they were accompanied with the shouts of the
children, who cried out, 'Eh! see to the Southland gentleman, that's
gaun to be hanged for shooting lang John Mucklewrath the smith!'

CHAPTER XXXVI

AN INCIDENT

The dinner-hour of Scotland Sixty Years since was two o'clock. It was
therefore about four o'clock of a delightful autumn afternoon that Mr.
Gilfillan commenced his march, in hopes, although Stirling was eighteen
miles distant, he might be able, by becoming a borrower of the night
for an hour or two, to reach it that evening. He therefore put forth his
strength, and marched stoutly along at the head of his followers, eyeing
our hero from time to time, as if he longed to enter into controversy
with him. At length unable to resist the temptation, he slackened his
pace till he was alongside of his prisoner's horse, and after marching a
few steps in silence abreast of him, he suddenly asked,--'Can ye say wha
the carle was wi' the black coat; and the mousted head, that was wi' the
Laird of Cairnvreckan?'

'A Presbyterian clergyman,' answered Waverley.

'Presbyterian!' answered Gilfillan contemptuously: 'a wretched Erastian,
or rather an obscured Prelatist,--a favourer of the black Indulgence;
ane of thae dumb dogs that canna bark: they tell ower a clash o' terror
and a clatter o' comfort in their sermons, without ony sense, or savour,
or life.--Ye've been fed in siccan a fauld, belike?'

'No; I am of the Church of England,' said Waverley.

And they're just neighbour-like,' replied the Covenanter; 'and nae
wonder they gree sae weel. Wha wad hae thought the goodly structure
of the Kirk of Scotland, built up by our fathers in 1642, wad hae been
defaced by carnal ends and, the corruptions of the time;--aye, wha wad
hae thought the carved work of the sanctuary would hae been sae soon cut
down!'

To this lamentation, which one or two of the assistants chorussed with a
deep groan, our hero thought it unnecessary to make any reply. Whereupon
Mr. Gilfillan, resolving that he should be a hearer at least, if not a
disputant, proceeded in his Jeremiad.

'And now is it wonderful, when, for lack of exercise anent the call to
the service of the altar and the duty of the day, ministers fall into
sinful compliances with patronage, and indemnities, and oaths, and
bonds, and, other corruptions,--is it wonderful, I say, that you, sir,
and other sic-like unhappy persons, should labour to build up your auld
Babel of iniquity, a