his message;
and, after much consideration, resolved to send the token to the Earl by
one of the domestics.

* [Supposed to represent Glammis Castle, in Forfarshire, with which the
Author was well acquainted.]

With this purpose he stopped at a cottage, where he obtained the means
of making up the ring in a sealed packet like a petition, addressed,
Forr his hounor the Yerl of Glenllan--These. But being aware that
missives delivered at the doors of great houses by such persons as
himself, do not always make their way according to address, Edie
determined, like an old soldier, to reconnoitre the ground before
he made his final attack. As he approached the porter's lodge, he
discovered, by the number of poor ranked before it, some of them being
indigent persons in the vicinity, and others itinerants of his own
begging profession,--that there was about to be a general dole or
distribution of charity.

"A good turn," said Edie to himself, "never goes unrewarded--I'll maybe
get a good awmous that I wad hae missed but for trotting on this auld
wife's errand."

Accordingly, he ranked up with the rest of this ragged regiment,
assuming a station as near the front as possible,--a distinction due, as
he conceived, to his blue gown and badge, no less than to his years and
experience; but he soon found there was another principle of precedence
in this assembly, to which he had not adverted.

"Are ye a triple man, friend, that ye press forward sae bauldly?--I'm
thinking no, for there's nae Catholics wear that badge."

"Na, na, I am no a Roman," said Edie.

"Then shank yoursell awa to the double folk, or single folk, that's the
Episcopals or Presbyterians yonder: it's a shame to see a heretic hae
sic a lang white beard, that would do credit to a hermit."

Ochiltree, thus rejected from the society of the Catholic mendicants,
or those who called themselves such, went to station himself with the
paupers of the communion of the church of England, to whom the noble
donor allotted a double portion of his charity. But never was a
poor occasional conformist more roughly rejected by a High-church
congregation, even when that matter was furiously agitated in the days
of good Queen Anne.

"See to him wi' his badge!" they said;--"he hears ane o' the king's
Presbyterian chaplains sough out a sermon on the morning of every
birth-day, and now he would pass himsell for ane o' the Episcopal
church! Na, na!--we'll take care o' that."

Edie