atural yearning of heart on parting with so many known and
familiar faces; and to this feeling Godfrey Bertram was peculiarly
accessible, from the limited qualities of his mind, which sought its
principal amusements among the petty objects around him. As he was about
to turn his horse's head to pursue his journey, Meg Merrilies, who had
lagged behind the troop, unexpectedly presented herself.

She was standing upon one of those high precipitous banks which, as we
before noticed, overhung the road, so that she was placed considerably
higher than Ellangowan, even though he was on horseback; and her tall
figure, relieved against the clear blue sky, seemed almost of
supernatural stature. We have noticed that there was in her general
attire, or rather in her mode of adjusting it, somewhat of a foreign
costume, artfully adopted perhaps for the purpose of adding to the effect
of her spells and predictions, or perhaps from some traditional notions
respecting the dress of her ancestors. On this occasion she had a large
piece of red cotton cloth rolled about her head in the form of a turban,
from beneath which her dark eyes flashed with uncommon lustre. Her long
and tangled black hair fell in elf-locks from the folds of this singular
head-gear. Her attitude was that of a sibyl in frenzy, and she stretched
out in her right hand a sapling bough which seemed just pulled.

'I'll be d--d,' said the groom, 'if she has not been cutting the young
ashes in the dukit park!' The Laird made no answer, but continued to look
at the figure which was thus perched above his path.

'Ride your ways,' said the gipsy, 'ride your ways, Laird of Ellangowan;
ride your ways, Godfrey Bertram! This day have ye quenched seven smoking
hearths; see if the fire in your ain parlour burn the blyther for that.
Ye have riven the thack off seven cottar houses; look if your ain
roof-tree stand the faster. Ye may stable your stirks in the shealings at
Derncleugh; see that the hare does not couch on the hearthstane at
Ellangowan. Ride your ways, Godfrey Bertram; what do ye glower after our
folk for? There's thirty hearts there that wad hae wanted bread ere ye
had wanted sunkets, and spent their life-blood ere ye had scratched your
finger. Yes; there's thirty yonder, from the auld wife of an hundred to
the babe that was born last week, that ye have turned out o' their bits
o' bields, to sleep with the tod and the blackcock in the muirs! Ride
your ways, Ell