much softened. Their numbers, however, are so greatly
diminished that, instead of one hundred thousand, as calculated by
Fletcher, it would now perhaps be impossible to collect above five
hundred throughout all Scotland.

A tribe of these itinerants, to whom Meg Merrilies appertained, had long
been as stationary as their habits permitted in a glen upon the estate of
Ellangowan. They had there erected a few huts, which they denominated
their 'city of refuge,' and where, when not absent on excursions, they
harboured unmolested, as the crows that roosted in the old ash-trees
around them. They had been such long occupants that they were considered
in some degree as proprietors of the wretched shealings which they
inhabited. This protection they were said anciently to have repaid by
service to the Laird in war, or more frequently, by infesting or
plundering the lands of those neighbouring barons with whom he chanced to
be at feud. Latterly their services were of a more pacific nature. The
women spun mittens for the lady, and knitted boot-hose for the Laird,
which were annually presented at Christmas with great form. The aged
sibyls blessed the bridal bed of the Laird when he married, and the
cradle of the heir when born. The men repaired her ladyship's cracked
china, and assisted the Laird in his sporting parties, wormed his dogs,
and cut the ears of his terrier puppies. The children gathered nuts in
the woods, and cranberries in the moss, and mushrooms on the pastures,
for tribute to the Place. These acts of voluntary service, and
acknowledgments of dependence, were rewarded by protection on some
occasions, connivance on others, and broken victuals, ale, and brandy
when circumstances called for a display of generosity; and this mutual
intercourse of good offices, which had been carried on for at least two
centuries, rendered the inhabitants of Derncleugh a kind of privileged
retainers upon the estate of Ellangowan. 'The knaves' were the Laird's
'exceeding good friends'; and he would have deemed himself very ill used
if his countenance could not now and then have borne them out against the
law of the country and the local magistrate. But this friendly union was
soon to be dissolved.

The community of Derncleugh, who cared for no rogues but their own, were
wholly without alarm at the severity of the Justice's proceedings towards
other itinerants. They had no doubt that he determined to suffer no
mendicants or strollers in t