er of his predecessors. And, in short, that
Edward was now (the intermediate steps of cornet and lieutenant being
overleapt with great agility) Captain Waverley, of Gardiner's regiment of
dragoons, which he must join in their quarters at Dundee in Scotland, in
the course of a month.

Sir Everard Waverley received this intimation with a mixture of feelings.
At the period of the Hanoverian succession he had withdrawn from
parliament, and his conduct in the memorable year 1715 had not been
altogether unsuspected. There were reports of private musters of tenants
and horses in Waverley-Chase by moonlight, and of cases of carbines and
pistols purchased in Holland, and addressed to the Baronet, but
intercepted by the vigilance of a riding officer of the excise, who was
afterwards tossed in a blanket on a moonless night, by an association of
stout yeomen, for his officiousness. Nay, it was even said, that at the
arrest of Sir William Wyndham, the leader of the Tory party, a letter
from Sir Everard was found in the pocket of his night-gown. But there was
no overt act which an attainder could be founded on, and government,
contented with suppressing the insurrection of 1715, felt it neither
prudent nor safe to push their vengeance farther than against those
unfortunate gentlemen who actually took up arms.

Nor did Sir Everard's apprehensions of personal consequences seem to
correspond with the reports spread among his Whig neighbours. It was well
known that he had supplied with money several of the distressed
Northumbrians and Scotchmen, who, after being made prisoners at Preston
in Lancashire, were imprisoned in Newgate and the Marshalsea, and it was
his solicitor and ordinary counsel who conducted the defence of some of
these unfortunate gentlemen at their trial. It was generally supposed,
however, that, had ministers possessed any real proof of Sir Everard's
accession to the rebellion, he either would not have ventured thus to
brave the existing government, or at least would not have done so with
impunity. The feelings which then dictated his proceedings were those of
a young man, and at an agitating period. Since that time Sir Everard's
Jacobitism had been gradually decaying, like a fire which burns out for
want of fuel. His Tory and High-Church principles were kept up by some
occasional exercise at elections and quarter-sessions; but those
respecting hereditary right were fallen into a sort of abeyance. Yet it
jarred severe