up!"

"But you can at least tell me who sent you here, Geordie?" said I, anxious
for further information before intrusting myself to such erratic guidance.

He of the gill-stoups lifted up his voice and sang--

"Cam' ye by Tweedside,
Or cam' ye by Flodden?
Met ye the deil
On the braes o' Culloden?

"Three imps o' darkness
I saw in a neuk,
Riving the red-coats,
And roasting the Deuk.

"Quo' ane o' them--'Geordie,
Gae down to the brig,
I'm yaup for my supper,
And fetch us a Whig.'"

"Ha! ha! ha! Hoo d'ye like that, my man? Queer freends ye've gotten noo,
and ye'll need a lang spune to sup kail wi' them. But come awa'. I canna
stand here the haill nicht listening to your havers."

Although the hint conveyed by Mr Dowie's ingenious verses was rather of an
alarming nature, I made up my mind at once to run all risks and follow
him. Geordie strode on, selecting apparently the most unfrequented lanes,
and making, as I anxiously observed, for a remote part of the suburbs. Nor
was his voice silent during our progress, for he kept regaling me with a
series of snatches, which, being for the most part of a supernatural and
diabolical tendency, did not much contribute towards the restoration of my
equanimity. At length he paused before a small house, the access to which
was by a downward flight of steps.

"Ay--this is the place!" he muttered. "I ken it weel. It's no just bad the
whusky that they sell, but they needna put sae muckle water intil't."

So saying, he descended the stair. I followed. There was no light in the
passage, but the bauldy went forward, stumbling and groping in the dark. I
saw a bright ray streaming through a crevice, and three distinct knocks
were given.

"Come in, whaever ye are!" said a bluff voice; and I entered a low
apartment, in which the candles looked yellow through a fog of
tobacco-smoke. Three men were seated at a deal table, covered with the
implements of national conviviality: and to my intense astonishment none
of the three were strangers to me. I at once recognised the features of
the taciturn M'Auslan, the wary Shanks, and the independent Mr Thomas
Gills.

"There's the man ye wanted," said Geordie Dowie, slapping me familiarly on
the shoulder.--"Whaur's the dram ye promised me?

"In Campbelltown my love was born;
Her mither in Glen Turrit!
But Ferintosh is the place for me.
For that's the strangest speerit!"

"Hand yer claverin