entering slowly into all the minutiæ, as if with the skill and feelings of a connoisseur. A long dark-coloured seacloak, which she dragged out of a corner, was disposed for a pall. The face she left bare, after closing the mouth and eyes, and arranged the capes of the cloak so as to hide the bloody bandages, and give the body, as she muttered, “a mair decent appearance.'

"

At once three or four men, equally ruffians in appearance and dress, rushed into the hut. Meg, ye limb of Satan, how dare you leave the door open?" was the first salutation of the party.

"And wha ever heard of a door being barred when a man was in the dead-thraw?-how d'ye think the spirit was to get awa through bolts and bars like thae?"

"Is he dead, then?" said one who went to the side of the couch to look at the body.

Ay, ay-dead enough," said another "but here's what shall give him a rousing lykewake." So saying, he fetched a keg of spirits from a corner, while Meg hastened to display pipes and tobacco. From the activity with which she undertook the task, Brown conceived good hope of her fidelity towards her guest. It was obvious that she wished to engage the ruffians in their debauch, to prevent the discovery which might take place, if, by accident, any of them should approach too nearly the place of Brown's concealment.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

Nor board nor garner own we now,
Nor roof nor latched door,

Nor kind mate, bound, by holy vow,
To bless a good man's store.
Noon lulls us in a gloomy den,

And night is grown our day;
Uprouse ye, then, my merry men!
And use it as ye may.

JOANNA BAILLIE.

BROWN could now reckon his foes;-they were five in number; two of them were very powerful men, who appeared to be either real seamen, or strollers who assumed that character; the other three, an old man and two lads, were slighter made, and from their black hair and dark complexion, seemed to belong to Meg's tribe. They passed from one to another the cup out of which they drank their spirits. "Here's to his good voyage!" said one of the seamen, drinking; "a squally night he's got, however, to drift through the sky in."

We omit here various execrations with which these honest gentlemen garnished their discourse, retaining only such of their expletives as are least offensive.

""A does not mind wind and weather-'A has had many a north-easter in his day.”

"He had his last yesterday," said another gruffly; "and now old Meg may pray for his last fair wind, as she's often done before."

"I'll pray for nane o' him," said Meg, "nor for you neither, you randy dog. The times are sair altered since I was a kitchen-mort.* Men were men then, and fought other in the open field, and there was nae milling in the darkmans.† And the gentry had kind hearts, and would have given baith lap and pannel ‡ to ony puir gipsy; and there was not one, from Johnnie Faa, the upright man,§ to little Christie that was in the panniers, would cloyed a dud || from them. But ye are a' altered from the gude auld rules, and no wonder that you scour the crampring, and trine to the cheat ¶ sae often. Yes, ye are a' altered -you'll eat the goodman's meat, drink his drink, sleep on the strammel ** in his barn, and break his house and cut his throat for his pains! There's blood on your hands, too, ye dogs-mair than ever came there by fair fighting. See how ye'll die then-lang it was ere he died-he strove, and strove sair, and could neither die nor live;—but you-half the country will see how ye'll grace the woodie."

The party set up a hoarse laugh at Meg's prophecy. “What made you come back here, ye auld beldam ? said one of the gipsies; "could ye not have staid where you were, and spaed fortunes to the Cumberland flats?— Bing out and tour,†† ye auld devil, and see that nobody has scented; that's a' you're good for now."

"Is that a' I am good for now?" said the indignant matron. I was good for mair than that in the great fight between our folk and Patrico Salmon's; if I had not helped you with these very fambles (holding up her

hands,) Jean Baillie would have frammagem'd you,* ye feckless do-little!"

There was here another laugh, at the expense of the hero who had received this amazon's assistance.

66

Here, mother," said one of the sailors, "here's a cup of the right for you, and never mind that bully-huff."

Meg drank the spirits, and, withdrawing herself from farther conversation, sat down before the spot where Brown lay hid, in such a posture that it would have been difficult for any one to have approached it without her rising. The men, however, showed no disposition to disturb her.

They closed around the fire, and held deep consultation together; but the low tone in which they spoke, and the cant language which they used, prevented Brown from understanding much of their conversation. He gathered in general, that they expressed great indignation against some individual. “ He shall have his gruel,”

said one, and then whispered something very low into the ear of his comrade.

"I'll have nothing to do with that," said the other. "Are you turned hen-hearted, Jack?”

"No, by G-d, no more than yourself,-but I won't; —it was something like that stopped all the trade fifteen or twenty years ago-you have heard of the Loup?"

“I have heard him (indicating the corpse by a jerk of his head) tell about that job. G-d, how he used to laugh when he showed us how he fetched him off the perch!"

"Well, but it did up the trade for one while,” said Jack.

"How should that be?" asked the surly villain.

*Throttled you.

"Why," replied Jack, "the people got rusty about it, and would not deal, and they had bought so many brooms * that "

"Well, for all that," said the other, "I think we should be down upon the fellow one of these darkmans, and let him get it well."

"she grows

She'll sing

“But old Meg's asleep now," said another; a driveller, and is afraid of her shadow. out,† some of these odd-come-shortlies, if you don't look sharp."

"Never fear," said the old gipsy man; "Meg's truebred; she's the last in the gang that will start-but she has some queer ways, and often cuts queer words.”

With more of this gibberish, they continued the conversation, rendering it thus, even to each other, a dark obscure dialect, eked out by significant nods and signs, but never expressing distinctly, or in plain language, the subject on which it turned. At length one of them, observing Meg was still fast asleep, or appeared to be so, desired one of the lads "to hand in the black Peter, that they might flick it open." The boy stepped to the door and brought in a portmanteau, which Brown instantly recognised as his own. His thoughts immediately turned to the unfortunate lad he had left with the carriage. Had the ruffians murdered him? was the horrible doubt that crossed his mind. The agony of his attention grew yet keener, and while the villains pulled out and admired the different articles of his clothes and linen, he eagerly listened for some indication that might intimate the fate of the postilion. But the ruffians were too much delighted

* Got so many warrants out.

† To sing out, or whistle in the cage, is when a rogue, being apprehended, peaches against his comrades.