Highlanders, who, each seizing him by the arm,
hurried him away from the scuffle and from the high-road. They ran with
great speed, half supporting and half dragging our hero, who could,
however, distinguish a few dropping shots fired about the spat which
he had left. This, as he afterwards learned, proceeded from Gilfillan's
party, who had now assembled, the stragglers in front and rear having
joined the others. At their approach the Highlanders drew off, but not
before they had rifled Gilfillan and two of his people, who remained on
the spot grievously wounded. A few shots were exchanged betwixt them
and the Westlanders; but the latter, now without a commander, and
apprehensive of a second ambush, did not make any serious effort to
recover their prisoner, judging it more wise to proceed on their journey
to Stirling, carrying with them their wounded captain and comrades.

CHAPTER XXXVII

WAVERLEY IS STILL IN DISTRESS

The velocity, and indeed violence, with which Waverley was hurried
along, nearly deprived him of sensation; for the injury he had received
from his fall prevented him from aiding himself so effectually as he
might otherwise have done. When this was observed by his conductors,
they called to their aid two or three others of the party, and swathing
our hero's body in one of their plaids, divided his weight by that
means among them, and transported him at the same rapid rate as before,
without any exertion of his own. They spoke little, and that in Gaelic;
and did not slacken their pace till they had run nearly two miles, when
they abated their extreme rapidity, but continued still to walk very
fast, relieving each other occasionally,

Our hero now endeavoured to address them, but was only answered with
'CHA N'EIL BEURL' AGAM,' i.e. 'I have no English,' being, as Waverley
well knew, the constant reply of a Highlander, when he either does not
understand, or does not choose to reply to, an Englishman or Lowlander.
He then mentioned the name of Vich Ian Vohr, concluding that he was
indebted to his friendship for his rescue from the clutches of Gifted
Gilfillan; but neither did this produce any mark of recognition from his
escort.

The twilight had given place to moonshine when the party halted upon
the brink of a precipitous glen, which, as partly enlightened by the
moonbeams, seemed full of trees and tangled brushwood. Two of the
Highlanders dived into it by a small footpath, as if to explore its
re