atches in this country; all the world ran after
her, but she wore widow's mourning all her life for poor William, for
they were betrothed though not married, and died in--I cannot think of
the date; but I remember, in the November of that very year, when she
found herself sinking, she desired to be brought to Waverley-Honour once
more, and visited all the places where she had been with my grand-uncle,
and caused the carpets to be raised that she might trace the impression
of his blood, and if tears could have washed it out, it had not been
there now; for there was not a dry eye in the house. You would have
thought, Edward, that the very trees mourned for her, for their leaves
dropt around her without a gust of wind, and, indeed, she looked like one
that would never see them green again.'

From such legends our hero would steal away to indulge the fancies they
excited. In the corner of the large and sombre library, with no other
light than was afforded by the decaying brands on its ponderous and ample
hearth, he would exercise for hours that internal sorcery by which past
or imaginary events are presented in action, as it were, to the eye of
the muser. Then arose in long and fair array the splendour of the bridal
feast at Waverley-Castle; the tall and emaciated form of its real lord,
as he stood in his pilgrim's weeds, an unnoticed spectator of the
festivities of his supposed heir and intended bride; the electrical shock
occasioned by the discovery; the springing of the vassals to arms; the
astonishment of the bridegroom; the terror and confusion of the bride;
the agony with which Wilibert observed that her heart as well as consent
was in these nuptials; the air of dignity, yet of deep feeling, with
which he flung down the half-drawn sword, and turned away for ever from
the house of his ancestors. Then would he change the scene, and fancy
would at his wish represent Aunt Rachel's tragedy. He saw the Lady
Waverley seated in her bower, her ear strained to every sound, her heart
throbbing with double agony, now listening to the decaying echo of the
hoofs of the king's horse, and when that had died away, hearing in every
breeze that shook the trees of the park, the noise of the remote
skirmish. A distant sound is heard like the rushing of a swoln stream; it
comes nearer, and Edward can plainly distinguish the galloping of horses,
the cries and shouts of men, with straggling pistol-shots between,
rolling forwards to the Hall.