that might be proposed in example to ladies of much superior musical talent. Her natural good sense taught her, that if, as we are assured by high authority, music "be married to immortal verse," they are very often divorced by the performer in a most shameful manner. It was perhaps, owing to this sensibility to poetry, and power of combining its expression with those of the musical notes, that her singing gave more pleasure to all the unlearned in music, and even to many of the learned, than could have been extracted by a much finer voice and more brilliant execution, unguided by the same delicacy of feeling. A bartizan, or projecting gallery, before the windows of her parlour, served to illustrate another of Rose's pursuits, for it was crowded with flowers of different kinds, which she had taken under her special protection. A projecting turret gave access to this gothic balcony, which commanded a most beautiful prospect. The formal garden, with its high bounding walls, lay below, contracted, as it seemed, to a mere parterre; while the view extended beyond them down a wooded glen, where the river was sometimes visible, sometimes hidden in copse. The eye might be delayed by a desire to rest on the rocks, which here and there rose from the dell with massive or spiry fronts, or it might dwell on the noble, though ruined tower, which was here seen in all its dignity, frowning from a promontory over the river. To the left were seen two or three cottages, a part of the village; the brow of a hill concealed the others. The glen, or dell, was terminated by a sheet of water called Loch Veolan, into which the brook discharged itself, and which now glistened in the western sun. The distant country seemed open and varied in surface, though not wooded; and there was nothing to interrupt the view until the scene was bounded by a ridge of distant and blue hills, which formed the southern boundery of the strath or valley. To this pleasant station Miss Bradwardine had ordered coffee. The view of the old tower of fortalice, introduced some family anecdotes and tales of Scottish chivalry, which the baron told with great enthusiasm. The projecting peak of an impending crag, which rose near it, had acquired the name of St. Swithin's Chair. It was the scene of a peculiar superstition of which Mr. Rubrick mentioned some curious particulars, which reminded Waverley of a rhyme quoted by Edgar in King Lear; and Rose was called upon to sing a little legend in which they had been interwoven by some village poet, Who, noteless as the race from which he sprung The sweetness of her voice, and the simple beauty of her music, gave all the advantage which the minstrel could have desired, and which his poetry so much wanted. I almost doubt if it can be read with patience, destitute of those advantages; although I conjecture, the following copy to have been somewhat corrected by Waverley, to suit the taste of those who might not relish pure antiquity; St. Swithin's Chair. On Hallow Mass Eve, ere you boune ye to rest, Sign it with cross, and sain it with bead, Sing the Ave and say the creed, For on Hallow-Mass Eve the Night-Hag will ride Sailing through moonshine, or swath'd in the cloud. The lady she sate in St. Swithin's Chair, Was the word of her lip, and the glance of her eye. She mutter'd the spell of St. Swithin bold, When he stopped the Hag as she rode the night, He that dare sit in St. Swithin's Chair, The baron has been with King Robert his liege, She shudders and stops, as the charm she speaks; Or is it that sound betwixt laughter and scream, The moan of the wind sunk silent and low, * "I am sorry to disappoint the company, especially Captain Waverley, who listens with such laudible gravity it is but a fragment, although I think there are other verses, describing the return of the baron from the wars, and how the lady was found 'clay cold upon the grounsill ledge.' "It is one of those fragments," observed Mr. Bradwardine," with which the early history of distinguished families was deformed in the times of superstition; as that of Rome, and other ancient nations, had their prodigies, sir, the which you may read in ancient histories, or in the little work compiled by Julius Obsequens, and inscribed by the learned Scheffer, the editor to his patron, Benedictus Skyttee, Baron of Dudershoff." "My father has a strange defiance of the marvellous. Captain Waverley, and once stood firm when a whole 1 synod of presbyterian divines were put to the rout by a sudden apparition of the foul fiend." Waverley looked as if desirous to hear more. "Must I tell my story as well as sing my song?Well-Once upon a time there lived an old woman, called Janet Gellatly, who was suspected to be a witch, on the infallible grounds that she was very old, very ugly, very poor, and had two sons, one of whom was a poet, and the other a fool, which visitation, all the neighbourhood agreed, had come upon her for the sin of witchcraft. And she was imprisoned for a week in the steeple of the parish church, and sparely supplied with food, and not permitted to sleep, until she herself became as much persuaded of her being a witch, as her accusers; and in this lucid and happy state of mind was brought forth to make a clean breast, that is, to make open confession of her sorceries before all the whig gentry and ministers in the vicinity, who were no conjurers themselves. My father went to see fair play between the witch and the clergy; for the witch had been born on his estate. And while the witch was confessing that the enemy appeared, and made his addresses to her as a handsome black man-which, if you could have seen poor old bleareyed Janet, reflected little honour on Apollyon's taste-and while the auditors listened with astonished ears, and the clerk recorded with a trembling hand, she, all of a sudden, changed the low mumbling tone with which she spoke, into a shrill yell, and exclaimed, Look to yourselves! look to yourselves! I see the Evil One seated in the midst of ye.' The surprise was general, and terror and flight its immediate consequence. Happy were those who were next the door; and many were the disasters that befell hats, bands, cuffs, and wigs, 'before they could get out of the church, where they left the obstinate prelatist to settle matters with the witch and her admirer, at his own peril or pleasure." “Risu solvuntur tabulæ," said the baron; when they recovered their panic trepidation, they were toe much ashamed to bring any wakening of the process against Janet Gellatly.' This anecdote led into a long discussion of All those idle thoughts and fantasties And all that feigned is as leasings, tales, and lies. With such conversation, and the romantic legends which it introduced, closed our hero's second evening in the house of Tully-Veolan. CHAPTER XIV. A discovery-Waverley becomes domesticated at Tully-Veolan. THE next morning Edward arose betimes, and in a morning walk around the house and its vicinity, came suddenly upon a small court in front of the dog-kennel, where his friend Davie was employed about his four-footed charge. One quick glance of his eye recognised Waverley, when, instantly turning his back, as if he had not observed him, he began to sing part an old ballad: Young men will love thee more fair and more fast, Old men's the longest will last, And the throstle-cock's head is under his wing. of |