his fretful and hasty course through the vale of time shall be ceased and
over. What thy petty fuming is to the deep and vast billows of a
shoreless ocean, are our cares, hopes, fears, joys, and sorrows to the
objects which must occupy us through the awful and boundless succession
of ages!"

Thus moralizing, our traveller passed on till the dell opened, and the
banks, receding from the brook, left a little green vale, exhibiting a
croft, or small field, on which some corn was growing, and a cottage,
whose walls were not above five feet high, and whose thatched roof, green
with moisture, age, houseleek, and grass, had in some places suffered
damage from the encroachment of two cows, whose appetite this appearance
of verdure had diverted from their more legitimate pasture. An ill-spelt
and worse-written inscription intimated to the traveller that he might
here find refreshment for man and horse,--no unacceptable intimation,
rude as the hut appeared to be, considering the wild path he had trod in
approaching it, and the high and waste mountains which rose in desolate
dignity behind this humble asylum.

It must indeed have been, thought Morton, in some such spot as this that
Burley was likely to find a congenial confident.

As he approached, he observed the good dame of the house herself, seated
by the door; she had hitherto been concealed from him by a huge
alder-bush.

"Good evening, Mother," said the traveller. "Your name is Mistress
Maclure?"

"Elizabeth Maclure, sir, a poor widow," was the reply.

"Can you lodge a stranger for a night?"

"I can, sir, if he will be pleased with the widow's cake and the widow's
cruse."

"I have been a soldier, good dame," answered Morton, "and nothing can
come amiss to me in the way of entertainment."

"A sodger, sir?" said the old woman, with a sigh,--"God send ye a better
trade!"

"It is believed to be an honourable profession, my good dame; I hope you
do not think the worse of me for having belonged to it?"

"I judge no one, sir," replied the woman, "and your voice sounds like
that of a civil gentleman; but I hae witnessed sae muckle ill wi'
sodgering in this puir land that I am e'en content that I can see nae
mair o't wi' these sightless organs."

As she spoke thus, Morton observed that she was blind.

"Shall I not be troublesome to you, my good dame?" said he,
compassionately; "your infirmity seems ill calculated for your
profession."

"Na, sir," answered the old