which these circumstances had excited. The place had been acked by the King's troops, who, in wanton mischief, had ven attempted to burn it; and though the thickness of the alls had resisted the fire, unless to a partial extent, the tables and out-houses were totally consumed. The towers nd pinnacles of the main building were scorched and lackened; the pavement of the court broken and shattered; e doors torn down entirely, or hanging by a single hinge; e windows dashed in and demolished, and the court strewed ith articles of furniture broken into fragments. The accesries of ancient distinction, to which the Baron, in the pride his heart, had attached so much importance and veneraon, were treated with peculiar contumely. The fountain as demolished, and the spring, which had supplied it, now poded the court-yard. The stone-basin seemed to be destined r a drinking-trough for cattle, from the manner in which was arranged upon the ground. The whole tribe of Bears, rge and small, had experienced as little favour as those at e head of the avenue, and one or two of the family pictures, hich seemed to have served as targets for the soldiers, lay 1 the ground in tatters. With an aching heart, as may well e imagined, Edward viewed this wreck of a mansion so spected. But his anxiety to learn the fate of the proprietors, d his fears as to what that fate might be, increased with ery step. When he entered upon the terrace, new scenes desolation were visible. The balustrade was broken down, e walls destroyed, the borders overgrown with weeds, and e fruit-trees cut down or grubbed up. In one compartment this old-fashioned garden were two immense horse-chestnut ees, of whose size the Baron was particularly vain: too lazy, erhaps, to cut them down, the spoilers, with malevolent genuity, had mined them, and placed a quantity of gunowder in the cavity. One had been shivered to pieces by e explosion, and the fragments lay scattered around, enimbering the ground it had so long shadowed. The other ine had been more partial in its effect. About one-fourth f the trunk of the tree was torn from the mass, which, utilated and defaced on the one side, still spread on the ther its ample and undiminished boughs.1

Amid these general marks of ravage, there were some which

1 A pair of chestnut trees, destroyed, the one entirely, and the other in part, by such mischievous and wanton act of revenge, grew at Invergarry Castle, the fastness of acDonald of Glengarry.

more particularly addressed the feelings of Waverley. Viewing the front of the building, thus wasted and defaced, his eyes naturally sought the little balcony which more properly belonged to Rose's apartment-her troisième, or rather cinquième étage. It was easily discovered, for beneath it lay the stage-flowers and shrubs, with which it was her pride to decorate it, and which had been hurled from the bartizan several of her books were mingled with broken flower-pot and other remnants. Among these, Waverley distinguishe one of his own, a small copy of Ariosto, and gathered it a a treasure, though wasted by the wind and rain.

While, plunged in the sad reflections which the scene excited, he was looking around for some one who might explain the fate of the inhabitants, he heard a voice from the interior of the building singing, in well-remembered accent an old Scottish song:

Alas, thought Edward, is it thou? Poor helpless being, a thou alone left, to gibber and moan, and fill with thy wild and unconnected scraps of minstrelsy the halls that protected the ----He then called, first low, and then louder, "Davie Dav Gellatley!"

The poor simpleton showed himself from among the rui of a sort of green-house, that once terminated what was calle the Terrace-walk, but at first sight of a stranger retreated, as in terror. Waverley, remembering his habits, began to whist a tune to which he was partial, which Davie had expresse great pleasure in listening to, and had picked up from him b the ear. Our hero's minstrelsy no more equalled that Blondel, than poor Davie resembled Coeur de Lion; but the melody had the same effect, of producing recognition. Dav again stole from his lurking-place, but timidly, while Waverle afraid of frightening him, stood making the most encouraging signals he could devise. "It's his ghaist," muttered Davit yet, coming nearer, he seemed to acknowledge his livin

1 The first three couplets are from an old ballad, called the Border Widow's Lament

acquaintance.

The poor fool himself appeared the ghost of what he had been. The peculiar dress in which he had been attired in better days, showed only miserable rags of its whimsical finery, the lack of which was oddly supplied by the remnants of tapestried hangings, window-curtains, and shreds of pictures, with which he had bedizened his tatters. His face, oo, had lost its vacant and careless air, and the poor creature ooked hollow-eyed, meagre, half-starved, and nervous to a pitiable degree. After long hesitation, he at length approached Waverley with some confidence, stared him sadly in the face, nd said, "A' dead and gane-a' dead and gane.'

"Who are dead?" said Waverley, forgetting the incapacity of Davie to hold any connected discourse.

"Baron-and Bailie-and Saunders Saunderson-and Lady Rose, that sang sae sweet-A' dead and gane-dead and gane ;

But follow, follow me,

While glowworms light the lea,

I'll show you where the dead should be

Each in his shroud,

While winds pipe loud,

And the red moon peeps dim through the cloud.
Follow, follow me ;

Brave should he be

That treads by night the dead man's lea."

With these words, chanted in a wild and earnest tone, he ade a sign to Waverley to follow him, and walked rapidly toards the bottom of the garden, tracing the bank of the stream, hich, it may be remembered, was its eastern boundary. dward, over whom an involuntary shuddering stole at the imort of his words, followed him in some hope of an explanaon. As the house was evidently deserted, he could not expect find among the ruins any more rational informer.

Davie, walking very fast, soon reached the extremity of the arden, and scrambled over the ruins of the wall that once had ivided it from the wooded glen in which the old Tower of 'ully-Veolan was situated. He then jumped down into the ed of the stream, and, followed by Waverley, proceeded at a reat pace, climbing over some fragments of rock, and turning ith difficulty round others. They passed beneath the ruins f the castle; Waverley followed, keeping up with his guide with difficulty, for the twilight began to fall. Following the lescent of the stream a little lower, he totally lost him, but a winkling light, which he now discovered among the tangled

copse-wood and bushes, seemed a surer guide. He soon pursued a very uncouth path; and by its guidance at length reached the door of a wretched hut. A fierce barking of dogs was at first heard, but it stilled at his approach. A vo.c sounded from within, and he held it most prudent to listen before he advanced.

"Wha hast thou brought here, thou unsonsy villain, thou? said an old woman, apparently in great indignation. He heard Davie Gellatley, in answer, whistle a part of the tune by whid he had recalled himself to the simpleton's memory, and had now no hesitation to knock at the door. There was a dead silence instantly within, except the deep growling of the dogs and he next heard the mistress of the hut approach the door not probably for the sake of undoing a latch, but of fastening a bolt. To prevent this, Waverley lifted the latch himself.

In front was an old wretched-looking woman, exclaiming "Wha comes into folk's houses in this gate, at this time o' the night?" On one side, two grim and half-starved deer grey hounds laid aside their ferocity at his appearance, and seemed t recognise him. On the other side, half concealed by the oper door, yet apparently seeking that concealment reluctantly, with a cocked pistol in his right hand, and his left in the act drawing another from his belt, stood a tall bony gaunt figure in the remnants of a faded uniform, and a beard of thre weeks' growth.

It was the Baron of Bradwardine.—It is unnecessary to add that he threw aside his weapon, and greeted Waverley withi hearty embrace.

CHAPTER LXIV

COMPARING OF NOTES

THE Baron's story was short, when divested of the adages and common-places, Latin, English, and Scotch, with which h erudition garnished it. He insisted much upon his grief at the loss of Edward and of Glennaquoich, fought the fields Falkirk and Culloden, and related how, after all was lost in the last battle, he had returned home, under the idea of more easi finding shelter among his own tenants, and on his own estate than elsewhere. A party of soldiers had been sent to lay wast his property, for clemency was not the order of the day. The proceedings, however, were checked by an order from the civi

court.

The estate, it was found, might not be forfeited to the

crown, to the prejudice of Malcolm Bradwardine of InchGrabbit, the heir-male, whose claim could not be prejudiced by the Baron's attainder, as deriving no right through him, and who, therefore, like other heirs of entail in the same situation, entered upon possession. But, unlike many in imilar circumstances, the new laird speedily showed that he ntended utterly to exclude his predecessor from all benefit or dvantage in the estate, and that it was his purpose to avail imself of the old Baron's evil fortune to the full extent. This was the more ungenerous, as it was generally known, that, from romantic idea of not prejudicing this young man's right as eir-male, the Baron had refrained from settling his estate on is daughter.

This selfish injustice was resented by the country people, ho were partial to their old master, and irritated against his uccessor. In the Baron's own words, "The matter did not oincide with the feelings of the commons of Bradwardine, Mr. Waverley; and the tenants were slack and repugnant in ayment of their mails and duties; and when my kinsman ame to the village wi' the new factor, Mr. James Howie, to ift the rents, some wanchancy person-I suspect John Heatherlutter, the auld game-keeper, that was out wi' me in the year Fifteen-fired a shot at him in the gloaming, whereby he was o affrighted, that I may say with Tullius in Catilinam, Abiit, vasit, erupit, effugit. He fled, sir, as one may say, incontinent 。 Stirling. And now he hath advertised the estate for sale, eing himself the last substitute in the entail.—And if I were o lament about sic matters, this would grieve me mair than its assing from my immediate possession, whilk, by the course of ature, must have happened in a few years. Whereas now it ›asses from the lineage that should have possessed it in sæcula æculorum. But God's will be done, humana perpessi sumus. Sir John of Bradwardine-Black Sir John, as he is calledwho was the common ancestor of our house and the InchGrabbits, little thought such a person would have sprung from is loins. Meantime, he has accused me to some of the prinates, the rulers for the time, as if I were a cut-throat, and an bettor of bravoes and assassinates, and coupe-jarrets. And they have sent soldiers here to abide on the estate, and hunt me like a partridge upon the mountains, as Scripture says of good King David, or like our valiant Sir William Wallace,not that I bring myself into comparison with either.—I thought, when I heard you at the door, they had driven the auld deer