you to share my triumph, and you
have come to witness my disappointment we shall call it.' Evan now
presented the written report he had in his hand, which Fergus threw from
him with great passion. 'I wish to God,' he said, 'the old den would
tumble down upon the heads of the fools who attack and the knaves who
defend it! I see, Waverley, you think I am mad. Leave us, Evan, but be
within call.'

'The Colonel's in an unco kippage,' said Mrs. Flockhart to Evan as he
descended; 'I wish he may be weel,--the very veins on his brent brow are
swelled like whipcord; wad he no tak something?'

'He usually lets blood for these fits,' answered the Highland ancient
with great composure.

When this officer left the room, the Chieftain gradually reassumed some
degree of composure. 'I know, Waverley,' he said, 'that Colonel Talbot
has persuaded you to curse ten times a day your engagement with us; nay,
never deny it, for I am at this moment tempted to curse my own. Would you
believe it, I made this very morning two suits to the Prince, and he has
rejected them both; what do you think of it?'

'What can I think,' answered Waverley,'till I know what your requests
were?' 'Why, what signifies what they were, man? I tell you it was I that
made them--I to whom he owes more than to any three who have joined the
standard; for I negotiated the whole business, and brought in all the
Perthshire men when not one would have stirred. I am not likely, I think,
to ask anything very unreasonable, and if I did, they might have
stretched a point. Well, but you shall know all, now that I can draw my
breath again with some freedom. You remember my earl's patent; it is
dated some years back, for services then rendered; and certainly my merit
has not been diminished, to say the least, by my subsequent behaviour.
Now, sir, I value this bauble of a coronet as little as you can, or any
philosopher on earth; for I hold that the chief of such a clan as the
Sliochd nan Ivor is superior in rank to any earl in Scotland. But I had a
particular reason for assuming this cursed title at this time. You must
know that I learned accidentally that the Prince has been pressing that
old foolish Baron of Bradwardine to disinherit his male heir, or
nineteenth or twentieth cousin, who has taken a command in the Elector of
Hanover's militia, and to settle his estate upon your pretty little
friend Rose; and this, as being the command of his king and overlord, who
may alter th