle from whence she had risen to snatch at it. distributed in the parish for purposes of private or general charity. The sad procession now moved slowly forward, preceded by the beadles, or saulies, with their batons,-miserable-looking old men, tottering as if on the edge of that grave to which they were marshalling another, and clad, according to Scottish guise, with threadbare black coats, and hunting-caps decorated with rusty crape. Monkbarns would probably have remonstrated against this superfluous expense, had he been consulted; but, in doing so, he would have given more offence than he gained popularity by condescending to perform the office of chief mourner. Of this he was quite aware, and wisely withheld rebuke, where rebuke and advice would have been equally unavailing. In truth, the Scottish peasantry are still infected with that rage for funeral ceremonial, which once distinguished the grandees of the kingdom so much, that a sumptuary law was made by the Parliament of Scotland for the purpose of restraining it; and I have known many in the lowest stations, who have denied themselves not merely the comforts, but almost the necessaries of life, in order to save such a sum of money as might enable their surviving friends to bury them like Christians, as they termed it; nor could their faithful executors be prevailed upon, though equally necessitous, to turn to the use and maintenance of the living, the money vainly wasted upon the interment of the dead. As the general amazement subsided, Mr Oldbuck, whose heart bled to witness what he considered as the errings of the enfeebled intellect struggling with the torpid chill of age and of sorrow, observed to the clergyman, that it was time to proceed with the ceremony. The father was incapable of giving directions, but the nearest relation of the family made a sign to the carpenter, who in such cases goes through the duty of the undertaker, to proceed in his office. The creak of the screw-nails presently announced that the lid of the last mansion of mortality was in the act of being secured above its tenant. The last act which separates us for ever, even from the mortal relics of the person we assemble to mourn, has usually its effect upon the most indifferent, selfish, and hard-hearted. With a spirit of contradiction, which we may be pardoned for esteeming narrow-minded, the fathers of the Scottish kirk rejected, even on this most solemn occasion, the form of an address to the Divinity, lest they should be thought to give countenance to the rituals of Rome or of England. With much better and more liberal judgment, it is the present practice of most of the Scottish clergymen to seize this opportunity of offering a prayer, and exhortation, suitable to make an impression upon the living, while they are yet in the very presence of the relics of him whom they have but lately seen such as they themselves, and who now is such as they must in their time become. But this decent and praise-persed the mourners. worthy practice was not adopted at the time of which I am treating, or at least Mr Blattergowl did not act upon it, and the ceremony proceeded without any devotional exercise. The coffin, covered with a pall, and supported upon handspikes by the nearest relatives, now only waited the father to support the head, as is customary. Two or three of these privileged persons spoke to him, but he only answered by shaking his hand and his head in token of refusal. With better intention than judgment, the friends, who considered this as an act of duty on the part of the living, and of decency towards the deceased, would have proceeded to enforce their request, had not Oldbuck interfered between the distressed father and his well-meaning tormentors, and informed them, that he himself, as landlord and master to the deceased, "would carry his head to the grave.” In spite of the sorrowful occasion, the hearts of the relatives swelled within them at so marked a distinction on the part of the laird; and old Alison Breck, who was present among other fish-women, swore almost aloud, "His honour Monkbarns should never want sax warp of oysters in the season" (of which fish he was understood to be fond), " if she should gang to sea and dredge for them hersell, in the foulest wind that ever blew." And such is the temper of the Scottish common people, that, by this instance of compliance with their customs, and respect for their persons, Mr Oldbuck gained more popularity than by all the sums which he had yearly The procession to the churchyard, at about halfa-mile's distance, was made with the mournful solemnity usual on these occasions,-the body was consigned to its parent earth, and when the labour of the gravediggers had filled up the trench, and covered it with fresh sod, Mr Oldbuck, taking his hat off, saluted the assistants, who had stood by in melancholy silence, and with that adieu dis The clergyman offered our Antiquary his company to walk homeward; but Mr Oldbuck had been so much struck with the deportment of the fisherman and his mother, that, moved by compassion, and perhaps also, in some degree, by that curiosity which induces us to seek out even what gives us pain to witness, he preferred a solitary walk by the coast, for the purpose of again visiting the cottage as he passed. CHAPTER XXXII. What is this secret sin, this untold tale, THE Coffin had been borne from the place where it rested. The mourners, in regular gradation, according to their rank or their relationship to the deceased, had filed from the cottage, while the younger male children were led along to totter after the bier of their brother, and to view with wonder a ceremonial which they could hardly comprehend. The female gossips next rose to depart, and, with consideration for the situation of the parents, carried along with them the girls of the family, to give the unhappy pair time and opportunity to open their hearts to each other, and soften their grief by communicating it. But their kind inten "It's my gudemither, my lord," said Margaret; "but she canna see onybody e'enow-Ohon! we're dreeing a sair weird—we hae had a heavy dispensation!" "God forbid," said Lord Glenallan, "that I should on light occasion disturb your sorrow;- but my days are numbered-your mother-in-law is in the extremity of age, and, if I see her not to-day, we may never meet on this side of time." "And what," answered the desolate mother, "wad ye see at an auld woman, broken down wi' age and sorrow and heartbreak? Gentle or semple shall not darken my doors the day my bairn's been carried out a corpse." tion was without effect. The last of them had darkened the entrance of the cottage, as she went out, and drawn the door softly behind her, when the father, first ascertaining by a hasty glance that no stranger remained, started up, clasped his hands wildly above his head, uttered a cry of the despair which he had hitherto repressed, and, in all the impotent impatience of grief, half rushed half staggered forward to the bed on which the coffin had been deposited, threw himself down upon it, and smothering, as it were, his head among the bedclothes, gave vent to the full passion of his sorrow. It was in vain that the wretched mother, terrified by the vehemence of her husband's afflictionaffliction still more fearful as agitating a man of While she spoke thus, indulging the natural irrihardened manners and a robust frame-suppressed tability of disposition and profession, which began her own sobs and tears, and, pulling him by the to mingle itself in some degree with her grief when skirts of his coat, implored him to rise and remem- its first uncontrolled bursts were gone by, she held ber, that, though one was removed, he had still a the door about one-third part open, and placed wife and children to comfort and support. The ap- herself in the gap, as if to render the visitor's enpeal came at too early a period of his anguish, and trance impossible. But the voice of her husband was totally unattended to; he continued to remain was heard from within- "Wha's that, Maggie! prostrate, indicating, by sobs so bitter and violent what for are ye steeking them out?-let them come that they shook the bed and partition against which in; it doesna signify an auld rope's end wha comes it rested, by clenched hands which grasped the bed-in or wha gaes out o' this house frae this time forclothes, and by the vehement and convulsive motion of his legs, how deep and how terrible was the agony of a father's sorrow. "O, what a day is this! what a day is this!" said the poor mother, her womanish affliction already exhausted by sobs and tears, and now almost lost in terror for the state in which she beheld her husband-" O, what an hour is this! and naebody to help a poor lone woman- -O, gudemither, could ye but speak a word to him!-wad ye but bid him be comforted!" To her astonishment, and even to the increase of her fear, her husband's mother heard and answered the appeal. She rose and walked across the floor without support, and without much apparent feebleness, and standing by the bed on which her son had extended himself, she said, " Rise up, my son, and sorrow not for him that is beyond sin and sorrow and temptation. Sorrow is for those that remain in this vale of sorrow and darkness-I, wha dinna sorrow, and wha canna sorrow for ony ane, hae maist need that ye should a' sorrow for me." The voice of his mother, not heard for years as taking part in the active duties of life, or offering advice or consolation, produced its effect upon her son. He assumed a sitting posture on the side of the bed, and his appearance, attitude, and gestures, changed from those of angry despair to deep grief and dejection. The grandmother retired to her nook, the mother mechanically took in her hand her tattered Bible, and seemed to read, though her eyes were drowned with tears. They were thus occupied, when a loud knock was heard at the door. "Hegh, sirs!" said the poor mother, "wha is it that can be coming in that gait e'enow?- They canna hae heard o' our misfortune, I'm sure." The knock being repeated, she rose and opened the door, saying querulously, "Whatna gait's that to disturb a sorrowfu' house?" A tall man in black stood before her, whom she instantly recognised to be Lord Glenallan. "Is there not," he said, "an old woman lodging in this or one of the neighbouring cottages, called Elspeth, who was long resident at Craigburnfoot of Glenallan?" ward." The woman stood aside at her husband's command, and permitted Lord Glenallan to enter the hut. The dejection exhibited in his broken frame and emaciated countenance, formed a strong contrast with the effects of grief, as they were displayed in the rude and weatherbeaten visage of the fisherman, and the masculine features of his wife. He approached the old woman as she was seated on her usual settle, and asked her, in a tone as audible as his voice could make it, "Are you Elspeth of the Craigburnfoot of Glenallan?" "Wha is it that asks about the unhallowed residence of that evil woman?" was the answer returned to his query. "The unhappy Earl of Glenallan." "He who was called William Lord Geraldin," said the Earl; "and whom his mother's death has made Earl of Glenallan." 66 Open the bole," said the old woman, firmly and hastily to her daughter-in-law, "open the bole wi' speed, that I may see if this be the right Lord Geraldin-the son of my mistress,-him that I received in my arms within the hour after he was born-him that has reason to curse me that I didna smother him before the hour was past!" The window, which had been shut in order that a gloomy twilight might add to the solemnity of the funeral meeting, was opened as she commanded, and threw a sudden and strong light through the smoky and misty atmosphere of the stifling cabin. Falling in a stream upon the chimney, the rays illuminated, in the way that Rembrandt would have chosen, the features of the unfortunate nobleman, and those of the old sibyl, who now, standing upon her feet, and holding him by one hand, peered anxiously in his features with her light-blue eyes, and holding her long and withered fore-finger within a small distance of his face, moved it slowly as if to trace the outlines, and reconcile what she recollected with that she now beheld. As she finished her scrutiny, she said, with a deep sigh, "It's a sair -sair change; and wha's fault is it?-but that's written down where it will be remembered - it's written on tablets of brass with a pen of steel, where all is recorded that is done in the flesh.And what," she said, after a pause," what is Lord Geraldin seeking from a puir auld creature like me, that's dead already, and only belangs sae far to the living that she isna yet laid in the moulds?" "Nay," answered Lord Glenallan, "in the name of Heaven, why was it that you requested so urgently to see me?-and why did you back your request by sending a token which you knew well I dared not refuse?' As he spoke thus, he took from his purse the ring which Edie Ochiltree had delivered to him at Glenallan-House. The sight of this token produced a strange and instantaneous effect upon the old woman. The palsy of fear was immediately added to that of age, and she began instantly to search her pockets with the tremulous and hasty agitation of one who becomes first apprehensive of having lost something of great importance ;-then, as if convinced of the reality of her fears, she turned to the Earl, and demanded, "And how came ye by it, then?-how came ye by it? I thought I had kept it sae securely-what will the Countess say?" "You know," said the Earl, "at least you must have heard, that my mother is dead." "Dead! are ye no imposing upon me? has she left a' at last, lands and lordship and lineages?" "All, all," said the Earl, "as mortals must leave all human vanities." "I mind now," answered Elspeth-" I heard of it before; but there has been sic distress in our house since, and my memory is sae muckle impaired-But ye are sure your mother, the Lady Countess, is gane hame?" The Earl again assured her that her former mistress was no more. "Then," said Elspeth, "it shall burden my mind nae langer!-When she lived, wha dared to speak what it would hae displeased her to hae had noised abroad? But she's gane-and I will confess all." Then turning to her son and daughter-in-law, she commanded them imperatively to quit the house, and leave Lord Geraldin (for so she still called him) alone with her. But Maggie Mucklebackit, her first burst of grief being over, was by no means disposed in her own house to pay passive obedience to the commands of her mother-in-law, an authority which is peculiarly obnoxious to persons in her rank of life, and which she was the more astonished at hearing revived, when it seemed to have been so long relinquished and forgotten. "It was an unco thing," she said, in a grumbling tone of voice,-for the rank of Lord Glenallan was somewhat imposing-"it was an unco thing to bid a mother leave her ain house wi' the tear in her ee, the moment her eldest son had been carried a corpse out at the door o't." The fisherman, in a stubborn and sullen tone, added to the same purpose, "This is nae day for your auld-warld stories, mother. My lord, if he be a lord, may ca' some other day-or he may speak out what he has gotten to say if he likes it; there's nane here will think it worth their while to listen to him or you either. But neither for laird or loon, gentle or semple, will I leave my ain house to pleasure onybody on the very day my poor" Here his voice choked, and he could proceed no farther; but as he had risen when Lord Glenallan came in, and had since remained standing, he now threw himself doggedly upon a seat, and remained in the sullen posture of one who was determined to keep his word. But the old woman, whom this crisis seemed to repossess in all those powers of mental superiority with which she had once been eminently gifted, arose, and advancing towards him, said, with a solemn voice, "My son, as ye wad shun hearing of your mother's shame-as ye wad not willingly be a witness of her guilt-as ye wad deserve her blessing and avoid her curse, I charge ye, by the body that bore and that nursed ye, to leave me at freedom to speak with Lord Geraldin, what nae mortal ears but his ain maun listen to. Obey my words, that when ye lay the moulds on my head-and O that the day were come!-ye may remember this hour without the reproach of having disobeyed the last earthly command that ever your mother wared on you." The terms of this solemn charge revived in the fisherman's heart the habit of instinctive obedience in which his mother had trained him up, and to which he had submitted implicitly while her powers of exacting it remained entire. The recollection mingled also with the prevailing passion of the moment; for, glancing his eye at the bed on which the dead body had been laid, he muttered to himself, "He never disobeyed me, in reason or out o' reason, and what for should I vex her?" Then, taking his reluctant spouse by the arm, he led her gently out of the cottage, and latched the door behind them as he left it. As the unhappy parents withdrew, Lord Glenallan, to prevent the old woman from relapsing into her lethargy, again pressed her on the subject of the communication which she proposed to make to him. "Ye will have it sune eneugh," she replied;"my mind's clear eneugh now, and there is not-I think there is not a chance of my forgetting what I have to say. My dwelling at Craigburnfoot is before my een, as it were present in reality:-the green bank, with its selvidge, just where the burn met wi' the sea-the twa little barks, wi' their sails furled, lying in the natural cove which it formed the high cliff that joined it with the pleasuregrounds of the house of Glenallan, and hung right ower the stream Ah! yes-I may forget that I had a husband and have lost him—that I hae but ane alive of our four fair sons- that misfortune upon misfortune has devoured our ill-gotten wealth that they carried the corpse of my son's eldestborn frae the house this morning-But I never can forget the days I spent at bonny Craigburnfoot!" "You were a favourite of my mother," said Lord Glenallan, desirous to bring her back to the point, from which she was wandering. "I was, I was,-ye needna mind me o' that. She brought me up abune my station, and wi' knowledge mair than my fellows-but, like the tempter of auld, wi' the knowledge of gude she taught re the knowledge of evil.” "For God's sake, Elspeth," said the astonished Earl, "proceed, if you can, to explain the dreadful hints you have thrown out! I well know you are confident to one dreadful secret, which should split this roof even to hear it named- but speak on farther." "I will," she said—" I will;—just bear wi' me |