answered a male gypsy from under his slouched and large brimmed hat, and without raising his face, "and he shall have no more; the highway is as free to our cuddies as to his gelding."

The tone of the man being sulky, and even menacing, Mr Bertram thought it best to put his dignity in his pocket, and pass by the procession quietly, upon such space as they chose to leave for his accommodation, which was narrow enough. To cover with an appearance of indifference his feeling of the want of respect with which he was treated, he addressed one of the men, as he passed him without any show of greeting, salute, or recognition,—" Giles Baillie," he said, "have you heard that your son Gabriel is well ?" (The question respected the young man who had been pressed.)

"If I had heard otherwise," said the old man, looking up with a stern and menacing countenance, "you should have heard of it too." And he plodded on his way,

tarrying no farther question. When the Laird had pressed onward with difficulty among a crowd of familiar faces, in which he now only read hatred and contempt, but which had on all former occasions marked his approach with the reverence due to that of a superior being, and had got clear of the throng, he could not help turning his horse, and looking back to mark the progress of their march. The group would have been an excellent subject for the pencil of Calotte. The van had already reached a small and stunted thicket, which was at the bottom of the hill, and which gradually hid the line of march until the last stragglers disappeared.

His sensations were bitter enough. The race, it is true, which he had thus summarily dismissed from their ancient place of refuge, was idle and vicious; but had he endeavoured to render them otherwise? They were not more irregular characters now, than they had been while they were ad

mitted to consider themselves as a sort of subordinate dependants of his family; and ought the circumstance of his becoming a magistrate to have made at once such a change in his conduct towards them? Some means of reformation ought at least to have been tried, before sending seven families at once upon the wide world, and depriving them of a degree of countenance, which withheld them at least from atrocious guilt. There was also anatural yearning of heart upon 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 troops, unexpectedly presented herself.

She was standing upon one of those high banks, which, as we before noticed, overhung the road; so that she was pla

ced considerably higher than Ellangowan, even though he was on horseback; and her tall figure, relieved against the clear blue sky, seemed almost of supernatural height. 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 sybil in frenzy, and she stretched out, in her right hand, a sapling bough which seemed just pulled.

❝. I'll be dd," 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 gypsy, "ride your ways, Laird of Ellangowanride 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 glowr 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,