gh_! However,
his heart was not in the match, and he had made this visit to his father's
intimate friend, in order to avoid all importunity on a subject which was
irksome to him. It is useless to mince the matter. Helen, in spite of her
father's remonstrances and representations, was deeply and irrecoverably in
love with the gallant Graham, and he, in his turn, was at least equally
enamoured of the face, person, manners, mind, and soul, of the lovely and
fascinating Miss Palmer.

There was only one subject on which there was any division of opinion
betwixt the lovers--Helen was every inch a Covenanter; whilst Mr William
was rather, if anything, inclined to view their opposition to government as
factious and inexcusable. He did not, indeed, approve of the atrocities
which were practising every day around him, and in the parish of Closeburn
in particular; but he ventured to hope that a few instances of severity
would put an end to the delusion of the people, and that they would again
return to their allegiance and their parish churches. Helen was mighty and
magnificent in the cause of non-conformity and humanity. She talked of
freedom, conscience, religion, on the one hand--of tyranny, treachery,
oppression, and cruelty, on the other--till Mr William, either convinced,
or appearing to be so, fairly gave in, promising most willingly, and in
perfect good faith, that he would never assist the Laird of Closeburn, or
of Lag, in any of their unhallowed proceedings.

One day when Helen and her lover (for it was now no secret) were on a walk
into the Barmoor-wood, they were naturally attracted to the spot where
their intercourse had begun; and, sitting down opposite to each other on
the trunks of some felled trees, they gradually began a somewhat
confidential conversation respecting their birth and parentage. Helen
disguised nothing; she was born in Cumberland, and brought here whilst a
child; her mother, whose name was Helen Graham, had died at her birth. At
the mention of this name, the stranger and lover started convulsively to
his feet, and running up to and embracing Helen, he exclaimed--"O God! O
God! you are my own cousin!" Helen fainted, and was with difficulty
recovered, by an application of water from the adjoining brook. It was
indeed so. Out of delicacy, Mr William had made no particular inquiries at
Helen respecting her mother; and Helen, on the other hand, knew that Graham
is an almost universal name, in Cumberland