dbuck was the foremost and most earnest, pressing forward with
unwonted desperation to the very brink of the crag. Some fishermen had
brought with them the mast of a boat, and this was soon sunk in the
ground and sufficiently secured. A yard, across the upright mast, and a
rope stretched along it, and reeved through a block at each end, formed
an extempore crane, which afforded the means of lowering an arm-chair
down to the flat shelf on which the sufferers had roosted.

Lovel bound Miss Wardour to the back and arms of the chair, while
Ochiltree kept Sir Arthur quiet.

"What are ye doing wi' my bairn? She shall not be separated from me!
Isabel, stay with me, I command you!"

"Farewell, my father!" murmured Isabella; "farewell, my--my friends!"
and, shutting her eyes, she gave the signal to Lovel, and he to those
who were above.

A loud shout announced the success of the experiment. The chair was
again lowered, and Sir Arthur made fast in it; and after Sir Arthur had
been landed safe and sound, old Ochiltree was brought up; finally Lovel
was safely grounded upon the summit of the cliff. As he recovered from a
sort of half-swoon, occasioned by the giddiness of the ascent, he cast
his eyes eagerly around. The object for which they sought was already in
the act of vanishing. Her white garment was just discernible as she
followed on the path which her father had taken. She had lingered till
she saw the last of their company rescued from danger, but Lovel was not
aware that she had expressed in his fate even this degree of interest.

_III.--The Duel_

Some few weeks after the perilous escape from the tide, Sir Arthur
invited Mr. Lovel and the Monkbarns family to join him on a visit to the
ruins of a certain priory in the neighbourhood. Lovel at once accepted,
and Mr. Oldbuck decided that there would be room for his niece in a
postchaise. This niece, Mary M'Intyre, like her brother Hector, was an
orphan. They were the offspring of a sister of Monkbarns, who had
married one Captain M'Intyre, a Highlander. Both parents being dead, the
son and daughter were left to the charge of Mr. Oldbuck. The nephew was
now a captain in the army, the niece had her home at Monkbarns.

All went happily at Sir Arthur's party at the ruins, until the
unexpected arrival of Hector M'Intyre. This newcomer, a handsome young
man about five-and-twenty, had ridden to Monkbarns, and learning his
uncle's absence had come straight on to join the c