hold forth, his own treason will burst him."

Having made this arrangement, Bothwell placed himself at the head of the
party, and Inglis, with six dragoons, brought up the rear. The whole then
set forward at a trot, with the purpose of overtaking the main body of
the regiment.

Morton, overwhelmed with a complication of feelings, was totally
indifferent to the various arrangements made for his secure custody, and
even to the relief afforded him by his release from the fetters. He
experienced that blank and waste of the heart which follows the hurricane
of passion, and, no longer supported by the pride and conscious rectitude
which dictated his answers to Claverhouse, he surveyed with deep
dejection the glades through which he travelled, each turning of which
had something to remind him of past happiness and disappointed love. The
eminence which they now ascended was that from which he used first and
last to behold the ancient tower when approaching or retiring from it;
and, it is needless to add, that there he was wont to pause, and gaze
with a lover's delight on the battlements, which, rising at a distance
out of the lofty wood, indicated the dwelling of her, whom he either
hoped soon to meet or had recently parted from. Instinctively he turned
his head back to take a last look of a scene formerly so dear to him, and
no less instinctively he heaved a deep sigh. It was echoed by a loud
groan from his companion in misfortune, whose eyes, moved, perchance, by
similar reflections, had taken the same direction. This indication of
sympathy, on the part of the captive, was uttered in a tone more coarse
than sentimental; it was, however, the expression of a grieved spirit,
and so far corresponded with the sigh of Morton. In turning their heads
their eyes met, and Morton recognised the stolid countenance of Cuddie
Headrigg, bearing a rueful expression, in which sorrow for his own lot
was mixed with sympathy for the situation of his companion.

"Hegh, sirs!" was the expression of the ci-devant ploughman of the mains
of Tillietudlem; "it's an unco thing that decent folk should be harled
through the country this gate, as if they were a warld's wonder."

"I am sorry to see you here, Cuddie," said Morton, who, even in his own
distress, did not lose feeling for that of others.

"And sae am I, Mr Henry," answered Cuddie, "baith for mysell and you; but
neither of our sorrows will do muckle gude that I can see. To be sure,
for me,"