crackers and other fireworks. The health of
her Majesty the Queen was then pledged and drunk with Highland honours
by the assembled hundreds; the health of the Princess Beatrice was
also received with enthusiasm. Dancing was then resumed, and was
carried on till a late hour at night. The scene was very picturesque,
Lochnagar and other mountains in the neighbourhood being covered with
snow. Although the wind blew piercingly cold from the north, her
Majesty and the Princess remained a considerable time, viewing the
sports with evident interest.

As to giving up faith in dreams, signs, omens, predictions, and
warnings, some people would nearly as soon give up their belief in the
Bible. Then add to these a belief in ghosts, and we have a catalogue
before us so self-accusing that we dare not cast serious reflections
on the memories of our ancestors.

CHAPTER LXX.

Lizzie M'Gill, the Fifeshire
Spaewife--Fortune-telling--Predicting a Storm at
Sea--Servants alarmed thereby--Prediction
Fulfilled--Adam Donald, an Aberdeenshire Prophet--Adam
supposed to have been a Changeling--A Careless
Mother--Adam as a Linguist--His Predictions and
Cures--His Marriage--Valuable Charm--The Wise Woman of
Kincardineshire--The Recruiting
Sergeant--High-spirited Lady wooed and won--Lucky
Lightfoot, the Spaewife--Charmed Ring and its
Effects--Elopement and Marriage--An Enraged
Father--Life in America--Sergeant Campbell's
Death--Second Marriage--Literary
Talents--Strong-minded Women.

In the spring of 1866, Eliza M'Gill, who resided near a romantic
church in the Presbytery of St. Andrews, died at the advanced age of
ninety-three years. For a long period almost every one, far and near,
knew her as a spaewife of no ordinary knowledge. Lizzie (the name
usually given her) could scarcely be called an impostor, for she
appeared to have sincere faith in her profession. Often she exclaimed
with solemn fervency, "The gift I hae is fae aboon, an' what He gies
daurna be hidit." It was common for coy damsels and staid matrons to
wend their way to Lizzie's cot about twilight, to have their fortunes
spaed. About ten years before her death, when the prospects of the
herring fishing were discouraging in the extreme, a buxom young woman,
belonging to Pittenweem or St. Monance, repaired one evening to
Carnbee to consult Lizzie. The damsel went with a heavy countenance,