Catriona

ent at the Advocate's in a coat that I had ma

ne cavalier. Come, I take that kind of you. I take that kind of you, Mr. David.

news for m

to be received; and you may go, if you will, in my company to th

ch amazed to

I must caution you strictly to be reticent. To-morrow your precognition must be t

or this crowning mercy, and I do thank you gratefully. After yesterday, my lord, this

tion, for I think you may be able to repay me very shortly"-he coughed-"or even now. The matter is much changed. Your testimony, which I shall not trouble

this been brought about? The obstacles you told me of on Saturday app

ge (even to you, as you say) the councils of the Government; and

could be any shadow of deception in the man: yet when he drew to him a sheet of paper, dipped his pen among the i

d be now no longer necessary. This is not, of course, a part of your examination, which is to follow by

my lord,

ediately afte

wa

u speak

d

efore, I think?" say

or so thinking, my lord," I r

u part with him

d I. "The question will be

are therefore clear of all anxiety. Alan, it appears, you suppose you can protect; and you talk to me of your gratitude, which I think (if you push me) is not ill-deserved.

you my word I do not so m

"Nor how he might

him like a

tunate, and we are a couple at cross purposes. Let us speak of it no more; you will receive notice when, where, and by whom, we are

offered up, and found them dressed beyond what I

d and brief like a signal, and looking all about, spied for one moment the red head of Neil of the Tom, the son of Duncan. The next mo

ort. Upon our reaching the park I was launched on a bevy of eight or ten young gentlemen (some of them cockaded officers, the rest chiefly advocates) who crowded to attend upon these beauties; and though I was presented to all of them in very good words, it seemed I was by all immediately forgotten. Young folk in a company are like to savage animals: they fall upon or scorn a stranger without civility, or I may say, humanity; and I am sure, if I had been among baboons, they would have shown me quite

, Lieutenant Hector Duncansby, a gawky, leering

very kindly, for his

, and then, repeating

sir," says I, annoyed with myself to b

e, "but I wa

ce of that, sir," says I. "I feel sure y

here Alan Grigor fand

red, with a heckling laugh, that he thought I must ha

istake about this,

on gentlemen," said I, "I think I wou

ooner were we beyond the view of the promenaders, than the fashion of his countenance changed

urn; whereupon he stepped a little back

eeciency as tell a shentlemans that is the king's officer he cannae speak Cot's English? We have swor

o be seriously offended. But his manner at the beginning of our interview was there to belie him. It was manifest he had come prepared to fasten a quarrel on me, right or wrong;

nt as far as this, it would likely stick at nothing; and that to fall by the sword, however ungracefully, was still an improvement on the gallows. I considered besides that by the unguarded pertness of my words and the quickness of my blow I had put myself qui

xample, and stand on guard with the best face I could display. It seems it was not good enough for Mr. Dancansby, who spied some flaw in my man?uvres, paused, looked upon me sharply, and came off and on, and menaced

her?" cries t

d the sword out of my grasp and s

umiliated weapon, I found he had returned his own to the scabbard, and stood

ly what right I had to stand up before "shentlemans" when

me the justice to say I had given him all the satisfaction it wa

the way that you did, I declare it was peyond me. And I am sorry for the plow; though I declare I pelief your own was the elder broth

I am sure you will not stand up a second ti

tly myself to be set up to fecht with an auld wife, or all the same as a bai

rel with me," said I, "you would be yet the mor

round that; then suddenly shaking me by the hand, he vowed I was a pretty enough fellow after all, that it was a thou

e carried myself this day," I told him. "That will be the true service. For though he has sent me a gallant adversary for the first, the thought in Mr. Simon's mind is mere

more of a man than what you wass!" he cried

is passed." I mind that I was extremely thirsty, and had a drink at Saint Margaret's well on the road down, and the sweetness of that water passed belief. We went through the sanctuary, up the Canongate, in by the Netherbow, and s

wait," said I. "You may say it is by no means priva

ring of several voices in the room within. The truth is, they were three at the one table-Prestongrange, Simon Fraser, and Mr. Erskine, Sheriff of Perth

ngs you here again? and who is this yo

e looked before

vour, my lord, which I think it very needful yo

ur in the Hunter's Pog, which I am now fery sorry for, and he behaved himself as pre

your honest exp

to the company, and left the cham

do with this?" s

e. Now I think my character is covered, and until a certain date, which your lordship can very well supply, it will be quit

stongrange's brow, and h

"I spy your hand in the business, and, let me tell you, I resent it. It is disloyal, when we are agreed upon one expedient, to follow another in the dark. You are di

, or come to a differ, and have it out among yourselves. But I will no longer fetch and carry, and get your contrary instruct

ys he, "I think we should tell Mr. Balfour that his character for valour is quite established. He ma

ence; and they made haste, with a somewhat di