was six unces of it gaed to boil your parritch this morning; though, I trow, a carefu' man wad have ta'en drammock, if breakfast he behoved to have, rather than waste baith meltith and fuel in the same morning."

"That is to say, Baby," replied Triptolemus, who was somewhat of a dry joker in his way, "that when we have fire we are not to have food, and when we have food we are not to have fire, these being too great blessings to enjoy both in the same day. Good luck, you do not propose we should starve with cold and starve with hunger unico contextu. But to tell you the truth, I could never away with raw oatmeal, slockened with water, in all my life. Call it drammock, or crowdie, or just what ye list, my vivers must thole fire and water."

"The mair gowk you," said Baby; "can ye not make your brose of the Sunday, and sup them cauld on the Monday, since ye're sae dainty? Mony is the fairer face than yours that has licked the lip after a cogfu'."

"Mercy on us, sister!" said Triptolemus; " at this rate, it's a finished field with me-I must unyoke the pleugh, and lie down to wait for the dead-thraw. Here is that in this house wad hold all Zetland in meal for a twelvemonth; and ye grudge a cogfu' of warm parritch to me, that has sic a charge.'

"Whisht-hold your silly clavering tongue," said Baby, looking round with apprehension-"ye are a wise man to speak of what is in the house, and a fitting man to have the charge of it.-Hark, as I live by bread, I hear a tapping at the outer yett."

"Go and open it then, Baby," said her brother, glad at any thing that promised to interrupt the dispute.

"Go and open it, said he?" echoed Baby, half angry, half frightened, and half triumphant, at the

superiority of her understanding over that of her brother-Go and open it, said you, indeed?—is it to lend robbers a chance to take all that is in the house?"

"Robbers!" echoed Triptolemus in his turn; "there are no more robbers in this country than there are lambs at Youle. I tell you, as I have told you an hundred times, there are no Highlandmen to harry us here. This is a land of quiet and honesty. O fortunati nimium!"

"And what good is Saint Rinian to do ye, Tolemus?" said his sister, mistaking the quotation for a Catholic invocation. "Besides, if there be no Highlandmen, there may be as bad. I saw sax or seven as ill-looking chields gang past the place yesterday, as ever came frae beyont Clochna-ben; illfa'red tools they had in their hands, whaaling knives they ca'ed them, but they looked as like whingers as ae bit airn can look like anither. There is nae honest men carry siccan tools."

Here the knocking and shouts of Mordaunt were very audible betwixt every swell of the horrible blast which was careering without. The brother and sister looked at each other in real perplexity and fear. "If they have heard of the siller," said Baby, her very nose changing with terror from red to blue," we are but gane folks."

"Who speaks now, when they should hold their peace?" said Triptolemus. "Go to the shot-window instantly, and see how many there are of them,. while I load the old Spanish-barrelled duck-gungo as if you were stepping on new-laid eggs. Baby crept to the window, and reported that she saw only one young chield, clattering and roaring as gin he were daft. How many there might be ought of sight, she could not say.'

66

"Out of sight!-nonsense," said Triptolemus, laying aside the ramrod with which he was loading the piece, with a trembling hand. "I will warrant

them out of sight and hearing both-this is some poor fellow catched in the tempest, wants the shelter of our roof, and a little refreshment. Open the door, Baby, it's a Christian deed."

"But is it a Christian deed of him to come in at the window then?" said Baby, setting up a most doleful shriek, as Mordaunt Mertoun, who had forced open one of the windows, leaped down into the apartment, dripping with water like a river god. Triptolemus, in great tribulation, presented the gun which he had not yet loaded, while the intruder exclaimed, "Hold, hold-what the devil mean you by keeping your doors bolted in weather like this, and levelling your gun at folk's heads as you would at a sealgh's?"

"And who are you, friend, and what want you?" said Triptolemus, lowering the butt of his gun to the floor as he spoke, and so recovering his

arms.

"What do I want!" said Mordaunt; "I want every thing I want meat, drink, and fire, a bed for the night, and a sheltie for to-morrow morning to carry me to Jarlshof."

"And you said there were nae caterans or sorners here?" said Baby to the agriculturist, reproachfully. "Heard ye ever a breekless loon frae Lochabar tell his mind and his errand mair deftly?-Come, come, friend," she added, addressing herself to Mordaunt, "put up your pipes and gang your gait; this is the house of his Lordship's factor, and no place of resett for thiggers or sor

ners.

Mordaunt laughed in her face at the simplicity of the request. "Leave built walls," he said, “and in such a tempest as this? What take you me for?a gannet or a scarf do that think I am, you your clapping your hands and skirling at me like a mad woman, should drive me from the shelter into the storm?"

"And so you propose, young man," said Triptolemus, gravely, "to stay in my house, volens nolens-that is, whether we will or no?"

"Will!" said Mordaunt; " what right have you to will any thing about it? Do you not hear the thunder? Do you not hear the rain? Do you not see the lightning? And do you not know this is the only house within I wot not how many miles? Come, my good master and dame, this may be Scottish jesting, but it sounds strange in Zetland ears. You have let out the fire, too, and my teeth are dancing a jig in my head with cold; but I'll soon put that to rights.'

He seized the fire-tongs, raked together the embers upon the hearth, broke up into life the gathering-peat which the hostess had calculated should have preserved the seeds of fire, without giving them forth, for many hours; then casting his eye round, saw in a corner the stock of drift-wood, which Mistress Baby had served forth by ounces, and transferred two or three logs of it at once to the hearth, which, conscious of such unwonted supply, began to transmit to the chimney such a smoke as had not issued from the Place of Harfra for many a day.

While their uninvited guest was thus making himself at home, Baby kept edging and jogging the factor to turn out the intruder. But for this undertaking, Triptolemus Yellowley felt neither courage nor zeal, nor did circumstances seem at all to warrant the favourable conclusion of any fray in which he might enter with the young stranger. The sinewy limbs and graceful form of Mordaunt Mertoun were seen to great advantage in his simple sea-dress; and with his dark sparkling eye, finely formed head, animated features, close curled dark hair, and bold free looks, the stranger formed a very strong contrast with the host on whom he had intruded himself. Triptolemus

was a short, clumsy, duck-legged disciple of Ceres, whose bottle-nose, turned up and handsomely coppered at the extremity, seemed to intimate something of an occasional treaty with Bacchus. It was

like to be no equal mellay betwixt persons of such unequal form and strength; and the difference betwixt twenty and fifty years was nothing in favour of the weaker party. Besides, the factor was an honest good-natured fellow at bottom, and being soon satisfied that his guest had no other views than those of obtaining refuge from the storm, it would, despite his sister's instigations, have been his last act to deny a boon so reasonable and necessary to a youth whose exterior was so prepossessing. He stood, therefore, considering how he could most gracefully glide into the character of the hospitable landlord, out of that of the churlish defender of his domestic castle, against an unauthorized intrusion, when Baby, who had stood appalled at the extreme familiarity of the stranger's address and demeanour, now spoke up for herself. "My troth, lad," said she to Mordaunt, "ye are no blate, to light on at that rate, and the best of wood too-nane of your sharney peats, but good aik timber, nae less maun serve ye!"

"You come lightly by it, dame," said Mordount, carelessly; "and you should not grudge the fire what the sea gives you for nothing.— These good ribs of oak did their last duty upon earth and ocean when they could hold no longer together under the brave hearts that manned the bark."

"And that's true, too," said the old woman, softening" this maun be awsome weather by sea. Sit down and warm ye, since the sticks are a-low."

"Ay, ay," said Triptolemus," it is a pleasure to see siccan a bonny bleeze. I have na seen the like o't since I left Cauldacres."

VOL. I.- -6