CHAPTER XXIII.

Desolation.

WAVERLEY riding post, as was the usual fashion of the period, without any adventure, save one or two queries, which the talisman of his passport sufficiently answered, reached the borders of Scotland. Here he heard the tidings of the decisive battle of Culloden. It was no more than he had long expected, though the success at Falkirk had thrown a faint and setting gleam over the arms of the chevalier. Yet it came upon him like a shock, by which he was for a time altogether unmanned. The generous, the courteous, the noble-minded adventurer, was then a fugitive, with a price upon his head; his adherents, so brave, so enthusiastic, so faithful, were dead, imprisoned, or exiled. Where, now, was the exalted and high-souled Fergus, if, indeed, he had survived the night at Clifton? Where the pure-hearted and primitive Baron of Bradwardine, whose foibles seemed foils to set off the disinterestedness of his disposition, his genuine goodness of heart, and unshaken courage? Those who clung for support to their fallen columns, Rose and Flora, where were they to be sought, and in what distress must not the loss of their natural protectors have involved them? Of Flora, he thought with the regard of a brother for a sister; of Rose, with a sensation yet more deep and tender. It might be still his fate to supply the want of those guardians they had lost. Agitated by these thoughts he precipitated his jour

ney.

When he arrived at Edinburgh, where his inquiries must necessarily commence, he felt the full difficulty of his situation. Many inhabitants of that city had

seen and known him as Edward Waverley; how, then could he avail himself of a passport as Francis Stanley? He resolved, therefore, to avoid all company, and to move northward as soon as possible. He was, however, obliged to wait a day or two in expectation of a letter from Colonel Talbot, and he was also to leave his own address, under his feigned character, at a place agreed upon. With this latter purpose he sallied out in the dusk through the well-known = streets, carefully shunning observation; but in vain: one of the first persons whom he met at once recognised him. It was Mrs. Flockhart, Fergus Mac-Ivor's good-humoured landlady.

As

"Gude guide us, Mr. Waverley, is this you? na, ye need na be feared for me. I wad betray nae gentleman in your circumstance-eh, lack-a-day! lack-aday! here's a change o' markets; how merry Colonel Mac-Ivor and you used to be in our house?" And the good-natured widow shed a few natural tears. there was no resisting her claim of acquaintance, Waverley acknowledged it with a good grace, as well as the danger of his own situation. "As it is nigh the darkening, sir, wad ye just step in bye to our house, and tak a dish o' tea? and I am sure if ye like to sleep in the little room, I wad tak care ye are no dis. turbed, and nãe body wad ken ye; for Kate and Matty, the limmers, gaed aff wi' twa o' Hawley's dragoons, and I hae twa new queans instead o' them."

Waverley accepted her invitation, and engaged her lodging for a night or two, satisfied he would be safer in the house of this simple creature than any where else. When he entered the parlour, his heart swelled to see Fergus's bonnet, with the white cockade, hanging beside the little mirror.

"Ay," said Mrs. Flockhart, sighing, as she observed the direction of his eyes," the poor colonel bought a new ane just the day before the march, and I winna let them take that ane doon, but just to brush it ilka

day mysell, and whiles I look at it till I just think I hear him cry to Callum to bring him his bonnet, as he used to do when he was ganging out. Its unco silly-the neighbours ca' me a jacobite-but they may say their say-I am sure it's no for that-but he was as kind-hearted a gentleman as ever lived, and as weelfa'rd to. O, d'ye ken, sir, when he is to suffer ?” "Suffer! why, where is he?"

"Eh, Lord's sake! d'ye no ken? The poor Hieland body, Dugald Mahony, cam here a while since wi' ane o' his arms cut off, and a sair clour in the headye'll mind Dugald, he carried aye an axe on his shouther-and he cam here just begging, as I may say, for something to eat. A weel, he tauld us the chief, as they ca'd him, (but I aye ca' him the colonel,) and Ensign Maccombich, that ye mind weel, were ta'en somewhere beside the English border, when it was sae dark that his folk never missed him till it was ower late, and they were like to gang clean daft. And he said that little Callum Beg, (he was a bauld mischievous callant that,) and your honour, were kill ed that same night in the tulzie, and mony mae bra' men. But he grat when he spak o' the colonel, ye never saw the like. And now the word gangs the colonel is to be tried, and to suffer wi' them that were ta'en at Carlisle."

"And his sister?"

Ay, that they ca'd the Lady Flora--weel, she's away up to Carlisle to him, and lives wi' some grand papist lady thereabouts to be near him."

"And," said Edward, " the other young lady?" "Whilk other? I ken only of ane sister the colonel had."

"I mean Miss Bradwardine," said Edward.

"Ou, ay; the laird's daughter. She was a very bonny lassie, poor thing, but far shyer than Lady Flora."

"Where is she, for God's sake?"

"Ou, wha kens where ony o' them is now? puir. things, the're sair ta'en down for their white cockades and their white roses; but she gaed north to her father's in Perthshire, when the government troops cam back to Edinbro'. There was some pretty men amang them, and ane Major Whacker was quartered on me, a very civil gentleman, but O, Mr. Waverley, he was naething sae weel fa'rd as the poor colonel." "Do you know what is become of Miss Bradwardine's father?"

"The auld laird? na, naebody kens that; but they say he fought very hard in that bluidy battle at Inverness; and Deacon Clank, the white-iron smith, says that the government folk are sair agane him for having been out twice; and troth he might have ta'en warning, but there's nae fule like an auld fule-the puir colonel was only out ance."

Such conversation contained almost all the goodnatured widow knew of the fate of her late lodgers and acquaintances, but it was enough to determine Edward, at all hazards, to proceed instantly to TullyVeolan, where he concluded he should see, or at least hear something of Rose. He therefore left a letter for Colonel Talbot at the place agreed upon, signed by his assumed name, and giving for his address the post town next to the baron's residence.

From Edinburgh to Perth he took post-horses, resolving to make the rest of his journey on foot; a mode of travelling to which he was partial, and which had the advantage of permitting a deviation from the road when he saw parties of military at a distance. His campaign had considerably strengthened his constitution and improved his habits of enduring fatigue. His baggage he sent before him as opportunity occurred.

As he advanced northward, the traces of war became visible. Broken carriages, dead horses, unroofed cottages, trees felled for palisades, and bridges destroyed, or only partially repaired; all indicated the move.

ments of hostile armies. In those places where the gentry were attached to the Stuart cause, their houses seemed dismantled or deserted, the usual course of what may be called ornamental labour was totally interrupted, and the inhabitants were seen gliding about with fear, sorrow, and dejection in their faces.

It was evening when he approached the village of Tully-Veolan, with feelings and sentiments-how different from those which attended his first entrance! Then life was so new to him, that a dull or disagreeable day was one of the greatest misfortunes which his imagination anticipated, and it seemed to him that his time ought only to be consecrated to elegant or amusing study, and relieved by social or youthful frolick. Now, how changed, how saddened, yet how elevated was his character, within the course of a very few months! Danger and misfortune are rapid, though severe teachers. "A sadder and a wiser man," he felt, in internal confidence and mental dignity, a compen-. sation for the gay dreams which in his case experience had so rapidly dissolved.

As he approached the village, he saw with surprise and anxiety that a party of soldiers were quartered near it, and what was worse, that they seemed stationary there. This he conjectured from a few tents which he beheld glimmering upon what was called the Common Moor. To avoid the risk of being stopped and questioned in a place where he was so likely to be recognised, he fetched a large circuit, altogether avoiding the hamlet, and approaching the upper gate of the avenue by a by-path well known to him. A single glance announced that great changes had taken place. One half of the gate, entirely broken down, and split up for firewood, lay in piles ready to be taken away; the other swung uselessly about upon its loosened hinges. The battlements above the gate were broken and thrown down, and the carved bears, which were said to have done centinal's duty upon the top for cen