hope of liberty, I fancy, would be clouded; and I would be
remitted again to the care of Captain Wallace, who keepeth the town and the
Mayor's daughter from the spoiling arms of the robber Humes."

"Ha! ha!" replied he--"thy father wanteth not a Mayor's wits, Isabella, in
offering thee as a prize to the Governor of the town. Excellent device,
i'faith! The old burgher lord knew he could not keep thee, mad-cap wench as
thou art, from a hated Hume's arms, unless he gave the Captain an interest
as a _lover_ in guarding thee, like a piece of the old wall of Berwick."

"And therein thou'rt well complimented," replied she; "for my father could
not get, in all Berwick, a man that could keep me from thee, but he who
guardeth town, and Mayor, and maiden together. Since the Governor, as a
lover, got charge of me, I am more firmly caged than ever was the old
countess, who was so long confined in the grated wing-cage of the old
castle. When art thou to free me from the Governor's love and surveillance,
good Patrick? If what I have now to tell thee hath no power to quicken thy
wits and nerve thine arm, thou art indeed thyself no better than one of
those stones, to which, in thy wit, thou hast likened me. Knowest that a
day is fixed for Captain Wallace being my _legal_ governor?"

"Ha!" cried Hume, in agitation. "This soundeth differently from the playful
hammer of thy wit, Bell. What day is fixed? Thou hast fired me with high
purposes."

"How high tower they?" cried the maiden, laughing. "Do they reach thy
former threat, to pull down the Newmilne dam-dike, and let _up_ the salmon,
in revenge for the letting _down_ of the Mayor's daughter?"

"Another time for thy wit, Bell," replied Patrick, in a more serious tone.
"Thou hast put to flight my spirits. The grey owl Meditation is flapping
his dingy wing over my heart. The time--the time--when is the day?"

"This day se'ennight," answered Isabel. "Hush! hush! here cometh the
Governor, blowing like a Tweedmouth grampus, fresh from the German Sea, in
full run after a lady-fish of the queen of rivers."

And now Hume heard the hoarse voice of the redoubted Governor, Captain
Wallace--that fat overgrown _bellygerent_ son of Mars, so famous, in his
day, for vaunting of feats of arms, at Bothwell, (where he never was,) over
the Mayor's wine, and in presence of his fair daughter, whom he thus
courted after the manner of the noble Moor, with a slight difference as to
the truth of his feats sc