some
indistinct period before the beginning of history. The date is
reassuring; for I think cautious writers are silent on the General's
exploits. But the stone is connected with one of those remarkable
tenures of land which linger on into the modern world from Feudalism.
Whenever the reigning sovereign passes by, a certain landed proprietor
is held bound to climb on to the top, trumpet in hand, and sound a
flourish according to the measure of his knowledge in that art. Happily
for a respectable family, crowned heads have no great business in the
Pentland Hills. But the story lends a character of comicality to the
stone; and the passer-by will sometimes chuckle to himself.

The district is dear to the superstitious. Hard by, at the back-gate of
Comiston, a belated carter beheld a lady in white, "with the most
beautiful, clear shoes upon her feet," who looked upon him in a very
ghastly manner, and then vanished; and just in front is the Hunters'
Tryst, once a roadside inn, and not so long ago haunted by the devil in
person. Satan led the inhabitants a pitiful existence. He shook the four
corners of the building with lamentable outcries, beat at the doors and
windows, over-threw crockery in the dead hours of the morning, and
danced unholy dances on the roof. Every kind of spiritual disinfectant
was put in requisition; chosen ministers were summoned out of Edinburgh
and prayed by the hour; pious neighbours sat up all night making a noise
of psalmody; but Satan minded them no more than the wind about the
hill-tops; and it was only after years of persecution, that he left the
Hunters' Tryst in peace to occupy himself with the remainder of mankind.
What with General Kay, and the white lady, and this singular visitation,
the neighbourhood offers great facilities to the makers of sun-myths;
and without exactly casting in one's lot with that disenchanting school
of writers, one cannot help hearing a good deal of the winter wind in
the last story. "That nicht," says Burns, in one of his happiest
moments,--

"That nicht a child might understand
The deil had business on his hand."

And if people sit up all night in lone places on the hills, with Bibles
and tremulous psalms, they will be apt to hear some of the most
fiendish noises in the world: the wind will beat on doors and dance upon
roofs for them, and make the hills howl around their cottage with a
clamour like the Judgment Day.

The road goes down through anothe