y. The fatal bonnet lay on the table of the
court. Bargally swore that it was the identical article worn by the man
who robbed him; and he and others likewise deponed that they had found
the accused on the spot where the crime was committed, with the bonnet on
his head. The case looked gloomily for the prisoner, and the opinion of
the judge seemed unfavourable. But there was a person in court who knew
well both who did and who did not commit the crime. This was the Caird of
Barullion, who, thrusting himself up to the bar near the place where
Bargally was standing, suddenly seized on the bonnet, put it on his head,
and, looking the Laird full in the face, asked him, with a voice which
attracted the attention of the court and crowded audience--'Look at me,
sir, and tell me, by the oath you have sworn--Am not _I_ the man who
robbed you between Carsphairn and Dalmellington?' Bargally replied, in
great astonishment, 'By Heaven! you are the very man.' 'You see what sort
of memory this gentleman has,' said the volunteer pleader; 'he swears to
the bonnet whatever features are under it. If you yourself, my Lord, will
put it on your head, he will be willing to swear that your Lordship was
the party who robbed him between Carsphairn and Dalmellington.' The
tenant of Bantoberick was unanimously acquitted; and thus Willie Marshal
ingeniously contrived to save an innocent man from danger, without
incurring any himself, since Bargally's evidence must have seemed to
every one too fluctuating to be relied upon.

While the King of the Gipsies was thus laudably occupied, his royal
consort, Flora, contrived, it is said, to steal the hood from the judge's
gown; for which offence, combined with her presumptive guilt as a gipsy,
she was banished to New England, whence she never returned.

Now, I cannot grant that the idea of Meg Merrilies was, in the first
concoction of the character, derived from Flora Marshal, seeing I have
already said she was identified with Jean Gordon, and as I have not the
Laird of Bargally's apology for charging the same fact on two several
individuals. Yet I am quite content that Meg should be considered as a
representative of her sect and class in general, Flora as well as others.

The other instances in which my Gallovidian readers have obliged me by
assigning to

Airy nothing
A local habitation and a name,

shall also be sanctioned so far as the Author may be entitled to do so. I
think the facetious