and the Ragman-roll to boot, and acknowledge Queen
Mary to be nothing better than she should be, to get alongside my bottle
of old port that he ran away from, and left scarce begun. But he's safe
now, and here a' comes"--(for the chair was again lowered, and Sir Arthur
made fast in it, without much consciousness on his own part)--"here a'
comes--Bowse away, my boys! canny wi' him--a pedigree of a hundred links
is hanging on a tenpenny tow--the whole barony of Knockwinnock depends on
three plies of hemp--respice finem, respice funem--look to your end--look
to a rope's end.--Welcome, welcome, my good old friend, to firm land,
though I cannot say to warm land or to dry land. A cord for ever against
fifty fathom of water, though not in the sense of the base proverb--a
fico for the phrase,--better _sus. per funem_, than _sus. per coll_."

While Oldbuck ran on in this way, Sir Arthur was safely wrapped in the
close embraces of his daughter, who, assuming that authority which the
circumstances demanded, ordered some of the assistants to convey him to
the chariot, promising to follow in a few minutes, She lingered on the
cliff, holding an old countryman's arm, to witness probably the safety
of those whose dangers she had shared.

"What have we here?" said Oldbuck, as the vehicle once more
ascended--"what patched and weather-beaten matter is this?" Then as the
torches illumed the rough face and grey hairs of old Ochiltree,--"What!
is it thou?--Come, old Mocker, I must needs be friends with thee--but who
the devil makes up your party besides?"

"Ane that's weel worth ony twa o' us, Monkbarns;--it's the young stranger
lad they ca' Lovel--and he's behaved this blessed night as if he had
three lives to rely on, and was willing to waste them a' rather than
endanger ither folk's. Ca' hooly, sirs, as ye, wad win an auld man's
blessing!--mind there's naebody below now to haud the gy--Hae a care o'
the Cat's-lug corner--bide weel aff Crummie's-horn!"

"Have a care indeed," echoed Oldbuck. "What! is it my rara avis--my
black swan--my phoenix of companions in a post-chaise?--take care of him,
Mucklebackit."

"As muckle care as if he were a graybeard o' brandy; and I canna take
mair if his hair were like John Harlowe's.--Yo ho, my hearts! bowse away
with him!"

Lovel did, in fact, run a much greater risk than any of his precursors.
His weight was not sufficient to render his ascent steady amid such a
storm of wind, and he swung like a