The former had at length succeeded to the extensive property of his longlived grandaunt, and to considerable wealth besides, which he had employed in redeeming his paternal acres (by the title appertaining to which he still chose to be designated), notwithstanding Captain Craigengelt had proposed to him a most advantageous mode of vesting the money in Laws scheme, which was just then broached, and offered his services to travel express to Paris for the purpose. But Bucklaw had so far derived wisdom from adversity, that he would listen to no proposal which Craigengelt could invent, which had the slightest tendency to risk his newlyacquired independence. He that had once eat peasebannocks, drank sour wine, and slept in the secret chamber at Wolfs Crag, would, he said, prize good cheer and a soft bed as long as he lived, and take special care never to need such hospitality again. Craigengelt, therefore, found himself disappointed in the first hopes he had entertained of making a good hand of the Laird of Bucklaw. Still, however, he reaped many advantages from his friends good fortune. Bucklaw, who had never been at all scrupulous in choosing his companions, was accustomed to, and entertained by, a fellow whom he could either laugh with or laugh at as he had a mind, who would take, according to Scottish phrase, the bit and the buffet, understood all sports, whether within or without doors, and, when the laird had a mind for a bottle of wine (no infrequent circumstance), was always ready to save him from the scandal of getting drunk by himself. Upon these terms, Craigengelt was the frequent, almost the constant, inmate of the house of Girnington. In no time, and under no possibility of circumstances, could good have been derived from such an intimacy, however its bad consequences might be qualified by the thorough knowledge which Bucklaw possessed of his dependants character, and the high contempt in which he held it. But, as circumstances stood, this evil communication was particularly liable to corrupt what good principles nature had implanted in the patron. Craigengelt had never forgiven the scorn with which Ravenswood had torn the mask of courage and honesty from his countenance; and to exasperate Bucklaws resentment against him was the safest mode of revenge which occurred to his cowardly, yet cunning and malignant, disposition. He brought up on all occasions the story of the challenge which Ravenswood had declined to accept, and endeavoured, by every possible insinuation, to make his patron believe that his honour was concerned in bringing that matter to an issue by a present discussion with Ravenswood. But respecting this subject Bucklaw imposed on him, at length, a peremptory command of silence. I think, he said, the Master has treated me unlike a gentleman, and I see no right he had to send me back a cavalier answer when I demanded the satisfaction of one. But he gave me my life once; and, in looking the matter over at present, I put myself but on equal terms with him. Should he cross me again, I shall consider the old accompt as balanced, and his Mastership will do well to look to himself. That he should, reechoed Craigengelt; for when you are in practice, Bucklaw, I would bet a magnum you are through him before the third pass. Then you know nothing of the matter, said Bucklaw, and you never saw him fence. And I know nothing of the matter? said the dependanta good jest, I promise you! And though I never saw Ravenswood fence, have I not been at Monsieur Sagoons school, who was the first matre darmes at Paris; and have I not been at Signor Pocos at Florence, and Meinheer Durchstossens at Vienna, and have I not seen all their play? I dont know whether you have or not, said Bucklaw; but what about it, though you had? Only that I will be dd if ever I saw French, Italian, or HighDutchman ever make foot, hand, and eye keep time half so well as you, Bucklaw. I believe you lie, Craigie, said Bucklaw; however, I can hold my own, both with single rapier, backsword, sword and dagger, broadsword, or case of falchionsand thats as much as any gentleman need know of the matter. And the double of what ninetynine out of a hundred know, said Craigengelt; they learn to change a few thrusts with the small sword, and then, forsooth, they understand the noble art of defence! Now, when I was at Rouen in the year 1695, there was a Chevalier de Chapon and I went to the opera, where we found three bits of English birkies Is it a long story you are going to tell? said Bucklaw, interrupting him without ceremony. Just as you like, answered the parasite, for we made short work of it. Then I like it short, said Bucklaw. Is it serious or merry? Devilish serious, I assure you, and so they found it; for the Chevalier and I Then I dont like it at all, said Bucklaw; so fill a brimmer of my auld aunties claret, rest her heart! And, as the Hielandman says, Skioch doch na skiaill. That was what tough old Sir Even Dhu used to say to me when I was out with the metalld lads in 1689. Craigengelt, he used to say, you are as pretty a fellow as ever held steel in his grip, but you have one fault. If he had known you as long as I have done, said Bucklaw, he would have found out some twenty more; but hang long stories, give us your toast, man. Craigengelt rose, went atiptoe to the door, peeped out, shut it carefully, came back again, clapped his tarnished goldlaced hat on one side of his head, took his glass in one hand, and touching the hilt of his hanger with the other, named, The King over the water. I tell you what it is, Captain Craigengelt, said Bucklaw; I shall keep my mind to myself on these subjects, having too much respect for the memory of my venerable Aunt Girnington to put her lands and tenements in the way of committing treason against established authority. Bring me King James to Edinburgh, Captain, with thirty thousand men at his back, and Ill tell you what I think about his title; but as for running my neck into a noose, and my good broad lands into the statutory penalties, in that case made and provided, rely upon it, you will find me no such fool. So, when you mean to vapour with your hanger and your dramcup in support of treasonable toasts, you must find your liquor and company elsewhere. Well, then, said Craigengelt, name the toast yourself, and be it what it like, Ill pledge you, were it a mile to the bottom. And Ill give you a toast that deserves it, my boy, said Bucklaw; what say you to Miss Lucy Ashton? Up with it, said the Captain, as he tossed off his brimmer, the bonniest lass in Lothian! What a pity the old sneckdrawing Whigamore, her father, is about to throw her away upon that rag of pride and beggary, the Master of Ravenswood! Thats not quite so clear, said Bucklaw, in a tone which, though it seemed indifferent, excited his companions eager curiosity; and not that only, but also his hope of working himself into some sort of confidence, which might make him necessary to his patron, being by no means satisfied to rest on mere sufferance, if he could form by art or industry a more permanent title to his favour. I thought, said he, after a moments pause, that was a settled matter; they are continually together, and nothing else is spoken of betwixt Lammer Law and Traprain. They may say what they please, replied his patron, but I know better; and Ill give you Miss Lucy Ashtons health again, my boy. And I would drink it on my knee, said Craigengelt, if I thought the girl had the spirit to jilt that dd son of a Spaniard. I am to request you will not use the word jilt and Miss Ashtons name together, said Bucklaw, gravely. Jilt, did I say? Discard, my lad of acresby Jove, I meant to discard, replied Craigengelt; and I hope shell discard him like a small card at piquet, and take in the king of hearts, my boy! But yet But what? said his patron. But yet I know for certain they are hours together alone, and in the woods and the fields. Thats her foolish fathers dotage; that will be soon put out of the lasss head, if it ever gets into it, answered Bucklaw. And now fill your glass again, Captain; I am going to make you happy; I am going to let you into a secreta plota noosing plotonly the noose is but typical. A marrying matter? said Craigengelt, and his jaw fell as he asked the question, for he suspected that matrimony would render his situation at Girnington much more precarious than during the jolly days of his patrons bachelorhood. Ay, a marriage, man, said Bucklaw; but wherefore droops thy mighty spirit, and why grow the rubies on thy cheek so pale? The board will have a corner, and the corner will have a trencher, and the trencher will have a glass beside it; and the boardend shall be filled, and the trencher and the glass shall be replenished for thee, if all the petticoats in Lothian had sworn the contrary. What, man! I am not the boy to put myself into leadingstrings. So says many an honest fellow, said Craigengelt, and some of my special friends; but, curse me if I know the reason, the women could never bear me, and always contrived to trundle me out of favour before the honeymoon was over. If you could have kept your ground till that was over, you might have made a good years pension, said Bucklaw. But I never could, answered the dejected parasite. There was my Lord CastleCuddywe were hand and glove I rode his horses, borrowed money both for him and from him, trained his hawks, and taught him how to lay his bets; and when he took a fancy of marrying, I married him to Katie Glegg, whom I thought myself as sure of as man could be of woman. Egad, she had me out of the house, as if I had run on wheels, within the first fortnight! Well! replied Bucklaw, I think I have nothing of CastleCuddy about me, or Lucy of Katie Glegg. But you see the thing will go on whether you like it or no; the only question is, will you be useful? Useful! exclaimed the Captain, and to thee, my lad of lands, my darling boy, whom I would tramp barefooted through the world for! Name time, place, mode, and circumstances, and see if I will not be useful in all uses that can be devised. Why, then, you must ride two hundred miles for me, said the patron. A thousand, and call them a fleas leap, answered the dependant; Ill cause saddle my horse directly. Better stay till you know where you are to go, and what you are to do, quoth Bucklaw. You know I have a kinswoman in Northumberland, Lady Blenkensop by name, whose old acquaintance I had the misfortune to lose in the period of my poverty, but the light of whose countenance shone forth upon me when the sun of my prosperity began to arise. Dn all such doublefaced jades! exclaimed Craigengelt, heroically; this I will say for John Craigengelt, that he is his friends friend through good report and bad report, poverty and riches; and you know something of that yourself, Bucklaw. I have not forgot your merits, said his patron; I do remember that, in my extremities, you had a mind to crimp me for the service of the French king, or of the Pretender; and, moreover, that you afterwards lent me a score of pieces, when, as I firmly believe, you had heard the news that old Lady Girnington had a touch of the dead palsy. But dont be downcast, John; I believe, after all, you like me very well in your way, and it is my misfortune to have no better counsellor at present. To return to this Lady Blenkensop, you must know, she is a close confederate of Duchess Sarah. What! of Sall Jennings? exclaimed Craigengelt; then she must be a good one. Hold your tongue, and keep your Tory rants to yourself, if it be possible, said Bucklaw. I tell you, that through the Duchess of Marlborough has this Northumbrian cousin of mine become a crony of Lady Ashton, the Keepers wife, or, I may say, the Lord Keepers Lady Keeper, and she has favoured Lady Blenkensop with a visit on her return from London, and is just now at her old mansionhouse on the banks of the Wansbeck. Now, sir, as it has been the use and wont of these ladies to consider their husbands as of no importance in the management of their own families, it has been their present pleasure, without consulting Sir William Ashton, to put on the tapis a matrimonial alliance, to be concluded between Lucy Ashton and my own right honourable self, Lady Ashton acting as selfconstituted plenipotentiary on the part of her daughter and husband, and Mother Blenkensop, equally unaccredited, doing me the honour to be my representative. You may suppose I was a little astonished when I found that a treaty, in which I was so considerably interested, had advanced a good way before I was even consulted. Capot me! if I think that was according to the rules of the game, said his confidant; and pray, what answer did you return? Why, my first thought was to send the treaty to the devil, and the negotiators along with it, for a couple of meddling old women; my next was to laugh very heartily; and my third and last was a settled opinion that the thing was reasonable, and would suit me well enough. Why, I thought you had never seen the wench but once, and then she had her ridingmask on; I am sure you told me so. Ay, but I liked her very well then. And Ravenswoods dirty usage of meshutting me out of doors to dine with the lackeys, because he had the Lord Keeper, forsooth, and his daughter, to be guests in his beggarly castle of starvation,dn me, Craigengelt, if I ever forgive him till I play him as good a trick! No more you should, if you are a lad of mettle, said Craigengelt, the matter now taking a turn in which he could sympathise; and if you carry this wench from him, it will break his heart. That it will not, said Bucklaw; his heart is all steeled over with reason and philosophy, things that you, Craigie, know nothing about more than myself, God help me. But it will break his pride, though, and thats what Im driving at. Distance me! said Craigengelt, but I know the reason now of his unmannerly behaviour at his old tumbledown tower yonder. Ashamed of your company?no, no! Gad, he was afraid you would cut in and carry off the girl. Eh! Craigengelt? said Bucklaw, do you really think so? but no, no! he is a devilish deal prettier man than I am. Whohe? exclaimed the parasite. Hes as black as the crook; and for his sizehes a tall fellow, to be sure, but give me a light, stout, middlesized Plague on thee! said Bucklaw, interrupting him, and on me for listening to you! You would say as much if I were hunchbacked. But as to Ravenswoodhe has kept no terms with me, Ill keep none with him; if I can win this girl from him, I will win her. Win her! sblood, you shall win her, point, quint, and quatorze, my king of trumps; you shall pique, repique, and capot him. Prithee, stop thy gambling cant for one instant, said Bucklaw. Things have come thus far, that I have entertained the proposal of my kinswoman, agreed to the terms of jointure, amount of fortune, and so forth, and that the affair is to go forward when Lady Ashton comes down, for she takes her daughter and her son in her own hand. Now they want me to send up a confidential person with some writings. By this good win, Ill ride to the end of the worldthe very gates of Jericho, and the judgmentseat of Prester John, for thee! ejaculated the Captain. Why, I believe you would do something for me, and a great deal for yourself. Now, any one could carry the writings; but you will have a little more to do. You must contrive to drop out before my Lady Ashton, just as if it were a matter of little consequence, the residence of Ravenswood at her husbands house, and his close intercourse with Miss Ashton; and you may tell her that all the country talks of a visit from the Marquis of A, as it is supposed, to make up the match betwixt Ravenswood and her daughter. I should like to hear what she says to all this; for, rat me! if I have any idea of starting for the plate at all if Ravenswood is to win the race, and he has odds against me already. Never a bit; the wench has too much sense, and in that belief I drink her health a third time; and, were time and place fitting, I would drink it on bended knees, and he that would not pledge me, I would make his guts garter his stockings. Hark ye, Craigengelt; as you are going into the society of women of rank, said Bucklaw, Ill thank you to forget your strange blackguard oaths and dammes. Ill write to them, though, that you are a blunt, untaught fellow. Ay, ay, replied Craigengelta plain, blunt, honest, downright soldier. Not too honest, not too much of the soldier neither; but such as thou art, it is my luck to need thee, for I must have spurs put to Lady Ashtons motions. Ill dash them up to the rowelheads, said Craigengelt; she shall come here at the gallop, like a cow chased by a whole nest of hornets, and her tail over her rump like a corkscrew. And hear ye, Craigie, said Bucklaw; your boots and doublet are good enough to drink in, as the man says in the play, but they are somewhat too greasy for teatable service; prithee, get thyself a little better rigged out, and here is to pay all charges. Nay, Bucklaw; on my soul, man, you use me ill. However, added Craigengelt, pocketing the money, if you will have me so far indebted to you, I must be conforming. Well, horse and away! said the patron, so soon as you have got your riding livery in trim. You may ride the black cropear; and, hark ye, Ill make you a present of him to boot. I drink to the good luck of my mission, answered the ambassador, in a halfpint bumper. I thank ye, Craigie, and pledge you; I see nothing against it but the father or the girl taking a tantrum, and I am told the mother can wind them both round her little finger. Take care not to affront her with any of your Jacobite jargon. Oh, ay, trueshe is a Whig, and a friend of old Sall of Marlborough; thank my stars, I can hoist any colours at a pinch! I have fought as hard under John Churchill as ever I did under Dundee or the Duke of Berwick. I verily believe you, Craigie, said the lord of the mansion; but, Craigie, do you, pray, step down to the cellar, and fetch us up a bottle of the Burgundy, 1678; it is in the fourth bin from the righthand turn. And I say, Craigie, you may fetch up half a dozen whilst you are about it. Egad, well make a night ont! CHAPTER XXII. And soon they spied the merrymen green, And eke the coach and four. Duke upon Duke. Craigengelt set forth on his mission so soon as his equipage was complete, prosecuted his journey with all diligence, and accomplished his commission with all the dexterity for which bucklaw had given him credit. As he arrived with credentials from Mr. Hayston of Bucklaw, he was extremely welcome to both ladies; and those who are prejudiced in favour of a new acquaintance can, for a time at least, discover excellencies in his very faults and perfections in his deficiencies. Although both ladies were accustomed to good society, yet, being predetermined to find out an agreeable and wellbehaved gentleman in Mr. Haystons friend, they succeeded wonderfully in imposing on themselves. It is true that Craigengelt was now handsomely dressed, and that was a point of no small consequence. But, independent of outward show, his blackguard impudence of address was construed into honourable bluntness becoming his supposed military profession; his hectoring passed for courage, and his sauciness for wit. Lest, however, any one should think this a violation of probability, we must add, in fairness to the two ladies, that their discernment was greatly blinded, and their favour propitiated, by the opportune arrival of Captain Craigengelt in the moment when they were longing for a third hand to make a party at tredrille, in which, as in all games, whether of chance or skill, that worthy person was a great proficient. When he found himself established in favour, his next point was how best to use it for the furtherance of his patrons views. He found Lady Ashton prepossessed strongly in favour of the motion which Lady Blenkensop, partly from regard to her kinswoman, partly from the spirit of matchmaking, had not hesitated to propose to her; so that his task was an easy one. Bucklaw, reformed from his prodigality, was just the sort of husband which she desired to have for her Shepherdess of Lammermoor; and while the marriage gave her an easy fortune, and a respectable country gentleman for her husband, Lady Ashton was of opinion that her destinies would be fully and most favourably accomplished. It so chanced, also, that Bucklaw, among his new acquisitions, had gained the management of a little political interest in a neighbouring county where the Douglas family originally held large possessions. It was one of the bosomhopes of Lady Ashton that her eldest son, Sholto, should represent this county in the British Parliament, and she saw this alliance with Bucklaw as a circumstance which might be highly favourable to her wishes. Craigengelt, who, in his way, by no means wanted sagacity, no sooner discovered in what quarter the wind of Lady Ashtons wishes sate, than he trimmed his course accordingly. There was little to prevent Bucklaw himself from sitting for the county; he must carry the heatmust walk the course. Two cousinsgerman, six more distant kinsmen, his factor and his chamberlain, were all hollow votes; and the Girnington interest had always carried, betwixt love and fear, about as many more. But Bucklaw cared no more about riding the first horse, and that sort of thing, than he, Craigengelt, did about a game at birkie it was a pity his interest was not in good guidance. All this Lady Ashton drank in with willing and attentive ears, resolving internally to be herself the person who should take the management of the political influence of her destined soninlaw, for the benefit of her eldestborn, Sholto, and all other parties concerned. When he found her ladyship thus favourably disposed, the Captain proceeded, to use his employers phrase, to set spurs to her resolution, by hinting at the situation of matters at Ravenswood Castle, the long residence which the heir of that family had made with the Lord Keeper, and the reports whichthough he would be dd ere he gave credit to any of themhad been idly circulated in the neighbourhood. It was not the Captains cue to appear himself to be uneasy on the subject of these rumours; but he easily saw from Lady Ashtons flushed cheek, hesitating voice, and flashing eye, that she had caught the alarm which he intended to communicate. She had not heard from her husband so often or so regularly as she thought him bound in duty to have written, and of this very interesting intelligence concerning his visit to the Tower of Wolfs Crag, and the guest whom, with such cordiality, he had received at Ravenswood Castle, he had suffered his lady to remain altogether ignorant, until she now learned it by the chance information of a stranger. Such concealment approached, in her apprehension, to a misprision, at last, of treason, if not to actual rebellion against her matrimonial authority; and in her inward soul she did vow to take vengeance on the Lord Keeper, as on a subject detected in meditating revolt. Her indignation burned the more fiercely as she found herself obliged to suppress it in presence of Lady Blenkensop, the kinswoman, and of Craigengelt, the confidential friend, of Bucklaw, of whose alliance she now became trebly desirous, since it occurred to her alarmed imagination that her husband might, in his policy or timidity, prefer that of Ravenswood. The Captain was engineer enough to discover that the train was fired; and therefore heard, in the course of the same day, without the least surprise, that Lady Ashton had resolved to abridge her visit to Lady Blenkensop, and set forth with the peep of morning on her return to Scotland, using all the despatch which the state of the roads and the mode of travelling would possibly permit. Unhappy Lord Keeper! little was he aware what a storm was travelling towards him in all the speed with which an oldfashioned coach and six could possibly achieve its journey. He, like Don Gayferos, forgot his lady fair and true, and was only anxious about the expected visit of the Marquis of A. Soothfast tidings had assured him that this nobleman was at length, and without fail, to honour his castle at one in the afternoon, being a late dinnerhour; and much was the bustle in consequence of the annunciation. The Lord Keeper traversed the chambers, held consultation with the butler in the cellars, and even ventured, at the risk of a dml with a cook of a spirit lofty enough to scorn the admonitions of Lady Ashton herself, to peep into the kitchen. Satisfied, at length, that everything was in as active a train of preparation as was possible, he summoned Ravenswood and his daughter to walk upon the terrace, for the purpose of watching, from that commanding position, the earliest symptoms of his lordships approach. For this purpose, with slow and idle step, he paraded the terrace, which, flanked with a heavy stone battlement, stretched in front of the castle upon a level with the first story; while visitors found access to the court by a projecting gateway, the bartizan or flatleaded roof of which was accessible from the terrace by an easy flight of low and broad steps. The whole bore a resemblance partly to a castle, partly to a noblemans seat; and though calculated, in some respects, for defence, evinced that it had been constructed under a sense of the power and security of the ancient Lords of Ravenswood. This pleasant walk commanded a beautiful and extensive view. But what was most to our present purpose, there were seen from the terrace two roads, one leading from the east, and one from the westward, which, crossing a ridge opposed to the eminence on which the castle stood, at different angles, gradually approached each other, until they joined not far from the gate of the avenue. It was to the westward approach that the Lord Keeper, from a sort of fidgeting anxiety, his daughter, from complaisance to him, and Ravenswood, though feeling some symptoms of internal impatience, out of complaisance to his daughter, directed their eyes to see the precursors of the Marquiss approach. These were not long of presenting themselves. Two running footmen, dressed in white, with black jockeycaps, and long staffs in their hands, headed the train; and such was their agility, that they found no difficulty in keeping the necessary advance, which the etiquette of their station required, before the carriage and horsemen. Onward they came at a long swinging trot, arguing unwearied speed in their longbreathed calling. Such running footmen are often alluded to in old plays (I would particularly instance Middletons Mad World, my Masters), and perhaps may be still remembered by some old persons in Scotland, as part of the retinue of the ancient nobility when travelling in full ceremony. Behind these glancing meteors, who footed it as if the Avenger of Blood had been behind them, came a cloud of dust, raised by riders who preceded, attended, or followed the statecarriage of the Marquis. The privilege of nobility, in those days, had something in it impressive on the imagination. The dresses and liveries and number of their attendants, their style of travelling, the imposing, and almost warlike, air of the armed men who surrounded them, place them far above the laird, who travelled with his brace of footmen; and as to rivalry from the mercantile part of the community, these would as soon have thought of imitating the state equipage of the Sovereign. At present it is different; and I myself, Peter Pattieson, in a late journey to Edinburgh, had the honour, in the mailcoach phrase to change a leg with a peer of the realm. It was not so in the days of which I write; and the Marquiss approach, so long expected in vain, now took place in the full pomp of ancient aristocracy. Sir William Ashton was so much interested in what he beheld, and in considering the ceremonial of reception, in case any circumstance had been omitted, that he scarce heard his son Henry exclaim There is another coach and six coming down the east road, papa; can they both belong to the Marquis of A? At length, when the youngster had fairly compelled his attention by pulling his sleeve, He turned his eyes, and, as he turned, surveyd An awful vision. Sure enough, another coach and six, with four servants or outriders in attendance, was descending the hill from the eastward, at such a pace as made it doubtful which of the carriages thus approaching from different quarters would first reach the gate at the extremity of the avenue. The one coach was green, the other blue; and not the green and blue chariots in the circus of Rome or Constantinople excited more turmoil among the citizens than the double apparition occasioned in the mind of the Lord Keeper. We all remember the terrible exclamation of the dying profligate, when a friend, to destroy what he supposed the hypochondriac idea of a spectre appearing in a certain shape at a given hour, placed before him a person dressed up in the manner he described. Mon Dieu! said the expiring sinner, who, it seems, saw both the real and polygraphic apparition, il y en a deux! The surprise of the Lord Keeper was scarcely less unpleasing at the duplication of the expected arrival; his mind misgave him strangely. There was no neighbour who would have approached so unceremoniously, at a time when ceremony was held in such respect. It must be Lady Ashton, said his conscience, and followed up the hint with an anxious anticipation of the purpose of her sudden and unannounced return. He felt that he was caught in the manner. That the company in which she had so unluckily surprised him was likely to be highly distasteful to her, there was no question; and the only hope which remained for him was her high sense of dignified propriety, which, he trusted, might prevent a public explosion. But so active were his doubts and fears as altogether to derange his purposed ceremonial for the reception of the Marquis. These feelings of apprehension were not confined to Sir William Ashton. It is my motherit is my mother! said Lucy, turning as pale as ashes, and clasping her hands together as she looked at Ravenswood. And if it be Lady Ashton, said her lover to her in a low tone, what can be the occasion of such alarm? Surely the return of a lady to the family from which she has been so long absent should excite other sensations than those of fear and dismay. You do not know my mother, said Miss Ashton, in a tone almost breathless with terror; what will she say when she sees you in this place! My stay has been too long, said Ravenswood, somewhat haughtily, if her displeasure at my presence is likely to be so formidable. My dear Lucy, he resumed, in a tone of soothing encouragement, you are too childishly afraid of Lady Ashton; she is a woman of familya lady of fashiona person who must know the world, and what is due to her husband and her husbands guests. Lucy shook her head; and, as if her mother, still at the distance of half a mile, could have seen and scrutinised her deportment, she withdrew herself from beside Ravenswood, and, taking her brother Henrys arm, led him to a different part of the terrace. The Keeper also shuffled down towards the portal of the great gate, without inviting Ravenswood to accompany him; and thus he remained standing alone on the terrace, deserted and shunned, as it were, by the inhabitants of the mansion. This suited not the mood of one who was proud in proportion to his poverty, and who thought that, in sacrificing his deeprooted resentments so far as to become Sir William Ashtons guest, he conferred a favour, and received none.


I can forgive Lucy, he said to himself; she is young, timid, and conscious of an important engagement assumed without her mothers sanction; yet she should remember with whom it has been assumed, and leave me no reason to suspect that she is ashamed of her choice. For the Keeper, sense, spirit, and expression seem to have left his face and manner since he had the first glimpse of Lady Ashtons carriage. I must watch how this is to end; and, if they give me reason to think myself an unwelcome guest, my visit is soon abridged. With these suspicions floating on his mind, he left the terrace, and walking towards the stables of the castle, gave directions that his horse should be kept in readiness, in case he should have occasion to ride abroad. In the mean while, the drivers of the two carriages, the approach of which had occasioned so much dismay at the castle, had become aware of each others presence, as they approached upon different lines to the head of the avenue, as a common centre. Lady Ashtons driver and postilions instantly received orders to get foremost, if possible, her ladyship being desirous of despatching her first interview with her husband before the arrival of these guests, whoever they might happen to be. On the other hand, the coachman of the Marquis, conscious of his own dignity and that of his master, and observing the rival charioteer was mending his pace, resolved, like a true brother of the whip, whether ancient or modern, to vindicate his right of precedence. So that, to increase the confusion of the Lord Keepers understanding, he saw the short time which remained for consideration abridged by the haste of the contending coachmen, who, fixing their eyes sternly on each other, and applying the lash smartly to their horses, began to thunder down the descent with emulous rapidity, while the horsemen who attended them were forced to put on to a handgallop. Sir Williams only chance now remaining was the possibility of an overturn, and that his lady or visitor might break their necks. I am not aware that he formed any distinct wish on the subject, but I have no reason to think that his grief in either case would have been altogether inconsolable. This chance, however, also disappeared; for Lady Ashton, though insensible to fear, began to see the ridicule of running a race with a visitor of distinction, the goal being the portal of her own castle, and commanded her coachman, as they approached the avenue, to slacken his pace, and allow precedence to the strangers equipage; a command which he gladly obeyed, as coming in time to save his honour, the horses of the Marquiss carriage being better, or, at least, fresher than his own. He restrained his pace, therefore, and suffered the green coach to enter the avenue, with all its retinue, which pass it occupied with the speed of a whirlwind. The Marquiss laced charioteer no sooner found the pas davance was granted to him than he resumed a more deliberate pace, at which he advanced under the embowering shade of the lofty elms, surrounded by all the attendants; while the carriage of Lady Ashton followed, still more slowly, at some distance. In the front of the castle, and beneath the portal which admitted guests into the inner court, stood Sir William Ashton, much perplexed in mind, his younger son and daughter beside him, and in their rear a train of attendants of various ranks, in and out of livery. The nobility and gentry of Scotland, at this period, were remarkable even to extravagance for the number of their servants, whose services were easily purchased in a country where men were numerous beyond proportion to the means of employing them. The manners of a man trained like Sir William Ashton are too much at his command to remain long disconcerted with the most adverse concurrence of circumstances. He received the Marquis, as he alighted from his equipage, with the usual compliments of welcome; and, as he ushered him into the great hall, expressed his hope that his journey had been pleasant. The Marquis was a tall, wellmade man, with a thoughtful and intelligent countenance, and an eye in which the fire of ambition had for some years replaced the vivacity of youth; a bold, proud expression of countenance, yet chastened by habitual caution, and the desire which, as the head of a party, he necessarily entertained of acquiring popularity. He answered with courtesy the courteous inquiries of the Lord Keeper, and was formally presented to Miss Ashton, in the course of which ceremony the Lord Keeper gave the first symptom of what was chiefly occupying his mind, by introducing his daughter as his wife, Lady Ashton. Lucy blushed; the Marquis looked surprised at the extremely juvenile appearance of his hostess, and the Lord Keeper with difficulty rallied himself so far as to explain. I should have said my daughter, my lord; but the truth is, that I saw Lady Ashtons carriage enter the avenue shortly after your lordships, and Make no apology, my lord, replied his noble guest; let me entreat you will wait on your lady, and leave me to cultivate Miss Ashtons acquaintance. I am shocked my people should have taken precedence of our hostess at her own gate; but your lordship is aware that I supposed Lady Ashton was still in the south. Permit me to beseech you will waive ceremony, and hasten to welcome her. This was precisely what the Lord Keeper longed to do; and he instantly profited by his lordships obliging permission. To see Lady Ashton, and encounter the first burst of her displeasure in private, might prepare her, in some degree, to receive her unwelcome guests with due decorum. As her carriage, therefore, stopped, the arm of the attentive husband was ready to assist Lady Ashton in dismounting. Looking as if she saw him not, she put his arm aside, and requested that of Captain Craigengelt, who stood by the coach with his laced hat under his arm, having acted as cavaliere servente, or squire in attendance, during the journey. Taking hold of this respectable persons arm as if to support her, Lady Ashton traversed the court, uttering a word or two by way of direction to the servants, but not one to Sir William, who in vain endeavoured to attract her attention, as he rather followed than accompanied her into the hall, in which they found the Marquis in close conversation with the Master of Ravenswood. Lucy had taken the first opportunity of escaping. There was embarrassment on every countenance except that of the Marquis of A; for even Craigengelts impudence was hardly able to veil his fear of Ravenswood, and the rest felt the awkwardness of the position in which they were thus unexpectedly placed. After waiting a moment to be presented by Sir William Ashton, the Marquis resolved to introduce himself. The Lord Keeper, he said, bowing to Lady Ashton, has just introduced to me his daughter as his wife; he might very easily present Lady Ashton as his daughter, so little does she differ from what I remember her some years since. Will she permit an old acquaintance the privilege of a guest? Illustration He saluted the lady with too good a grace to apprehend a repulse, and then proceeded This, Lady Ashton, is a peacemaking visit, and therefore I presume to introduce my cousin, the young Master of Ravenswood, to your favourable notice. Lady Ashton could not choose but courtesy; but there was in her obeisance an air of haughtiness approaching to contemptuous repulse. Ravenswood could not choose but bow; but his manner returned the scorn with which he had been greeted. Allow me, she said, to present to your lordship my friend. Craigengelt, with the forward impudence which men of his cast mistake for ease, made a sliding bow to the Marquis, which he graced by a flourish of his goldlaced hat. The lady turned to her husband. You and I, Sir William, she said, and these were the first words she had addressed to him, have acquired new acquaintances since we parted; let me introduce the acquisition I have made to mineCaptain Craigengelt. Another bow, and another flourish of the goldlaced hat, which was returned by the Lord Keeper without intimation of former recognition, and with that sort of anxious readiness which intimated his wish that peace and amnesty should take place betwixt the contending parties, including the auxiliaries on both sides. Let me introduce you to the Master of Ravenswood, said he to Captain Craigengelt, following up the same amicable system. But the Master drew up his tall form to the full extent of his height, and without so much as looking towards the person thus introduced to him, he said, in a marked tone Captain Craigengelt and I are already perfectly well acquainted with each other. Perfectlyperfectly, replied the Captain, in a mumbling tone, like that of a double echo, and with a flourish of his hat, the circumference of which was greatly abridged, compared with those which had so cordially graced his introduction to the Marquis and the Lord Keeper. Lockhard, followed by three menials, now entered with wine and refreshments, which it was the fashion to offer as a whet before dinner; and when they were placed before the guests, Lady Ashton made an apology for withdrawing her husband from them for some minutes upon business of special import. The Marquis, of course, requested her ladyship would lay herself under no restraint; and Craigengelt, bolting with speed a second glass of racy canary, hastened to leave the room, feeling no great pleasure in the prospect of being left alone with the Marquis of A and the Master of Ravenswood; the presence of the former holding him in awe, and that of the latter in bodily terror. Some arrangements about his horse and baggage formed the pretext for his sudden retreat, in which he persevered, although Lady Ashton gave Lockhard orders to be careful most particularly to accommodate Captain Craigengelt with all the attendance which he could possibly require. The Marquis and the Master of Ravenswood were thus left to communicate to each other their remarks upon the reception which they had met with, while Lady Ashton led the way, and her lord followed somewhat like a condemned criminal, to her ladyships dressingroom. So soon as the spouses had both entered, her ladyship gave way to that fierce audacity of temper which she had with difficulty suppressed, out of respect to appearances. She shut the door behind the alarmed Lord Keeper, took the key out of the springlock, and with a countenance which years had not bereft of its haughty charms, and eyes which spoke at once resolution and resentment, she addressed her astounded husband in these words My lord, I am not greatly surprised at the connexions you have been pleased to form during my absence, they are entirely in conformity with your birth and breeding; and if I did expect anything else, I heartily own my error, and that I merit, by having done so, the disappointment you had prepared for me. My dear Lady Ashtonmy dear Eleanor [Margaret], said the Lord Keeper, listen to reason for a moment, and I will convince you I have acted with all the regard due to the dignity, as well as the interest, of my family. To the interest of your family I conceive you perfectly capable of attending, returned the indignant lady, and even to the dignity of your own family also, as far as it requires any looking after. But as mine happens to be inextricably involved with it, you will excuse me if I choose to give my own attention so far as that is concerned. What would you have, Lady Ashton? said the husband. What is it that displeases you? Why is it that, on your return after so long an absence, I am arraigned in this manner? Ask your own conscience, Sir William, what has prompted you to become a renegade to your political party and opinions, and led you, for what I know, to be on the point of marrying your only daughter to a beggarly Jacobite bankrupt, the inveterate enemy of your family to the boot. Why, what, in the name of common sense and common civility, would you have me do, madam? answered her husband. Is it possible for me, with ordinary decency, to turn a young gentleman out of my house, who saved my daughters life and my own, but the other morning, as it were? Saved your life! I have heard of that story, said the lady. The Lord Keeper was scared by a dun cow, and he takes the young fellow who killed her for Guy of Warwick any butcher from Haddington may soon have an equal claim on your hospitality. Lady Ashton, stammered the Keeper, this is intolerable; and when I am desirous, too, to make you easy by any sacrifice, if you would but tell me what you would be at. Go down to your guests, said the imperious dame, and make your apology to Ravenswood, that the arrival of Captain Craigengelt and some other friends renders it impossible for you to offer him lodgings at the castle. I expect young Mr. Hayston of Bucklaw. Good heavens, madam! ejaculated her husband. Ravenswood to give place to Craigengelt, a common gambler and an informer! It was all I could do to forbear desiring the fellow to get out of my house, and I was much surprised to see him in your ladyships train. Since you saw him there, you might be well assured, answered this meek helpmate, that he was proper society. As to this Ravenswood, he only meets with the treatment which, to my certain knowledge, he gave to a muchvalued friend of mine, who had the misfortune to be his guest some time since. But take your resolution; for, if Ravenswood does not quit the house, I will. Sir William Ashton paced up and down the apartment in the most distressing agitation; fear, and shame, and anger contending against the habitual deference he was in the use of rendering to his lady. At length it ended, as is usual with timid minds placed in such circumstances, in his adopting a mezzo termine, a middle measure. I tell you frankly, madam, I neither can nor will be guilty of the incivility you propose to the Master of Ravenswood; he has not deserved it at my hand. If you will be so unreasonable as to insult a man of quality under your own roof, I cannot prevent you; but I will not at least be the agent in such a preposterous proceeding. You will not? asked the lady. No, by heavens, madam! her husband replied; ask me anything congruent with common decency, as to drop his acquaintance by degrees, or the like; but to bid him leave my house is what I will not and cannot consent to. Then the task of supporting the honour of the family will fall on me, as it has often done before, said the lady. She sat down, and hastily wrote a few lines. The Lord Keeper made another effort to prevent her taking a step so decisive, just as she opened the door to call her female attendant from the anteroom. Think what you are doing, Lady Ashton you are making a mortal enemy of a young man who is like to have the means of harming us Did you ever know a Douglas who feared an enemy? answered the lady, contemptuously. Ay, but he is as proud and vindictive as an hundred Douglasses, and an hundred devils to boot. Think of it for a night only. Not for another moment, answered the lady. Here, Mrs. Patullo, give this billet to young Ravenswood. To the Master, madam? said Mrs. Patullo. Ay, to the Master, if you call him so. I wash my hands of it entirely, said the Keeper; and I shall go down into the garden, and see that Jardine gathers the winter fruit for the dessert. Do so, said the lady, looking after him with glances of infinite contempt; and thank God that you leave one behind you as fit to protect the honour of the family as you are to look after pippins and pears. The Lord Keeper remained long enough in the garden to give her ladyships mind time to explode, and to let, as he thought, at least the first violence of Ravenswoods displeasure blow over. When he entered the hall, he found the Marquis of A giving orders to some of his attendants. He seemed in high displeasure, and interrupted an apology which Sir William had commenced for having left his lordship alone. I presume, Sir William, you are no stranger to this singular billet with which my kinsman of Ravenswood (an emphasis on the word my) has been favoured by your lady; and, of course, that you are prepared to receive my adieus. My kinsman is already gone, having thought it unnecessary to offer any on his part, since all former civilities had been cancelled by this singular insult. I protest, my lord, said Sir William, holding the billet in his hand, I am not privy to the contents of this letter. I know Lady Ashton is a warmtempered and prejudiced woman, and I am sincerely sorry for any offence that has been given or taken; but I hope your lordship will consider that a lady Should bear herself towards persons of a certain rank with the breeding of one, said the Marquis, completing the halfuttered sentence. True, my lord, said the unfortunate Keeper; but Lady Ashton is still a woman And, as such, methinks, said the Marquis, again interrupting him, should be taught the duties which correspond to her station. But here she comes, and I will learn from her own mouth the reason of this extraordinary and unexpected affront offered to my near relation, while both he and I were her ladyships guests. Lady Ashton accordingly entered the apartment at this moment. Her dispute with Sir William, and a subsequent interview with her daughter, had not prevented her from attending to the duties of her toilette. She appeared in full dress; and, from the character of her countenance and manner, well became the splendour with which ladies of quality then appeared on such occasions. The Marquis of A bowed haughtily, and she returned the salute with equal pride and distance of demeanour. He then took from the passive hand of Sir William Ashton the billet he had given him the moment before he approached the lady, and was about to speak, when she interrupted him. I perceive, my lord, you are about to enter upon an unpleasant subject. I am sorry any such should have occurred at this time, to interrupt in the slightest degree the respectful reception due to your lordship; but so it is. Mr. Edgar Ravenswood, for whom I have addressed the billet in your lordships hand, has abused the hospitality of this family, and Sir William Ashtons softness of temper, in order to seduce a young person into engagements without her parents consent, and of which they never can approve. Both gentlemen answered at once. My kinsman is incapable said the Lord Marquis. I am confident that my daughter Lucy is still more incapable said the Lord Keeper. Lady Ashton at once interrupted and replied to them both My Lord Marquis, your kinsman, if Mr. Ravenswood has the honour to be so, has made the attempt privately to secure the affections of this young and inexperienced girl. Sir William Ashton, your daughter has been simple enough to give more encouragement than she ought to have done to so very improper a suitor. And I think, madam, said the Lord Keeper, losing his accustomed temper and patience, that if you had nothing better to tell us, you had better have kept this family secret to yourself also. You will pardon me, Sir William, said the lady, calmly; the noble Marquis has a right to know the cause of the treatment I have found it necessary to use to a gentleman whom he calls his bloodrelation. It is a cause, muttered the Lord Keeper, which has emerged since the effect has taken place; for, if it exists at all, I am sure she knew nothing of it when her letter to Ravenswood was written. It is the first time that I have heard of this, said the Marquis; but, since your ladyship has tabled a subject so delicate, permit me to say, that my kinsmans birth and connexions entitled him to a patient hearing, and at least a civil refusal, even in case of his being so ambitious as to raise his eyes to the daughter of Sir William Ashton. You will recollect, my lord, of what blood Miss Lucy Ashton is come by the mothers side, said the lady. I do remember your descentfrom a younger branch of the house of Angus, said the Marquis; and your ladyshipforgive me, ladyought not to forget that the Ravenswoods have thrice intermarried with the main stem. Come, madam, I know how matters standold and longfostered prejudices are difficult to get over, I make every allowance for them; I ought not, and I would not, otherwise have suffered my kinsman to depart alone, expelled, in a manner, from this house, but I had hopes of being a mediator. I am still unwilling to leave you in anger, and shall not set forward till after noon, as I rejoin the Master of Ravenswood upon the road a few miles from hence. Let us talk over this matter more coolly. It is what I anxiously desire, my lord, said Sir William Ashton, eagerly. Lady Ashton, we will not permit my Lord of A to leave us in displeasure. We must compel him to tarry dinner at the castle. The castle, said the lady, and all that it contains, are at the command of the Marquis, so long as he chooses to honour it with his residence; but touching the farther discussion of this disagreeable topic Pardon me, good madam, said the Marquis; but I cannot allow you to express any hasty resolution on a subject so important. I see that more company is arriving; and, since I have the good fortune to renew my former acquaintance with Lady Ashton, I hope she will give me leave to avoid perilling what I prize so highly upon any disagreeable subject of discussionat least till we have talked over more pleasant topics. The lady smiled, courtesied, and gave her hand to the Marquis, by whom, with all the formal gallantry of the time, which did not permit the guest to tuck the lady of the house under the arm, as a rustic does his sweetheart at a wake, she was ushered to the eatingroom. Here they were joined by Bucklaw, Craigengelt, and other neighbours, whom the Lord Keeper had previously invited to meet the Marquis of A. An apology, founded upon a slight indisposition, was alleged as an excuse for the absence of Miss Ashton, whose seat appeared unoccupied. The entertainment was splendid to profusion, and was protracted till a late hour. CHAPTER XXIII. Such was our fallen fathers fate, Yet better than mine own; He shared his exile with his mate, Im banishd forth alone. WALLER I will not attempt to describe the mixture of indignation and regret with which Ravenswood left the seat which had belonged to his ancestors. The terms in which Lady Ashtons billet was couched rendered it impossible for him, without being deficient in that spirit of which he perhaps had too much, to remain an instant longer within its walls. The Marquis, who had his share in the affront, was, nevertheless, still willing to make some efforts at conciliation. He therefore suffered his kinsman to depart alone, making him promise, however, that he would wait for him at the small inn called the Tods Hole, situated, as our readers may be pleased to recollect, halfway betwixt Ravenswood Castle and Wolfs Crag, and about five Scottish miles distant from each. Here the Marquis proposed to join the Master of Ravenswood, either that night or the next morning. His own feelings would have induced him to have left the castle directly, but he was loth to forfeit, without at least one effort, the advantages which he had proposed from his visit to the Lord Keeper; and the Master of Ravenswood was, even in the very heat of his resentment, unwilling to foreclose any chance of reconciliation which might arise out of the partiality which Sir William Ashton had shown towards him, as well as the intercessory arguments of his noble kinsman. He himself departed without a moments delay, farther than was necessary to make this arrangement. At first he spurred his horse at a quick pace through an avenue of the park, as if, by rapidity of motion, he could stupify the confusion of feelings with which he was assailed. But as the road grew wilder and more sequestered, and when the trees had hidden the turrets of the castle, he gradually slackened his pace, as if to indulge the painful reflections which he had in vain endeavoured to repress. The path in which he found himself led him to the Mermaidens Fountain, and to the cottage of Alice; and the fatal influence which superstitious belief attached to the former spot, as well as the admonitions which had been in vain offered to him by the inhabitant of the latter, forced themselves upon his memory. Old saws speak truth, he said to himself, and the Mermaidens Well has indeed witnessed the last act of rashness of the heir of Ravenswood. Alice spoke well, he continued, and I am in the situation which she foretold; or rather, I am more deeply dishonourednot the dependant and ally of the destroyer of my fathers house, as the old sibyl presaged, but the degraded wretch who has aspired to hold that subordinate character, and has been rejected with disdain. We are bound to tell the tale as we have received it; and, considering the distance of the time, and propensity of those through whose mouths it has passed to the marvellous, this could not be called a Scottish story unless it manifested a tinge of Scottish superstition. As Ravenswood approached the solitary fountain, he is said to have met with the following singular adventure His horse, which was moving slowly forward, suddenly interrupted its steady and composed pace, snorted, reared, and, though urged by the spur, refused to proceed, as if some object of terror had suddenly presented itself. On looking to the fountain, Ravenswood discerned a female figure, dressed in a white, or rather greyish, mantle, placed on the very spot on which Lucy Ashton had reclined while listening to the fatal tale of love. His immediate impression was that she had conjectured by which path he would traverse the park on his departure, and placed herself at this wellknown and sequestered place of rendezvous, to indulge her own sorrow and his parting interview. In this belief he jumped from his horse, and, making its bridle fast to a tree, walked hastily towards the fountain, pronouncing eagerly, yet under his breath, the words, Miss Ashton!Lucy! The figure turned as he addressed it, and displayed to his wondering eyes the features, not of Lucy Ashton, but of old blind Alice. The singularity of her dress, which rather resembled a shroud than the garment of a living woman; the appearance of her person, larger, as it struck him, than it usually seemed to be; above all, the strange circumstance of a blind, infirm, and decrepit person being found alone and at a distance from her habitation (considerable, if her infirmities be taken into account), combined to impress him with a feeling of wonder approaching to fear. As he approached, she arose slowly from her seat, held her shrivelled hand up as if to prevent his coming more near, and her withered lips moved fast, although no sound issued from them. Ravenswood stopped; and as, after a moments pause, he again advanced towards her, Alice, or her apparition, moved or glided backwards towards the thicket, still keeping her face turned towards him. The trees soon hid the form from his sight; and, yielding to the strong and terrific impression that the being which he had seen was not of this world, the Master of Ravenswood remained rooted to the ground whereon he had stood when he caught his last view of her. At length, summoning up his courage, he advanced to the spot on which the figure had seemed to be seated; but neither was there pressure of the grass nor any other circumstance to induce him to believe that what he had seen was real and substantial. Full of those strange thoughts and confused apprehensions which awake in the bosom of one who conceives he has witnessed some preternatural appearance, the Master of Ravenswood walked back towards his horse, frequently, however, looking behind him, not without apprehension, as if expecting that the vision would reappear. But the apparition, whether it was real or whether it was the creation of a heated and agitated imagination, returned not again; and he found his horse sweating and terrified, as if experiencing that agony of fear with which the presence of a supernatural being is supposed to agitate the brute creation. The Master mounted, and rode slowly forward, soothing his steed from time to time, while the animal seemed internally to shrink and shudder, as if expecting some new object of fear at the opening of every glade. The rider, after a moments consideration, resolved to investigate the matter further. Can my eyes have deceived me, he said, and deceived me for such a space of time? Or are this womans infirmities but feigned, in order to excite compassion? And even then, her motion resembled not that of a living and existing person. Must I adopt the popular creed, and think that the unhappy being has formed a league with the powers of darkness? I am determined to be resolved; I will not brook imposition even from my own eyes. In this uncertainty he rode up to the little wicket of Alices garden. Her seat beneath the birchtree was vacant, though the day was pleasant and the sun was high. He approached the hut, and heard from within the sobs and wailing of a female. No answer was returned when he knocked, so that, after a moments pause, he lifted the latch and entered. It was indeed a house of solitude and sorrow. Stretched upon her miserable pallet lay the corpse of the last retainer of the house of Ravenswood who still abode on their paternal domains! Life had but shortly departed; and the little girl by whom she had been attended in her last moments was wringing her hands and sobbing, betwixt childish fear and sorrow, over the body of her mistress. The Master of Ravenswood had some difficulty to compose the terrors of the poor child, whom his unexpected appearance had at first rather appalled than comforted; and when he succeeded, the first expression which the girl used intimated that he had come too late. Upon inquiring the meaning of this expression, he learned that the deceased, upon the first attack of the mortal agony, had sent a peasant to the castle to beseech an interview of the Master of Ravenswood, and had expressed the utmost impatience for his return. But the messengers of the poor are tardy and negligent the fellow had not reached the castle, as was afterwards learned, until Ravenswood had left it, and had then found too much amusement among the retinue of the strangers to return in any haste to the cottage of Alice. Meantime her anxiety of mind seemed to increase with the agony of her body; and, to use the phrase of Babie, her only attendant, she prayed powerfully that she might see her masters son once more, and renew her warning. She died just as the clock in the distant village tolled one; and Ravenswood remembered, with internal shuddering, that he had heard the chime sound through the wood just before he had seen what he was now much disposed to consider as the spectre of the deceased. It was necessary, as well from his respect to the departed as in common humanity to her terrified attendant, that he should take some measures to relieve the girl from her distressing situation. The deceased, he understood, had expressed a desire to be buried in a solitary churchyard, near the little inn of the Tods Hole, called the Hermitage, or more commonly Armitage, in which lay interred some of the Ravenswood family, and many of their followers. Ravenswood conceived it his duty to gratify this predilection, commonly found to exist among the Scottish peasantry, and despatched Babie to the neighbouring village to procure the assistance of some females, assuring her that, in the mean while, he would himself remain with the dead body, which, as in Thessaly of old, it is accounted highly unfit to leave without a watch.


Thus, in the course of a quarter of an hour or little more, he found himself sitting a solitary guard over the inanimate corpse of her whose dismissed spirit, unless his eyes had strangely deceived him, had so recently manifested itself before him. Notwithstanding his natural courage, the Master was considerably affected by a concurrence of circumstances so extraordinary. She died expressing her eager desire to see me. Can it be, then, was his natural course of reflectioncan strong and earnest wishes, formed during the last agony of nature, survive its catastrophe, surmount the awful bounds of the spiritual world, and place before us its inhabitants in the hues and colouring of life? And why was that manifested to the eye which could not unfold its tale to the ear? and wherefore should a breach be made in the laws of nature, yet its purpose remain unknown? Vain questions, which only death, when it shall make me like the pale and withered form before me, can ever resolve. He laid a cloth, as he spoke, over the lifeless face, upon whose features he felt unwilling any longer to dwell. He then took his place in an old carved oaken chair, ornamented with his own armorial bearings, which Alice had contrived to appropriate to her own use in the pillage which took place among creditors, officers, domestics, and messengers of the law when his father left Ravenswood Castle for the last time. Thus seated, he banished, as much as he could, the superstitious feelings which the late incident naturally inspired. His own were sad enough, without the exaggeration of supernatural terror, since he found himself transferred from the situation of a successful lover of Lucy Ashton, and an honoured and respected friend of her father, into the melancholy and solitary guardian of the abandoned and forsaken corpse of a common pauper. He was relieved, however, from his sad office sooner that he could reasonably have expected, considering the distance betwixt the hut of the deceased and the village, and the age and infirmities of three old women who came from thence, in military phrase, to relieve guard upon the body of the defunct. On any other occasion the speed of these reverend sibyls would have been much more moderate, for the first was eighty years of age and upwards, the second was paralytic, and the third lame of a leg from some accident. But the burial duties rendered to the deceased are, to the Scottish peasant of either sex, a labour of love. I know not whether it is from the temper of the people, grave and enthusiastic as it certainly is, or from the recollection of the ancient Catholic opinions, when the funeral rites were always considered as a period of festival to the living; but feasting, good cheer, and even inebriety, were, and are, the frequent accompaniments of a Scottish oldfashioned burial. What the funeral feast, or dirgie, as it is called, was to the men, the gloomy preparations of the dead body for the coffin were to the women. To straight the contorted limbs upon a board used for that melancholy purpose, to array the corpse in clean linen, and over that in its woollen shroad, were operations committed always to the old matrons of the village, and in which they found a singular and gloomy delight. The old women paid the Master their salutations with a ghastly smile, which reminded him of the meeting betwixt Macbeth and the witches on the blasted heath of Forres. He gave them some money, and recommended to them the charge of the dead body of their contemporary, an office which they willingly undertook; intimating to him at the same time that he must leave the hut, in order that they might begin their mournful duties. Ravenswood readily agreed to depart, only tarrying to recommend to them due attention to the body, and to receive information where he was to find the sexton, or beadle, who had in charge the deserted churchyard of the Armitage, in order to prepare matters for the reception of Old Alice in the place of repose which she had selected for herself. Yell no be pinched to find out Johnie Mortsheugh, said the elder sibyl, and still her withered cheek bore a grisly smile; he dwells near the Tods Hole, an house of entertainment where there has been mony a blythe birling, for death and drinkdraining are near neighbours to ane anither. Ay! and thats een true, cummer, said the lame hag, propping herself with a crutch which supported the shortness of her left leg, for I mind when the father of this Master of Ravenswood that is now standing before us sticked young Blackhall with his whinger, for a wrang word said ower their wine, or brandy, or what not he gaed in as light as a lark, and he came out wi his feet foremost. I was at the winding of the corpse; and when the bluid was washed off, he was a bonny bouk of mans body. It may be easily believed that this illtimed anecdote hastened the Masters purpose of quitting a company so evilomened and so odious. Yet, while walking to the tree to which his horse was tied, and busying himself with adjusting the girths of the saddle, he could not avoid hearing, through the hedge of the little garden, a conversation respecting himself, betwixt the lame woman and the octogenarian sibyl. The pair had hobbled into the garden to gather rosemary, southernwood, rue, and other plants proper to be strewed upon the body, and burned by way of fumigation in the chimney of the cottage. The paralytic wretch, almost exhausted by the journey, was left guard upon the corpse, lest witches or fiends might play their sport with it. The following law, croaking dialogue was necessarily overheard by the Master of Ravenswood Thats a fresh and fullgrown hemlock, Annie Winnie; mony a cummer lang syne wad hae sought nae better horse to flee over hill and how, through mist and moonlight, and light down in the King of Frances cellar. Ay, cummer! but the very deil has turned as hardhearted now as the Lord Keeper and the grit folk, that hae breasts like whinstane. They prick us and they pine us, and they pit us on the pinnywinkles for witches; and, if I say my prayers backwards ten times ower, Satan will never gie me amends o them. Did ye ever see the foul thief? asked her neighbour. Na! replied the other spokeswoman; but I trow I hae dreamed of him mony a time, and I think the day will come they will burn me fort. But neer mind, cummer! we hae this dollar of the Masters, and well send doun for bread and for yill, and tobacco, and a drap brandy to burn, and a wee pickle saft sugar; and be there deil, or nae deil, lass, well hae a merry night ot. Here her leathern chops uttered a sort of cackling, ghastly laugh, resembling, to a certain degree, the cry of the screechowl. Hes a frank man, and a freehanded man, the Master, said Annie Winnie, and a comely personagebroad in the shouthers, and narrow around the lunyies. He wad mak a bonny corpse; I wad like to hae the streiking and winding o him. It is written on his brow, Annie Winnie, returned the octogenarian, her companion, that hand of woman, or of man either, will never straught him deaddeal will never be laid on his back, make you your market of that, for I hae it frae a sure hand. Will it be his lot to die on the battleground then, Ailsie Gourlay? Will he die by the sword or the ball, as his forbears had dune before him, mony ane o them? Ask nae mair questions about ithell no be graced sae far, replied the sage. I ken ye are wiser than ither folk, Aislie Gourlay. But wha telld ye this? Fashna your thumb about that, Annie Winnie, answered the sibyl, I hae it frae a hand sure eneugh. But ye said ye never saw the foul thief, reiterated her inquisitive companion. I hae it frae as sure a hand, said Ailsie, and frae them that spaed his fortune before the sark gaed ower his head. Hark! I hear his horses feet riding aff, said the other; they dinna sound as if good luck was wi them. Mak haste, sirs, cried the paralytic hag from the cottage, and let us do what is needfu, and say what is fitting; for, if the dead corpse binna straughted, it will girn and thraw, and that will fear the best o us. Ravenswood was now out of hearing. He despised most of the ordinary prejudices about witchcraft, omens, and vaticination, to which his age and country still gave such implicit credit that to express a doubt of them was accounted a crime equal to the unbelief of Jews or Saracens; he knew also that the prevailing belief, concerning witches, operating upon the hypochondriac habits of those whom age, infirmity, and poverty rendered liable to suspicion, and enforced by the fear of death and the pangs of the most cruel tortures, often extorted those confessions which encumber and disgrace the criminal records of Scotland during the 17th century. But the vision of that morning, whether real or imaginary, had impressed his mind with a superstitious feeling which he in vain endeavoured to shake off. The nature of the business which awaited him at the little inn, called Tods Hole, where he soon after arrived, was not of a kind to restore his spirits. It was necessary he should see Mortsheugh, the sexton of the old burialground at Armitage, to arrange matters for the funeral of Alice; and, as the man dwelt near the place of her late residence, the Master, after a slight refreshment, walked towards the place where the body of Alice was to be deposited. It was situated in the nook formed by the eddying sweep of a stream, which issued from the adjoining hills. A rude cavern in an adjacent rock, which, in the interior, was cut into the shape of a cross, formed the hermitage, where some Saxon saint had in ancient times done penance, and given name to the place. The rich Abbey of Coldinghame had, in latter days, established a chapel in the neighbourhood, of which no vestige was now visible, though the churchyard which surrounded it was still, as upon the present occasion, used for the interment of particular persons. One or two shattered yewtrees still grew within the precincts of that which had once been holy ground. Warriors and barons had been buried there of old, but their names were forgotten, and their monuments demolished. The only sepulchral memorials which remained were the upright headstones which mark the graves of persons of inferior rank. The abode of the sexton was a solitary cottage adjacent to the ruined wall of the cemetery, but so low that, with its thatch, which nearly reached the ground, covered with a thick crop of grass, fog, and houseleeks, it resembled an overgrown grave. On inquiry, however, Ravenswood found that the man of the last mattock was absent at a bridal, being fiddler as well as gravedigger to the vicinity. He therefore retired to the little inn, leaving a message that early next morning he would again call for the person whose double occupation connected him at once with the house of mourning and the house of feasting. An outrider of the Marquis arrived at Tods Hole shortly after, with a message, intimating that his master would join Ravenswood at that place on the following morning; and the Master, who would otherwise have proceeded to his old retreat at Wolfs Crag, remained there accordingly to give meeting to his noble kinsman. CHAPTER XXIV. Hamlet. Has this fellow no feeling of his business? he sings at grave making. Horatio. Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness. Hamlet. Tis een so the hand of little employment hath the daintier sense. Hamlet, Act V. Scene 1. The sleep of Ravenswood was broken by ghastly and agitating visions, and his waking intervals disturbed by melancholy reflections on the past and painful anticipations of the future. He was perhaps the only traveller who ever slept in that miserable kennel without complaining of his lodgings, or feeling inconvenience from their deficiencies. It is when the mind is free the bodys delicate. Morning, however, found the Master an early riser, in hopes that the fresh air of the dawn might afford the refreshment which night had refused him. He took his way towards the solitary burialground, which lay about half a mile from the inn. The thin blue smoke, which already began to curl upward, and to distinguish the cottage of the living from the habitation of the dead, apprised him that its inmate had returned and was stirring. Accordingly, on entering the little churchyard, he saw the old man labouring in a halfmade grave. My destiny, thought Ravenswood, seems to lead me to scenes of fate and of death; but these are childish thoughts, and they shall not master me. I will not again suffer my imagination to beguile my senses. The old man rested on his spade as the Master approached him, as if to receive his commands; and as he did not immediately speak, the sexton opened the discourse in his own way. Ye will be a wedding customer, sir, Ise warrant? What makes you think so, friend? replied the Master. I live by twa trades, sir, replied the blythe old manfiddle, sir, and spade; filling the world, and emptying of it; and I suld ken baith cast of customers by headmark in thirty years practice. You are mistaken, however, this morning, replied Ravenswood. Am I? said the old man, looking keenly at him, troth and it may be; since, for as brent as your brow is, there is something sitting upon it this day that is as near akin to death as to wedlock. Weelweel; the pick and shovel are as ready to your order as bow and fiddle. I wish you, said Ravenswood, to look after the decent interment of an old woman, Alice Gray, who lived at the Graigfoot in Ravenswood Park. Alice Gray!blind Alice! said the sexton; and is she gane at last? thats another jow of the bell to bid me be ready. I mind when Habbie Gray brought her down to this land; a likely lass she was then, and looked ower her southland nose at us a. I trow her pride got a downcome. And is she een gane? She died yesterday, said Ravenswood; and desired to be buried here beside her husband; you know where he lies, no doubt? Ken where he lies! answered the sexton, with national indirection of response. I ken whar abody lies, that lies here. But ye were speaking o her grave? Lord help us, its no an ordinar grave that will haud her in, if as true that folk said of Alice in her auld days; and if I gae to six feet deepand a warlocks grave shouldna be an inch mair ebb, or her ain witch cummers would soon whirl her out of her shroud for a their auld acquaintanceand bet six feet, or bet three, whas to pay the making ot, I pray ye? I will pay that, my friend, and all other reasonable charges. Reasonable charges! said the sexton; ou, theres grundmailand bellsiller, though the bells broken, nae doubtand the kistand my days warkand my bit feeand some brandy and yill to the dirgie, I am no thinking that you can inter her, to ca decently, under saxteen pund Scots. There is the money, my friend, said Ravenswood, and something over. Be sure you know the grave. Yell be ane o her English relations, Ise warrant, said the hoary man of skulls; I hae heard she married far below her station. It was very right to let her bite on the bridle when she was living, and its very right to gie her a decent burial now shes dead, for thats a matter o credit to yoursell rather than to her. Folk may let their kindred shift for themsells when they are alive, and can bear the burden of their ain misdoings; but its an unnatural thing to let them be buried like dogs, when a the discredit gangs to the kindred. What kens the dead corpse about it? You would not have people neglect their relations on a bridal occasion neither? said Ravenswood, who was amused with the professional limitation of the gravediggers philanthropy. The old man cast up his sharp grey eyes with a shrewd smile, as if he understood the jest, but instantly continued, with his former gravity Bridalswha wad neglect bridals that had ony regard for plenishing the earth? To be sure, they suld be celebrated with all manner of good cheer, and meeting of friends, and musical instrumentsharp, sackbut, and psaltery; or gude fiddle and pipes, when these auldwarld instruments of melody are hard to be compassed. The presence of the fiddle, I dare say, replied Ravenswood, would atone for the absence of all the others. The sexton again looked sharply up at him, as he answered. Nae doubtnae doubt, if it were weel played; but yonder, he said, as if to change the discourse, is Halbert Grays lang hame, that ye were speering after, just the third bourock beyond the muckle throughstane that stands on sax legs yonder, abune some ane of the Ravenswoods; for there is mony of their kin and followers here, deil lift them! though it isna just their main burialplace. They are no favourites, then, of yours, these Ravenswoods? said the Master, not much pleased with the passing benediction which was thus bestowed on his family and name. I kenna wha should favour them, said the gravedigger; when they had lands and power, they were ill guides of them baith, and now their heads down, theres few care how lang they may be of lifting it again. Indeed! said Ravenswood; I never heard that this unhappy family deserved illwill at the hands of their country. I grant their poverty, if that renders them contemptible. It will gang a far way tillt said the sexton of Hermitage, ye may tak my word for that; at least, I ken naething else that suld mak myself contemptible, and folk are far frae respecting me as they wad do if I lived in a twalofted sclated house. But as for the Ravenswoods, I hae seen three generations of them, and deil ane to mend other. I thought they had enjoyed a fair character in the country, said their descendant. Character! Ou, ye see, sir, said the sexton, as for the auld gudesire body of a lord, I lived on his land when I was a swanking young chield, and could hae blawn the trumpet wi ony body, for I had wind eneugh then; and touching this trumpeter Marine that I have heard play afore the lords of the circuit, I wad hae made nae mair o him than of a bairn and a bawbee whistle. I defy him to hae played Boot and saddle, or Horse and away, or Gallants, come trot, with me; he handa the tones. But what is all this to old Lord Ravenswood, my friend? said the Master, who, with an anxiety not unnatural in his circumstances, was desirous of prosecuting the musicians first topicwhat had his memory to do with the degeneracy of the trumpet music? Just this, sir, answered the sexton, that I lost my wind in his service. Ye see I was trumpeter at the castle, and had allowance for blawing at break of day, and at dinner time, and other whiles when there was company about, and it pleased my lord; and when he raised his militia to caper awa to Bothwell Brig against the wrangheaded westland Whigs, I behoved, reason or name, to munt a horse and caper awa wi them. And very reasonable, said Ravenswood; you were his servant and vassal. Servitor, say ye? replied the sexton, and so I was; but it was to blaw folk to their warm dinner, or at the warst to a decent kirkyard, and no to skirl them awa to a bluidy braeside, where there was deil a bedral but the hooded craw. But bide ye, ye shall hear what cam ot, and how far I am bund to be bedesman to the Ravenswoods. Tillt, ye see, we gaed on a braw simmer morning, twentyfourth of June, saxteen hundred and seentynine, of a the days of the month and yeardrums beat, guns rattled, horses kicked and trampled. Hackstoun of Rathillet keepit the brig wi mustket and carabine and pike, sword and scythe for what I ken, and we horsemen were ordered down to cross at the ford,I hate fords at a times, let abee when theres thousands of armed men on the other side. There was auld Ravenswood brandishing his Andrew Ferrara at the head, and crying to us to come and buckle to, as if we had been gaun to a fair; there was Caleb Balderstone, that is living yet, flourishing in the rear, and swearing Gog and Magog, he would put steel through the guts of ony man that turned bridle; there was young Allan Ravenswood, that was then Master, wi a bended pistol in his handit was a mercy it gaed na aff!crying to me, that had scarce as much wind left as serve the necessary purpose of my ain lungs, Sound, you poltroon!sound, you damned cowardly villain, or I will blow your brains out! and, to be sure, I blew sic points of war that the scraugh of a clockinhen was music to them. Well, sir, cut all this short, said Ravenswood. Short! I had like to hae been cut short mysell, in the flower of my youth, as Scripture says; and thats the very thing that I compleen o. Weel! in to the water we behoved a to splash, heels ower head, sit or faae horse driving on anither, as is the way of brute beasts, and riders that hae as little sense; the very bushes on the ither side were ableeze wi the flashes of the Whig guns; and my horse had just taen the grund, when a blackavised westland carleI wad mind the face o him a hundred years yetan ee like a wild falcons, and a beard as broad as my shovelclapped the end o his lang black gun within a quarters length of my lug! By the grace o Mercy, the horse swarved round, and I fell aff at the tae side as the ball whistled by at the tither, and the fell auld lord took the Whig such a swauk wi his broadsword that he made twa pieces o his head, and down fell the lurdance wi a his bouk abune me. You were rather obliged to the old lord, I think, said Ravenswood. Was I? my sartie! first for bringing me into jeopardy, would I nould I, and then for whomling a chield on the tap o me that dang the very wind out of my body? I hae been shortbreathed ever since, and canna gang twenty yards without peghing like a millers aiver. You lost, then, your place as trumpeter? said Ravenswood. Lost it! to be sure I lost it, replied the sexton, for I couldna hae played pew upon a dry hemlock; but I might hae dune weel eneugh, for I keepit the wage and the free house, and little to do but play on the fiddle to them, but for Allan, last Lord Ravenswood, that was far waur than ever his father was. What, said the Master, did my fatherI mean, did his fathers sonthis last Lord Ravenswood, deprive you of what the bounty of his father allowed you? Ay, troth did he, answered the old man; for he loot his affairs gang to the dogs, and let in this Sir William Ashton on us, that will gie naething for naething, and just removed me and a the puir creatures that had bite and soup at the castle, and a hole to put our heads in, when things were in the auld way. If Lord Ravenswood protected his people, my friend, while he had the means of doing so, I think they might spare his memory, replied the Master. Ye are welcome to your ain opinion, sir, said the sexton; but ye winna persuade me that he did his duty, either to himsell or to huz puir dependent creatures, in guiding us the gate he has done; he might hae gien us liferent tacks of our bits o houses and yards; and me, thats an auld man, living in yon miserable cabin, thats fitter for the dead than the quick, and killed wi rheumatise, and John Smith in my dainty bit mailing, and his window glazen, and a because Ravenswood guided his gear like a fule! It is but too true, said Ravenswood, consciencestruck; the penalties of extravagance extend far beyond the prodigals own sufferings. However, said the sexton, this young man Edgar is like to avenge my wrangs on the haill of his kindred. Indeed? said Ravenswood; why should you suppose so? They say he is about to marry the daughter of Leddy Ashton; and let her leddyship get his head ance under her oxter, and see you if she winna gie his neck a thraw. Sorra a bit, if I were him! Let her alane for hauding athing in het water that draws near her. Sae the warst wish I shall wish the lad is, that he may take his ain creditable gate ot, and ally himsell wi his fathers enemies, that have taken his broad lands and my bonny kailyard from the lawful owners thereof. Cervantes acutely remarks, that flattery is pleasing even from the mouth of a madman; and censure, as well as praise, often affects us, while we despise the opinions and motives on which it is founded and expressed. Ravenswood, abruptly reiterating his command that Alices funeral should be attended to, flung away from the sexton, under the painful impression that the great as well as the small vulgar would think of his engagement with Lucy like this ignorant and selfish peasant. And I have stooped to subject myself to these calumnies, and am rejected notwithstanding! Lucy, your faith must be true and perfect as the diamond to compensate for the dishonour which mens opinions, and the conduct of your mother, attach to the heir of Ravenswood! As he raised his eyes, he beheld the Marquis of A, who, having arrived at the Tods Hole, had walked forth to look for his kinsman. After mutual greetings, he made some apology to the Master for not coming forward on the preceding evening. It was his wish, he said, to have done so, but he had come to the knowledge of some matters which induced him to delay his purpose. I find, he proceeded, there has been a love affair here, kinsman; and though I might blame you for not having communicated with me, as being in some degree the chief of your family With your lordships permission, said Ravenswood, I am deeply grateful for the interest you are pleased to take in me, but I am the chief and head of my family. I know itI know it, said the Marquis; in a strict heraldic and genealogical sense, you certainly are so; what I mean is, that being in some measure under my guardianship I must take the liberty to say, my lord answered Ravenswood, and the tone in which he interrupted the Marquis boded no long duration to the friendship of the noble relatives, when he himself was interrupted by the little sexton, who came puffing after them, to ask if their honours would choose music at the changehouse to make up for short cheer. We want no music, said the Master, abruptly. Your honour disna ken what yere refusing, then, said the fiddler, with the impertinent freedom of his profession. I can play, Wilt thou dot again, and The Auld Mans Mears Dead, sax times better than ever Patie Birnie. Ill get my fiddle in the turning of a coffinscrew. Take yourself away, sir, said the Marquis. And if your honour be a northcountry gentleman, said the persevering minstrel, whilk I wad judge from your tongue, I can play Liggeram Cosh, and Mullin Dhu, and The Cummers of Athole. Take yourself away, friend; you interrupt our conversation. Or if, under your honours favour, ye should happen to be a thought honest, I can play (this in a low and confidential tone) Killiecrankie, and The King shall hae his ain, and The Auld Stuarts back again; and the wife at the changehouse is a decent, discreet body, neither kens nor cares what toasts are drucken, and what tunes are played, in her house shes deaf to athing but the clink o the siller. The Marquis, who was sometimes suspected of Jacobitism, could not help laughing as he threw the fellow a dollar, and bid him go play to the servants if he had a mind, and leave them at peace. Aweel, gentlemen, said he, I am wishing your honours gude day. Ill be a the better of the dollar, and yell be the waur of wanting music, Ise tell ye. But Ise gang hame, and finish the grave in the tuning o a fiddlestring, lay by my spade, and then get my tother breadwinner, and awa to your folk, and see if they hae better lugs than their masters. CHAPTER XXV. True love, an thou be true, Thou has ane kittle part to play; For fortune, fashion, fancy, and thou, Maun strive for many a day. Ive kend by mony a friends tale, Far better by this heart of mine, What time and change of fancy avail A truelove knot to untwine. HENDERSOUN. I wished to tell you, my good kinsman, said the Marquis, now that we are quit of that impertinent fiddler, that I had tried to discuss this love affair of yours with Sir William Ashtons daughter. I never saw the young lady but for a few minutes today; so, being a stranger to her personal merits, I pay a compliment to you, and offer her no offence, in saying you might do better. My lord, I am much indebted for the interest you have taken in my affairs, said Ravenswood. I did not intend to have troubled you in any matter concerning Miss Ashton. As my engagement with that young lady has reached your lordship, I can only say, that you must necessarily suppose that I was aware of the objections to my marrying into her fathers family, and of course must have been completely satisfied with the reasons by which these objections are overbalanced, since I have proceeded so far in the matter. Nay, Master, if you had heard me out, said his noble relation, you might have spared that observation; for, without questioning that you had reasons which seemed to you to counterbalance every other obstacle, I set myself, by every means that it became me to use towards the Ashtons, to persuade them to meet your views. I am obliged to your lordship for your unsolicited intercession, said Ravenswood; especially as I am sure your lordship would never carry it beyond the bounds which it became me to use. Of that, said the Marquis, you may be confident; I myself felt the delicacy of the matter too much to place a gentleman nearly connected with my house in a degrading or dubious situation with these Ashtons. But I pointed out all the advantages of their marrying their daughter into a house so honourable, and so nearly related with the first of Scotland; I explained the exact degree of relationship in which the Ravenswoods stand to ourselves; and I even hinted how political matters were like to turn, and what cards would be trumps next Parliament. I said I regarded you as a sonor a nephew, or sorather than as a more distant relation; and that I made your affair entirely my own. And what was the issue of your lordships explanation? said Ravenswood, in some doubt whether he should resent or express gratitude for his interference. Why, the Lord Keeper would have listened to reason, said the Marquis; he is rather unwilling to leave his place, which, in the present view of a change, must be vacated; and, to say truth, he seemed to have a liking for you, and to be sensible of the general advantages to be attained by such a match. But his lady, who is tongue of the trump, Master What of Lady Ashton, my lord? said Ravenswood; let me know the issue of this extraordinary conference I can bear it. I am glad of that, kinsman, said the Marquis, for I am ashamed to tell you half what she said. It is enoughher mind is made up, and the mistress of a firstrate boardingschool could not have rejected with more haughty indifference the suit of a halfpay Irish officer, beseeching permission to wait upon the heiress of a West India planter, than Lady Ashton spurned every proposal of mediation which it could at all become me to offer in behalf of you, my good kinsman. I cannot guess what she means. A more honourable connexion she could not form, thats certain. As for money and land, that used to be her husbands business rather than hers; I really think she hates you for having the rank which her husband has not, and perhaps for not having the lands that her goodman has. But I should only vex you to say more about ithere we are at the changehouse. The Master of Ravenswood paused as he entered the cottage, which reeked through all its crevices, and they were not few, from the exertions of the Marquiss travellingcooks to supply good cheer, and spread, as it were, a table in the wilderness. My Lord Marquis, said Ravenswood, I already mentioned that accident has put your lordship in possession of a secret which, with my consent, should have remained one even to you, my kinsman, for some time. Since the secret was to part from my own custody, and that of the only person besides who was interested in it, I am not sorry it should have reached your lordships ears, as being fully aware that you are my noble kinsman and friend.