gathered wild
flowers in the wood?"

It was Elspeth Faa.

The musket dropped from the hands of the intended executioner--a
thousand recollections, that he had often fancied dreams, rushed across
his memory. He again seized the musket, he rushed forward to his father,
but, ere he reached, Elspeth had cut the cords that bound the laird, and
placed a dagger in his hand for his defence, and, with extended arms, he
flew to meet the youth, crying--"My son!--my son!"

The old Faa king shook with rage and disappointment, and his first
impulse was to poniard his wife--but he feared to do so; for although he
had injured her, and had not seen her for years, her influence was
greater with the tribe than his.

"Now, Willie," cried she, addressing him, "wha rues it now? Fareweel for
ance and a'--and the bairn I brought up will find a shelter for my auld
head."

It were vain to tell how Clennel and his son wept on each other's neck,
and how they exchanged forgiveness. But such was the influence of
Elspeth, that they departed from the midst of the Faas unmolested, and
she accompanied them.

Imagination must picture the scene when the long-lost son flung himself
upon the bosom of his mother, and pressed his sister's hand in his.
Clennel Hall rang with the sounds of joy for many days; and, ere they
were ended, Andrew Smith placed a ring upon the finger of Susan, and
they became one flesh--she a respectable woman. And old Elspeth lived to
the age of ninety and seven years beneath its roof.

KATE KENNEDY;

OR, THE MAID OF INNERKEPPLE.

Innerkepple was, some three hundred years ago, as complete a
fortification as could be seen along the Borders--presenting its
bastions, its turrets and donjon, and all the appurtenances of a
military strength, in the face of a Border riever, with that solemn air
of defiance that belongs to the style of the old castles. Many a blow of
a mangonel it had received; and Scotch and English engines of war had,
with equal force and address, poured into its old grey ribs their
destructive bolts; every wound was an acquisition of glory; and, unless
where a breach demanded a repair for the sake of security, the scars on
the old warrior were allowed to remain as a proof of his prowess.
Indeed, these very wounds appearing on the walls had their names--being
christened after the leaders of the sieges that had been in vain
directed against it; and, among the number, the kings of England might
have been