privilege as a halberdier of the Lord Provost: the soldiers only laughed at him. Auchenbrae, who in the mean time, had all his eyes about him, was eagerly looking for an opportunity to escape; and having been much incommoded by his female garment, he was quietly untying his petticoats, the easier to shoot out from among them. ! Johnnie Gaff, in the mean time, was waxing more and more wroth at the irreverence of the soldiers, and threatening them with all sorts of pains and penalties, for the indignity with which, in his person, they treated the authority and jurisdiction of the Provost, Bailies, and Council of Edinburgh. His menaces only served to increase their derision; in the midst of which, the door being accidentally left open, the culprit dropped his petticoats, and was off like an arrow from the bow. "Gude guide us," exclaimed Johnnie, cooled in an instant, "he's fuge again, wi' neither kilt nor breeks!" : This new escape had the effect of instantly clearing the guard-house but none of the soldiers followed. Johnnie Gaff, however, as if he had been booted in seven-league boots, rushed after the fugitive like the nucleus of a comet, with a spreading train of children, huzzaing and cheering him forwards. The condition of Auchenbrae deterred him from running far into the town. He ascended the first outside stair, and darted into a room where an elderly female was spinning on a distaff, and singing, at the open window. Without leave asked, he bounded into a bed which stood in a corner, and drew the coverlet over him. Scarcely was he in this asylum, when the noise of his pursuers rose loud in the street, by which the industrious housewife was moved to look out, and, on seeing them, to call aloud "Hey gudeman!" and, licking her fingers, she twirled her whorl, and cried still louder, "Hey, Johnnie Gaff, there's a wud woman in our bed! Come and tak' her out immediately." But Johnnie flew still onward, regardless of the cool cry of his wife. Auchenbrae heard what she said, and called to her for goodness' sake to make no noise, but to come in and lend him a petticoat, for which he would reward her. On hearing his hoarse masculine voice, she was so startled, that she flung her distaff from her, and ran down the stair, crying "Robbery and murder!" At the same moment, Auchenbrae chanced to observe Johnnie's best breeches, and all the paraphernalfa of the full dress in which he attended the magistrates to church : on Sundays, hanging behind the door. His case admitted of no delay he sprung from the bed, tore off the remainder of his female vestments, and was soon closed in the garb of the Provost's chief halberdier. By this time Lucky Gaff had roused the neighbourhood; the men and children had followed the chase, but the wives joined her and, just as she was leading this army of auxiliaries to the stair-foot, Auchenbrae made his appearance on the top, dressed as her husband. : "Eh! it's my gudeman's wraith," cried she, and fell back with the terror of astonishment into the arms of one of her kimmers; while Auchenbrae, dashing boldly through them, was again free. Meanwhile, Hughoc, in total oblivion of his master's orders, was one of the most forward and eager of the hounds in the hunt; but his sagacity had soon apprized him that they had lost the scent, and that the fox was earthed. Anxious to tell Johnnie this, he kept crying aloud behind him, "Stop, stop, stop him!" At this juncture, Knockwhinnie, unable to repress his anxiety to meet our hero, was coming down the street in his disguise, crippling slowly, in the twilight. The sound struck his ear; and, being instantly alarmed, he forgot his assumed infirmities, and ran with the speed and agility so necessary to an Outlaw. The chase was turned. Johnnie, on seeing the new game, rushed upon Knockwhinnie, and, seizing him by the collar, held him fast. Among the foremost of the crowd, by whom they were instantly surrounded, was Hughoc, who exclaimed, on seeing who was taken, "Eh, what a pity!" and darted away, while the Outlaw was conducted to the Council Chamber." In the meantime, Southennan had ascended the palace-stairs, and was waiting in the gallery for the Count Dufroy, who was then engaged with the Queen; and, as he was standing there Adelaide came from her own apartment. "I have great news for you," said he, addressing her. "This morning, your father returned from France. We must, without delay, endeavour to procure his pardon. Though the Count refuses to assist, I trust he will do nothing to mar our application." The news, and the abruptness of the communication, so affected her, that she was for some time unable to speak, until relieved by a burst of tears. "Where is he?" was her first exclamation. "Let me but see him-take me to him!" . Southennan replied, it could not be that night; "for," said he," although it might facilitate what we so earnestly desire, were he taken, yet a reasonable doubt hangs upon it. If taken, he will be brought to trial, and the Queen, so soon after her arrival, will hesitate to interfere until his trial shall have been completed. And should he be found". "Oh!" cried Adelaide; "say not the dreadful possibility. I will this night myself supplicate the Queen." More she would have said; but Chatelard and Rizzio came into the gallery. And at their appearance Southennan softly cried, "Hush!" and made a signal for her to be silent. CHAPTER XLVI. "Now came still evening on, and twilight gray MILTON. THE twilight was almost faded when Auchenbrae escaped in the habiliments of Johnnie Gaff. As he could hardly expect to pass up into the town unremarked, he directed his flight across the King's Park, and ascended the road which led to the chapel of St. Anthony, to wait on the mountain until the darkness of the night would allow him to return in safety to his lodgings. The original character of this profligate man was not without qualities which might have been improved into virtues. He possessed, besides an impassioned admiration of female beauty, extreme sensibility of the charms of external nature. In the midst of his wildness there was much of poesy, and in consequence the contrition which he sometimes felt for his licentiousness was often blended with an elegance of sentiment, strangely, as it seemed by its sadness, at variance with the tenor of his life. His excursion across the water of Leith had been one of those loose and low enterprises in which he sometimes recklessly indulged; but the humiliation to which he had been exposed at the Palace Gate, so derogatory to his birth, deeply moved him when alone on the solitude of Arthur's seat. He continued to ascend the hill until he reached the summit, and sat down looking towards the west, where a faint amber tinge still glowed along the horizon. It was just enough to show the contour of the Highland mountains, and the brighter and darker masses of the rising grounds and the hollows between. All the dome of the heavens was unclouded, pure azure, in which the stars were numerously kindling. But where the twilight lingered, horizontal streaks of black vapour recalled gloomy associations of the free day, as seen from within through the bars and gratings of a prison window. The sullied fancies of Auchenbrae yielded to the influences of the scene. The memory of youthful times and sunny days and purer thoughts returned, and with a feeling of disgust at himself, he courted, as it were in revenge of his own folly, sullen resolutions, not of amendment, but to hasten the conclusion of his dishonourable career. As he sat in this desolate mood, leaning forwards with his chin resting upon his hand, his abstraction was broken by the sudden apparition of a splendid meteor, trailing its golden fires in a beautiful arch across the heavens. His eyes eagerly followed its course, until it was suddenly shattered into momentary stars, and extinguished. He viewed it as an emblem of his life, a brilliant promise, ending without fulfilling one hope of the admiration that had attended his outset. In these gloomy ruminations the recollection of the injury he had done to Knockwhinnie was one of the keenest and the deepest. It was the molten fire of the remorse of the moment, and its lurid gleam changed the hue of his reflections. The anguish of its intensity became as it were an impulse, rather than a motive, to redeem the past; and he arose with the intention of proceeding at once to the magistrates, to acknowledge the extent of his aggression, and afterward to return to Kilwinning, where he had, from the time of the outrage, assumed the garb of the Cistertian order, and where, although the great edifice of the monastery had been destroyed by the Reformers, many of the brotherhood continued to reside in the village. But this determination was, like all the promptings of his feeling, an evanescent flesh. Throughout the kingdom there was no longer a religious house remaining in which piety or penitence could find refuge. His mind was thus turned to consider the state and circumstances of the times, and he resumed his seat to reflect in what way by them he might retrieve in some degree his long abandoned ambition for fame. But even this flickering of virtue was soon over ; the tainted habitude of his thoughts gradually returned, and the VOL. I.-14 spirit of the solitary mountain and the solemn hour departed. The moral inspiration of the scene passed away; and with the cold contemplation of an artist's eye, he looked only at the forms and outlines of the material things before him; among which, the dark masses and huge lineaments of the city, sprinkled all over with lights, interested his imagination the most. He traced fantastical resemblances in them to the unreal creations of necromancy; but still, as often as he embodied these dreamy images, something haunted him of a melancholy cast. The emotion he had felt was, it is true, at rest, but it was like the calm of the sea, which reflects all objects above and around it. Above and around him were the solemnities of the heavens and the earth, the ocean and the murmurings of a great city, all in the shadows and mysteries of night. By this time the glow in the west was entirely faded, and he was admonished by a faint brightening in the eastern horizon that he ought to seek his lodging before the moon rose, and while there was yet darkness in the streets to conceal his disguise. He accordingly returned down from the brow of the hill, and hastened by all the crooked wynds in which he was least exposed to observation, to the house of his kinswoman, which he reached unmolested. But just as he was on the point of entering to ascend the stair, he was met by Johnnie Gaff and Hughoc, and Southennan himself, all proceeding to the Council chamber. The boy was the first who observed him, and exclaimed, "Oh Laird, here's anither officer!" With an instinctive grasp, Johnnie Gaff instantly seized the fugitive with both his hands. Auchenbrae, being a more powerful man, might easily have disentangled himself from the tall and meagre halberdier, but his good genius was at that time hovering at hand, and he submitted to be taken prisoner without an effort. "Who is it?" exclaimed Southennan. "Oh, Chirstal! it's Friar Michael," replied Hughoc. "It's the deevil incarnate in pro. per. and my best breeks and coat," exclaimed Johnnie Gaff; for his wife had in the mean time informed him of the robbery; "but Clootie hae his will o' me if he slips through my fingers afore I hae him forenent the Provost, Bailies, and Council of the Burgh o' Embro, to answer in foro, for haimsucken in the house o' Kinlochie and stouthrief in mine. My word, but ye're braw in your barrow't feathers! but ye shall mak a cessy bonorum, before the night be an hour aulder." Auchenbrae was not acquainted with Southennan, but dis |