ion.

Shanty put on his coat, and walked with her over the rest of the moor,
nor did he leave Heatherdale (where Mrs. Margaret insisted that he
should sup,) until he had opened out to the Laird and his aunt the whole
history of Tamar's rencounter with the gipsy. It was curious to observe
the effect of this story on the minds of the two auditors. Mrs. Margaret
embraced Tamar with tears, saying, "Methinks I am rejoiced that there is
no one likely to claim my precious one from me;" whilst the Laird
exclaimed, "I am not in the least convinced. The gipsy has no doubt some
scheme of her own in view. She is afraid of being found out, and
transported for child-stealing; but I wish I could see her, to tell her
that I no more believe my palm-tree to have sprung from the briers of
the Egyptian wilderness, than that I am not at this moment the Laird
of Dymock."

"Lord help you, nephew!" said Mrs. Margaret, "if poor dear Tamar's
noble birth has not more substantial foundation than your lairdship, I
believe that she must be content as she is,--the adopted daughter of a
poor spinster, who has nothing to leave behind her but a few bales of
old clothes."

"Contented, my mother," said Tamar, bursting into tears, "could I be
contented if taken from you?"

Thus the affair of the gipsy passed off. The Laird, indeed, talked of
raising the country to catch the randy quean; but all these resolutions
were speedily forgotten, and no result ensued from this alarm, but that
which Almighty power produced from it in the mind of Tamar, by making
her more anxious to draw the minds of her patrons to religion.

After this, for several weeks things went on much as usual on Dymock's
moor. The inhabitants of the Tower were so still and quiet, that unless
a thin curl of smoke had now and then been seen rising from the kitchen
chimney, all the occupants might have been supposed to have been in a
state of enchantment. Jacob, however, the dwarfish, deformed
serving-man, did cross the moat at intervals, and came back laden with
food; but he was so surly and short, that it was impossible to get a
word of information from him, respecting that which was going on within
the moat. Whilst Dymock scribbled, his aunt darned, Shanty hammered, and
Tamar formed the delight and comfort of all the three last mentioned
elders. But some settlement was necessarily to be made respecting Mr.
Salmon's last payment, which had run up, with certain fixtures and old
pictures, f