e; so
much so, indeed, that the venerable sages of the Kirk, conceiving that
the mode gave tempting facilities for intrigue, directed more than one
act of Assembly against this use of the mantle. But fashion, as usual,
proved too strong for authority, and while plaids continued to be worn,
women of all ranks occasionally employed them as a sort of muffler or
veil. [Note: Concealment of an individual, while in public or promiscuous
society, was then very common. In England, where no plaids were worn, the
ladies used vizard masks for the same purpose, and the gallants drew the
skirts of their cloaks over the right shoulder, so as to cover part of
the face. This is repeatedly alluded to in Pepys's Diary.] Her face and
figure thus concealed, Edith, holding by her attendant's arm, hastened
with trembling steps to the place of Morton's confinement.

This was a small study or closet, in one of the turrets, opening upon a
gallery in which the sentinel was pacing to and fro; for Sergeant
Bothwell, scrupulous in observing his word, and perhaps touched with some
compassion for the prisoner's youth and genteel demeanour, had waved the
indignity of putting his guard into the same apartment with him.
Halliday, therefore, with his carabine on his arm, walked up and down the
gallery, occasionally solacing himself with a draught of ale, a huge
flagon of which stood upoon the table at one end of the apartment, and at
other times humming the lively Scottish air,

"Between Saint Johnstone and Bonny Dundee, I'll gar ye be fain to follow
me."

Jenny Dennison cautioned her mistress once more to let her take her own
way.

"I can manage the trooper weel eneugh," she said, "for as rough as he
is--I ken their nature weel; but ye maunna say a single word."

She accordingly opened the door of the gallery just as the sentinel had
turned his back from it, and taking up the tune which he hummed, she sung
in a coquettish tone of rustic raillery,

"If I were to follow a poor sodger lad, My friends wad be angry, my
minnie be mad; A laird, or a lord, they were fitter for me, Sae I'll
never be fain to follow thee."--

"A fair challenge, by Jove," cried the sentinel, turning round, "and from
two at once; but it's not easy to bang the soldier with his bandoleers;"
then taking up the song where the damsel had stopt,

"To follow me ye weel may be glad, A share of my supper, a share of my
bed, To the sound of the drum to range fearless and free, I'll g