took a friendly leave of them, with a smile of contented importance upon his visage.

'Long live our dear friend, the Baron," exclaimed the Chief, as soon as he was out of hearing, "for the most absurd riginal that exists north of the Tweed! I wish to heaven I ad recommended him to attend the circle this evening with a oot-ketch under his arm. I think he might have adopted the uggestion, if it had been made with suitable gravity."

"And how can you take pleasure in making a man of his orth so ridiculous ? "

"Begging pardon, my dear Waverley, you are as ridiculous she. Why, do you not see that the man's whole mind is rapped up in this ceremony? He has heard and thought of since infancy, as the most august privilege and ceremony the world; and I doubt not but the expected pleasure of erforming it was a principal motive with him for taking up ms. Depend upon it, had I endeavoured to divert him om exposing himself, he would have treated me as an morant, conceited coxcomb, or perhaps might have taken fancy to cut my throat; a pleasure which he once proposed himself upon some point of etiquette, not half so important, his eyes, as this matter of boots or brogues, or whatever e calige shall finally be pronounced by the learned. But I just go to head-quarters, to prepare the Prince for this extrardinary scene. My information will be well taken, for it will ive him a hearty laugh at present, and put him on his guard gainst laughing, when it might be very mal-a-propos. So, au voir, my dear Waverley."

CHAPTER XLIX

THE ENGLISH PRISONER

THE first occupation of Waverley, after he departed from the Chieftain, was to go in quest of the officer whose life he had saved. He was guarded, along with his companions in misfortune, who were very numerous, in a gentleman's house near the field of battle.

On entering the room, where they stood crowded together, Waverley easily recognised the object of his visit, not only by the peculiar dignity of his appearance, but by the appendage of Dugald Mahony, with his battle-axe, who had stuck to him

from the moment of his captivity, as if he had been skewered to his side. This close attendance was, perhaps, for the purpose of securing his promised reward from Edward, but it also operated to save the English gentleman from being plundered in the scene of general confusion; for Dugald sagaciously argued, that the amount of the salvage which he might be allowed, would be regulated by the state of the prisoner, when he should deliver him over to Waverley. He hastened assure Waverley, therefore, with more words than he usually employed, that he had "kepit ta sidier roy haill, and that wasna a plack the waur since the fery moment when honour forbad her to gie him a bit clamhewit wi' her Lochaber-axe."

Waverley assured Dugald of a liberal recompence, and approaching the English officer, expressed his anxiety to de anything which might contribute to his convenience under hi present unpleasant circumstances.

I am

"I am not so inexperienced a soldier, sir," answered th Englishman, as to complain of the fortune of war. only grieved to see those scenes acted in our own island which I have often witnessed elsewhere with comparative in difference."

"Another such day as this," said Waverley, "and I trus the cause of your regrets will be removed, and all will agai return to peace and order."

The officer smiled and shook his head. "I must not forge my situation so far as to attempt a formal confutation of tha opinion; but, notwithstanding your success, and the valour which achieved it, you have undertaken a task to which your strength appears wholly inadequate."

At this moment Fergus pushed into the press.

the

"Come, Edward, come along; the Prince has gone to Pinkie house for the night; and we must follow, or lose the whole cere mony of the caliga. Your friend, the Baron, has been guilty of a great piece of cruelty; he has insisted upon dragging Bailie Mac wheeble out to the field of battle. Now, you must know, Bailie's greatest horror is an armed Highlander, or a loaded gun; and there he stands, listening to the Baron's instructions concerning the protest; ducking his head like a sea-gull a the report of every gun and pistol that our idle boys are firing upon the fields; and undergoing, by way of penance, at every symptom of flinching, a severe rebuke from his patron, who would not admit the discharge of a whole battery of cannon,

within point-blank distance, as an apology for neglecting a discourse, in which the honour of his family is interested." "But how has Mr. Bradwardine got him to venture so far?" said Edward.

"Why, he had come as far as Musselburgh, I fancy, in hopes of making some of our wills; and the peremptory comnands of the Baron dragged him forward to Preston after the attle was over. He complains of one or two of our raganuffins having put him in peril of his life, by presenting their ieces at him; but as they limited his ransom to an English enny, I don't think we need trouble the provost-martial upon hat subject. So, come along, Waverley."

shire?"

"Waverley!" said the English officer, with great emotion; the nephew of Sir Everard Waverley, of "The same, sir," replied our hero, somewhat surprised at the one in which he was addressed.

"I am at once happy and grieved," said the prisoner, "to ave met with you."

"I am ignorant, sir," answered Waverley, "how I have eserved so much interest."

"Did your uncle never mention a friend called Talbot?"

'I have heard him talk with great regard of such a person," eplied Edward; "a colonel, I believe, in the army, and the usband of Lady Emily Blandeville; but I thought Colonel albot had been abroad."

"I am just returned," answered the officer; "and being in cotland, thought it my duty to act where my services proised to be useful. Yes, Mr. Waverley, I am that Colonel albot, the husband of the lady you have named; and I am roud to acknowledge, that I owe alike my professional rank nd my domestic happiness to your generous and nobleinded relative. Good God! that I should find his nephew such a dress, and engaged in such a cause!"

'Sir," said Fergus, haughtily, "the dress and cause are those of men of birth and honour."

"My situation forbids me to dispute your assertion," said Colonel Talbot; "otherwise it were no difficult matter to show, that neither courage nor pride of lineage can gild a bad cause. But, with Mr. Waverley's permission, and yours, sir, if yours also must be asked, I would willingly speak a few words with him on affairs connected with his own family."

“Mr. Waverley, sir, regulates his own motions. You will Follow me, I suppose, to Pinkie," said Fergus, turning to

Edward, when you have finished your discourse with this new acquaintance?" So saying, the Chief of Glennaquoich adjusted his plaid with rather more than his usual air of haughty assumption, and left the apartment.

The interest of Waverley readily procured for Colonel Talbot the freedom of adjourning to a large garden, belonging to his place of confinement. They walked a few paces in silence, Colonel Talbot apparently studying how to open what he had to say; at length he addressed Edward.

"Mr. Waverley, you have this day saved my life; and yet! would to God that I had lost it, ere I had found you wearing the uniform and cockade of these men."

"I forgive your reproach, Colonel Talbot; it is well meant and your education and prejudices render it natural. But there is nothing extraordinary in finding a man, whose honou has been publicly and unjustly assailed, in the situation which promised most fair to afford him satisfaction on hi

calumniators."

"I should rather say, in the situation most likely to confirm the reports which they have circulated," said Colonel Talbot "by following the very line of conduct ascribed to you Are you aware, Mr. Waverley, of the infinite distress, even danger, which your present conduct has occasioned to your nearest relatives?"

"Danger!"

and

"Yes, sir, danger. When I left England, your uncle and father had been obliged to find bail to answer a charge treason, to which they were only admitted by the exertion of the most powerful interest. I came down to Scotland, with the sole purpose of rescuing you from the gulf into which you have precipitated yourself; nor can I estimate the conse quences to your family, of your having openly joined the rebellion since the very suspicion of your intention was so perilous to them. Most deeply do I regret, that I did not meet you before this last and fatal error.'

"I am really ignorant," said Waverley, in a tone of reserve "why Colonel Talbot should have taken so much trouble on my account."

"Mr. Waverley," answered Talbot, "I am dull at appre hending irony; and therefore I shall answer your words according to their plain meaning. I am indebted to your uncle for benefits greater than those which a son owes to a father. I acknowledge to him the duty of a son; and as I

know there is no manner in which I can requite his kindness so well as by serving you, I will serve you, if possible, whether you will permit me or no. The personal obligation which you have this day laid me under, (although, in common estimation, as great as one human being can bestow on another,) adds nothing to my zeal on your behalf; nor can that zeal be bated by any coolness with which you may please to receive it."

"Your intentions may be kind, sir," said Waverley drily; but your language is harsh, or at least peremptory."

"On my return to England," continued Colonel Talbot, after long absence, I found your uncle, Sir Everard Waverey, in the custody of a king's messenger, in consequence of a uspicion brought upon him by your conduct. He is my ldest friend-how often shall I repeat it-my best benefactor! e sacrificed his own views of happiness to mine-he never ttered a word, he never harboured a thought, that benevoence itself might not have thought or spoken. I found this nan in confinement, rendered harsher to him by his habits of ife, his natural dignity of feeling, and-forgive me, Mr. Vaverley, by the cause through which this calamity had ome upon him. I cannot disguise from you my feelings pon this occasion; they were most painfully unfavourable to ou. Having, by my family interest, which you probably now is not inconsiderable, succeeded in obtaining Sir Everard's release, I set out for Scotland. I saw Colonel Gardiner, a man whose fate alone is sufficient to render this nsurrection for ever execrable. In the course of conversation vith him, I found, that, from late circumstances, from a e-examination of the persons engaged in the mutiny, and rom his original good opinion of your character, he was much oftened towards you; and I doubted not, that if I could be io fortunate as to discover you, all might yet be well. But his unnatural rebellion has ruined all. I have, for the first time, in a long and active military life, seen Britons disgrace themselves by a panic flight, and that before a foe without either arms or discipline: And now I find the heir of my dearest friend-the son, I may say, of his affections-sharing a triumph, for which he ought the first to have blushed. Why should I lament Gardiner! his lot was happy, compared to mine!"

There was so much dignity in Colonel Talbot's manner, such a mixture of military pride and manly sorrow, and the