THE
SCOTTISH CAVALIER.

An Historical Romance.

BY JAMES GRANT, ESQ.,

AUTHOR OF
"THE ROMANCE OF WAR, OR THE GORDON HIGHLANDERS,"
"MEMOIRS OF KIRKALDY OF GRANGE," &C.

Dost thou admit his right,
Thus to transfer our ancient Scottish crown?
Ay, Scotland was a kingdom once,
And, by the might of God, a kingdom still shall be!
ROBERT THE BRUCE, ACT II.

IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.

LONDON:
HENRY COLBURN, PUBLISHER,
GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.
1850.

Contents

[Preface]
I. [The Place of Bruntisfield]
II. [The Preacher]
III. [The Old Clockcase]
IV. [A Pair of Blue Eyes]
V. [A Pair of Rapiers]
VI. [The Old Tolbooth]
VII. [The Laigh Council House]
VIII. [The Privy Council]
IX. [Dejection]
X. [Hope]
XI. [Clermistonlee at Home]
XII. [The Cottage of Elsie]
XIII. [A Reverse]
XIV. [Walter and Lilian]
XV. [Love and Burnt-sack]
XVI. [The Ten O'Clock Drum]
XVII. [Clermistonlee Makes a Bad Mistake]
XVIII. [The Growth of Love and Hope]
XIX. [The Old Scottish Service]

PREFACE.

From the historical and descriptive nature of the following tale, the Author intended that certain passages should be illustrated with notes, containing the local traditions and authorities from which it has been derived; but on second thoughts he has preferred confining these explanations to the preface.

History will have rendered familiar to the reader the names of many who bear a prominent part in the career of Walter Fenton; but there are other characters of minor importance, who, though less known to fame than Dundee and Dunbarton, were beings who really lived and breathed, and acted a part in the great drama of those days. Among these, we may particularise Douglas, of Finland, and Annie Laurie.

This lady was one of the four daughters of Sir Robert Laurie, the first Baronet of Maxwelton, and it was to her that Finland inscribed those well-known verses, and that little air which now bear her name, and are so wonderfully plaintive and chaste for the time; but it is painful to record that, notwithstanding all the ardour and devotion of her lover, the fair Annie was wedded as described in the romance. Her father, Sir Robert, was created a baronet in 1685.

The Old Halberdier and Hugh Blair (mentioned so frequently) are also real characters. The former distinguished himself at the battle of Sedgemoor, and by a Royal Order, dated 26th February, 1686, received "forty pounds for his good service in firing the great guns against the rebells" who were opposed to Sir James Halkett's Royal Scots. The tavern of Hugh Blair was long celebrated in Edinburgh. His name will be found in Blackadder's Memoirs, and frequently among the Decisions of Lord Fountainhall, in disputes concerning various runlets of Frontiniac, &c.

Lord Mersington was exactly the personage he is described in the following pages—an unprincipled sot. From Cruickshank's History it appears that his lady was banished the liberties of Edinburgh in 1674, for being engaged in the female assembly which insulted Archbishop Sharpe.

Of Thomas Butler, an unfortunate Irish gentleman connected with the ducal house of Ormond, who bears a prominent part in Volume III., an account will be found in the London Papers of 1720, in which year he was executed at Tyburn as a highwayman.

The song mentioned so frequently, and the burden of which is Lillibulero bullen a la! was a favorite whig ditty, and the chorus was formed by the pass-words used during the Irish massacre of 1641.

The principal locality of the story is the Wrightshouse or Castle of Bruntisfield, which stood near the Burghmuir of Edinburgh, and was unwisely removed in 1800, to make way for that hideous erection—the hospital of Gillespie. As described in the romance, it was a magnificent chateau in the old Scoto-French style of architecture, and was completely encrusted with legends, devices, armorial bearings, and quaint bassi relievi.

It was of great antiquity, and over the central door were the arms of Britain, with the initials J. VI. M. B. F. E. H. R.

Amid a singular profusion of sculptured figures representing Hope, Faith, Charity, &c., was a bas-relief of Adam and Eve in Eden, bearing the following legend:—

Quhen Adam delvd and Eve span
Quhar war a' the gentiles than?

Between them was a female representing Taste, and inscribed Gustus. "On the eastern front of the castle was sculptured a head of Julius Cæsar, and under it Caius Jul. Cæsar, primus Rom. Imp. On the eastern wing were figures of Temperentia, Prudentia, and Justitia, which it is remarkable were among the first stones thrown down." (Scots Mag., 1800.) On the west wing was a Roman head of Octavius II., and five representations of the Virtues, beautifully sculptured. Sicut oliva fructifera 1376, In Domino Confido, 1400, Patriæ et Posteris, and many other valuable carvings, which are now preserved at Woodhouselee, adorned the walls and windows.

The east wing was said to have been built by Robert III.; Arnot informs us, that the centre was erected by James IV. for one of his mistresses, and about the close of the last century, Hamilton of Barganie made many additions to it. How the edifice obtained the name of Wright's or Wryte's-house is now unknown, as no proprietor of it who bore that name can now be traced; but the Napiers appear to have possessed the barony from an early period, and their names frequently occur in local records.

Alexander Napier de Wrichtyshouse appears as one of an inquest in 1488. His coat-armorial was a bend charged with a crescent, between two mullets. He married Margaret Napier of Merchiston, whose father was slain at the battle of Flodden. In 1581, among the commissioners appointed by James VI., "anent the cuinze," we find William Napier of the Wrightshouse, (Acta Parliamentorum) and in 1590, Barbara Napier, his sister, was convicted of sorcery, for which on the llth of May she was sentenced to be burnt at a "stake sett on the Castellhill, with barrels, coales, heather, and powder;" but when the torch was about to be applied, pregnancy was alleged, and the execution delayed. (Calderwood's Historic.)

In 1632, William of the Wrightshouse was a commissioner at Holyrood, anent the valuation of Tiends ; and two years after we find him retoured heir to his father William in certain lands in Berwickshire; but in 1626, "terrarum de Brounisfield, infra parochiam de Sanct. Cuthbert" belonged to Sir William Fairlie of Braid. In 1649 he obtained a crown charter of his lands (MS. Mag. Sigilli), and in 1680, the last notice of this old family will be found in the Inquisitionum Retornatarum, where it ends in a female.

Thus about the close of the 17th century, the Napiers had passed away, and their barony was possessed by the Laird of Pennicuick. All that now remains of them is their burial place on the north side of St. Giles' Cathedral, where may still be seen their mouldering coat-armorial, with this inscription:—

S. E. D.
Fam. de Naperarum interibus,
Hic situm est.

EDINBURGH, March, 1850.

WALTER FENTON;

OR,

THE SCOTTISH CAVALIER.

CHAPTER I.
THE PLACE OF BRUNTISFIELD.

There is nae Covenant noo, Lassie,
There is nae covenant, noo;
The solemn league and covenant,
Are a' broken through.
OLD SONG.

One evening in the month of March, 1688, a party of thirty soldiers mustered rapidly and silently under the arches of the White Horse Hostel, an old and well-known inn on the north side of the Canongate of Edinburgh. The night was dark and cold, and a high wind swept in gusts down the narrow way between the picturesque houses of that venerable street and the steep side of the bare and rocky Calton-hill.

Gathering in cautious silence, the soldiers scarcely permitted the butts of their heavy matchlocks to touch the pavement: in a loud whisper the officer gave the order to march, and they moved off with the same air of quietness and rapidity which characterized their muster, and showed that a very secret or important duty was about to be executed.

In those days the ranks were drawn up three deep, and such was the mode until a later period; so, by simply facing a body of men to the right or left, they found themselves three abreast without confusion or delay.

"Fenton," said the officer to a young man who carried a pike beside him, "keep rearward. You are wont to have the eye of a hawk; and if any impertinent citizen appears to watch us, lay thy truncheon across his pate."

This injunction was unnecessary; for those belated citizens who saw them, hurried past, glad to escape unquestioned. In those days, when every corporal of horse or foot, was vested with more judicial powers than the Lord Justice General, the night march of a band of soldiers was studiously to be avoided. Aware that some "deed of persecution" was about to be acted, the occasional wayfarers hurried on, or turned altogether aside, when forewarned that soldiers appeared, by the measured tread of feet, by the gleam of a gun-barrel, or cone of a helmet glinting in the rays of light that shot from half-closed windows into the palpable darkness.

These soldiers belonged to the regiment of George Earl of Dunbarton, the oldest in the Scottish army, and a body of such antiquity, that they were jocularly known in France as Pontius Pilate's Guards. With red coats, they wore morions of black unpolished iron; breast-plates of the same metal, crossed by buff belts which sustained their swords, fixing-daggers and collars of bandoleers, as the twelve little wooden cases, each containing a charge of powder, were named. Their breeches and stockings were of bright scarlet, and each had a long musket sloped on his shoulder, with its lighted match gleaming like a glowworm in the dark. The officer was distinguished by a plume that waved from a tube on his gilded helmet, which, like his gorget, was of polished steel, while to denote his rank he carried a half-pike, in addition to his rapier and dagger, and wore a black corslet richly engraved and studded with nails of gold, conform to the Royal Order of 1686. He was a handsome fellow, tall, and well set up, with a heavy dark mustache, and a face like each of his soldiers, well bronzed by the sun of France and Tangiers.

In that age, the closes and wynds of the Scottish capital were like those of ancient Paris or modern Lisbon, narrow, smoky, and crowded, unpaved, unlighted, and encumbered with heaps of rubbish and mud, which obstructed the gutters and lay in fœtid piles, until heavy rains swept all the debris of the city down from its lofty ridge into the Loch on the north, or the ancient communis ma, on the south. At night the careful citizen carried a lantern—the bold one his sword; for men generally walked abroad well armed, and none ever rode without a pair of long iron pistols at his saddle-bow.

The late king had made every kind of dissipation fashionable; and after night-fall the gallants of the city swaggered about the Craimes or the Abbey-Close, muffled in their cloaks like conspirators; and despite the axes of the city guard, and the halberds of the provost, excesses were committed hourly; and seldom a night passed without the clash of rapiers and the shouts of cavalier brawlers being heard ringing in the dark thoroughfares of the city. Thieves were hanged, coiners were quartered, covenanters beheaded, and witches burned, until executions failed to excite either interest or horror; but with the plumed and buff-booted Ruffler of the day, who brawled and fought from a sheer love of mischief and wine, what plebeian baillie or pumpkin-headed city-guard would have dared to find fault? Of this more anon.

Stumbling through the dark streets, the party of soldiers marched past the Pleasance Porte, above the arch of which grinned a white row of five bare skulls, which had been bleaching there since 1681. Every barrier of Edinburgh was garnished with these terrible trophies of maladministration.

Leaving behind them the ancient suburb, they diverged upon the road near the old ruined convent of St. Mary of Placentia, which, from the hill of St. Leonard, reared up its ivied walls in shattered outline. Beyond, and towering up abruptly from the lonely glen below, frowned the tremendous front of Salisbury craigs. The rising moon showed its broad and shining disc, red and fiery above their black rocks, and fitfully between the hurrying clouds, its rays streamed down the Hauze, a deep and ghastly defile, formed by some mighty convulsion of nature, when these vast craigs had been rent from that ridgy mountain, where King Arthur sat of old, and watched his distant gallies on the waters of the Roman Bodoria.

For a moment the moonlight streamed down the defile, on the hill of St. Leonard, with its thatched cottages and ruined convent, on the glancing armour of the soldiers, and the bare trees bordering the highway; again the passing clouds enveloped it in opaque masses, and all was darkness.

"Sergeant Wemyss," cried the cavalier officer, breaking the silence which had till then been observed.

"Here, an't please your honour," responded the halberdier.

"Where tarries that loitering abbeylubber, who was to have joined us on the march?"

"The Macer?"

"Ay, he with the council's warrant for this dirty work."

"Yonder he stands, I believe, your honour, by the ruins of the mass-monging days," replied the sergeant, pointing to a figure which a passing gleam of the moon revealed emerging from the ruins.

"Mean you that tall spunger in the red Rocquelaure? To judge by his rapier and feather, he is a gentleman, but one that seems to watch us. So, ho, sir! a good even; you are late abroad to-night."

"At your service, Sir," responded the other gruffly behind the cape of his cloak, which, in the fashion of an intriguing gallant of the day, he wore so high up as completely to conceal his face.

"For King or for Covenant, Sir?" asked the lieutenant, who was Richard Douglas, of Finland.

"Tush!" laughed the stranger; "this is an old-fashioned test; you should have asked," he added, in a lower voice, "For James VII., or William of Orange! ha, hah!"

"Hush, my Lord Clermistonlee, by this light."

"Right, by Jove!" exclaimed the other, who was considerably intoxicated.

"Body o' me! it ill beseems one of His Majesty's Privy Councillors to be roving abroad thus like a night hawk."

"I am the best judge of my own actions, Mr. Douglas," replied the lord haughtily; but added in a whisper, "you are bound for the Wrytes-house?"

"To the point, my Lord?" rejoined Douglas, drily.

"You will take particular care that the young lady—tush, I mean the old one—they must not escape, as you shall answer to the Council. Dost comprehend me—the young lady of Bruntisfield, eh?"

"Too well, my Lord," replied the cavalier, drawing himself up, and shaking his lofty plume with undisguised hauteur. "Curse on the libertine fool!" he exclaimed to the young pikeman, as he hurried after his party; "would he make me his pimp? By Heaven! he well deserves a slash in the doublet for casting his eyes upon noble ladies, as he would on the bona-robas of Merlin's Wynd."

The young man's hand gradually sought the hilt of his poniard.

"What said he, Finland?" he asked, with a kindling eye and a reddening cheek. "He spoke of the Napiers, did he not?"

"Only to this purpose, that on peril of our beards the ladies do not escape, especially the younger one. Hah! they say this ruffling libertine hath long looked unutterable things at Lilian Napier. He is a deep intriguer, and the devil only knows what plots he may be hatching now against her."

"S'death! Finland, assure me of this, and by Heaven I will brain him with my partisan!"

"Hush, lad! these words are dangerous. You are but a young soldier yet, Walter," continued the officer, laughing; "had you trailed a pike under Henry de la Tour of Auvergne, and the old Mareschal Crecqy, like me, you would ere this have learned to value a girl's tears and a grandam's groans at the same ransom, perhaps. But, egad, I had rather than my burganet full of broad pieces, that this night's duty had fallen on any other than myself; and I think, Major, the Chevalier Drumquhazel (as we call him) might have selected some of those old fellows whose iron faces and iron hearts will bear them through anything."

"Why, Finland," rejoined the pikeman, "you are not wont to be backward!"

"Never when bullets or blades are to be encountered; but to worry an old preacher, and harry the house and barony of an ancient and noble matron, by all the devils! 'tis not work for men of honour. The Napiers of Bruntisfield are soothfast friends of the Lauries of Maxwelton—and my dear little Annie—thou knowest, Walter, that her wicked waggery will never let me hear the end of it, if we march the Napiers to the Tolbooth to-night."

"You see the advantage of being alone in this bad and hollow-hearted world," said Fenton, in a tone of bitterness, "of being uncaring and utterly uncared for."

"Again in one of thy moody humours!"

"I have trailed this pike——"

"True—since Sedgemoor-field was fought and lost by Monmouth; but cheer up, my gallant. If this rascal, William of Orange, unfurls his banner among us, we will have battles and leaguers enough; ay, faith! to which the Race of Dunbar, and the Sack of Dundee, will be deemed but child's-play. And hark! for thy further contentment, I trailed a partisan for four long years under Turenne ere I obtained a pair of colours; and then I thought my fortune made; but thou see'st, Walter, I am only a poor lieutenant still. Uncaring and uncared for! Bravo! 'tis the frame of mind to make an unscrupulous lad do his devoire as becomes a soldier. And yet I assure thee, friend Walter, if aught in Scotland will make a man swerve from his duty—ay, even old Thomas Dalzel, that heart of steel—'tis the blue eyes of Lilian Napier, of Bruntisfield. The beauty of her person is equalled only by the winning grace of her manner; and I swear to thee, that not even Mary of Charteris, or my own merry Annie, have brighter charms—a redder lip, or a whiter hand. Hast seen her, lad?"

"Oh, yes," replied the young man with vivacity, "a thousand times."

"And spoken to her?"

"Alas, no!" was the response, "not for these past three years at least."

There was a sadness in his voice, which, with the sigh accompanying his words, conveyed a great deal—but only to the wind—for the gayer cavalier marked it not.

"If we start the game—I mean these Dutch renegades on the Napiers' barony—it will go hard with them in these times, when every day brings to light some new plot against the Government. Napier of the Wrytes—'tis an old and honourable line, and loth will I be to see it humbled."

"What can prompt ladies of honour to meddle in matters of kirk or state?"

"The great father of confusion who usually presides at the head of our Scottish affairs. True, Walter, the rock, the cod, and the bobbins become them better; but I shall be sorry to exact marching-money and free quarters from old Lady Grizel. Clermistonlee is the source of this accusation, which alleges that her ladyship knows of an intended invasion from Holland, and that she hath reset two emissaries of the House of Orange. But a word in thine ear, Fenton; there are villains at our Council-board who more richly merit the cord of the Provost Marshal; and Randal Clermont, of Clermistonlee, is not the least undeserving of such exaltation."

"If the soldiers overhear, you are a lost man."

"God save King James and sain King Charles, say I! but to old Mahoud with the Council, which is driving the realm to ruin at full gallop. Hah! here comes, at last, this loitering villain, the macer," added Finland, as the moonlight revealed a man running after them. "Fellow! why the deuce did you not meet us at the White Horse Cellar?"

"Troth, Sir, just to tell ye the truth," replied the panting functionary, drawing his gilt baton from the pocket of his voluminous skirt, "it is a kittle job this, and likely to get a puir man like me unco ill will in such uncanny times—but I stayed a wee while owre late may be, biding the ale cogue, at Lucky Dreep's change-house in the Kirk-o'-field Wynd. However, Sir, follow me, and we'll catch these traitors where the reiver fand the tangs—at Madam's fire-side."

"Follow thee!" reiterated the cavalier officer, contemptuously; "malediction on the hour when a Douglas of Finland and a band of the old Scottish Musqueteers are bent on the same errand with a knave like thee! Step out, my lads, and, Walter Fenton, do thou fall rearward again, and see that we are neither followed nor watched; for, egad! these are times to sharpen one's wits."

Thus ordered, our hero (for such is the handsome pikeman) fell gradually to the rear, and stopped at times to bend his ear to the ground and his eyes on the changing shadows of the moonlit scenery; but he heard nothing save the blustering wind of March, which swept through the hollow dells, and saw only the shadows of the flying clouds cast by the bright moon on the fields through which the soldiers marched.

They had now passed all the houses of the city, and were moving westward, by the banks of the Burghloch, a broad and beautiful sheet of water, upwards of a mile in length, shaded on one side by the broken woods of Warrender and the old orchards of the convent of Sienna; on the other, open fields extended from its margin to the embattled walls of the city. One moment it shone like a sheet of polished silver; the next it lay like a lake of ink, as the passing clouds revealed or obscured the full-orbed moon.

"What lights are those twinkling in the woods yonder?" asked Finland, pointing northward with his pike, on his party reaching the rhinns, or flat at the end of the lake.

"The house of Coates, Sir—the old patrimony of the Byres o' that Ilk."

"Harkee, macer, and the dark pile rising on the height, further to the westward."

"The Place of Drumsheugh, Sir, pertaining of auld to my Lord Clermistonlee. He was just the gudeman thereof before these kittle times. A dark and eerie place it is, where neither light has burned nor fire bleezed—a joke been cracked nor a runlet broached these mony lang years. He is a dour cheild that Clermistonlee, and one that would—"

"Twist thy hause, fellow," said the pikeman, sternly, "for speaking of your betters otherwise than with the reverence that becomes your station."

"Ye craw brawly for the spawn o' an auld covenanter," muttered the macer between his teeth, as they entered the dark avenue that led to the place of their destination; "brawly indeed! but may-be I'll hae ye under my hands yet, for a' your iron bravery and gay gauds."

CHAPTER II.
THE PREACHER.

A stranger, and a slave, unknown like him,
Proposing much means little;—talks and vows,
Delighted with the prospect of a change,
He promised to redeem ten Christians more,
And free us all from slavery.
ZARA.

On the succession of James VII. to the throne, the persecution of the covenanters by the civil authorities, and by the troops under Dalzel, Claverhouse, Lag, and officers of their selection, was waged without pity or remorse, and the mad rage which had disgraced the government of the preceding reign, was still poured forth on the poor peasantry, who were hunted from hill to wood, and from moss to cavern, by the cavalry employed in riding down the country, until by banishment, imprisonment, famine, torture, the sword, and the scaffold, presbyterianism was likely to be crushed altogether; but an odium was raised, and a hatred fostered, against the Scottish ministry of the House of Stuart, which is yet felt keenly in the pastoral districts, where the deeds of those days are still spoken of with bitterness and reprehension.

The parliament of Scotland was presided over by the Duke of Queensbury, a base time-server: it appeared devoted to the new sovereign, and declared him vested with solid and absolute authority, in which none could participate, and had promised him the whole array of the realm, between the ages of sixteen and sixty, whenever he should require their services. Notwithstanding these and similar loyal and liberal offers, there existed a strong faction intensely averse to the rule of a Catholic king; and though only three years before Archibald, Earl of Argyle, and the equally unfortunate Duke of Monmouth, had both perished in a futile attempt to preserve the civil and religious liberties of the land, the unsubdued Presbyterians were still intriguing with Holland, and concerting measures with William Prince of Orange, for a descent on the British shores, the expulsion of James by force of arms, and thus breaking the legitimate succession of the Crown. Suspicion of these plots, and the intended invasion, had called forth all the fury and tyranny of the Scottish ministry against those whom they supposed to be inimical to the then existing state of things.

A certain covenanting preacher of some celebrity, the Reverend Mr. Ichabod Bummel, and a man of a very different stamp, Captain Quentin Napier, (an officer of the Scottish Brigade in the service of the States-General,) both supposed to be emissaries of the Prince of Orange, were known to be concealed in the house of Bruntisfield, the residence of Lady Grizel Napier, widow of Sir Archibald of the Wrytes, a brave commander of cavalier troops, who had fallen in the Battle of Inverkeithing. Unluckily for herself the old lady was a kinswoman of the intercommuned traitor, Patrick Hume, "umquhile designate of Polworth," to use the legal and malevolent phraseology of the day; and consequently, notwithstanding the loyalty of her husband, the eyes of that stern tribunal, which ruled the Scottish Lowlands with a rod of iron, had been long upon her. And now, attended by a macer of Council, bearing a warrant of search and arrest, a party of soldiers were approaching her mansion.

An archway, the piers of which were surmounted by two great stone eagles in full flight, each bearing a lance aloft, gave admittance to the long avenue that curved round the eminence on which the mansion stood. As the soldiers entered, the measured tap of a distant drum was borne from the city on the passing night-wind, and announced the hour of ten.

Thick dark beeches and darker oaks waved over them; the gigantic reliques of the great forest of Drumsheugh, beneath whose shade in the days of other years, the savage wolf, the stately elk, the bristly boar, and the magnificent white bull of ancient Caledonia, had roamed in all the glory of unbounded freedom, on the site now occupied by the Scottish capital.

The blustering wind of March swept through their leafless branches, and whirled the last year's leaves along the lonely and grass-grown avenue, a turn of which brought the detachment at once in front of the mansion.

The Wrytes-house, or Castle of Bruntisfield, was a high and narrow edifice, built in that striking and peculiar style of architecture which has again become so common—the old Scottish. It was several stories in height, and had steep corbie-stoned gables with little round turrets at every angle, a lofty circular tower terminating in a slated spire, numerous dormer windows, the acute gablets of which were surmounted by thistles, rosettes, crescents, and stars. Every casement was strongly grated, and the tall fantastic outline of the mansion rose from the old woodlands against the murky sky in a dark opaque mass, as the soldiers passed the barbican gate, and found themselves close to the oak-door, which closed the central tower.

The night was still and dark; at times a red star gleamed tremulously amid the flying vapour, or a ray of moonlight cast a long and silvery line of radiance across the beautiful sheet of water to the eastward. The turret-vanes, and old ancestral oaks creaked mournfully in the rising wind, and the venerable rooks that occupied their summits croaked and screamed in concert.

"A noble old mansion!" said Walter Fenton; "and if tradition says truly, was built by our gallant James IV. for one of his frail fair ones."

"It dates as far back as the days of the first Stuart, and men say, Walter, that its founder was William de Napier, a stark warrior of King Robert II.; but fair though the mansion, and broad the lands around it, the greedy gleds of our council-board will soon rend all piecemeal. Soldiers, blow your matches, and give all who attempt to escape a prick of the hog's-bristle."

The musqueteers cautiously surrounded the lofty edifice, resistance to the death being an every-day occurrence—but the windows remained dark, and the vast old manor-house exhibited no sign of life, save where between the half-parted shutters of a thickly-grated window a ray of flaky light streamed into the obscurity without. To this opening the curious macer immediately applied his legal eye, and cried in a loud whisper,

"Look ye here, Sirs, and behauld the godly Maister Ichabod himsel' sitting in the cosiest neuk o' the ingle between the auld lady and her kinswoman. Hech! a gallows'-looking buckie he is as ever skirled a psalm in the muirlands, or testified at the Bowfoot, wi' a St. Johnstoun cravat round his whaislin craig."

"Silence!" said Fenton in an agitated voice, as, clutching the haft of his poniard, he applied his face to the barred window; "silence, wretch, or I will trounce thee!" and the scowling macer could perceive that his colour came and went, and that his eye sparkled with vivacity as he took a rapid survey of the apartment. "Fool, fool!" he muttered, as a cracked voice was heard singing

"I like ane owle in desart am,
That nichtlie there doth moan;
I like unto ane sparrow am,
On the house-top alone."

"The true sough o' the auld conventicle," said the bluff old sergeant, merrily. "Hark your honours, the game's afoot."

According to the rank of the house and the fashion of the present time, the room which Fenton surveyed would be deemed small for a principal or state apartment; but it was richly decorated with a stuccoed ceiling, divided into deep compartments, as the walls were by wainscotting, but in the pannels of the latter were numerous anomalous paintings of scenery, scripture pieces, armorial bearings, and the quaint devices of the Scoto-Italian school. An old ebony buffet laden with glittering crystal and shining plate massively embossed. The furniture was ancient, richly carved, and dark with time; stark, high-backed chairs with red leather cushions, and tables supported by lions legs and wyverns heads. The floor was richly carpeted around the arched fire-place, where a bright fire of coals and roots burned cheerily, while the grotesque iron fire-dogs around which the fuel was piled, were glowing almost red-hot, and the blue ware of Delft that lined the recess, reflected the kindly warmth on all sides. The ponderous fire-irons were chained to the stone jambs—a necessary precaution in such an age; and on a stone shield appeared the blazon of the Napiers: argent, a saltire, engrailed, between four roses, gules, and an eagle in full flight, with the lance and motto, "Aye ready." A tall portrait of Sir Archibald Napier in the dark armour of Charles the First's age, appeared above it.

A young lady sat near the fire-place, and on her the attention of the handsome eavesdropper became immediately rivetted. Her face was of a very delicate cast of beauty; her bright blue eyes were expressive of the utmost vivacity, as her short upper lip and dimpled chin were of archness and wit. The fairness, the purity of her complexion was dazzling, and her glittering hair of the brightest auburn, fell in massive locks on her white neck and stiff collar of starched lace. A string of Scottish pearls alone confined them, and they rolled over her shoulders in soft profusion, adding to the grace of her round and beautiful figure, which the hideous length of her long stomacher, and the volume of her ample skirt could not destroy. She was Lilian Napier.

Opposite sat her grand-aunt, Lady Grizel, a tall, stately, and at first sight, grim old dame, as stiff as a tremendous boddice, a skirt of the heaviest brocade, the hauteur of the age, and an inborn sense of much real and more imaginary dignity, could make her. Frizzled with the nicest care, her lint-white locks were all drawn upwards, thus adding to the dignity of her noble features, though withered by care and blanched by time; and the healthy bloom of the young girl near her made the contrast between them greater: it was the summer and the winter of life contrasted. Lady Grizel's forehead was high, her nose decidedly aquiline, her eyes grey and keen, her brows a perfect arch. Though less in stature, and softer in feature, her kinswoman strongly resembled her; and though one was barely eighteen, and the other bordering on eighty, their dresses were quite the same; their gorgeously flowered brocades, their vandyked cuffs, high collars, and red-heeled shoes, were all similar.

As was natural in so young a man, Walter Fenton remarked only the younger lady, whose quick, small hands toyed with a flageolet, and a few leaves of music, while her more industrious grand-aunt was busily urging a handsome spinning-wheel, the silver and ivory mountings of which flashed in the light of the fire, as it sped round and round. Close at her feet lay an aged staghound, that raised its head and erected its bristles at times, as if aware that foes were nigh.

There was such an air of happiness and domestic comfort in that noble old chamber-of-dais, that the young volunteer felt extremely loth to be one of those who should disturb it; but fairly opposite the glowing fire, in the most easy chair in the room, (a great cushioned one, valanced round with silken bobs,) sat he of whom they were in search, and whom the macer had pronounced so worthy of martyrdom.

He was a spare but athletic man, above the middle height; his blue bonnet hung on a knob of his chair, and his straight dark hair hung in dishevelled masses around his lean, lank visage, and sallow neck. His face was gaunt, with red and prominent cheek-bones; his eyes intensely keen, penetrating, and generally unsettled in expression. He wore clerical bands falling over that part of his heavily skirted and wide-cuffed coat, where lapelles would have been had such been the fashion of the day; his breeches and spatterdashes were of rusty grey cloth; his large eyes seemed fixed on vacancy, and his hands were clasped on his left knee. When he spoke his whole face seemed to be convulsed by a spasm.

"Maiden," said he, reproachfully, "and ye will not accompany me in the godly words of Andro Hart's Scottish metre?"

"Think of the danger of being overheard, Mr. Bummel," urged the young lady. "I will sing you my new song, the Norlan' Harp."

"Name it not, maiden, for thy profane songs sound as abomination in my ears!"

Lilian Napier laughed merrily, and all her white teeth glittered like pearls.

"Fair as thou art to look upon, maiden, and innocent withal, the fear grieves me that ye are one of the backsliders of this sinful generation. Thy 'Norlan' Harp' quotha? Know that there is no harp save that of Zion, whilk is a lyre of treble refined gold. What saith the sacred writ,—'Is any among ye afflicted, let him pray. Is any merrie, let him sing psalmes.'"

"I wot it would be but sad merriment," laughed the young lady.

"Peace, Lilian," said grand-aunt Grizel, while the solemn divine fidgetted in his chair, and hemmed gruffly, preparatory to returning to the charge.

"Maiden, when thou hast perused my forthcoming discourse, whilk is entitled, 'A Bombshell aimed at the tail of the Great Beast,' and whilk, please God, shall be imprinted when I can procure ink and irons from Holland (that happy Elysium of the faithful), thou shalt there see in words of fire the straight and narrow path, contrasted with the broad but dangerous way that leadeth to the sea of flame: and therein will I shew thee, and all that are yet in darkness, that the four animals in the Vision of Daniel hieroglyphically represent four empires, Rome, Persia, Grecia, and Babylonia, and that the man of sin, the antichrist, and the scarlet harlot of Babylon——"

At that moment the stag-hound barked and howled furiously, upon which the preacher's voice died away in a quaver, and his upraised hand sank powerless by his side.

"The dog howls eerily," said the old lady, "Gude sain us! that foretells death—and far-seen folk say that dumb brutes can see him enter the house when a departure is about to happen."

"—And further," continued the preacher incoherently, when his confusion had somewhat subsided: "I will show thee that the blessing of Heaven will descend upon the men of the Covenant—"

"Yea," chimed in Lady Grizel, "and upon their children—"

"Even unto the third and fourth generation."

"My honoured husband was as true a cavalier as ever wore buff," said Lady Grizel, striking her cane emphatically on the floor; "but some of my dearest kinsmen have shed bluid for the other side, and I can think kindly o' baith."

"But if the King," urged Lilian; "if the King should permit—"

"Maiden!" cried Mr. Bummel, in a shrill and stern voice; "mean ye the bloody and papistical Duke James, who, contrary to religion and to law, hath usurped the throne of this unhappy land—that throne from which (as I show in my Bombshell) justice hath debarred him—that throne from the steps of which the blood of God's children, the blessed sancts of our oppressed and martyred Kirk, rolls down on every hand! But the hour cometh, Lilian, when it is written, that he shall perish, and a new religious and political millenium will dawn on these persecuted kingdoms. On one hand we have the power of the horned beast that sitteth upon seven hills, and her best beloved son James, with his thumbscrews, the iron boots and gory maiden,—the savage Amorites of the Highland hills—who go bare-legged to battle—yea, maiden, naked as the heretical Adamites of Bohemia—those birds of Belial, the soldiers of Dunbarton—those kine of Bashan, the troopers of Claverse, of Lag and Dalyel, the fierce Muscovite cannibal—in England the lambs of Kirke, and the gallows of the Butcher Jeffreys—a sea of blood, of darkness, death, and horror! But lo! on the other hand, behold ye the dawn of a new morn of peace, of love, and mercy; when the exile shall be restored to his hearth, and the doomed shall be snatched from the scaffold—for he cometh, at whose approach the doors of a thousand dungeons shall fly open, the torch of rapine be extinguished, the sword of the persecutor sheathed, and when the flowers shall bloom, and the grass grow green on the lonely graves of our ten thousand martyrs. Yea—he, the Saviour—William of Orange!"

The eyes of Ichabod Bummel filled with fire and enthusiasm as he spoke; the crimson glowed in his sallow cheek—the intonations of his voice alternated between a whistle and a growl, and with his hands clenched above his head, he concluded this outburst, which gave great uneasiness and even terror to the old lady, though Lilian smiled with ill-concealed merriment.

"You have all heard this tirade of treason and folly?" said Douglas to his soldiers.

"Hech me!" ejaculated the macer, drawing a long breath; "it is enough to hang, draw, and quarter a haill parochin, I think."

"The Dutch rebel!" exclaimed Douglas, whose loyalty was fired. "Soldiers! look well that none escape by the windows; close up, my 'birds of Belial;' and, harkee, Sergeant Wemyss, tirl at the pin there."

The risp rung, and the door resounded beneath the blows of the halberdier. Lilian shrieked, Lady Grizel grew pale, and all the blood left the cheeks of the poor preacher, save the two scarlet spots on his cheek-bones.

"Woe is me!" he shouted; "for, lo! the Philistines are upon me!"

"The Guards of Pontius Pilate, he means," said the soldiers, as they gave a reckless laugh.

A shutter flew open, and the fair face of Lilian Napier, with all her bright hair waving around it, appeared for a moment gazing into the obscurity without.

"Soldiers! soldiers!" she screamed, as the light fell on corslets and accoutrements. "O! Aunt Grizel, we are ruined, disgraced, and undone for ever!"

CHAPTER III.
THE OLD CLOCKCASE.

In the meanwhile
The King doth ill to throw his royal sceptre
In the accuser's scale, ere he can know
How justice shall incline it.
THE AYRSHIRE TRAGEDY.

The entrance to the mansion was by the narrow tower already described, and which contained what is called in Scotland the Turnpike, a spiral stair, turning sharply round on its axis. The small doorway was heavily moulded, and ornamented above by a mossy coat armorial, the saltire and four roses. The door was of massive oak, covered with a profusion of iron studs, and furnished with two eyelet holes, through which visitors could be reconnoitred, or, if necessary, favoured with a dose of musketry.

"What graceless runions are you, that knock in this way, and sae near the deid hour of the nicht, too?" asked the querulous voice of old John Leekie, the gardener, while two rays of streaming light through the eylets imparted to the doorway the aspect of some gigantic visage, of which the immense risp was the nose.

"Gae wa' in peace," added the venerable butler, in a very blustering voice, "or bide to face the waur!"

"Open, rascals!" cried the sergeant, "or we will set the four corners of the house on fire."

"Doubtless, my bauld buckie," chuckled the old serving-man; "but the wa's are thick, and the winnocks weel grated, and we gaed a stronger band o' the English Puritans their kail through the reek in the year saxteen-hunderd-and-fifty." The over-night potations of the aged vassals had endued them with a courage unusual at that time, when a whole village trembled at the sight of a soldier.

"Wha are ye, sirs!" queried the butler, Mr. Drouthy; "wha are ye?"

"Those who are empowered to storm the house if its barriers are not opened forthwith!" replied the sonorous voice of Douglas; "so, up! varlets! and be doing, for the soldiers of the King cannot bide your time."

The only reply to this was a smothered exclamation of fear from various female voices within, and the clank of one or two additional heavy bolts being shot into their places; and then succeeded the clatter of various slippers and high-heeled shoes, as the household retreated up the steep turnpike in great dismay.

"Now, ye dyvour loons!" cried the old butler, from a shot-hole, "we'll gie ye a taste o' the Cromwell days, if ye dinna mak' toom the barbican in five minutes. Lads," he continued, as if speaking to men behind, although, save the old and equally intoxicated gardener, the whole household were women; "lads, tak' the plugs frae the loop-holes. John Leekie, burn a light in the north turret, and in a crack we'll hae our chields frae the grange wi' pitchfork, pike, and caliver. Awa' to the vaults and bartizan—blaw your coals, and fire cannily when I tout my old hunting horn."

These orders caused a muttering among the soldiers, who were quite unprepared to find the house garrisoned and ready for resistance. An additional puffing of gun-matches ensued, and all eyes were bent to the turrets and those parts which were battlemented; but no man appeared therein or thereon, and the thundering was renewed at the door with great energy. Suddenly the bolts were withdrawn, the door revolved slowly on its hinges, and the musqueteers who were about to rush in, hung back with mingled indecision and respect.

In the doorway stood Lady Grizel Napier, leaning on her long walking-cane; her dark-grey eyes lit up with indignation, and her forehead, though marked by the furrows of eighty years, still expressive of dignity and determination; nearly six feet in height, erect and stately as lace and brocade could make her, she was the belle ideal of an old Scottish matron. She wore on the summit of her frizzled hair a little coif of widow-hood, which she had never laid aside since her husband was slain at Inverkeithing; and the circumstance of his having died by a Puritan's hand alone made her somewhat cold in the cause of the Covenant. Her retinue of female servitors crowded fearfully behind her, and by her side appeared the silver-haired butler, armed with a huge partisan, while a battered morion covered his head, as it often had done in many a tough day's work; and behind him staggered the old gardener, armed with a watering-pan, and a steel cap with the peak behind.

"Gentlemen," said the old lady, in a tone of great asperity, while striking her long cane thrice on the doorstep, and all her frills seemed to ruffle with indignation like the feathers of a swan; "Gentlemen, what want ye at this untimeous hour? Know ye not that this is a house whilk we are entitled by Crown charter to fortify and defend, as well against domestic enemies as foreign! and methinks it is a daring act, and a graceless to boot, to march with cocked matches, and bodin in array of war on the bounds of a lone auld woman like me. By my faith, in the days of my honoured Sir Archibald, ye had gone off our barony faster than ye came, king's soldiers though ye be."

"Excuse us, madam," replied Douglas, lowering his rapier, and bowing with a peculiar grace which then was only to be acquired by service in France: "we have a warrant from the Lords of his Majesty's Privy Council, to arrest the persons of a certain Captain Napier, of a Scots Dutch regiment, and the Reverend Mr. Ichabod Bummel, who are accused of being treasonable emissaries of the States-General—intercommuned traitors, and now concealed in your mansion. Your Ladyship must be aware that implicit obedience is the soldier's first duty: surrender unto us these guilty men, otherwise your house must be ransacked by my soldiers,—a severe humiliation, which I would willingly spare the baronial mansion of a dame of honour, more especially when I remember the rank and loyal service of her husband."

"Gude keep us, Laird of Finland," replied the old lady, trembling violently and leaning on her cane. "O what dool is this that hath come upon us at last? My dream—my dream—it forewarned me of this: as the rhyme saith—

"A Friday nicht's grue
On the Saturday tauld,
Is sure to come true,
Be it never sae auld."

"On my honour—nae such persons—I protest to you——"

"Enough, Lady Grizel," replied Douglas, with a little hauteur; "positively we must spare you the trouble, if not the shame, of making those unavailing but humiliating assertions, which the laws of humanity and hospitality require. The sooner this affair is over the better—we crave your pardon, madam, but the king's service is paramount. Serjeant Wemyss, guard the door—follow me, Walter—forward, soldiers, and I will unearth this clerical fox!"

Rushing past Lady Grizel, while the startled household fled before them, the musqueteers pressed forward into the chamber-of-dais; but the Reverend Mr. Bummel had vanished, and no trace remained of him, save his ample blue bonnet, with its red cherry or tuft, and Walter Fenton was certainly not the last to perceive that the young lady had disappeared also.

"Search the whole house, from roof-tree to foundations," exclaimed Douglas; "cut down all who make the least resistance; but on your lives beware of plunder or destruction—away!"

A violent and unscrupulous search was made forthwith; every curtain, every bed and pannel were pierced by swords and daggers; every press, bunker, and girnel—the turrets and all the innumerable nooks and corners of the old house were searched. Every lockfast place was blown open by musket-balls, and thirty stentorian voices summoned the miserable preacher "to come forth;" but he was nowhere to be found. Pale and trembling between terror and indignation, propped on her long cane, the old lady stood under her baronial canopy on the dais of the dining-hall, listening to the uproar that rang through all the stone-vaults, wainscotted chambers, and long corridors of her mansion, and regarding Richard Douglas and his friend the young volunteer, with glances of pride and hostility.

Walter Fenton coloured deeply, and appeared both agitated and confused; but Douglas coolly and collectedly leaned against the buffet, toying with the knot of his rapier, and drinking a cup of wine to Lady Bruntisfield's health, helping himself from the buffet uninvited.

"Lady Grizel," said he, "by surrendering up these foolish and guilty men, whom, contrary to law, you have harboured and resetted within your barony, you may considerably avert the wrath of the already incensed Council."

"Never, Sir! never will I be guilty of such a breach of hospitality and honour. Bethink ye, Sirs, the Captain Napier is my sister's son, and it would ill become a Scottish dame to prove false to her ain blude. The minister, though but a gomeral body, is his friend—one of those whom the people deem exiled and persecuted for Christ's sake—ye may hew me to pieces with your partisans, but never would I yield a fugitive to the tortures and executioners of that bluidy and infamous Council." And to give additional force to her words, Lady Grizel as usual struck the floor thrice with her cane.

"Lady Bruntisfield," said Walter Fenton, gently, "beware lest our soldiers, or that dog the macer overhear you."

"Glorious canary this!" muttered the Lieutenant, apostrophizing the silver mug—"hum—I believe your ladyship is a Presbyterian."

"Though unused to be catechised by soldiers," replied the dame, drawing herself up with great dignity, "I acknowledge what all my neighbours know. I am Presbyterian, thank God, and so are all my household, who never miss a sabbath at kirk or meeting; and our minister is one, who having complied with the government regulations, hath an indulgence to preach."

"This applies not to the spy of that rogue William of Orange—this pious Ichabod, whom we must hale forth by the lugs at every risk."

"Never before was I suspected of disloyalty to the Scottish Crown," said Lady Grizel, sobbing, "and now in my auld and donnart days, with ane foot in the grave, it's hard to thole, Sirs—it's hard to thole. How often hae these hands, wrinkled now, and withered though they be, laced steel cap, greave and corslet, on my buirdly husband and his three fair sons. Ehwhow, Sirs! how often hae my very heart pulses died away with the clang o' their horses' hoofs in yonder avenue. Ane fell at Dumbar—another in his stirrups at the sack of Dundee, and my fair-haired Archy, my youngest and my best beloved, the apple o' my e'e, was shot deid by the side of his dying father, on the field of Inverkeithing. Save my sister's grandchild, all I loved have gone before me to God—but though my heart be seared, and my bower desolate, O Laird of Finland, this disgrace is harder to thole than a' I hae tholed in my time."

Touched with her sorrow, Walter Fenton and Finland approached her; but ere they could speak, a dismal voice, that seemed to ascend from the profundity of some vast tun, was heard to sing, "I like an owle in desert am," &c., and the verse was scarcely concluded when the officer burst into a violent fit of laughter.

"O, ye fule man!" exclaimed the old lady, shaking her cane wrathfully: "ye have ruined yoursel' and the House of Bruntisfield too!"

"Where the devil is he?" said Douglas. "Ah, there must be some pannel here," he added, knocking on the wainscot with the pommel of his sword.

"He is not very far off, your honour," said the macer approaching, pushing his bonnet on one side, and scratching his head with an air of vulgar drollery and perplexity. "I'll wager ye a score o' broad pieces, Finland, that I howk out the tod in a moment."

"Then do so," said Douglas, haughtily, "but first, you irreverend knave, doff your bonnet in the Lady Bruntisfield's presence."

"There is something queer about this braw Flanders wag-at-the-wa'," said the macer, approaching a clock, the case of which formed part of the wainscotting. It was violently shaken, and emitted a hollow groan. The macer opened the narrow pannel, and revealed the poor preacher coiled up within, in great spiritual and bodily tribulation, and half stifled by want of air. His face was almost black, his eyes bloodshot, and his features sharpened by an expression of delirious terror bordering on the ludicrous.

"Dolt and fool!" exclaimed Walter, "what fiend tempted ye to rant thus within earshot of us?"

"Gadso, I think the varlet's mad," said Douglas, laughing. "Dost think we will eat thee, fellow?"

"Mad!—I hope so, for the sake of this noble lady."

"And the marrow in his bones, Fenton."

"Come awa, my man," said the macer, making him a mock bow; "use your shanks while the ungodly Philistines will let you. Ye'll no walk just sae weel after you have tried on the braw buits my Lord Chancellor keeps for such pious gentlemen as you."

"From these sons of blood and Belial, good Lord deliver me!" ejaculated the poor man, turning up his hollow eyes, as he was dragged forth; "ye devouring wolves, I demand your warrant for what ye do?"

"Macer—your warrant?" said Douglas.

Unfolding the slip of paper, the worthy official now reverentially took off his bonnet, and in a sing-song voice drawled forth—

"I, Michael Maclutchy, macer to the Privy Council of Scotland, by virtue of, and conform to, the principal letters raised at ye instance of Maister Roderick Mackenzie, Advocat-Depute to Sir David Dalrymple, His Majesty's Advocat, summon, warn, and charge you, the said Reverend Mr. Hugh—otherwise Ichabod Bummel—is that richt, friend?"

"Yea—I was so named by my parents Hugh, a heathenish name, whilk in a better hour I changit to Ichabod, signifying in the Hebrew tongue—'where is glory?'"

"Weel—weel, mind na the Hebrew—charge you to surrender peaceably—and sae forth; it's a' there in black and white: subscribitur Perth."

"Fie upon ye!" exclaimed Ichabod, "ye abjurers of the Lord, and persecutors of his covenanted kirk."

"Away with him!" said Fenton to the soldiers.

"Truly ye are properly clad in scarlet, for it is the garb——"

"Silence, Sir; you make bad worse."

"Of your Babylonian mother."

"Peace!" cried Douglas.

"I liken ye even unto broken reeds——"

"On with the gyves, and away wi' him!" said the serjeant, and the poor crack-brained enthusiast was unceremoniously handcuffed and dragged away, pouring a torrent of hard scriptural epithets and invectives on his captors, and chanting suitable verses from Andro Hart's book of the Psalmes.

Lady Bruntisfield started as he was taken away, and was about to bestow on him some address of comfort and farewell; but the young volunteer interposed, saying with great gentleness,

"Pardon me, Lady Grizel—by addressing him you will only compromise your own safety and honour. O madam, I deeply regret your involvement in this matter! The Privy Council is not to be trifled with."

"Madam," observed Douglas, "I believe I have the honour of being not unknown to you?"

"You are the young Laird of Finland, who wounded my nephew Quentin——"

"In a duel in Flanders—O yes—ha! ha! we quarrelled about little Babette of the Hans-in-Kelder, or some folly of that kind. I acquaint you, madam, with regret, that in consequence of this trumpeter of rebellion being found resetted here—your whole family——"

"Alake, Laird, I have only my little grand-niece."

"Your whole household must be considered prisoners until the pleasure of the Council is known. In the interim," he added in a low voice, "I hope your kinsman will escape; though he has been no friend of mine since that time we fought with sword and dagger on the ramparts of Tournay, I would wish him another fate than a felon's, for a braver fellow never marched under baton. Meanwhile, Lady Bruntisfield, I am your servant—adieu;" and bowing until his plume touched the floor, he withdrew.

Leaving his veteran serjeant, and Walter the volunteer, with twenty men to keep ward, he returned to the city with his prisoner, who was immediately consigned to the Iron Room of the Tolbooth.

For a few minutes after his departure Lady Grizel seemed quite stunned by the dilemma in which she so suddenly found herself. She had now been joined by Lilian, who hung upon her shoulder weeping; for the Privy Council of Scotland was a court of religious and political inquisition, whose name and satellites bore terror throughout the land.

Sergeant Wemyss posted seven of his musketeers within the barbican, with orders "to keep all in who were within, and all out who were so;" after which he withdrew with the remainder to the spacious and vaulted kitchen, where, as occupying free quarters, they made themselves quite at home, and crowded round the great wood-fire that was roaring in the vast archway which spanned one side of the apartment, joked and toyed with the half-pleased and half-frightened maids, and compelled the indignant housekeeper (who, with Lady Grizel's cast coifs and fardingales assumed many of her airs) to provide them with a substantial supper, the least items of which were a huge side of beef, a string of good fat capons, and an unmeasured quantity of ale and usquebaugh for the soldiers; while his honour the halberdier insisted on wine dashed with brandy, swearing "by the devil's horns," and other cavalier oaths, "he would drink nothing but the best Rhenish." There was an immense consumption of viands, and as the revellers became merrier, they made the whole house ring to their famous camp-song,

"Dunbarton's drums beat bonnie, O,"

to the great envy of those luckless wights in the barbican, who heard only the bleak March wind sighing among the leafless woods, and witnessed through the windows all this hilarity and good cheer from which they were for a time debarred.

Mr. Drouthy the butler, and other old servitors, who had seen something of free quarters under the Duke of Hamilton in England, entered heartily into the spirit of entertaining their noisy visitors, to whom they detailed the fields of Inverkeithing, Dunbar, and Kerbeister, with great vociferation, and ever and anon voted the Reverend Mr. Bummel a most unqualified bore, and declared that "the house of Bruntisfield was weel rid of his grunting and skirling about owls and sparrows in the desert."

CHAPTER IV.
A PAIR OF BLUE EYES.

Thou tortur'st me. I hate all obligations
Which I can ne'er return—and who art thou,
That I should stoop to take them from your hand?
FATAL CURIOSITY.

The post of honour—that in the hall or lobby immediately outside the room occupied by the ladies—had been appropriated by the serjeant to Walter Fenton.

The young man placed his pike across the door of the chamber of dais (as the dining-hall was named in those Scottish houses, which, though to all intents baronial, were not castles) and then paced slowly to and fro.

A lamp, the chain of which was suspended from the mouth of a grotesque face carved on the wall, lighted the lobby or ambulatory, and dimly its flickering rays were reflected by a rusty trophy of ancient weapons opposite. An old head-piece and chain-jacket formed the centre, while crossbows, matchlocks, partisans, and two-handed swords, radiated round them. A deer's skull and antlers, riding gambadoes, heavy whips and spurs, a row of old knobby chairs, and a clumsy oaken clock, which (like many persons in the world) had two faces, one looking to the lobby, the other to the dining-hall, ticked sullenly in a corner, and made up the furniture of the place.

Save the monotonous vibrations of the clock, and an occasional murmur of voices from the chamber of dais, no other sound disturbed the solitary watch of Fenton, unless when a distant shout of hilarity burst from the vaulted kitchen, and reverberated through the winding staircases and stone corridors of the ancient mansion.

Absorbed in meditation, the young man walked slowly to and fro, turning with something of military briskness at each end of the half-darkened passage, by the indifferent light of which we must present a view of him to the reader.

"A young man, gentle-voiced and gentle-eyed,
Who looked and spake like one the world had frowned on."

He seemed to be about twenty years of age; of a rather tall and very handsome figure, which his scarlet sleeves, and corslet tapering to the waist, and tightly compressed by a broad buff belt sustaining a plainly-mounted sword and dagger, tended greatly to improve. The cheek-plates of his burgonet, or steel cap, were unclasped, and his dark-brown hair rolled over his polished gorget in the profuse fashion of the time; his pale forehead was thoughtful and intellectual in expression; but the gilt peak of his cap partly concealed it, and cast a shadow over a very prepossessing face of a dark complexion, and somewhat melancholy contour. His dark eye had a soft and pleasing expression, though at times it loured and overcast. The curve of his lips, though gentle, and haughty, and scornful, by turns, was ever indicative of firmness and decision. They were red and full as those of a girl; but short black mustaches, pointed smartly upward, imparted a military aspect to a face such as few could contemplate without interest—especially women. With the manner of one who has early learned to think, and hold communion with himself, his eye sparkled and his cheek flushed as certain ideas occurred to him: anon his animation died away, he sighed deeply, and thus immersed in his own thoughts, continued to pace to and fro, until at the half-opened door of the chamber of dais there appeared the fair face of Lilian Napier—a face so regular in its contour of eyebrow, lip, and nostril, that the brightness of her blue eyes, and the waving of her auburn ringlets, together with a decided piquancy of expression, alone prevented it from being insipid. She was looking cautiously out.

On recognizing her, Fenton bowed, and the girl blushed deeply, as she said hurriedly, and in a low voice,

"O joy! Walter Fenton, is it indeed you? how fortunate! but oh, what a night this has been for us all!"

"Mistress Lilian," said he (the prefix Miss as a title of honour did not become common until the beginning of the next century) "need I say that it has been a night of sorrow and mortification to me? Yet, God wot, what could I do but obey the orders of my superiors?"

"Hush!" she whispered; for at that moment Lady Bruntisfield came forth, pale and agitated, with eyes red from recent weeping.

Tall in form and majestic in bearing, Lady Grizel Napier, as I have said before, was one of those stately matrons who appear to have departed with their hoops and fardingales. In youth, her face had possessed more than ordinary beauty, and now, in extreme old age, it still retained its feminine softness and pleasing expression. Undecided in politics, she was intensely loyal to James; while condemning his government, she railed at the non-conformists and reprobated the severities of the council in the same breath. Like every dame of the olden time, she was a matchless mediciner, and maker of preserves, conserves, physics, and cordials, and, did a vassal's finger but ache, Lady Grizel was consulted forthwith. Like every woman of her time, she was intensely superstitious: she shook her purse when the pale crescent of the new moon rose above the Corstorphine woods; if the salt-foot was overturned, she remembered Judas, trembled, and threw a pinch over her left shoulder; she saw coffins in the fire, letters in the candles, and quaked at deidspales when they guttered in the wind. She listened in fear to the chakymill, or death-watch, which often ticked obstinately for a whole night in the massive posts of her canopied bed. Witches, of course, were a constant source of hatred and annoyance, and, notwithstanding her great faith in the Holy Kirk (and a little in Peden's Prophecies), she had such a wholesome dread of the Prince of darkness, that, according to the ancient usage, a piece of her lands adjoining the Harestane was dedicated to him, under the dubious name of the gudeman's croft, and, in defiance of all the acts against this old superstition (which still exists in remote parts of Scotland), it was allowed to remain a weedy waste, unsown and unemployed. With all this, her manners were high-bred and courtly; her information extensive; and there was in her air a certain indescribable loftiness, which then consciousness of noble birth and long descent inspired, and which failed not to enforce due respect from equals and inferiors.

On her approach, Walter Fenton bowed with an air in which politeness and commiseration were gracefully blended. Her bright-haired kinswoman leant upon her arm, and from time to time stole furtive and timid glances at the volunteer beneath her long eyelashes.

"Young man," said Lady Bruntisfield, "for a soldier, you seem good and gentle. Have you a mother" (her voice faltered) "who is dear to you—a sister whom you love?"

"Nor mother, nor sister, nor kindred have I, madam. Alas! Lady Grizel, I am alone in the world: the first, and perhaps it may be the last, of my race," he added bitterly. "But what would your ladyship with Walter Fenton?"

"Ha! are you one of the Fentons of that Ilk?"

"Nay, lady, I am only Walter Fenton of the Scottish Musqueteers, and nothing more: but in what can I serve you?"

"How shall I speak it?—That you will sleep on your post, and permit this poor child—dost comprehend me?—oh! I will nobly reward you; and the deed will be registered elsewhere."

"Oh, no!—no! beg no such boon for me," said the blushing and trembling girl; while the brow of the young man became clouded.

"You would counsel me to my ruin, Lady Bruntisfield: is it generous, is it noble, when I am but a poor soldier? Seek not to corrupt me by gold," he said hurriedly, on the old lady drawing a purse from her girdle; "for all I possess is my honour, the poor man's best inheritance. And yet, for the sake of Lilian Napier, I would dare much."

The deep blush which suffused the soft cheek and white brow of Lilian as the pikeman spoke, was not unobserved by the elder lady; and she said, with undisguised hauteur,—

"How is this, sir sentinel?—ye know my kinswoman, and by that glance it would seem that ye have met before. Lilian, do thou speak."

Lilian trembled, but was silent and confused.

"I have often had the honour of seeing Mistress Lilian at my Lord Dunbarton's," said the young man, hastening to her relief.

"How! are you little Fenton?"

"The Countess's page, madam."

"By my father's bones!" said Lady Grizel, striking the floor angrily with her cane; "I little thought a time would come when I would sue a boon in vain, either from a lord's loon or a lady's foot-page!"

These words seemed to sting the young soldier deeply; fire sparkled in his eyes. But tears suffused those of Lilian.

"Madam," said he firmly, "I am the first private gentleman of Dunbarton's Foot, and am so unused to such hauteur, that had the best man in broad Scotland uttered words like these, my sword had assuredly taken the measure of his body."

"I admire your spirit, sir," said Lady Grizel gently; "but it might be shewn in a more honourable cause than the persecution of helpless women-folk."

"Lady Grizel, a soldier from my childhood, I have been inured to hardship and trained to face every danger. My conscience is my own; my soul belongs to God: and my sword to the King and Parliament of Scotland, whose orders I must obey."

"Then, gentle sir, be generous as your bearing is noble, and, in the name of God, permit my little kinswoman to escape. Alas! you know well what is in store for us, if we are dragged before that odious Privy Council—fine, imprisonment, torture——"

"Or banishment to Virginia," said Lilian, bursting into tears.

"God wot I pity you, Lady Bruntisfield, and would lay down my life to serve you. Retire—I will keep my post; your chamber has windows by which——"

"Alas! they are grated, and there are sentinels without."

Fenton stamped his foot impatiently.

"Birds' eggs aye bring ill luck; and oh! Lilian, ye thoughtless bairn, when ye strung up the pyets yesternight, I forewarned ye that something would happen. The thumbscrews and extortions of the Council, yea, and banishment even in my auld age, I might bear, though the thocht of being laid far frae the graves of my ain kindred is hard to thole; but thee, my dear doo, Lilian—it is for thee my heart bleeds."

"Oh! madam, they cannot be such villains as to harm her—so young—so fair."

"You know not what I mean," replied Lady Grizel, pressing her hands upon her breast, and speaking in an incoherent and bitter manner. "Lord Clermistonlee rules at the Council-board, and he hath seen Lilian. Wretch—wretch, too well do I know 'tis for worse than the thumb-screws he would reserve her!"

She paused; and Fenton starting, said—

"Oh, whence were all my unreasonable scruples? Finland by his hints warned me of Clermistonlee, that roué and ruffian, whose name brings scandal on our peerage."

"Then let my dear aunt Grizel escape to some place of concealment, and, good Mr. Fenton, you shall have my prayers and gratitude for life."

It was the young girl who spoke; her accents were low and imploring; and her whole appearance was very fascinating, for her timidity and mortification added the utmost expression to her blue eyes, while her lips, half parted, shewed the whiteness of her teeth, and lent a sweetness and simplicity to her face. The tenor of her address made the heart of Walter flutter, for love was fast subduing his scrupulous sense of duty.

"Artless Lilian," said he with a faint smile, "Lord Clermistonlee aims neither at Lady Grizel's liberty or life. He is a villain of the deepest dye; and you have many things to fear. It ill beseems a lady of birth to sue a boon from a poor sworder such as I. Leave me to my fate, and the fury of the Council. I am, I hope, a gentleman, though an unfortunate one, and reduced to the necessity of trailing a pike under the noble Earl of Dunbarton; but in spirit I can be generous as a king, though my whole inheritance is to follow the drum."

"I offered you money——"

"Lady Grizel," said Fenton, colouring again, "I hope that the poorest musqueteer who follows the banner of Dunbarton would have rejected it with scorn. Though soldiers, we are not like those rapacious wolves the troopers of Lag, of Dalzel, or Kirke the Englishman. By my faith, madam, for six shillings Scots per day I have often perilled life and limb in a worse cause than yours; and why should I scruple now? Escape while there is yet time. Lady Grizel, permit me to lead you forth."

And, drawing off his leather glove, he offered his hand to the old dame, who, struck by the gallantry of his manner, said—

"You have quite the air of a cavalier, such as I mind o' in my young days, when the first Charles was crowned in Holyrood."

"I pretend not to be a cavalier," said Walter, with a sad smile: "the camp is the school of gallantry."

"Fear for my Lilian makes me miserably selfish. I would rather die, good youth, than that a hair of your head should be injured; but that this delicate bairn should be dragged before that fierce Council, like some rude cottar's wife—'tis enough to make the dead bones in the West-kirk aisle to clatter in their coffins! Ere we go, say what will be your inevitable punishment for this dereliction of duty?"

"A few days' close ward in the Abbey-guard, with pease bannocks and sour beer to regale on, and mounting guard at the Palace porch in back-breast and headpieces, partisan, sword and dagger; in full marching harness, for four-and-twenty consecutive hours—that is all, madam," said he gaily; though the inward forebodings of his heart and his sad experience told him otherwise. "In serving you, fair Lilian," he added gently, and half attempting, but not daring to touch her hand, "I shall be more than a thousand times recompensed for any penance I may perform. Believe me, it will weigh as a featherweight against what the Council may inflict on Lady Bruntisfield. Now, then, away in God's name! Ye will surely find a secure shelter somewhere among your numerous friends and tenantry; but seek not the city, for Dunbraiken's guards are on the alert at every gate; and, above all, oh! beware of—of Lord Clermistonlee, who (if Finland suspects truly) has a deep project to accomplish."

"Heaven bless thee, good young man!" faltered the venerable Lady Grizel, laying her small but wrinkled hands upon his shoulders, and gazing on him with eyes that beamed with heartfelt gratitude. "Alack! alack! my mind gangs back to the time when three hearts as brave and as gentle as yours, grew up from heartsome youth to stately manhood under this auld roof-tree; but, oh, waly! waly! the cauld blast o' war laid my three fair flowers in the dust."

A noise in the kitchen, and the loud voice of the halberdier calling fresh sentinels, now caused them to hurry away. To conceal about their persons such jewels and money as they could collect from the cabinets in the chamber of dais, to muffle up in their hoods and mantles, to give one glance of adieu to the portrait of the dark cavalier above the fire-place, and another of gratitude to Walter Fenton, were all the work of a minute,—and they were led forth to the avenue. Grey morning was breaking in the east, and the black ridge of Arthur's Seat stood in strong relief against the brightening sky; the wind had died away, and the waning moon shone cold and dim in the west, while, far to the northward, the dark opaque clouds were piled in shadowy masses above the bold and striking outline of the capital. There the great spire of the Gothic cathedral, the ramparts of its rockbuilt fortress, the crenelated towers of the Flodden-wall, and the streets within "piled deep and massy, close and high," were all glimmering in the first pale rays of the dawn, though the valleys below, and the woods around, were still sunk in the gloom and obscurity of night. A sentinel challenged from the dark shadow of the barbican wall, and his voice made the fugitives tremble with fear.

"Dunbarton," answered Walter, and on receiving the password, the soldier stept back. "And now, ladies, whence go ye?"

"As God shall direct—to some of our faithful tenant bodies, for safety and concealment," sobbed Lady Bruntisfield.

"Poor Mr. Fenton!" murmured Lilian; "I tremble more for you than for ourselves."

"A long farewell to our gude auld barony of Bruntisfield and the Wrytes—to main and holm, and wood and water," said Lady Grizel, mournfully; "we stand under the shadow of its green sauchs and oak woods for the last time. Once before I fled frae them, but that was in the year fifty, when our natural enemies, the English, won that doolfu' day at Dunbar, and again our hail plenishing will be ruined and harried, as in the days o' the ruffianly and ungracious Puritans."

"Not by us, Lady Bruntisfield," replied the young man, slightly piqued; "we are the soldiers of the gallant Dunbarton, the old Royals of Turenne, les Gardes Ecossais of a thousand battles and a thousand glorious memories, and your mansion will be sacred as if in the hands of so many apostles. Farewell, and God speed ye! Would that I could accompany your desolate steps to some place of safety! but that would discover all." They parted.

"I have done," muttered Walter, striking his breast; "and from this hour I am a lost man!"

Hastily returning, he resumed his post, with his heart beating high with the conflicting emotions of pleasure and apprehension. Youth and beauty in suffering, danger, or humiliation, form naturally an object of interest and compassion; but Walter, though pleased by the conviction that he had done a good action, and one so fully involving the gratitude of Lilian Napier and her haughty relative, felt a dread of what was to ensue, weighing heavily on his mind; for the Scottish privy council was then composed of men with whom the proudest noble dared not to trifle, and before whom the pride and power of the great Argyle, lord of a vast territory, and chief of the most powerful of the western clans, bent like a reed beneath the storm. Poor Walter reflected, that he was but a friendless and nameless volunteer, and too well he knew that the council would not be cheated of their prey without a terrible vengeance.

Scarcely had he resumed his post in the corridor, when the serjeant, whose brown visage was flushed with carousing, and whose corslet braces were unclasped to give space for the quantity of viands he had imbibed, reeled up with a relief of sentinels, all more or less in the same condition.

"All right, an't please you, Master Walter. I warrant you will be tired of this post of honour, and longing for a leg of a devilled capon, and a horn of the old butler's Rhenish."

"I thought you had forgotten me, Wemyss. You will have a care, sir," said Walter, addressing the soldier who relieved him, with a glance that was not to be misunderstood, "that you do not disturb the ladies by entering the chamber of dais; dost hear me, thou pumpkin-head?"

"Rot me, Master Fenton, I have clanked my bandoleers before the tent of Monsieur of France, and I need nae be learned now, how to keep guard on king or knave, baron or boor. Dost think that I, who am the son of an auld vassal of her ladyship's, would dragoon her out of marching money?"

"'Tis well," replied the pikeman, briefly, as he retired, not to the kitchen, but to a solitary apartment prepared for him by the orders of his old patron, the halberdier.

CHAPTER V.
A PAIR OF RAPIERS.

If thou sleep alone in Urrard,
Perchance in midnight gloom,
Thoul't hear behind the wainscot
Of that old and darken'd room
A fleshless hand that knocketh——"
HIGHLAND MINSTRELSY.

In a dark old wainscotted apartment, in the small arched chimney of which a coal fire was glowing cheerily, supper and wine were sullenly laid for Walter by a sleepy and half-frightened servant; but the first remained untouched and the last untasted, at least for a time. Removing his burgonet and gloves, he sat with his elbow on the table and his forehead on his hand, with his fingers writhed among his thick dark locks. He was again sunk in one of his gloomy reveries; but at times a smile of pleasure and animation unbent his haughty lip and lit up his handsome face like sunlight through a cloud; and it was evident he thought more of Lilian Napier's bright blue eyes, her innocence, and her fears, than the dangers and ignominy to which coming day would assuredly expose him.

The mildness, modesty, and beauty of the young girl, with the touching artlessness of her manner, had awakened a nearer and more vivid interest in his heart, one to which it had hitherto been utterly a stranger. It was the dawn of passion; never before, he thought, had one so winning or so attractive crossed his path; he had found at last the well-known face that his fancy had conjured up in a thousand happy reveries, and he was predisposed to love it. Her tears and affliction for the last relative (save one) whom fate and war had left, had increased her natural attractions, and a keen sense of her unmerited humiliation, and the risk he ran for her, by knitting their names together, all tended to raise a glow in young Walter's solitary heart; for having no living thing in this wide world to cling to, it was peculiarly susceptible and open to impressions of kindness and generosity; now it expanded with a flush of happiness and delight to which since thoughtless childhood it had been a stranger; and in a burst of soldierlike enthusiasm, he uttered her name aloud, and drained the pewter flagon of Rhenish to the bottom.

As he set it down, a noise behind made him turn sharply round and listen; nothing was visible but the dark stains of the wainscotting, and its gilded pannels glistening ruddily in the glow of the fire. From an antique brass sconce on the wall, the light of three great candles burned steadily on the old discoloured floor, the massively jointed arch of the fire-place, which bore a legend in Saxon characters, on three old pictures by Jamieson, of cavaliers in barrelled doublets, high ruffs, and peaked beards, and one of the famous Barbara Napier of Bruntisfield, who so narrowly escaped the stake for her sorceries, on a spectral suit of mail, and six old heavily carved chairs, ranged against the wall like grotesque gnomes with their arms akimbo; but although nothing was visible to create alarm, the aspect of the chamber was so gloomy, that certain tales of a spectre cavalier who haunted the old house, began to flit through Walter's mind, and he could not resist listening intensely; still not a sound was heard, but the wind rumbling in the hollow vent, and the creaking of the turret vanes overhead.

"Tush!" said he, and whether it was the faint echo of his own voice or a sound again behind the wainscot, he knew not, but he palpably heard something that made him bring the hilt of his long rapier more readily to hand. The portraits, like all those of persons whom one knows to have been long dead, when viewed by the dim candle-light had a staring, desolate, and ghastly expression, and they really seemed to "frown" over their high ruffs on the intruder, who would probably have frowned in return, had he not, even in the harsh lines of the old Scottish artist traced a family likeness to the soft features of Lilian Napier. But there was a stern, keen and malignant expression in the features of the old sorceress, Lady Barbara, that made Walter often avert his eyes, for her sharp features seemed to start from the pannel instinct with life and mockery.

As sleep weighed down the eyelids of Walter, strange fancies pressed thick and fast, though obscurely, on his mind; and though once or twice the same faint hollow sound made him start and take another survey of the apartment by the dim light of the sconce and dying embers of the fire, his head bowed down on the table, and at last he slumbered soundly.

Scarcely had he sunk into this state when there was a sharp click heard; a jarring sound succeeded, and on the opposite side of the room, about three feet from the ground, a pannel in the wainscotting was opened slowly and cautiously, and the bright glare of a large oil cruise streamed into the darkened apartment. Beyond the aperture, receded a gloomy alcove or secret passage, into the obscurity of which the steps of a narrow stair ascended, and therein appeared the figure of a man, who gazed cautiously upon the unconscious sleeper. He was about thirty years of age, strongly formed, and possessing a handsome but very weatherbeaten countenance. He wore a plain buff coat and steel gorget; his waist was encircled by a broad belt, which sustained a pair of long iron pistols of the Scottish fashion, and a sharp narrow-bladed rapier glittered in his hand.

Young Fenton still slept soundly.

The stranger regarded him with a stern and louring visage, on which the lurid light of the upraised cruise fell strongly. It betokened some fell and deadly intention, and as the hostile ferocity of its aspect increased as slowly, softly, and ominously he descended into the apartment.

"Through which part of the iron shell shall I strike this papistical interloper?" he muttered; "I will teach thee, wretch, to think of Lilian Napier in thy cups!"

His right hand was withdrawn preparatory to making one furious and deadly thrust, which assuredly would have ended this history (ere it is well begun) had not the subject thereof started up suddenly, exclaiming,—

"Back, rebel dog! on thy life, stand back!" and striking up the thrust rapier, drew his own, and throwing a chair between him and his adversary, he stood at once upon his guard.

"Malediction!" cried the stranger, furiously, "dolt that I was not to have pistolled thee from the pannel!"

"Wemyss, Wemyss!" exclaimed Walter, "The guard—what; ho! without there!"

"Spare your breath, for you may need it all," said the other, putting down his lamp, and barring the door. "This chamber is vaulted and boxed, and long enough mayest thou bawl ere thy fellow-beagles hear thee. Defend thyself, foul minion of the bloodiest tyrant that ever disgraced a throne. Strike! for by the Heaven that is above, ere a sword is sheathed, this floor must smoke with the blood of one or both of us! Come on, Mr. Springald, and remember that you have the honour to cross blades with the best swordsman in the six battalions of the Scottish Brigade."

"You are——"

"Ha, scoundrel! Quentin Napier of Bruntisfield, by God's grace and King William's, a captain of the Scots-Dutch; so fall on, for I am determined to slay thee, were it but to keep my hand in practice for better work."

The blades crossed and struck fire as they clashed; each cavalier remained a moment with his head drawn back, the right leg thrown forward and his eyes glaring on his antagonist. Walter was ten years younger than his adversary, upon whom he rushed with more ardour than address, and consequently, in endeavouring to pass his point and close, received a slight wound on the hand, which kindled him into a terrible fury. Napier excelled him in temper, if not in skill; he parried all his thrusts with admirable coolness, until, perceiving that the youth's impetuosity began to flag, he pressed him in turn, the ferocity that sparkled in his eyes and blanched his nether lip revealing the bitterness of his intention; but in making one furious lunge, he overthrust himself, and was struck down with his sword-hand under him. Rage had deprived Walter of all government over himself; in an instant his knee was on Napier's breast, and his sword shortened in his hand with the intention of running him through the heart, for his blood was now up, and all "the devil" was stirred within him. He felt the deep broad chest of his powerful adversary heaving beneath him with suppressed passion and fury.

"Captain Napier," said Walter, "for the sake of her whose name and blood you share—though you disgrace them—I will spare your life if you will beg it at my hands."