THE

FAA'S REVENGE

OR THE

Laird of Clennel

BY JOHN MACKAY WILSON.

Brown October was drawing to a close—the breeze had acquired a degree of sharpness too strong to be merely termed bracing—and the fire, as the saying is, was becoming the best flower in the garden, for the hardiest and the latest plants had either shed their leaves, or their flowers had shrivelled at the breath of approaching winter—when a stranger drew his seat towards the parlour fire of the Three-Half-Moons Inn, in Rothbury. He had sat for the space of half-an-hour when a party entered, who, like himself (as appeared from their conversation), were strangers, or rather visitors of the scenery, curiosities, and antiquities in the vicinity. One of them having ordered the waiter to bring each of them a glass of brandy and warm water, without appearing to notice the presence of the first mentioned stranger, after a few remarks on the objects of interest in the neighbourhood, the following conversation took place amongst them:—

"Why," said one, "but even Rothbury here, secluded as it is from the world, and shut out from the daily intercourse of men, is a noted place. It was here that the ancient and famous northern bard, and unrivalled ballad writer, Bernard Rumney, was born, bred, and died. Here, too, was born Dr Brown, who, like Young and Home, united the characters of divine and dramatist, and was the author of 'Barbarossa,' 'The Cure of Saul,' and other works of which posterity and his country are proud. The immediate neighbourhood, also, was the birthplace of the inspired boy, the heaven-taught mathematician, George Coughran, who knew no rival, and who bade fair to eclipse the glory of Newton, but whom death struck down ere he had reached the years of manhood."

"Why, I can't tell," said another; "I don't know much about what you've been talking of; but I know, for one thing, that Rothbury was a famous place for every sort of games; and, at Fastren's E'en times, the rule was, every male inhabitant above eight years of age to pay a shilling, or out to the foot-ball. It was noted for its gamecocks, too—they were the best breed on the Borders."

"May be so," said the first speaker; "but though I should be loath to see the foot-ball, or any other innocent game which keeps up a manly spirit, put down, yet I do trust that the brutal practice of cock-fighting will be abolished, not only on the Borders, but throughout every country which professes the name of Christian; and I rejoice that the practice is falling into disrepute. But, although my hairs are not yet honoured with the silver tints of age, I am old enough to remember, that, when a boy at school on the Scottish side of the Border, at every Fastren's E'en which you have spoken of, every schoolboy was expected to provide a cock for the battle, or main, and the teacher or his deputy presided as umpire. The same practice prevailed on the southern Border. It is a very old, savage amusement, even in this country; and perhaps the preceptors of youth, in former days, considered it classical, and that it would instil into their pupils sentiments of emulation; inasmuch as the practice is said to have taken rise from Themistocles perceiving two cocks tearing at and fighting with each other, while marching his army against the Persians, when he called upon his soldiers to observe them, and remarked that they neither fought for territory, defence of country, nor for glory, but they fought because the one would not yield to, or be defeated by, the other; and he desired his soldiers to take a moral lesson from the barn-door fowls. Cock-fighting thus became among the heathen Greeks a political precept and a religious observance—and the Christian inhabitants of Britain, disregarding the religious and political moral, kept up the practice, adding to it more disgusting barbarity, for their amusement.

"Coom," said a third, who, from his tongue, appeared to be a thorough Northumbrian, "we wur talking about Rothbury, but you are goin' to give us a regular sarmin on cock-fighting. Let's hae none o' that. You was saying what clever chaps had been born here—but none o' ye mentioned Jamie Allan, the gipsy and Northumberland piper, who was born here as weel as the best o' them. But I hae heard that Rothbury, as weel as Yetholm and Tweedmouth Moor, was a great resort for the Faa or gipsy gangs in former times. Now, I understand that thae folk were a sort o' bastard Egyptians; and though I am nae scholar, it strikes me forcibly that the meaning o' the word gipsies is just Egypts, or Gypties—a contraction and corruption o' Gyptian!"

"Gipsies," said he who spoke of Rumney and Brown, and abused the practice of cock-fighting, "still do in some degree, and formerly did in great numbers, infest this county; and I will tell you a story concerning them."

"Do so," said the thorough Northumbrian; "I like a story when it's weel put thegither. The gipsies were queer folk. I've heard my faither tell many a funny thing about them, when he used to whistle 'Felton Loanin,' which was made by awd piper Allan—Jamie's faither." And here the speaker struck up a lively air, which, to the stranger by the fire, seemed a sort of parody on the well-known tune of "Johnny Cope."

The other then proceeded with his tale, thus:—

You have all heard of the celebrated Johnny Faa, the Lord and Earl of Little Egypt, who penetrated into Scotland in the reign of James IV., and with whom that gallant monarch was glad to conclude a treaty. Johnny was not only the king, but the first of the Faa gang of whom we have mention. I am not aware that gipsies get the name of Faas anywhere but upon the Borders; and though it is difficult to account for the name satisfactorily, it is said to have its origin from a family of the name of Fall or Fa', who resided here (in Rothbury), and that their superiority in their cunning and desperate profession, gave the same cognomen to all and sundry who followed the same mode of life upon the Borders. One thing is certain, that the name Faa not only was given to individuals whose surname might be Fall, but to the Winters and Clarkes—id genus omne—gipsy families well known on the Borders. Since waste lands, which were their hiding-places and resorts, began to be cultivated, and especially since the sun of knowledge snuffed out the taper of superstition and credulity, most of them are beginning to form a part of society, to learn trades of industry, and live with men. Those who still prefer their father's vagabond mode of life—finding that, in the northern counties, their old trade of fortune-telling is at a discount, and that thieving has thinned their tribe and is dangerous—now follow the more useful and respectable callings of muggers, besom-makers, and tinkers. I do not know whether, in etiquette, I ought to give precedence to the besom-maker or tinker; though, as compared with them, I should certainly suppose that the "muggers" of the present day belong to the Faa aristocracy; if it be not that they, like others, derive their nobility from descent of blood rather than weight of pocket—and that, after all, the mugger with his encampment, his caravans, horses, crystal, and crockery, is but a mere wealthy plebeian or bourgeois in the vagrant community.— But to my tale.

On a dark and tempestuous night in the December of 1628, a Faa gang requested shelter in the out-houses of the laird of Clennel. The laird himself had retired to rest; and his domestics being fewer in number than the Faas, feared to refuse them their request.

"Ye shall have up-putting for the night, good neighbours," said Andrew Smith, who was a sort of major-domo in the laird's household, and he spoke in a tone of mingled authority and terror. "But, sir," added he, addressing the chief of the tribe—"I will trust to your honour that ye will allow none o' your folk to be making free with the kye, or the sheep, or the poultry—that is, that you will not allow them to mistake ony o' them for your own, lest it bring me into trouble. For the laird has been in a fearful rage at some o' your people lately; and if onything were to be amissing in the morning, or he kenned that ye had been here, it might be as meikle as my life is worth."

"Tush, man!" said Willie Faa, the king of the tribe, "ye dree the death ye'll never die. Willie Faa and his folk maun live as weel as the laird o' Clennel. But, there's my thumb, not a four-footed thing, nor a feather o' a bird, shall be touched by me or mine. But I see the light is out in the laird's chamber window—he is asleep and high up amang the turrets—and wherefore should ye set human bodies in byres and stables in a night like this, when your Ha' fire is bleezing bonnily, and there is room eneugh around it for us a'? Gie us a seat by the cheek o' your hearth, and ye shall be nae loser; and I promise ye that we shall be off, bag and baggage, before the skreigh o' day, or the laird kens where his head lies."

Andrew would fain have refused this request, but he knew that it amounted to a command; and, moreover, while he had been speaking with the chief of the tribe, the maid-servants of the household, who had followed him and the other men-servants to the door, had divers of them been solicited by the females of the gang to have futurity revealed to them. And whether it indeed be that curiosity is more powerful in woman than in man (as it is generally said to be), I do not profess to determine; but certain it is, that the laird of Clennel's maid-servants, immediately on the hint being given by the gipsies, felt a very ardent desire to have a page or two from the sybilline leaves read to them—at least that part of them which related to their future husbands, and the time when they should obtain them. Therefore, they backed the petition or command of King Willie, and said to Andrew—

"Really, Mr Smith, it would be very unchristian-like to put poor wandering folk into cauld out-houses on a night like this; and, as Willie says, there is room enough in the Ha'."

"That may be a' very true, lasses," returned Andrew, "but only ye think what a dirdum there would be if the laird were to waken or get wit o't!"

"Fearna the laird," said Elspeth, the wife of King Willie—"I will lay a spell on him that he canna be roused frae sleep, till I, at sunrise, wash my hands in Darden Lough."

The sybil then raised her arms and waved them fantastically in the air, uttering, as she waved them, the following uncouth rhymes by way of incantation—

"Bonny Queen Mab, bonny Queen Mab,
    Wave ye your wee bits o' poppy wings
Ower Clennel's laird, that he may sleep
    Till I hae washed where Darden springs."

Thus assured, Andrew yielded to his fears and the wishes of his fellow-servants, and ushered the Faas into his master's hall for the night. But scarce had they taken their seats upon the oaken forms around the fire, when—

"Come," said the Faa king, "the night is cold, pinching cold, Mr Smith; and, while the fire warms without, is there naething in the cellar that will warm within? See to it, Andrew, man—thou art no churl, or thy face is fause."

"Really, sir," replied Andrew—and, in spite of all his efforts to appear at ease, his tongue faltered as he spoke—"I'm not altogether certain what to say upon that subject; for ye observe that our laird is really a very singular man; ye might as weel put your head in the fire there as displease him in the smallest; and though Heaven kens that I would gie to you just as freely as I would tak to mysel, yet ye'll observe that the liquor in the cellars is not mine, but his—and they are never sae weel plenished but I believe he would miss a thimblefu'. But there is some excellent cold beef in the pantry, if ye could put up wi' the like o' it, and the home-brewed which we servants use."

"Andrew," returned the Faa king, proudly—"castle have I none, flocks and herds have I none, neither have I haughs where the wheat, and the oats, and the barley grow—but, like Ishmael, my great forefather, every man's hand is against me, and mine against them—yet, when I am hungry, I never lack the flesh-pots o' my native land, where the moorfowl and the venison make brown broo together. Cauld meat agrees nae wi' my stomach, and servants' drink was never brewed for the lord o' Little Egypt. Ye comprehend me, Andrew?"

"Oh, I daresay I do, sir," said the chief domestic of the house of Clennel; "but only, as I have said, ye will recollect that the drink is not mine to give; and if I venture upon a jug, I hope ye winna think o' asking for another."

"We shall try it," said the royal vagrant.

Andrew, with trembling and reluctance, proceeded to the cellar, and returned with a large earthen vessel filled with the choicest home-brewed, which he placed upon a table in the midst of them.

    "Then each took a smack
    Of the old black jack,
While the fire burned in the hall."

The Faa king pronounced the liquor to be palatable, and drank to his better acquaintance with the cellars of the laird of Clennel; and his gang followed his example.

Now, I should remark that Willie Faa, the chief of his tribe, was a man of gigantic stature; the colour of his skin was the dingy brown peculiar to his race; his arms were of remarkable length, and his limbs a union of strength and lightness; his raven hair was mingled with grey; while, in his dark eyes, the impetuosity of youth and the cunning of age seemed blended together. It is in vain to speak of his dress, for it was changed daily as his circumstances or avocations directed. He was ever ready to assume all characters, from the courtier down to the mendicant. Like his wife, he was skilled in the reading of no book but the book of fate. Now, Elspeth was a less agreeable personage to look upon than even her husband. The hue of her skin was as dark as his. She was also of his age—a woman of full fifty. She was the tallest female in his tribe; but her stoutness took away from her stature. Her eyes were small and piercing, her nose aquiline, and her upper lip was "bearded like the pard."

While her husband sat at his carousals, and handing the beverage to his followers and the domestics of the house, Elspeth sat examining the lines upon the palms of the hands of the maid-servants—pursuing her calling as a spaewife. And ever as she traced the lines of matrimony, the sybil would pause and exclaim—

"Ha!—money!—money!—cross my loof again, hinny. There is fortune before ye! Let me see! A spur!—a sword!—a shield!—a gowden purse! Heaven bless ye! They are there!—there, as plain as a pikestaff; they are a' in your path. But cross my loof again, hinny, for until siller again cross it, I canna see whether they are to be yours or no."

Thus did Elspeth go on until her "loof had been crossed" by the last coin amongst the domestics of the house of Clennel; and when these were exhausted, their trinkets were demanded and given to assist the spell of the prophetess. Good fortune was prognosticated to the most of them, and especially to those who crossed the loof of the reader of futurity most freely; but to others, perils, and sudden deaths, and disappointments in love, and grief in wedlock, were hinted, though to all and each of these forebodings, a something like hope—an undefined way of escape—was pended.

Now, as the voice of Elspeth rose in solemn tones, and as the mystery of her manner increased, not only were the maid-servants stricken with awe and reverence for the wondrous woman, but the men-servants also began to inquire into their fate. And as they extended their hands, and Elspeth traced the lines of the past upon them, ever and anon she spoke strange words, which intimated secret facts; and she spoke also of love-makings and likings; and ever, as she spoke, she would raise her head and grin a ghastly smile, now at the individual whose hand she was examining, and again at a maid-servant whose fortune she had read; while the former would smile and the latter blush, and their fellow domestics exclaim—

"That's wonderfu'!—that dings a'!—ye are queer folk! hoo in the world do ye ken?"

Even the curiosity of Mr Andrew Smith was raised, and his wonder excited; and, after he had quaffed his third cup with the gipsy king, he, too, reverentially approached the bearded princess, extending his hand, and begging to know what futurity had in store for him.

She raised it before her eyes, she rubbed hers over it.

"It is a dark and a difficult hand," muttered she: "here are ships and the sea, and crossing the sea, the great danger, and a way to avoid it—but the gowd!—the gowd that's there! And yet ye may lose it a'! Cross my loof, sir—yours is an ill hand to spae—for it's set wi' fortune, and danger, and adventure."

Andrew gave her all the money in his possession. Now, it was understood that she was to return the money and the trinkets with which her loof had been crossed; and Andrew's curiosity overcoming his fears, he ventured to intrust his property in her keeping; for, as he thought, it was not every day that people could have everything that was to happen unto them revealed. But when she had again looked upon his hand—

"It winna do," said she—"I canna see ower the danger ye hae to encounter, the seas ye hae to cross, and the mountains o' gowd that lie before ye yet—ye maun cross my loof again." And when, with a woful countenance, he stated that he had crossed it with his last coin—

"Ye hae a chronometer, man," said she—"it tells you the minutes now, it may enable me to show ye those that are to come!"

Andrew hesitated, and, with doubt and unwillingness, placed the chronometer in her hand.

Elspeth wore a short cloak of faded crimson; and in a sort of pouch in it, every coin, trinket, and other article of value which was put into her hands were deposited, in order, as she stated, to forward her mystic operations. Now, the chronometer had just disappeared in the general receptacle of offerings to the oracle, when heavy footsteps were heard descending the staircase leading to the hall. Poor Andrew, the ruler of the household, gasped—the blood forsook his cheeks, his knees involuntarily knocked one against another, and he stammered out—

"For Heaven's sake, gie me my chronometer!—Oh, gie me it!—we are a' ruined!"

"It canna be returned till the spell's completed," rejoined Elspeth, in a solemn and determined tone—and her countenance betrayed nothing of her dupe's uneasiness; while her husband deliberately placed his right hand upon a sort of dagger which he wore beneath a large coarse jacket that was loosely flung over his shoulders. The males in his retinue, who were eight in number, followed his example.

In another moment, the laird, with wrath upon his countenance, burst into the hall.

"Andrew Smith," cried he, sternly, and stamping his foot fiercely on the floor, "what scene is this I see? Answer me, ye robber, answer me;—ye shall hang for it!"

"O sir! sir!" groaned Andrew, "mercy!—mercy!—O sir!" and he wrung his hands together and shook exceedingly.

"Ye fause knave!" continued the laird, grasping him by the neck—and dashing him from him, Andrew fell flat upon the floor, and his terror had almost shook him from his feet before—"Speak, ye fause knave!" resumed the laird; "what means your carousin' w' sic a gang? Ye robber, speak!" And he kicked him with his foot as he lay upon the ground.

"O sir!—mercy, sir!" vociferated Andrew, in the stupor and wildness of terror; "I canna speak!—ye hae killed me outright! I am dead—stone dead! But it wasna my blame—they'll a' say that, if they speak the truth."

"Out! out, ye thieves!—ye gang o' plunderers, born to the gallows!—out o' my house!" added the laird, addressing Willie Faa and his followers.

"Thieves! ye acred loon!" exclaimed the Faa king, starting to his feet, and drawing himself up to his full height—"wha does the worm that burrows in the lands o' Clennel ca' thieves? Thieves, say ye!—speak such words to your equals, but no to me. Your forebears came ower wi' the Norman, invaded the nation, and seized upon land—mine invaded it also, and only laid a tax upon the flocks, the cattle, and the poultry—and wha ca' ye thieves?—or wi' what grace do ye speak the word?"

"Away, ye audacious vagrant!" continued the laird; "ken ye not that the king's authority is in my hands?—and for your former plunderings, if I again find you setting foot upon ground o' mine, on the nearest tree ye shall find a gibbet."

"Boast awa—boast awa, man," said Willie; "ye are safe here for me, and mine winna harm ye; and it is a fougie cock indeed that darena craw in its ain barn-yard. But wait until the day when we may meet upon the wide moor, wi' only twa bits o' steel between us, and see wha shall brag then."

"Away!—instantly away!" exclaimed Clennel, drawing his sword, and waving it threateningly over the head of the gipsy.

"Proud, cauld-hearted, and unfeeling mortal," said Elspeth, "will ye turn fellow-beings from beneath your roof in a night like this, when the fox darena creep frae its hole, and the raven trembles on the tree?"

"Out! out! ye witch!" rejoined the laird.

"Farewell, Clennel," said the Faa king; "we will leave your roof, and seek the shelter o' the hill-side. But ye shall rue! As I speak, man, ye shall rue it!"

"Rue it!" screamed Elspeth, rising—and her small dark eyes flashed with indignation—"he shall rue it—the bairn unborn shall rue it—and the bann o' Elspeth Faa shall be on Clennel and his kin, until his hearth be desolate and his spirit howl within him like the tempest which this night rages in the heavens!"

The servants shrank together into a corner of the hall to avoid the rage of their master; and they shook the more at the threatening words of the weird woman, lest she should involve them in his doom; but he laughed with scorn at her words.

"Proud, pitiless fool," resumed Elspeth, more bitterly than before, "repress your scorn. Whom, think ye, ye treat wi' contempt? Ken ye not that the humble adder which ye tread upon can destroy ye—that the very wasp can sting ye, and there is poison in its sting? Ye laugh, but for your want of humanity this night, sorrow shall turn your head grey, lang before age sit down upon your brow."

"Off! off! ye wretches!" added the laird; "vent your threats on the wind, if it will hear ye, for I regard them as little as it will. But keep out o' my way for the future, as ye would escape the honours o' a hempen cravat, and the hereditary exaltation o' your race."

Willie Faa made a sign to his followers, and without speaking they instantly rose and departed; but, as he himself reached the door, he turned round, and significantly striking the hilt of his dagger, exclaimed—

"Clennel! ye shall rue it!"

And the hoarse voice of Elspeth without, as the sound was borne away on the storm, was heard crying—"He shall rue it!" and repeating her imprecations.

Until now, poor Andrew Smith had lain groaning upon the floor more dead than alive, though not exactly "stone dead" as he expressed it; and ever, as he heard his master's angry voice, he groaned the more, until in his agony he doubted his existence. When, therefore, on the departure of the Faas, the laird dragged him to his feet, and feeling some pity for his terror, spoke to him more mildly, Andrew gazed vacantly around him, his teeth chattering together, and he first placed his hands upon his sides, to feel whether he was still indeed the identical flesh, blood, and bones of Andrew Smith, or his disembodied spirit; and being assured that he was still a man, he put down his hand to feel for his chronometer, and again he groaned bitterly—and although he now knew he was not dead, he almost wished he were so. The other servants thought also of their money and their trinkets, which, as well as poor Andrew's chronometer, Elspeth, in the hurry in which she was rudely driven from the house, had, by a slip of memory, neglected to return to their lawful owners.

It is unnecessary to dwell upon the laird's anger at his domestics, or farther to describe Andrew's agitation; but I may say that the laird was not wroth against the Faa gang without reason. They had committed ravages on his flocks—they had carried off the choicest of his oxen—they destroyed his deer—they plundered him of his poultry—and they even made free with the grain that he reared, and which he could spare least of all. But Willie Faa considered every landed proprietor as his enemy, and thought it his duty to quarter on them. Moreover, it was his boisterous laugh, as he pushed round the tankard, which aroused the laird from his slumbers, and broke Elspeth's spell. And the destruction of the charm, by the appearance of their master, before she had washed her hands in Darden Lough, caused those who had parted with their money and trinkets to grieve for them the more, and to doubt the promises of the prophetess, or to

"Take all for gospel that the spaefolk say."

Many weeks, however, had not passed until the laird of Clennel found that Elspeth the gipsy's threat, that he should "rue it," meant more than idle words. His cattle sickened and died in their stalls, or the choicest of them disappeared; his favourite horses were found maimed in the mornings, wounded and bleeding in the fields; and, notwithstanding the vigilance of his shepherds, the depredations on his flocks augmented tenfold. He doubted not but that Willie Faa and his tribe were the authors of all the evils which were besetting him: but he knew also their power and their matchless craft, which rendered it almost impossible either to detect or punish them. He had a favourite steed, which had borne him in boyhood, and in battle when he served in foreign wars, and one morning when he went into his park, he found it lying bleeding upon the ground. Grief and indignation strove together in arousing revenge within his bosom. He ordered his sluthhound to be brought, and his dependants to be summoned together, and to bring arms with them. He had previously observed foot-prints on the ground, and he exclaimed—

"Now the fiend take the Faas, they shall find whose turn it is to rue before the sun gae down."

The gong was pealed on the turrets of Clennel Hall, and the kempers with their poles bounded in every direction, with the fleetness of mountain stags, to summon all capable of bearing arms to the presence of the laird. The mandate was readily obeyed; and within two hours thirty armed men appeared in the park. The sluthhound was led to the foot-print; and after following it for many a weary mile over moss, moor, and mountain, it stood and howled, and lashed its lips with its tongue, and again ran as though its prey were at hand, as it approached what might be called a gap in the wilderness between Keyheugh and Clovencrag.

Now, in the space between these desolate crags stood some score of peels, or rather half hovels, half encampments—and this primitive city in the wilderness was the capital of the Faa king's people.

"Now for vengeance!" exclaimed Clennel; and his desire of revenge was excited the more from perceiving several of the choicest of his cattle, which had disappeared, grazing before the doors or holes of the gipsy village.

"Bring whins and heather," he continued—"pile them around it, and burn the den of thieves to the ground."

His order was speedily obeyed, and when he commanded the trumpet to be sounded, that the inmates might defend themselves if they dared, only two or three men and women of extreme age, and some half-dozen children, crawled upon their hands and knees from the huts—for it was impossible to stand upright in them.

The aged men and women howled when they beheld the work of destruction that was in preparation, and the children screamed when they heard them howl. But the laird of Clennel had been injured, and he turned a deaf ear to their misery. A light was struck, and a dozen torches applied at once. The whins crackled, the heather blazed, and the flames overtopped the hovels which they surrounded, and which within an hour became a heap of smouldering ashes.

Clennel and his dependants returned home, driving the cattle which had been stolen from him before them, and rejoicing in what they had done. On the following day, Willie Faa and a part of his tribe returned to the place of rendezvous—their city and home in the mountains—and they found it a heap of smoking ruins, and the old men and the old women of the tribe—their fathers and their mothers—sitting wailing upon the ruins, and warming over them their shivering limbs, while the children wept around them for food.

"Whose work is this?" inquired Willie, while anxiety and anger flashed in his eyes.

"The Laird o' Clennel!—the Laird o' Clennel!" answered every voice at the same instant.

"By this I swear!" exclaimed the king of the Faas, drawing his dagger from beneath his coat, "from this night henceforth he is laird nor man nae langer." And he turned hastily from the ruins, as if to put his threat in execution.

"Stay, ye madcap!" cried Elspeth following him, "would ye fling away revenge for half a minute's satisfaction?"

"No, wife," cried he, "nae mair than I would sacrifice living a free and a fu' life for half an hour's hangin'."

"Stop, then," returned she, "and let our vengeance fa' upon him, so that it may wring his life away, drap by drap, until his heart be dry; and grief, shame, and sorrow burn him up, as he has here burned house and home o' Elspeth Faa and her kindred."

"What mean ye, woman?" said Willie, hastily; "if I thought ye would come between me and my revenge, I would drive this bit steel through you wi' as goodwill as I shall drive it through him."

"And ye shall be welcome," said Elspeth. She drew him aside, and whispered a few minutes in his ear. He listened attentively. At times he seemed to start, and at length, sheathing his dagger and grasping her hand, he exclaimed—"Excellent, Elspeth!—ye have it!—ye have it!"

At this period the laird of Clennel was about thirty years of age, and two years before he had been married to Eleanor de Vere, a lady alike distinguished for her beauty and accomplishments. They had an infant son, who was the delight of his mother, and his father's pride. Now, for two years after the conflagration of their little town, Clennel heard nothing of his old enemies the Faas, neither did they molest him, nor had they been seen in the neighbourhood, and he rejoiced in having cleared his estate of such dangerous visitors. But the Faa king, listening to the advice of his wife, only "nursed his wrath to keep it warm," and retired from the neighbourhood, that he might accomplish, in its proper season, his design of vengeance more effectually, and with greater cruelty.

The infant heir of the house of Clennel had been named Henry, and he was about completing his third year—an age at which children are, perhaps, most interesting, and when their fondling and their prattling sink deepest into a parent's heart—for all is then beheld on childhood's sunny side, and all is innocence and love. Now, it was in a lovely day in April, when every bird had begun its annual song, and flowers were bursting into beauty, buds into leaves, and the earth resuming its green mantle, when Lady Clennel and her infant son, who then, as I have said, was about three years of age, went forth to enjoy the loveliness and the luxuries of nature, in the woods which surrounded their mansion, and Andrew Smith accompanied them as their guide and protector. They had proceeded somewhat more than a mile from the house, and the child, at intervals breaking away from them, sometimes ran before his mother, and at others sauntered behind her, pulling the wild flowers that strewed their path, when a man, springing from a dark thicket, seized the child in his arms, and again darted into the wood. Lady Clennel screamed aloud, and rushed after him. Andrew, who was coming dreaming behind, got but a glance of the ruffian stranger—but that glance was enough to reveal to him the tall, terrible figure of Willie Faa, the gipsy king.

There are moments when, and circumstances under which even cowards become courageous, and this was one of those moments and circumstances which suddenly inspired Andrew (who was naturally no hero) with courage. He, indeed, loved the child as though he had been his own; and following the example of Lady Clennel, he drew his sword and rushed into the wood. He possessed considerable speed of foot, and he soon passed the wretched mother, and came in sight of the pursued. The unhappy lady, who ran panting and screaming as she rushed along, unable to keep pace with them, lost all trace of where the robber of her child had fled, and her cries of agony and bereavement rang through the woods.

Andrew, however, though he did not gain ground upon the gipsy, still kept within sight of him, and shouted to him as he ran, saying that all the dependants of Clennel would soon be on horseback at his heels, and trusting that every moment he would drop the child upon the ground. Still Faa flew forward, bearing the boy in his arm, and disregarding the cries and threats of his pursuer. He knew that Andrew's was not what could be called a heart of steel, but he was aware that he had a powerful arm, and could use a sword as well as a better man; and he knew also that cowards will fight as desperately, when their life is at stake, as the brave.

The desperate chase continued for four hours, and till after the sun had set, and the gloaming was falling thick on the hills. Andrew, being younger and unencumbered, had at length gained ground upon the gipsy, and was within ten yards of him when he reached the Coquet side, about a mile below this town, at the hideous Thrumb, where the deep river, for many yards, rushes through a mere chasm in the rock. The Faa, with the child beneath his arm, leaped across the fearful gulf, and the dark flood gushed between him and his pursuer. He turned round, and, with a horrid laugh, looked towards Andrew and unsheathed his dagger. But even at this moment the unwonted courage of the chief servant of Clennel did not fail him, and as he rushed up and down upon one side of the gulf, that he might spring across and avoid the dagger of the gipsy, the other ran in like manner on the other side; and when Andrew stood as if ready to leap, the Faa king, pointing with his dagger to the dark flood that rolled between them, cried—

"See, fool! eternity divides us!"

"And for that bairn's sake, ye wretch, I'll brave it!" exclaimed Andrew, while his teeth gnashed together; and he stepped back, in order that he might spring across with the greater force and safety.

"Hold, man!" cried the Faa; "attempt to cross to me, and I will plunge this bonny heir o' Clennel into the flood below."

"Oh, gracious! gracious!" cried Andrew, and his resolution and courage forsook him; "ye monster!—ye barbarian!—oh, what shall I do now!"

"Go back whence you came," said the gipsy, "or follow me another step and the child dies."

"Oh, ye butcher!—ye murderer!" continued the other—and he tore his hair in agony—"hae ye nae mercy?"

"Sic mercy as your maister had," returned the Faa, "when he burned our dwellings about the ears o' the aged and infirm, and o' my helpless bairns! Ye shall find in me the mercy o' the fasting wolf, o' the tiger when it laps blood!"

Andrew perceived that to rescue the child was now impossible, and with a heavy heart he returned to his master's house, in which there was no sound save that of lamentation.

For many weeks, yea months, the Laird of Clennel, his friends, and his servants, sought anxiously throughout every part of the country to obtain tidings of his child, but their search was vain. It was long ere his lady was expected to recover the shock, and the affliction sat heavy on his soul, while in his misery he vowed revenge upon all of the gipsy race. But neither Willie Faa nor any of his tribe were again seen upon his estates, or heard of in their neighbourhood.

Four years were passed from the time that their son was stolen from them, and an infant daughter smiled upon the knee of Lady Clennel; and oft as it smiled in her face, and stretched its little hands towards her, she would burst into tears, as the smile and the infantine fondness of her little daughter reminded her of her lost Henry.—They had had other children, but they had died while but a few weeks old.

For two years there had been a maiden in the household named Susan, and to her care, when the child was not in her own arms, Lady Clennel intrusted her infant daughter; for every one loved Susan, because of her affectionate nature and docile manners—she was, moreover, an orphan, and they pitied while they loved her. But one evening, when Lady Clennel desired that her daughter might be brought her in order that she might present her to a company who had come to visit them (an excusable, though not always a pleasant vanity in mothers), neither Susan nor the child were to be found. Wild fears seized the bosom of the already bereaved mother, and her husband felt his heart throb within him. They sought the woods, the hills, the cottages around; they wandered by the sides of the rivers and the mountain burns, but no one had seen, no trace could be discovered of either the girl or the child.

I will not, because I cannot, describe the overwhelming misery of the afflicted parents. Lady Clennel spent her days in tears and her nights in dreams of her children, and her husband sank into a settled melancholy, while his hatred of the Faa race became more implacable, and he burst into frequent exclamations of vengeance against them.

More than fifteen years had passed, and though the poignancy of their grief had abated, yet their sadness was not removed, for they had been able to hear nothing that could throw light upon the fate of their children. About this period, sheep were again missed from the flocks, and, in one night, the hen-roosts were emptied. There needed no other proof that a Faa gang was again in the neighbourhood. Now, Northumberland at that period was still thickly covered with wood, and abounded with places where thieves might conceal themselves in security. Partly from a desire of vengeance, and partly from the hope of being able to extort from some of the tribe information respecting his children, Clennel armed his servants, and taking his hounds with him, set out in quest of the plunderers.

For two days their search was unsuccessful, but on the third the dogs raised their savage cry, and rushed into a thicket in a deep glen amongst the mountains. Clennel and his followers hurried forward, and in a few minutes perceived the fires of the Faa encampment. The hounds had already alarmed the vagrant colony, they had sprung upon many of them and torn their flesh with their tusks; but the Faas defended themselves against them with their poniards, and, before Clennel's approach, more than half his hounds lay dead upon the ground, and his enemies fled. Yet there was one poor girl amongst them, who had been attacked by a fierce hound, and whom no one attempted to rescue, as she strove to defend herself against it with her bare hands. Her screams for assistance rose louder and more loud; and as Clennel and his followers drew near, and her companions fled, they turned round, and, with a fiendish laugh, cried—

"Rue it now!"

Maddened more keenly by the words, he was following on in pursuit, without rescuing the screaming girl from the teeth of the hound, or seeming to perceive her, when a woman, suddenly turning round from amongst the flying gipsies, exclaimed—

"For your sake!—for Heaven's sake! Laird Clennel! save my bairn."

He turned hastily aside, and, seizing the hound by the throat, tore it from the lacerated girl, who sank, bleeding, terrified, and exhausted, upon the ground. Her features were beautiful, and her yellow hair contrasted ill with the tawny hue of her countenance and the snowy whiteness of her bosom, which in the struggle had been revealed. The elder gipsy woman approached. She knelt by the side of the wounded girl.

"O my bairn!" she exclaimed, "what has this day brought upon me!—they have murdered you! This is rueing, indeed; and I rue too!"

"Susan!" exclaimed Clennel, as he listened to her words, and his eyes had been for several seconds fixed upon her countenance.

"Yes!—Susan!—guilty Susan!" cried the gipsy.

"Wretch!" he exclaimed, "my child!—where is my child?—is this"—and he gazed on the poor girl, his voice failed him, and he burst into tears.

"Yes!—yes!" replied she bitterly. "it is her—there lies your daughter—look upon her face."

He needed, indeed, but to look upon her countenance—disfigured as it was, and dyed with weeds to give it a sallow hue—to behold in it every lineament of her mother's, lovely as when they first met his eye and entered his heart. He flung himself on the ground by her side, he raised her head, he kissed her cheek, he exclaimed, "my child!—my child!—my lost one! I have destroyed thee!"

He bound up her lacerated arms, and applied a flask of wine, which he carried with him, to her lips, and he supported her on his knee, and again kissing her cheek, sobbed, "my child!—my own!"

Andrew Smith also bent over her and said, "Oh, it is her! there isna the smallest doubt o' that. I could swear to her among a thousand. She's her mother's very picture." And, turning to Susan, he added, "O Susan, woman, but ye hae been a terrible hypocrite!"

Clennel having placed his daughter on horseback before him, supporting her with his arm, Susan was set between two of his followers, and conducted to the hall.

Before the tidings were made known to Lady Clennel, the wounds of her daughter were carefully dressed, the dye that changed the colour of her countenance was removed, and her gipsy garb was exchanged for more seemly apparel.

Clennel anxiously entered the apartment of his lady, to reveal to her the tale of joy; but when he entered, he wist not how to introduce it. He knew that excess of sudden joy was not less dangerous than excess of grief, and his countenance was troubled, though its expression was less sad than it had been for many years.

"Eleanor," he at length began, "cheer up."

"Why, I am not sadder than usual, dear," replied she, in her wonted gentle manner; "and to be more cheerful would ill become one who has endured my sorrows."

"True, true," said he, "but our affliction may not be so severe as we have thought—there may be hope—there may be joy for us yet."

"What mean ye, husband?" inquired she, eagerly; "have ye heard aught—aught of my children?—you have!—you have!—your countenance speaks it."

"Yes, dear Eleanor," returned he, "I have heard of our daughter."

"And she lives?—she lives?—tell me that she lives!"

"Yes, she lives."

"And I shall see her—I shall embrace my child again?"

"Yes, love, yes," replied he, and burst into tears.

"When—oh, when?" she exclaimed, "can you take me to her now?"

"Be calm, my sweet one. You shall see our child—our long-lost child. You shall see her now—she is here."

"Here!—my child!" she exclaimed, and sank back upon her seat.

Words would fail to paint the tender interview—the mother's joy—the daughter's wonder—the long, the passionate embrace—the tears of all—the looks—the words—the moments of unutterable feeling.

I shall next notice the confession of Susan. Clennel promised her forgiveness if she would confess the whole truth; and he doubted not, that from her he would also obtain tidings of his son, and learn where he might find him, if he yet lived. I shall give her story in her own words.

"When I came amongst you," she began, "I said that I was an orphan, and I told ye truly, so far as I knew myself. I have been reared amongst the people ye call gipsies from infancy. They fed me before I could provide for myself. I have wandered with them through many lands. They taught me many things; and, while young, sent me as a servant into families, that I might gather information to assist them in upholding their mysteries of fortune-telling, I dared not to disobey them—they kept me as their slave—and I knew that they would destroy my life for an act of disobedience. I was in London when ye cruelly burned down the bit town between the Keyhaugh and Clovencrag. That night would have been your last, but Elspeth Faa vowed more cruel vengeance than death on you and yours. After our king had carried away your son, I was ordered from London to assist in the plot o' revenge. I at length succeeded in getting into your family, and the rest ye know. When ye were a' busy wi' your company, I slipped into the woods wi' the bairn in my arms, where others were ready to meet us; and long before ye missed us, we were miles across the hills, and frae that day to this your daughter has passed as mine."

"But tell me all, woman," cried Clennel, "as you hope for either pardon or protection—where is my son, my little Harry? Does he live?—where shall I find him?"

"As I live," replied Susan, "I cannot tell. There are but two know concerning him—and that is the king and his wife Elspeth; and there is but one way of discovering anything respecting him, which is by crossing Elspeth's loof, that she may betray her husband; and she would do it for revenge's sake, for an ill husband has he been to her, and in her old days he has discarded her for another."

"And where may she be found?" inquired Clennel, earnestly.

"That," added Susan, "is a question I cannot answer. She was with the people in the glen to-day, and was first to raise the laugh when your dog fastened its teeth in the flesh of your ain bairn. But she may be far to seek and ill to find now—for she is wi' those that travel fast and far, and that will not see her hindmost."

Deep was the disappointment of the laird when he found he could obtain no tidings of his son. But, at the intercession of his daughter (whose untutored mind her fond mother had begun to instruct), Susan was freely pardoned, promised protection from her tribe, and again admitted as one of the household.

I might describe the anxious care of the fond mother, as, day by day, she sat by her new-found and lovely daughter's side, teaching her, and telling her of a hundred things of which she had never heard before, while her father sat gazing and listening near them, rejoicing over both.

But the ray of sunshine which had penetrated the house of Clennel was not destined to be of long duration. At that period a fearful cloud overhung the whole land, and the fury of civil war seemed about to burst forth.

The threatening storm did explode; a bigoted king overstepped his prerogative, set at nought the rights and the liberties of the subject, and an indignant people stained their hands with blood. A political convulsion shook the empire to its centre. Families and individuals became involved in the general catastrophe; and the house of Clennel did not escape. In common with the majority of the English gentry of that period, Clennel was a stanch loyalist, and if not exactly a lover of the king, or an ardent admirer of his acts, yet one who would fight for the crown though it should (as it was expressed about the time) "hang by a bush." When, therefore, the parliament declared war against the king, and the name of Cromwell spread awe throughout the country, and when some said that a prophet and deliverer had risen amongst them, and others an ambitious hypocrite and a tyrant, Clennel armed a body of his dependants, and hastened to the assistance of his sovereign, leaving his wife and his newly-found daughter with the promise of a speedy return.

It is unnecessary to describe all that he did or encountered during the civil wars. He had been a zealous partizan of the first Charles, and he fought for the fortunes of his son to the last. He was present at the battle of Worcester, which Cromwell calls his "crowning mercy," in the September of 1651, where the already dispirited royalists were finally routed; and he fought by the side of the king until the streets were heaped with dead; and when Charles fled, he, with others, accompanied him to the borders of Staffordshire.

Having bid the young prince an affectionate farewell, Clennel turned back, with the intention of proceeding on his journey, on the following day, to Northumberland, though he was aware, that, from the part which he had taken in the royal cause, even his person was in danger. Yet the desire again to behold his wife and daughter overcame his fears, and the thought of meeting them in some degree consoled him for the fate of his prince, and the result of the struggle in which he had been engaged.

But he had not proceeded far when he was met by two men dressed as soldiers of the Parliamentary army—the one a veteran with grey hairs, and the other a youth. The shades of night had set in; but the latter he instantly recognised as a young soldier whom he had that day wounded in the streets of Worcester.

"Stand!" said the old man, as they met him; and the younger drew his sword.

"If I stand!" exclaimed Clennel, "it shall not be when an old man and a boy command me." And, following their example, he unsheathed his sword.

"Boy!" exclaimed the youth; "whom call ye boy?—think ye, because ye wounded me this morn, that fortune shall aye sit on your arm?—yield or try."

They made several thrusts at each other, and the old man, as an indifferent spectator, stood looking on. But the youth, by a dexterous blow, shivered the sword in Clennel's hand, and left him at his mercy.

"Now yield ye," he exclaimed; "the chance is mine now—in the morning it was thine."

"Ye seem a fair foe," replied Clennel, "and loath am I to yield, but that I am weaponless."

"Despatch him at once!" growled the old man. "If he spilled your blood in the morning, there can be no harm in spilling his the night—and especially after giein' him a fair chance."

"Father," returned the youth, "would ye have me to kill a man in cold blood?"

"Let him submit to be bound then, hands and eyes, or I will," cried the senior.

The younger obeyed, and Clennel, finding himself disarmed, submitted to his fate; and his hands were bound, and his eyes tied up, so that he knew not where they led him.

After wandering many miles, and having lain upon what appeared the cold earth for a lodging, he was aroused from a comfortless and troubled sleep, by a person tearing the bandage from his eyes, and ordering him to prepare for his trial. He started to his feet. He looked around, and beheld that he stood in the midst of a gipsy encampment. He was not a man given to fear, but a sickness came over his heart when he thought of his wife and daughter, and that, knowing the character of the people in whose power he was, he should never behold them again.

The males of the Faa tribe began to assemble in a sort of half circle in the area of the encampment, and in the midst of them, towering over the heads of all, he immediately distinguished the tall figure of Willie Faa, in whom he also discovered the grey-haired Parliamentary soldier of the previous night. But the youth with whom he had twice contended and once wounded, and by whom he had been made prisoner, he was unable to single out amongst them.

He was rudely dragged before them, and Willie Faa cried—"Ken ye the culprit?"

"Clennel o' Northumberland!—our enemy!" exclaimed twenty voices.

"Yes," continued Willie, "Clennel, our enemy—the burner o' our humble habitations—that left the auld, the sick, the infirm, and the helpless, and the infants o' our kindred to perish in the flaming ruins. Had we burned his house, the punishment would have been death; and shall we do less to him than he would do to us?"

"No! no!" they exclaimed with one voice.

"But," added Willie, "though he would have disgraced us wi' a gallows, as he has been a soldier, I propose that he hae the honour o' a soldier's death, and that Harry Faa be appointed to shoot him."

"All! all! all!" was the cry.

"He shall die with the setting sun," said Willie, and again they cried, "Agreed!"

Such was the form of trial which Clennel underwent, when he was again rudely dragged away, and placed in a tent round which four strong Faas kept guard. He had not been alone an hour, when his judge, the Faa king, entered, and addressed him—-

"Now, Laird Clennel, say ye that I haena lived to see day about wi' ye. When ye turned me frae beneath your roof, when the drift was fierce and the wind howled in the moors, was it not tauld to ye that ye would rue it!—but ye mocked the admonition and the threat, and, after that, cruelly burned us out o' house and ha'. When I came hame, I saw my auld mother, that was within three years o' a hunder, couring ower the reeking ruins, without a wa' to shelter her, and crooning curses on the doer o' the black deed. There were my youngest bairns, too, crouching by their granny's side, starving wi' hunger as weel as wi' cauld, for ye had burned a', and haudin' their bits o' hands before the burnin' ruins o' the house that they were born in, to warm them! That night I vowed vengeance on you; and even on that night I would have executed it, but I was prevented; and glad am I now that I was prevented, for my vengeance has been complete—or a' but complete. Wi' my ain hand I snatched your son and heir from his mother's side, and a terrible chase I had for it; but revenge lent me baith strength and speed. And when ye had anither bairn that was like to live, I forced a lassie, that some o' our folk had stolen when an infant, to bring it to us. Ye have got your daughter back again, but no before she has cost ye mony a sad heart and mony a saut tear; and that was some revenge. But the substance o' my satisfaction and revenge lies in what I hae to tell ye. Ye die this night as the sun gaes down; and, hearken to me now—the young soldier whom ye wounded on the streets o' Worcester, and who last night made you prisoner, was your son—your heir—your lost son! Ha! ha!—Clennel, am I revenged?"

"My son!" screamed the prisoner—"monster, what is it that ye say? Strike me dead, now I am in your power—but torment me not!"

"Ha! ha! ha!" again laughed the grey-haired savage—"man, ye are about to die, and ye know not that ye are born. Ye have not heard half I have to tell. I heard that ye had joined the standard o' King Charles. I, a king in my ain right, care for neither your king nor parliament; but I resolved to wear, for a time, the cloth o' old Noll, and to make your son do the same, that I might hae an opportunity o' meeting you as an enemy, and seeing him strike you to the heart. That satisfaction I had not; but I had its equivalent. Yesterday, I saw you shed his blood on the streets o' Worcester, and in the evening he gave you a prisoner into my hands that desired you."

"Grey-haired monster!" exclaimed Clennel, "have ye no feeling—no heart? Speak ye to torment me, or tell me truly, have I seen my son?"

"Patience, man!" said the Faa, with a smile of sardonic triumph—"my story is but half finished. It was the blood o' your son ye shed yesterday at Worcester—it was your son who disarmed ye, and gave ye into my power; and best o' a'! now, hear me! hear me! lose not a word!—it is the hand o' your son that this night, at sunset, shall send you to eternity! Now, tell me, Clennel, am I no revenged? Do ye no rue it?"

"Wretch! wretch!" cried the miserable parent, "in mercy strike me dead. If I have raised my sword against my son, let that suffice ye!—but spare, oh, spare my child from being an involuntary parricide!"

"Hush, fool!" said the Faa; "I have waited for this consummation o' my revenge for twenty years, and think ye that I will be deprived o' it now by a few whining words? Remember, sunset!" he added, and left the tent.

Evening came, and the disk of the sun began to disappear behind the western hills. Men and women, the old and the young, amongst the Faas, came out from their encampment to behold the death of their enemy. Clennel was brought forth between two, his hands fastened to his sides, and a bandage round his mouth, to prevent him making himself known to his executioner. A rope was also brought round his body, and he was tied to the trunk of an old ash tree. The women of the tribe began a sort of yell or coronach; and their king, stepping forward, and smiling savagely in the face of his victim, cried aloud—

"Harry Faa! stand forth and perform the duty your tribe have imposed on you."

A young man, reluctantly, and with a slow and trembling step, issued from one of the tents. He carried a musket in his hand, and placed himself in front of the prisoner, at about twenty yards from him.

"Make ready!" cried Willie Faa, in a voice like thunder. And the youth, though his hands shook, levelled the musket at his victim.

But, at that moment, one who, to appearance, seemed a maniac, sprang from a clump of whins behind the ash tree where the prisoner was bound, and, throwing herself before him, she cried—"Hold!—would you murder your own father? Harry Clennel!—would you murder your father? Mind ye not when ye was stolen frae your mother's side, as ye gathered wild flowers in the wood?"

It was Elspeth Faa.

The musket dropped from the hands of the intended executioner—a thousand recollections, that he had often fancied dreams, rushed across his memory. He again seized the musket, he rushed forward to his father, but, ere he reached, Elspeth had cut the cords that bound the laird, and placed a dagger in his hand for his defence, and, with extended arms, he flew to meet the youth, crying—"My son!—my son!"

The old Faa king shook with rage and disappointment, and his first impulse was to poniard his wife—but he feared to do so; for although he had injured her, and had not seen her for years, her influence was greater with the tribe than his.

"Now, Willie," cried she, addressing him, "wha rues it now? Fareweel for ance and a'—and the bairn I brought up will find a shelter for my auld head."

It were vain to tell how Clennel and his son wept on each other's neck, and how they exchanged forgiveness. But such was the influence of Elspeth, that they departed from the midst of the Faas unmolested, and she accompanied them.

Imagination must picture the scene when the long-lost son flung himself upon the bosom of his mother, and pressed his sister's hand in his. Clennel Hall rang with the sounds of joy for many days; and, ere they were ended, Andrew Smith placed a ring upon the finger of Susan, and they became one flesh—she a respectable woman. And old Elspeth lived to the age of ninety and seven years beneath its roof.

THE RIVAL NIGHTCAPS.

BY ALEXANDER CAMPBELL.

In the neighbourhood of the suburban village of Bridgeton, near Glasgow, there lived, a good many years ago, a worthy man, and an excellent weaver, of the name of Thomas Callender, and his wife, a bustling, active woman, but, if anything, a little of what is called the randy. We have said that Thomas's occupation was the loom. It was so; but, be it known, that he was not a mere journeyman weaver—one who is obliged to toil for the subsistence of the day that is passing over him, and whose sole dependence is on the labour of his hands. By no means. Thomas had been all his days, a careful, thrifty man, and had made his hay while the sun shone;—when wages were good, he had saved money—as much as could keep him in a small way, independent of labour, should sickness or any other casualty render it necessary for him to fall back on his secret resources. Being, at the time we speak of, however, suffering under no bodily affliction of any kind, but, on the contrary, being hale and hearty, and not much past the meridian of life, he continued at his loom, although, perhaps, not altogether with the perseverance and assiduity which had distinguished the earlier part of his brilliant career. The consciousness of independence, and, probably, some slight preliminary touches from approaching eild, had rather abated the energy of his exertions; yet Thomas still made a fair week's wage of it, as matters went. Now, with a portion of the honest wealth which he had acquired, Mr Callender had built himself a good substantial tenement—the first floor of which was occupied by looms, which were let on hire; the second was his own place of residence; and the third was divided into small domiciles, and let to various tenants. To the house was attached a small garden, a kail-yard, in which he was wont, occasionally, to recreate himself with certain botanical and horticultural pursuits, the latter being specially directed to the cultivation of greens, cabbages, leeks, and other savoury and useful pot herbs.

But Thomas's mansion stood not alone in its glory. A rival stood near. This was the dwelling of Mr John Anderson, in almost every respect the perfect counterpart of that of Mr Thomas Callender—a similarity which is in part accounted for by the facts that John was also a weaver, that he too had made a little money by a life of industry and economy, and that the house was built by himself. By what we have just said, then, we have shown, we presume, that Thomas and John were near neighbours; and, having done so, it follows, of course, that their wives were near neighbours also; but we beg to remark, regarding the latter, that it by no means, therefore, follows that they were friends, or that they had any liking for each other. The fact, indeed, was quite otherwise. They hated each other with great cordiality—a hatred in which a feeling of jealousy of each other's manifestations of wealth, whether in matters relating to their respective houses or persons, or those of their husbands, was the principal feature. Any new article of dress which the one was seen to display, was sure to be immediately repeated, or, if possible, surpassed by the other; and the same spirit of retaliation was carried throughout every department of their domestic economy.

Between the husbands, too, there was no great good will; for, besides being influenced, to a certain extent, in their feelings towards each other by their wives, they had had a serious difference on their own account. John Anderson, on evil purpose intent, had once stoned some ducks of Thomas Callender's out of a dub, situated in the rear of, and midway between the two houses; claiming said dub for the especial use of his ducks alone; and, on that occasion, had maimed and otherwise severely injured a very fine drake, the property of his neighbour, Thomas Callender. Now, Thomas very naturally resented this unneighbourly proceeding on the part of John; and, further, insisted that his ducks had as good a right to the dub as Anderson's. Anderson denied the justice of this claim; Callender maintained it; and the consequence was a series of law proceedings, which mulcted each of them of somewhere about fifty pounds sterling money, and finally ended in the decision that they should divide the dub between them in equal portions, which was accordingly done.

The good-will, then, towards each other, between the husbands, was thus not much greater than between their wives; but, in their case, of course, it was not marked by any of those outbreaks and overt acts which distinguished the enmity of their better halves. The dislike of the former was passive, that of the latter active—most indefatigably active; for Mrs Anderson was every bit as spirited a woman as her neighbour, Mrs Callender, and was a dead match for her in any way she might try.

Thus, then, stood matters between these two rival houses of York and Lancaster, when Mrs Callender, on looking from one of her windows one day, observed that the head of her rival's husband, who was at the moment recreating himself in his garden, was comfortably set off with a splendid, new striped Kilmarnock nightcap. Now, when Mrs Callender saw this, and recollected the very shabby, faded article of the same denomination—"mair like a dish-cloot," as she muttered to herself, "than onything else"—which her Thomas wore, she determined on instantly providing him with a new one; resolved, as she also remarked to herself, not to let the Andersons beat her, even in the matter of a nightcap. But Mrs Callender not only resolved on rivalling her neighbour, in the matter of having a new nightcap for her husband, but in surpassing her in the quality of the said nightcap. She determined that her "man's" should be a red one; "a far mair genteeler thing," as she said to herself, "than John Anderson's vulgar striped Kilmarnock." Having settled this matter to her own satisfaction, and having dexterously prepared her husband for the vision of a new nightcap—which she did by urging sundry reasons, totally different from those under whose influence she really acted, as she knew that he would never give in to such an absurdity as a rivalship with his neighbour in the matter of a nightcap: this matter settled then, we say, the following day saw Mrs Callender sailing into Glasgow, to purchase a red nightcap for her husband—a mission which, we need not say, she very easily accomplished. Her choice was one of the brightest hue she could find—a flaming article, that absolutely dazzled Thomas with the intensity of its glare, when it was triumphantly unrolled before him.

"Jenny," said the latter, in perfect simplicity of heart, and utter ignorance of the true cause of his wife's care of his comfort in the present instance—"Jenny, but that is a bonny thing," he said, looking admiringly at the gaudy commodity, into which he had now thrust his hand and part of his arm, in order to give it all possible extension, and thus holding it up before him as he spoke.

"Really it is a bonny thing," he replied, "and, I warrant, a comfortable."

"Isna't?" replied his wife, triumphantly. And she would have added, "How far prettier and mair genteeler a thing than John Anderson's!" But as this would have betrayed secrets, she refrained, and merely added, "Now, my man, Tammas, ye'll just wear't when ye gang about the doors and the yard. It'll mak' ye look decent and respectable—what ye wasna in that creeshy cloot that ye're wearin', that made ye look mair like a tauty bogle than a Christian man."

Thomas merely smiled at these remarks, and made no reply in words.

Thus far, then, Mrs Callender's plot had gone on swimmingly. There only wanted now her husband's appearance in the garden in his new red nightcap, where the latter could not but be seen by her rival, to complete her triumph; and this satisfaction she was not long denied. Thomas, at her suggestion (warily and cautiously urged, however) instantly took the field in his new nightcap; and the result was as complete and decisive as the heart of woman, in Mrs Callender's circumstances, could desire. Mrs Anderson saw the nightcap, guessed the cause of its appearance, and resolved to be avenged. In that moment, when her sight was blasted, her pride humbled, and her spirits roused, which they were all at one and the same time by the vision of Thomas Callender's new red nightcap, she resolved on getting her husband to strike the striped cap, and mount one of precisely the same description—better, if possible, but she was not sure if this could be had.