" said Helen MacGregor, turning to her sons,
"in what this young Saxon tells us--Wise only when the bonnet is on his
head, and the sword is in his hand, he never exchanges the tartan for the
broad-cloth, but he runs himself into the miserable intrigues of the
Lowlanders, and becomes again, after all he has suffered, their
agent--their tool--their slave."

"Add, madam," said I, "and their benefactor."

"Be it so," she said; "for it is the most empty title of them all, since
he has uniformly sown benefits to reap a harvest of the most foul
ingratitude.--But enough of this. I shall cause you to be guided to the
enemy's outposts. Ask for their commander, and deliver him this message
from me, Helen MacGregor;--that if they injure a hair of MacGregor's
head, and if they do not set him at liberty within the space of twelve
hours, there is not a lady in the Lennox but shall before Christmas cry
the coronach for them she will be loath to lose,--there is not a farmer
but shall sing well-a-wa over a burnt barnyard and an empty byre,--there
is not a laird nor heritor shall lay his head on the pillow at night with
the assurance of being a live man in the morning,--and, to begin as we
are to end, so soon as the term is expired, I will send them this Glasgow
Bailie, and this Saxon Captain, and all the rest of my prisoners, each
bundled in a plaid, and chopped into as many pieces as there are checks
in the tartan."

As she paused in her denunciation, Captain Thornton, who was within
hearing, added, with great coolness, "Present my compliments--Captain
Thornton's of the Royals, compliments--to the commanding officer, and
tell him to do his duty and secure his prisoner, and not waste a thought
upon me. If I have been fool enough to have been led into an ambuscade by
these artful savages, I am wise enough to know how to die for it without
disgracing the service. I am only sorry for my poor fellows," he said,
"that have fallen into such butcherly hands."

"Whist! whist!" exclaimed the Bailie; "are ye weary o' your life?--Ye'll
gie _my_ service to the commanding officer, Mr. Osbaldistone--Bailie
Nicol Jarvie's service, a magistrate o' Glasgow, as his father the deacon
was before him--and tell him, here are a wheen honest men in great
trouble, and like to come to mair; and the best thing he can do for the
common good, will be just to let Rob come his wa's up the glen, and nae
mair about it. There's been some ill dune here already; but as