urney. As the
country was chiefly friendly to their cause, and in possession of their
detached parties, excepting here and there the stronghold of some old
cavaliering Baron, they travelled without any other attendant than the
faithful Cuddie.

It was near sunset when they reached Milnwood, where Poundtext bid adieu
to his companions, and travelled forward alone to his own manse, which
was situated half a mile's march beyond Tillietudlem. When Morton was
left alone to his own reflections, with what a complication of feelings
did he review the woods, banks, and fields, that had been familiar to
him! His character, as well as his habits, thoughts, and occupations, had
been entirely changed within the space of little more than a fortnight,
and twenty days seemed to have done upon him the work of as many years. A
mild, romantic, gentle-tempered youth, bred up in dependence, and
stooping patiently to the control of a sordid and tyrannical relation,
had suddenly, by the rod of oppression and the spur of injured feeling,
been compelled to stand forth a leader of armed men, was earnestly
engaged in affairs of a public nature, had friends to animate and enemies
to contend with, and felt his individual fate bound up in that of a
national insurrection and revolution. It seemed as if he had at once
experienced a transition from the romantic dreams of youth to the labours
and cares of active manhood. All that had formerly interested him was
obliterated from his memory, excepting only his attachment to Edith; and
even his love seemed to have assumed a character more manly and
disinterested, as it had become mingled and contrasted with other duties
and feelings. As he revolved the particulars of this sudden change, the
circumstances in which it originated, and the possible consequences of
his present career, the thrill of natural anxiety which passed along his
mind was immediately banished by a glow of generous and high-spirited
confidence.

"I shall fall young," he said, "if fall I must, my motives misconstrued,
and my actions condemned, by those whose approbation is dearest to me.
But the sword of liberty and patriotism is in my hand, and I will neither
fall meanly nor unavenged. They may expose my body, and gibbet my limbs;
but other days will come, when the sentence of infamy will recoil against
those who may pronounce it. And that Heaven, whose name is so often
profaned during this unnatural war, will bear witness to the purity