his surprise that it was nearly empty.

With a brother's acknowledged right to make personal remarks, he loudly
called attention to the fact that Grizel had eaten nearly all her big
helping before anyone else had scarcely started. Lady Hume promptly
reprimanded the boy, and ordered him to confine his attention to his
own plate. The youngster made no further remarks concerning his
sister's appetite, but Grizel often found him glancing at her during
meals, and was in constant fear that he would detect her slipping the
food into her lap.

After giving her father the day's news of home and political events she
would start on her return journey, leaving Sir Patrick alone for
another twenty-four hours in his gruesome hiding-place. Many men would
have been driven out of their mind by a month's sojourn in a
skull-and-bone-littered tomb, but Sir Patrick was a man of high
spirits, and his daughter never once found him depressed. During a
previous imprisonment he had committed to memory Buchanan's translation
of the Psalms, and he obtained much comfort from repeating them while
in the Polwarth vault.

One day as he sat at his little table deep in thought he fancied that
he saw a skull lying on the floor move slightly. He watched it, and
saw to his surprise that it was undoubtedly moving. He was not
alarmed, but stretching out his cane turned over the skull and startled
a mouse from underneath it.

Grizel was determined that her father should not remain in the vault
longer than was absolutely necessary, and with the assistance of the
trusty Winter was preparing a hiding-place for him at the castle.
There was a room on the ground floor, the key of which was kept by
Grizel, and under this they dug a big hole with their bare hands,
fearing that the sound of a spade, if used, would be heard. Night
after night, when all but they two were asleep, they scratched out the
earth, and placed it on a sheet spread on the floor. Then, when their
night's work was done, they silently opened the window and emptied the
earth into the garden The hole in the floor they covered by placing a
bed over it.

At last, when Grizel's finger nails were worn almost completely away,
the subterranean hiding-place was finished, Winter placing in it a
large box which he had made for the purpose. Inside the box was a bed
and bedding, and fresh air was admitted through holes pierced in the
lid and sides. In this box Sir Patrick was to hide whenever t