freedom of the subject
and the immunities of God's kirk. Sir, it is not a flightering blink of
prosperity which can change my constant opinion in this regard, seeing
it has been my lot before now, like holy David, to see the wicked great
in power and flourishing like a green bay-tree; nevertheless I passed,
and they were not, and the place thereof knew them no more. Wishing you
to lay these things to your heart for your own sake, so far as they may
concern you, I pray you to take no farther notice of her who desires to
remain your unknown servant,

"MARGARET DOUGLAS,

"otherwise ASHTON."

About two days after he had received this very unsatisfactory epistle,
the Master of Ravenswood, while walking up the High Street of Edinburgh,
was jostled by a person, in whom, as the man pulled off his hat to make
an apology, he recognized Lockhard, the confidential domestic of
Sir William Ashton. The man bowed, slipt a letter into his hand, and
disappeared. The packet contained four close-written folios, from which,
however, as is sometimes incident to the compositions of great lawyers,
little could be extracted, excepting that the writer felt himself in a
very puzzling predicament.

Sir William spoke at length of his high value and regard for his dear
young friend, the Master of Ravenswood, and of his very extreme high
value and regard for the Marquis of A----, his very dear old friend;
he trusted that any measures that they might adopt, in which he was
concerned, would be carred on with due regard to the sanctity of
decreets and judgments obtained in foro contentioso; protesting, before
men and angels, that if the law of Scotland, as declared in her supreme
courts, were to undergo a reversal in the English House of Lords, the
evils which would thence arise to the public would inflict a greater
wound upon his heart than any loss he might himself sustain by such
irregular proceedings. He flourished much on generosity and forgiveness
of mutual injuries, and hinted at the mutability of human affairs,
always favourite topics with the weaker party in politics. He
pathetically lamented, and gently censured, the haste which had been
used in depriving him of his situation of Lord Keeper, which his
experience had enabled him to fill with some advantage to the public,
without so much as giving him an opportunity of explaining how far his
own views of general politics might essentially differ from those now in
power. He was convinced