his temporary master, that it was either ta muckle Sunday hersel', or ta little government Sunday that they ca'd ta fast.'

On alighting at the sign of the Seven-branched Golden Candlestick, which, for the further delectation of the guests, was graced with a short Hebrew motto, they were received by mine host, a tall thin puritanical figure, who seemed to debate with himself whether he ought to give shelter to those who travelled on such a day. Reflecting, however, in all probability, that he possessed the power of mulcting them for this irregularity, a penalty which they might escape by passing into Gregor Duncanson's, at the sign of the Highlander and the Hawick Gill, Mr. Ebenezer Cruickshanks condescended to admit them into his dwelling.

To this sanctified person Waverley addressed his request that he would procure him a guide, with a saddle-horse, to carry his portmanteau to Edinburgh.

And whar may ye be coming from?' demanded mine host of the Candlestick.

'I have told you where I wish to go; I do not conceive any further information necessary either for the guide or his saddle-horse.'

'Hem! Ahem!' returned he of the Candlestick, somewhat disconcerted at this rebuff. 'It's the general fast, sir, and I cannot enter into ony carnal transactions on sic a day, when the people should be humbled, and the backsliders should return, as worthy Mr. Goukthrapple said; and moreover when, as the precious Mr. Jabesh Rentowel did weel observe, the land was mourning for covenants burnt, broken, and buried.'

'My good friend,' said Waverley, if you cannot let me have a horse and guide, my servant shall seek them elsewhere.'

'Aweel! Your servant ?-and what for gangs he not forward wi' you himsel'?'

Waverley had but very little of a captain of horse's spirit within him-I mean of that sort of spirit which I have been obliged to when I happened, in a mail-coach, or diligence, to meet some military man who has kindly taken upon him the disciplining of the waiters, and the taxing of reckonings. Some of this useful talent our hero had, however, acquired during his military service, and on this gross provocation it began seriously to arise. Look ye, sir; I came here for my own accommodation, and not to answer impertinent questions. Either say you can, or cannot, get me what I want; I shall pursue my course in either case.

Mr. Ebenezer Cruickshanks left the room with some indistinct muttering; but whether negative or acquiescent, Edward could not well distinguish. The hostess, a civil, quiet, laborious drudge, came to take his orders for dinner, but declined to make answer on the subject of the horse and guide; for the Salique law, it seems, extended to the stables of the Golden Candlestick.

From a window which overlooked the dark and narrow court in which Callum Beg rubbed down the horses after their journey, Waverley heard the following dialogue betwixt the subtile foot-page of Vich Ian Vohr and his landlord :'Ye'll be frae the north, young man?' began

the latter.

And ye may say that,' answered Callum. And ye'll hae ridden a lang way the day, it may weel be?'

Sae lang, that I could weel tak a dram.' 'Gudewife, bring the gill stoup.'

Here some compliments passed, fitting the occasion, when my host of the Golden Candlestick, having, as he thought, opened his guest's heart by this hospitable propitiation, resumed his scrutiny.

'Ye'll no hae mickle better whisky than that aboon the Pass?'

'I am nae frae aboon the Pass.'

'Ye're a Highlandman by your tongue?' 'Na; I am but just Aberdeen-a-way.' 'And did your master come frae Aberdeen wi' you?'

Ay-that's when I left it mysel',' answered the cool and impenetrable Callum Beg. 'And what kind of a gentleman is he? 'I believe he is ane o' King George's state officers; at least, he's aye for ganging on to the south; and he has a hantle siller, and never grudges onything till a poor body, or in the way of a lawing.'

He wants a guide and a horse frae hence to Edinburgh?'

'Ay, and ye maun find it him forthwith.' Ahem! It will be chargeable.'

'He cares na for that a bodle.' 'Aweel, Duncan-did ye say your name was Duncan, or Donald?'

'Na, man-Jamie-Jamie Steenson—I telt ye before.'

This last undaunted parry altogether foiled Mr. Cruickshanks, who, though not quite satisfied either with the reserve of the master, or the extreme readiness of the man, was contented to lay a tax on the reckoning and horse-hire, that might compound for his ungratified curiosity. The circumstance of its being the fast-day was not forgotten in the charge, which, on the whole, did not, however, amount to much more than double what in fairness it should have been.

Callum Beg soon after announced in person the ratification of this treaty, adding, Ta auld deevil was ganging to ride wi' ta Duinhé-wassel hersel'.'

'That will not be very pleasant, Callum, nor altogether safe, for our host seems a person of great curiosity; but a traveller must submit to these inconveniences. Meanwhile, my good lad, here is a trifle for you to drink Vich Ian Vohr's health.'

The hawk's eye of Callum flashed delight upon a golden guinea, with which these last words were accompanied. He hastened, not without a curse on the intricacies of a Saxon breeches pocket, or spleuchan, as he called it, to deposit the treasure in his fob; and then, as if he conceived the benevolence called for some requital on his part, he gathered close up to Edward, with an expression of countenance peculiarly knowing, and spoke in an under tone, 'If his honour thought ta auld deevil Whig carle was a bit dangerous, she could easily provide for him,and teil ane ta wiser.'

'How, and in what manner?'

'Her ainsel',' replied Callum, 'could wait for him a wee bit frae the toun, and kittle his quarters wi' her skene-occle.'

'Skene-occle! what's that?'

Callum unbuttoned his coat, raised his left arm, and with an emphatic nod, pointed to the hilt of a small dirk, snugly deposited under it, in the lining of his jacket. Waverley thought he had understood his meaning; he gazed in his face, and discovered in Callum's very handsome, though embrowned features, just the degree of roguish malice with which a lad of the same age in England would have brought forward a plan for robbing an orchard.

'Good God, Callum, would you take the man's life?'

'Indeed,' answered the young desperado, 'and I think he has had just a lang enough lease o't, when he's for betraying honest folk, that come to spend siller at his public.'

Edward saw nothing was to be gained by argument, and therefore contented himself with enjoining Callum to lay aside all practices against the person of Mr. Ebenezer Cruickshanks; in which injunction the page seemed to acquiesce with an air of great indifference.

'Ta Duinhé-wassel might please himsel'; ta auld rudas loon had never done Callum nae ill. But here's a bit line frae ta Tighearna, tat he bade me gie your honour ere I came back.'

The letter from the Chief contained Flora's lines on the fate of Captain Wogan, whose enterprising character is so well drawn by Clarendon. He had originally engaged in the service of the Parliament, but had abjured that party upon the execution of Charles I.; and upon hearing that the Royal Standard was set up by the Earl of Glencairn and General Middleton in the Highlands of Scotland, took leave of Charles II., who was then at Paris, passed into England, assembled a body of cavaliers in the neighbourhood of London, and traversed the kingdom, which had been so long under domination of the usurper, by marches conducted with such skill, dexterity, and spirit, that he safely united his handful of horsemen with the body of Highlanders then in arms. After several months of desultory warfare, in which Wogan's skill and courage gained him the highest reputation, he had the misfortune to be wounded in a dangerous manner, and no surgical assistance being within reach, he terminated his short but glorious career.

There were obvious reasons why the politic Chieftain was desirous to place the example of this young hero under the eye of Waverley, with whose romantic disposition it coincided so peculiarly. But his letter turned chiefly upon some trifling commissions which Waverley had promised to execute for him in England, and it was only toward the conclusion that Edward found these words :-'I owe Flora a grudge for refusing us her company yesterday; and as I am giving you the trouble of reading these lines, in order to keep in your memory your promise to procure me the fishing-tackle and cross-bow from London, I will enclose her verses on the Grave of Wogan. This I know will tease her; for, to tell you the truth, I think her more in love with the memory of that dead hero, than she is likely to be with any living one, unless he shall tread a similar path. But English squires of our day keep their oak-trees to shelter their deer-parks, or repair the losses of an evening at

White's, and neither invoke them to wreath their brows nor shelter their graves. Let me hope for one brilliant exception in a dear friend, to whom I would most gladly give a dearer title.'

The verses were inscribed,

To an Oak-Tree,

In the Churchyard of in the Highlands of Scotland, said to mark the Grave of Captain Wogan, killed in 1649.

Emblem of England's ancient faith,

Full proudly may thy branches wave,
Where loyalty lies low in death,

And valour fills a timeless grave.

And thou, brave tenant of the tomb!
Repine not if our clime deny,
Above thine honoured sod to bloom,
The flowerets of a milder sky.

These owe their birth to genial May;
Beneath a fiercer sun they pine,
Before the winter storm decay-

And can their worth be type of thine?

No! for 'mid storms of Fate opposing,

Still higher swell'd thy dauntless heart,
And, while Despair the scene was closing,
Commenced thy brief but brilliant part.

'Twas then thou sought'st, on Albyn's hill,
(When England's sons the strife resigned),
A rugged race, resisting still,

And unsubdued, though unrefined.

Thy death's hour heard no kindred wail,
No holy knell thy requiem rung:
Thy mourners were the plaided Gael;
Thy dirge the clamorous pibroch sung.
Yet who, in Fortune's summer-shine,
To waste life's longest term away,
Would change that glorious dawn of thine,
Though darkened ere its noontide day?

Be thine the Tree whose dauntless boughs
Brave summer's drought and winter's gloom!
Rome bound with oak her patriots' brows,
As Albyn shadows Wogan's tomb.

Whatever might be the real merit of Flora Mac-Ivor's poetry, the enthusiasm which it intimated was well calculated to make a corresponding impression upon her lover. The lines were read-read again-then deposited in Waverley's bosom-then again drawn out, and read line by line, in a low and smothered voice, and with frequent pauses which prolonged the mental treat, as an epicure protracts, by sipping slowly, the enjoyment of a delicious beverage. The entrance of Mrs. Cruickshanks, with the sublunary articles of dinner and wine, hardly interrupted this pantomime of affectionate enthusiasm.

At length the tall ungainly figure and ungracious visage of Ebenezer presented themselves. The upper part of his form, notwithstanding the season required no such defence, was shrouded in a large great-coat, belted over his under habiliments, and crested with a huge cowl of the same stuff, which, when drawn over the head and hat, completely overshadowed both, and being buttoned beneath the chin, was called a trot

might have executed his threat, had he not been withheld by a part of the mob, while the rest endeavoured to force the termagant out of his presence.

Waverley meditated a retreat in the confusion, but his horse was nowhere to be seen. At length he observed, at some distance, his faithful attendant, Ebenezer, who, as soon as he had perceived the turn matters were likely to take, had withdrawn both horses from the press, and, mounted on the one, and holding the other, answered the loud and repeated calls of Waverley for his horse-Na, na! if ye are nae friend to kirk and the king, and are detained as siccan a person, ye maun answer to honest men of the country for breach of contract; and I maun keep the naig and the walise for damage and expense, in respect my horse and mysel' will lose to-morrow's day's-wark, besides the afternoon preaching.'

Edward, out of patience, hemmed in and hustled by the rabble on every side, and every moment expecting personal violence, resolved to try measures of intimidation, and at length drew a pocket-pistol, threatening, on the one hand, to shoot whomsoever dared to stop him, and, on the other, menacing Ebenezer with a similar doom, if he stirred a foot with the horses. The sapient Partridge says, that one man with a pistol is equal to a hundred unarmed, because, though he can shoot but one of the multitude, yet no one knows but that he himself may be that luckless individual. The levée en masse of Cairnvreckan would therefore probably have given way, nor would Ebenezer, whose natural paleness had waxed three shades more cadaverous, have ventured to dispute a mandate so enforced, had not the Vulcan of the village, eager to discharge upon some more worthy object the fury which his helpmate had provoked, and not ill satisfied to find such an object in Waverley, rushed at him with the red-hot bar of iron, with such determination as made the discharge of his pistol an act of self-defence. The unfortunate man fell; and while Edward, thrilled with a natural horror at the incident, neither had presence of mind to unsheathe his sword nor to draw his remaining pistol, the populace threw themselves upon him, disarmed him, and were about to use him with great violence, when the appearance of a venerable clergyman, the pastor of the parish, put a curb on their fury.

This worthy man (none of the Goukthrapples or Rentowels) maintained his character with the common people, although he preached the practical fruits of Christian faith, as well as its abstract tenets, and was respected by the higher orders, notwithstanding he declined soothing their speculative errors by converting the pulpit of the gospel into a school of heathen morality. Perhaps it is owing to this mixture of faith and practice in his doctrine that, although his memory has formed a sort of era in the annals of Cairnvreckan, so that the parishioners, to denote what befell Sixty Years since, still say it happened in good Mr. Morton's time,' I have never been able to discover which he belonged to, the evangelical or the moderate party in the kirk. Nor do I hold the circumstance of much moment, since, in my own

remembrance, the one was headed by an Erskine, the other by a Robertson.*

Mr. Morton had been alarmed by the discharge of the pistol and the increasing hubbub around the smithy. His first attention, after he had directed the bystanders to detain Waverley, but to abstain from injuring him, was turned to the body of Mucklewrath, over which his wife, in a revulsion of feeling, was weeping, howling, and tearing her elf-locks, in a state little short of distraction. On raising up the smith, the first discovery was, that he was alive; and the next, that he was likely to live as long as if he had never heard the report of a pistol in his life. He had made a narrow escape, however; the bullet had grazed his head, and stunned him for a moment or two, which trance terror and confusion of spirit had prolonged somewhat longer. He now rose to demand vengeance on the person of Waverley, and with difficulty acquiesced in the proposal of Mr. Morton, that he should be carried before the laird, as a justice of peace, and placed at his disposal. The rest of the assistants unanimously agreed to the measure recommended; even Mrs. Mucklewrath, who had begun to recover from her hysterics, whimpered forth, 'She wadna say naething against what the minister proposed; he was e'en owre gude for his trade, and she hoped to see him wi' a dainty decent bishop's gown on his back; a comelier sight than your Geneva cloaks and bands, I wis.'

All controversy being thus laid aside, Waverley, escorted by the whole inhabitants of the village who were not bed-ridden, was conducted to the house of Cairnvreckan, which was about half a mile distant.

CHAPTER XXXI.

AN EXAMINATION.

MAJOR MELVILLE of Cairnvreckan, an elderly gentleman who had spent his youth in the military service, received Mr. Morton with great kindness and our hero with civility, which the equivocal circumstances wherein Edward was placed rendered constrained and distant.

The nature of the smith's hurt was inquired into, and as the actual injury was likely to prove trifling, and the circumstances in which it was received rendered the infliction, on Edward's part, a natural act of self-defence, the Major conceived he might dismiss that matter, on Waverley's depositing in his hands a small sum for the benefit of the wounded person.

'I could wish, sir,' continued the Major, that my duty terminated here; but it is necessary that we should have some further

The Rev. John Erskine, D.D., an eminent Scottish divine, and a most excellent man, headed the Evangelical party in the Church of Scotland at the time when the celebrated Dr. Robertson, the historian, was the leader of the Moderate party. These two distinguished persons were colleagues in the Old Grey-Friars' Church, Edinburgh; and, however much they differed in church politics, preserved the most perfect harmony as private friends, and as clergymen serving the same cure.