responding whisper of Mause "but bethink ye, my dear, them that deny
the Word, the Word will deny"--Her admonition was cut short by the
entrance of the Life-Guardsmen, a party of four troopers, commanded by
Bothwell.

In they tramped, making a tremendous clatter upon the stone-floor with
the iron-shod heels of their large jack-boots, and the clash and clang of
their long, heavy, basket-hilted broadswords. Milnwood and his
housekeeper trembled, from well-grounded apprehensions of the system of
exaction and plunder carried on during these domiciliary visits. Henry
Morton was discomposed with more special cause, for he remembered that he
stood answerable to the laws for having harboured Burley. The widow Mause
Headrigg, between fear for her son's life and an overstrained and
enthusiastic zeal, which reproached her for consenting even tacitly to
belie her religious sentiments, was in a strange quandary. The other
servants quaked for they knew not well what. Cuddie alone, with the look
of supreme indifference and stupidity which a Scottish peasant can at
times assume as a mask for considerable shrewdness and craft, continued
to swallow large spoonfuls of his broth, to command which he had drawn
within his sphere the large vessel that contained it, and helped himself,
amid the confusion, to a sevenfold portion.

"What is your pleasure here, gentlemen?" said Milnwood, humbling himself
before the satellites of power.

"We come in behalf of the king," answered Bothwell; "why the devil did
you keep us so long standing at the door?"

"We were at dinner," answered Milnwood, "and the door was locked, as is
usual in landward towns [Note: The Scots retain the use of the word town
in its comprehensive Saxon meaning, as a place of habitation. A mansion
or a farm house, though solitary, is called the town. A landward town is
a dwelling situated in the country.] in this country. I am sure,
gentlemen, if I had kend ony servants of our gude king had stood at the
door--But wad ye please to drink some ale--or some brandy--or a cup of
canary sack, or claret wine?" making a pause between each offer as long
as a stingy bidder at an auction, who is loath to advance his offer for a
favourite lot.

"Claret for me," said one fellow.

"I like ale better," said another, "provided it is right juice of John
Barleycorn."

"Better never was malted," said Milnwood; "I can hardly say sae muckle
for the claret. It's thin and cauld, gentlemen."

"Br