to the door of the room, and finding
it locked and bolted on the outside, rushed against it with all
his force, and made the most desperate efforts to burst it open,
notwithstanding the entreaties of his sister that he would compose
himself and recollect the condition in which he was placed. But the
door, framed to withstand attacks from excisemen, constables, and other
personages, considered as worthy to use what are called the king's keys,
[In common parlance, a crowbar and hatchet.] 'and therewith to make
lockfast places open and patent,' set his efforts at defiance. Meantime
the noise continued without, and we are to give an account of its origin
in our next chapter.

CHAPTER XX

NARRATIVE OF DARSIE LATIMER, CONTINUED

Joe Crackenthorp's public-house had never, since it first reared
its chimneys on the banks of the Solway, been frequented by such a
miscellaneous group of visitors as had that morning become its guests.
Several of them were persons whose quality seemed much superior to
their dresses and modes of travelling. The servants who attended them
contradicted the inferences to be drawn from the garb of their masters,
and, according to the custom of the knights of the rainbow, gave many
hints that they were not people to serve any but men of first-rate
consequence. These gentlemen, who had come thither chiefly for the
purpose of meeting with Mr. Redgauntlet, seemed moody and anxious,
conversed and walked together apparently in deep conversation, and
avoided any communication with the chance travellers whom accident
brought that morning to the same place of resort.

As if Fate had set herself to confound the plans of the Jacobite
conspirators, the number of travellers was unusually great, their
appearance respectable, and they filled the public tap-room of the inn,
where the political guests had already occupied most of the private
apartments.

Amongst others, honest Joshua Geddes had arrived, travelling, as he
said, in the sorrow of the soul, and mourning for the fate of Darsie
Latimer as he would for his first-born child. He had skirted the whole
coast of the Solway, besides making various trips into the interior,
not shunning, on such occasions, to expose himself to the laugh of the
scorner, nay, even to serious personal risk, by frequenting the haunts
of smugglers, horse-jockeys, and other irregular persons, who looked
on his intrusion with jealous eyes, and were apt to consider him as
an excis