nded a dram,
by precept and example."

"Very true, kinsman," replied Rob, "for which reason we, who are Children
of the Mist, have a right to drink brandy from morning till night."

The Bailie, thus refreshed, was mounted on a small Highland pony; another
was offered for my use, which, however, I declined; and we resumed, under
very different guidance and auspices, our journey of the preceding day.

Our escort consisted of MacGregor, and five or six of the handsomest,
best armed, and most athletic mountaineers of his band, and whom he had
generally in immediate attendance upon his own person.

When we approached the pass, the scene of the skirmish of the preceding
day, and of the still more direful deed which followed it, MacGregor
hastened to speak, as if it were rather to what he knew must be
necessarily passing in my mind, than to any thing I had said--he spoke,
in short, to my thoughts, and not to my words.

"You must think hardly of us, Mr. Osbaldistone, and it is not natural
that it should be otherwise. But remember, at least, we have not been
unprovoked. We are a rude and an ignorant, and it may be a violent and
passionate, but we are not a cruel people. The land might be at peace and
in law for us, did they allow us to enjoy the blessings of peaceful law.
But we have been a persecuted generation."

"And persecution," said the Bailie, "maketh wise men mad."

"What must it do then to men like us, living as our fathers did a
thousand years since, and possessing scarce more lights than they did?
Can we view their bluidy edicts against us--their hanging, heading,
hounding, and hunting down an ancient and honourable name--as deserving
better treatment than that which enemies give to enemies?--Here I stand,
have been in twenty frays, and never hurt man but when I was in het
bluid; and yet they wad betray me and hang me like a masterless dog, at
the gate of ony great man that has an ill will at me."

I replied, "that the proscription of his name and family sounded in
English ears as a very cruel and arbitrary law;" and having thus far
soothed him, I resumed my propositions of obtaining military employment
for himself, if he chose it, and his sons, in foreign parts. MacGregor
shook me very cordially by the hand, and detaining me, so as to permit
Mr. Jarvie to precede us, a manoeuvre for which the narrowness of the
road served as an excuse, he said to me--"You are a kind-hearted and an
honourable youth, and unders