for this is a bishop's
house?"

I was astounded to hear that I had been so led into the lion's den; but
I saw pity in the countenance of the damsel, and I told her that I was
the father of the poor youth whose head had been carried by the
executioner through the town the day before, and that I could not but
believe Providence had sent me thither; for surely no one would ever
think of searching for me in a bishop's house.

Greatly moved by what I said, she bade me softly follow her, and she led
me to a solitary and ruinous chamber. She then retired, but presently
returned with some refreshment, which having placed on an old chest, she
bade God be with me, and went away.

With a spirit of inexpressible admiration and thanksgiving I partook of
that repast, and then laying myself down on the bare floor, was blessed
with the enjoyment of a downy sleep.

CHAPTER LXXXII

I slept in that ruinous room in the Bishop's house till far in the
morning, when, on going to the window with the intent of dropping myself
into the wynd, I saw that it was ordained and required of me to remain
where I then was; for the inmates of the houses forenent were all astir
at their respective vocations; and at the foot of the wynd, looking
straight up, was a change-house, into which there was, even at that
early hour, a great resorting of bein elderly citizens for their dram
and snap. Moreover, at the head of the wynd, an aged carlin, with a
distaff in her arms and a whorl in her hand, sat on a doorstep tending a
stand of apples and comfits; so that, to a surety, had I made any
attempt to escape by the window, I must have been seen by some one, and
laid hold of. I therefore retired back into the obscurity of the
chamber, and sat down again on the old kist-lid, to abide the issues
that were in reservation for me. I had not, however, been long there,
till I heard the voices of persons entering into the next chamber behind
where I was sitting, and I soon discerned by their courtesies of speech,
that they were Lords of the Privy Council, who had come to walk with the
Bishop to the palace, where a council was summoned in sudden haste that
morning. The matter whereof they discoursed was not at first easily made
out, for they were conversing on it when they entered; but I very soon
gathered that it boded no good to the covenanted cause nor to the
liberties of Scotland.

"What you remark, Aberdeen," said one, "is very just; man and wife are
th