, and to make a large tack back into the bay, in order to recover
sea-room enough to double the headland.

'They 'll lose her, by--, cargo and lugger, one or both,' said Kennedy;
'I must gallop away to the Point of Warroch (this was the headland so
often mentioned), and make them a signal where she has drifted to on the
other side. Good-bye for an hour, Ellangowan; get out the gallon
punch-bowl and plenty of lemons. I'll stand for the French article by the
time I come back, and we'll drink the young Laird's health in a bowl that
would swim the collector's yawl.' So saying, he mounted his horse and
galloped off.

About a mile from the house, and upon the verge of the woods, which, as
we have said, covered a promontory terminating in the cape called the
Point of Warroch, Kennedy met young Harry Bertram, attended by his tutor,
Dominie Sampson. He had often promised the child a ride upon his
galloway; and, from singing, dancing, and playing Punch for his
amusement, was a particular favourite. He no sooner came scampering up
the path, than the boy loudly claimed his promise; and Kennedy, who saw
no risk, in indulging him, and wished to tease the Dominie, in whose
visage he read a remonstrance, caught up Harry from the ground, placed
him before him, and continued his route; Sampson's 'Peradventure, Master
Kennedy-' being lost in the clatter of his horse's feet. The pedagogue
hesitated a moment whether he should go after them; but Kennedy being a
person in full confidence of the family, and with whom he himself had no
delight in associating, 'being that he was addicted unto profane and
scurrilous jests,' he continued his own walk at his own pace, till he
reached the Place of Ellangowan.

The spectators from the ruined walls of the castle were still watching
the sloop of war, which at length, but not without the loss of
considerable time, recovered sea-room enough to weather the Point of
Warroch, and was lost to their sight behind that wooded promontory. Some
time afterwards the discharges of several cannon were heard at a
distance, and, after an interval, a still louder explosion, as of a
vessel blown up, and a cloud of smoke rose above the trees and mingled
with the blue sky. All then separated on their different occasions,
auguring variously upon the fate of the smuggler, but the majority
insisting that her capture was inevitable, if she had not already gone to
the bottom.

'It is near our dinner-time, my dear,' said Mrs