re
was not the slightest sound stirring in the neighbourhood, and then
continued,--"I'll tell ye. Ye ken how he has laboured to raise up again
the Covenant, burned, broken, and buried in the hard hearts and selfish
devices of this stubborn people. Now, when he went to Holland, far from
the countenance and thanks of the great, and the comfortable fellowship
of the godly, both whilk he was in right to expect, the Prince of Orange
wad show him no favour, and the ministers no godly communion. This was
hard to bide for ane that had suffered and done mickle,--ower mickle, it
may be; but why suld I be a judge? He came back to me and to the auld
place o' refuge that had often received him in his distresses, mair
especially before the great day of victory at Drumclog, for I sail ne'er
forget how he was bending hither of a' nights in the year on that e'ening
after the play when young Milnwood wan the popinjay; but I warned him off
for that time."

"What!" exclaimed Morton, "it was you that sat in your red cloak by the
high-road, and told him there was a lion in the path?"

"In the name of Heaven! wha are ye?" said the old woman, breaking off her
narrative in astonishment. "But be wha ye may," she continued, resuming
it with tranquillity, "ye can ken naething waur o' me than that I hae
been willing to save the life o' friend and foe."

"I know no ill of you, Mrs. Maclure, and I mean no ill by you; I only
wished to show you that I know so much of this person's affairs that I
might be safely intrusted with the rest. Proceed, if you please, in your
narrative."

"There is a strange command in your voice," said the blind woman, "though
its tones are sweet. I have little mair to say. The Stewarts hae been
dethroned, and William and Mary reign in their stead; but nae mair word
of the Covenant than if it were a dead letter. They hae taen the indulged
clergy, and an Erastian General Assembly of the ante pure and triumphant
Kirk of Scotland, even into their very arms and bosoms. Our faithfu'
champions o' the testimony agree e'en waur wi' this than wi' the open
tyranny and apostasy of the persecuting times, for souls are hardened and
deadened, and the mouths of fasting multitudes are crammed wi' fizenless
bran instead of the sweet word in season; and mony an hungry, starving
creature, when he sits down on a Sunday forenoon to get something that
might warm him to the great work, has a dry clatter o' morality driven
about his lugs, and--"