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who captivated by his exceeding beauty, and rejoicing to find a child to tend and to love, resolves to bring him up in the castle. But, Magdalen Græme his grandmother, a tall and stately woman, though clad in poor vestments, waits to ascertain his safety. An interview between this lofty sibyl and the lady of Avenel ensues, which we give at length, on account of the vivid idea it affords of the former. The lady having asked after her name and birth

"Magdalen Græme is my name," said the woman: "I come of the Græmes of Heathergill, in Nicol-forest, a people of ancient blood."

"And what make you," continued the lady, so far distant from your home?"

66

"I have no home," said Magdalen Græme, "it was burnt by your Borderriders-my husband and my son were slain there is not a drop's blood left in the veins of any one which is of kin to mine."

"That is no uncommon fate in these wild times, and in this unsettled land," said the lady; "the English hands have been as deeply dyed in our blood as ever those of Scotsmen have been in yours."

"You have right to say it, lady," answered Magdalen Græme; "for men tell of a time when this castle was not strong enough to save your father's life, or to afford your mother and her infant a place of refuge. And why ask ye me, then, wherefore I dwell, not in mine own home, and with my own people?"

"It was indeed an idle question, where misery so often makes wanderers: but wherefore take refuge in a hostile country?" "My neighbours were Popish and massmongers," said the old woman; "it has pleased Heaven to give me a clearer sight of the gospel, and I have tarried here to enjoy the ministry of that worthy man Henry Warden, who, to the praise and comfort of many, teacheth the Evangel in truth and in sincerity."

"Are you poor?" again demanded the Lady of Avenel.

"You hear me ask alms of no one," answered the Englishwoman.

Here there was a pause. The manner of the woman was, if not disrespectful, at least much less than gracious; and she appeared to give no encouragement to farther communication. The Lady of Avenel renewed the conversation on a different topic.

"You have heard of the danger in which your boy has been placed?"

"I have, lady, and how by an especial providence he was rescued from death. May Heaven make him thankful, and me!"

What relation do you bear to him?" "I am his grandmother, lady, if it so please you; the only relation he hath left upon earth to take charge of him."co

("The burthen of his maintenance must necessarily be grievous to you in your de serted situation," pursued the lady of C5 ** I have complained of it to no one," said Magdalen Græme, with the same unmoved, dry, and unconcerned tone of voice in which she had answered all the former questions.

"If," said the Lady of Avenel, "your grand-child could be received into a noble family, would it not advantage both him and you?"

"Received into a noble family!" said the old woman, drawing herself up, and bending her brows until her forehead was wrinkl ed into a frown of unusual severity :" and for what purpose, I pray you ?-to be my lady's page, or my lord's jackman, to eat broken victuals and contend with other me nials for the remnants of the master's meal Would you have him to fan the flies from my lady's face while she sleeps, to carry her train while she walks, to hand her trencher when she feeds, to ride before her on horseback, to walk after her on foot, to sing when she lists, and to be silent when she bids?-a very weathercock, which, though furnished in appearance with wings and plumage, cannot soar into the air cannot fly from the spot where it is perched, but receives all its impulses, and performs all its revolutions, obedient to the changeful breath of a vain woman? When the eagle of Helvellyn perches on the tower of Lanercost, and turns and changes to shew how the wind sits, Roland Græme shall be what you would make him."

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The woman spoke with a rapidity and vehemence which seemed to have in it va touch of insanity; and a sudden sense of the danger to which the child must necessarily be exposed in the charge of such a keeper, increased the lady's desire to keep him in the castle if possible.

"You mistake me, dame," she said, addressing the old woman in a soothing manner; "I do not wish your boy to be in attendance on myself, but upon the good knight, my husband. Were he himself the son of a belted earl, he could not better be trained to arms, and all that befits a gentleman, than by the instructions and discipline of Sir Halbert Glendinning."

"Ay," answered the old woman in the same style of bitter irony, "I know, the wages of that service ;-a curse when the corslet is not sufficiently brightened,-a blow when the girth is not tightly drawn,to be beaten because the hounds are at fault, -to be reviled because the foray is unsuccessful, to stain his hands, for the master's bidding, in the blood alike of beast and of man, to be a butcher of harmless deer, a murderer and defacer of God's own image, not at his own pleasure, but at that of this lord to live a brawling ruffian, and a common stabber,exposed to heat, to cold, to want of food, to all the privations of an an

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choret, not for the love of God, but for the
service of Satan,to die by the gibbet, or
in some obscure skirmish,to sleep out his
life in carnal security, and to awake in the
eternal fire, which is never quenched."
Nay," said the Lady of Avenel, but to
such unhallowed course of life your grand
son will not be here exposed. My husband
is just and kind to those who live under his
banner; and you yourself well know, that
youth have here a strict as well as a good
preceptor in the person of our chaplain."

The old woman appeared to pause.
"You have named," she said, "the only
circumstance which can move me. I must
soon onward, the vision has said it-I must
not tarry in the same spot--I must on-I
must on, it is my weird.-Swear, then, that
you will protect the boy as if he were your
own, until I return hither and claim him,
and I will consent for a space to part with
him. But especially swear, he shall not
lack the instruction of the godly man who
hath placed the gospel-truth high above
these idolatrous shavelings, the monks and
friars."

"Be satisfied, dame," said the Lady of Avenel ; "the boy shall have as much care as if he were born of my own blood. you see him now?"

Will

"No," answered the old woman, sternly; "to part is enough. I go forth on my own mission. I will not soften my heart by useless tears and wailings, as one that is not called to a duty."

"Will you not accept of something to aid you in your pilgrimage?" said the Lady of Avenel, putting into her hand two crowns of the sun. The old woman flung them down on the table.

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"Am I of the race of Cain," she said, proud lady, that you offer me gold in exchange for my own flesh and blood?"

"I had no such meaning," said the lady gently; << nor am I the proud woman you term me. Alas! my own fortunes might have taught me humility, even had it not been born with me."

The old woman seemed somewhat to relax her tone of severity.

"You are of gentle blood," she said, "else we had not parleyed thus long together. You are of gentle blood, and to such," she added, drawing up her tall form as she spoke," pride is as graceful as is the plume upon the bonnet. But, for these pieces of gold, lady, you must needs resume them. I need not money. I am well provided; and I may not care for myself, nor think how, or by whom, I shall be sustained. Farewell, and keep your word. Cause your gates to be opened, and your bridges to be lowered, I will set forward this very night. When I come again, I will demand from you a strict account, for I have left with you the jewel of my life! Sleep will visit me but in snatches, food will notre fresh me, rest will not restore my strength, 7-6 397

until I see Roland Græme. Once moreyent
farewell. the yungsod 16t anzurdão diew
"Make your obeisance, dame," said Li-
lias to Magdalen Græme, as she retired,
"make your obeisance to her ladyship, and
thank her for her goodness, as is but fitting
and right."
mum de yer al

The old woman turned short round on the
officious waiting-maid. Let her make her
obeisance to me then, and I will return it.
Why should I bend to her is it because
her kirtle is of silk, and mine of blue locker-
am?-Go to, my lady's waiting-woman." &
Know that the rank of the man rates that of
the wife, and that she who marries achurl's
son, were she a king's daughter, is but a
peasant's bride."

1

duced to the castle, grows up in favour Roland Græme, the child thus introof the lady, but with little shew of ret gard from her husband. Thus he pass oi ed his boyhood, attending on his lady as a page, with little regular instruction" or controul, proud, gallant, and advenuton vants, and admired by the surrounding turous, envied and disliked by the ser peasantry. An irruption of his insolent petulance brings on a quarrel between which incites Henry Warden, who re-, him and Adam Woodcock the falconer, sides at the castle as chaplain, to give a st public rebuke to the impetuous page. This produces no beneficial impression on the youth, who rushes from his seaty hastily crosses the chapel, and violently! throws the door after him. He is shortly after summoned to attend his mistress; when his fate is decided by an interview, the account of which we will extract as one of the most vivid scenes which our author has set before

us.

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"Roland Græme entered the apartment
with a loftier mien, and somewhat a higher
colour than his wont; there was embarrass-
ment in his manner, but it was neither that Y
of fear nor of penitence.

you am I to think of your conduct this
"Young man," said the lady, "what trow
day?"

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deeply grieved," replied the youth.
"If it has offended you, madam, I am

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"To have offended me alone,” replied the 2nd
lady," were but little-You have been guilty
of conduct which will highly offend your
and of disrespect to God himself, in the per-
master-of violence to your fellow-servants,
son of his ambassador."

page," that if I have offended my only mis-
"Permit me again to reply," said thes
tress, friend, and benefactress, it includes
the sum of my guilt, and deserves the sumwan
of my penitence-Sir Halbert Glendinning21
calls me not servant, nor do I call hini mas d
ter-he is not entitled to blame me for chas-
DAI YURTMOM WEY

tising an insolent groom nor do I fear the strangely," said she, “that you will tempt wrath of heaven for treating with scorn theme to take serious measures to lower you unauthorized interference of a meddling in your own opinion, by reducing you to preacher." your proper station in society."

The Lady of Avenel had before this seen symptoms in her favourite of boyish petulance, and of impatience of censure or reproof. But his present demeanour was of a graver and more determined character, and she was for a moment at a loss how she should treat the youth, who seemed to have at once assumed the character not only of a man, but of a bold and determined one. She paused an instant, and then assuming the dignity which was natural to her, she said, "Is it to me, Roland, that you hold this language? Is it for the purpose of making me repent the favour I have shewn you, that you declare yourself independent, both of an earthly and a heavenly master? Have you forgotten what you were, and to what the loss of my protection would speedily again reduce you?"

"Lady," said the page, "I have forgot nothing. I remember but too much. I know, that but for you, I should have perished in yon blue waves," pointing as he spoke to the lake, which was seen through the window, agitated by the western wind. "Your goodness has gone farther, madam— you have protected me against the malice of others, and against my own folly. You are free, if you are willing, to abandon the orphan you have reared. You have left nothing undone by him, and he complains of nothing. And yet, lady, do not think I have been ungrateful-I have endured something on my part, which I would have borne for the sake of no one but my benefactress.".

"For my sake!" said the lady; "and what is it that I can have subjected you to endure, which can be remembered with other feelings than those of thanks and gratitude?"

66 You are too just, madam, to require me to be thankful for the cold neglect with which your husband has uniformly treated me-neglect not unmingled with fixed aversion. You are too just, madam, to require me to be grateful for the constant and unceasing marks of scorn and malevolence with which I have been treated by others, or for such a homily as that with which your reverend chaplain has, at my expense, this very day regaled the assembled house hold."

Heard mortal ears the like of this!" said the waiting-maid, with her hands expanded, and her eyes turned up to heaven; "he speaks as if he were son of an earl, or of a belted knight the least penny."

The page glanced on her a look of supreme contempt, but vouchsafed no other answer. His mistress, who began to feel herself seriously offended, and yet sorry for the youth's folly, took up the same tone. "Indeed, Roland, you forget yourself so NEW MONTHLY MAG.-No. 81.

"And that," added Lilias, "* would be best done by turning him out the same beggar's brat that your ladyship took him in.” "Lilias speaks too rudely," continued the lady," but she has spoken the truth, young man; nor do I think I ought to spare that pride which hath so completely turned your head. You have been tricked up with fine garments, and treated like the son of a gentleman, until you have forgot the fountain of your churlish blood.”

"Craving your pardon, most honourable madam, Lilias hath not spoken truth, nor does your ladyship know aught of my descent, which should entitle you to treat it with such decided scorn. I am no beggar's brat-my grandmother begged from no one, here nor elsewhere-she would have perished sooner on the bare moor. We were harried out and driven from our home-a chance which has happed elsewhere, and to others. Avenel Castle, with its lake and its towers, was not at all times able to protect its inhabitants from want and desolation.”

"Hear but his assurance!" said Lilias, "he upbraids my lady with the distresses of her family!"

"It had indeed been a theme more gratefully spared," said the lady, affected nevertheless with the allusion.

"It was necessary, madam, for my vindication," said the page, "or I had not even hinted at a word that might give you pain. But believe, honoured lady, I am of no churl's blood. My proper descent I know not; but my only relation has said, and my heart has echoed it back and attested the truth, that I am sprung of gentle blood, and deserve gentle usage."

"And upon an assurance so vague as this," said the lady, "do you propose to expect all the regard, all the privileges, due to high rank and to distinguished birth, and become a contender for privileges which are only due to the noble? Go to, sir, know yourself, or the master of the household shall make you know you are liable to the scourge as a malapert boy. You have tasted too little the discipline fit for your age and

station."

"The master of the household shall taste of my dagger, ere I taste of his discipline," said the page, giving way to his restrained passion. "Lady, I have been too long the vassal of a pantoufle, and the slave of a silver whistle. You must find some other to answer your call; and let him be of birth and spirit mean enough to brook the scorn of your menials, and to call a church vassal his master."

“I have deserved this insult," said the lady, colouring deeply, "for so long enduring and fostering your petulance. Begone, sir. Leave this castle to-night-I will VOL. XIV. 3 I

send you the means of subsisting yourself till you find some honest mode of support, though I fear your imaginary grandeur will be above all others, save those of rapine and violence. Begone, sir, and see my face no more."

The page threw himself at her feet in an agony of sorrow. "My dear and honoured mistress—” he said, but was unable to bring out another syllable.

"Arise, sir," said the lady, "and let go my mantle-hypocrisy is a poor cloak for ingratitude."

"I am incapable of either, madam," said the page, springing up with the exchange of passion which belonged to his rapid and impetuous temper. "Think not I meant to implore permission to reside here; it has een long my determination to leave Avenel, and I will never forgive myself for having permitted you to say the word begone, ere I said, 'I leave you.' I did but kneel to ask your forgiveness for an ill-considered word used in the height of my displeasure, but which ill became my mouth, as addressed to you. Other grace I asked not-you have done much for me-but I repeat, that you

better know what you yourself have done,

than what I have suffered."

"Roland," said the lady, somewhat appeased and relenting towards her favourite, "you had me to appeal to when you were aggrieved. You were neither called upon to suffer wrong, nor entitled to resent it, when you were under my protection."

"And what," said the youth, "if I sustained wrong from those you loved and favoured, was I to disturb your peace with idle

tale-bearings and eternal complaints? No, madam; I have borne my own burden in silence, and without disturbing you with murmurs; and the respect which you accuse me of wanting, furnishes the only reason why I have neither appealed to you, nor taken vengeance at my own hand in a manner far more effectual. It is well, however, that we part. I was not born to be a sticendiary, favoured by his mistress, until ruined by the calumnies of others. May Heaven multiply its choicest blessings on your honoured head; and, for your sake,

upon all that are dear to you!"

purse, and only say, instead, that you do not part from me in anger."

"No, not in anger," said the lady, "in sorrow rather for your wilfulness; but take the gold, you cannot but need it."

"May God evermore bless you for the kind tone and the kind word; but the gold I cannot take. I am able of body, and do not lack friends so wholly as you may think ; for the time may come that I may yet shew myself more thankful than by mere words." He threw himself on his knees, kissed the hand which she did not withdraw, and then hastily left the apartment.

Lilias, for a moment or two, kept her eye fixed on her mistress, who looked so unusually pale, that she seemed about to faint; but the lady instantly recovered herself, and declining the assistance which her attendant offered her, walked to her own apart

ment.

Roland quits the castle, and leaves a string of golden beads behind, which discloses his secret attachment to the catholic faith. This his mysterious grandmother had exhorted him secretly to cherish, and he had obeyed her rather in dislike to the straitlaced puritanism of Henry Warden, than from any deeplyrooted love to the elder creed. Now, at once forlorn and free, he seeks the well of St. Cuthbert, where a holy man was wont to reside, from whom he hoped protection, until he could send dinning, under the name of Father to the monastery, where Edward GlenAmbrose, still resided. He finds this little sanctuary deserted and spoiled by violence-the spring half choaked-the altar thrown down-the huge stone crucifix broken in pieces-and the whole spot covered with the marks of recent desolation. He determines, at least, to raise the fragments of the holy emblem, and succeeds better than his hopes. While he is engaged in this pious office, Magdalen Græme suddenly appears, and rejoices thus to meet again the grand-child from whom she had so long been parted. She addresses him in mysterious language, as one destined for some high and perilous mission; and while she tends him with maternal fondness, asserts a claim to his unques

He was about to leave the apartment, when the lady called on him to return. He stood still, while she thus addressed him: "It was not my intention, nor would it be just, even in the height of my displeasure, to dismiss you without the means of support;tioning acquiescence in her will, which take this purse of gold."

"Forgive me, lady," said the boy," and let me go hence with the consciousness that I have not been degraded to the point of accepting alms. If my poor services can be placed against the expense of my apparel and my maintenance, I only remain debtor to you for my life, and that alone is a debt which I can never repay; put up then that

he is ill-disposed to yield. He suffers her, however, to guide him, on the following day, to an old convent, where the abbess and her niece yet lingered, after the forcible dispersion of the rest of the sisterhood. The two old women express the strange design of leaving the youth and maiden together to become

better acquainted, as they are to be fel-
low-labourers in the same cause; and
accordingly the page is suffered to talk
with Catherine Seyton, a strange laugh-
ing and bantering girl, who proves the
heroine of the tale. In the morning,
Roland leaves the convent with his
aged guide, for the monastery of Kenna-
quhair, sustained by the hope of seeing
Catherine Seyton at Edinburgh, whi-
ther they were afterwards to travel.
When they reach the monastery, they
find its few inmates installing "with
maimed rites" father Ambrose in the
dignity of abbot, Eustace having recent-
ly died, and the office being of far more
peril than authority or grandeur. While
they are thus piously attempting to sus-
tain their persecuted religion, a band of
peasants rush in wild uproar, with gro-
tesque masks and strange habiliments,
to burlesque the ceremony, not SO
much in Protestant bigotry, as in the
spirit of old frolics, which had been un-
wisely permitted by the Roman church
in the plenitude of its power. During
the confusion, Sir Halbert Glendinning
arrives-commands his vassals to make
merry elsewhere-and recognizes Ro-
land, whom he bespeaks with kindness,
and dismisses with Adam Woodcock to
Edinburgh, on a commission to his pa-
tron, Murray, then Regent of Scotland.
Light of heart, Roland arrives at Edin-
burgh, where he has the good fortune
to rescue the Earl of Seyton from an
affray, and to see Catherine, for an in-
stant, in her father's house, whither he
had rashly pursued her. He has also a
strange encounter at the hostelry of St.
Michael's, with a youth whom he firmly
believes to be Catherine Seyton in dis-
guise, and from whom he receives a
short but beautifully wrought sword,
with an injunction that he shall not
unsheath it until commanded by his
rightful sovereign. At length he is
sent by Murray to Lochleven-the cas-
tle of the Douglasses, where Mary of
Scotland was confined-ostensibly to
serve that unhappy lady as a page, but
really as a spy on her actions. At Loch-
leven he meets Catherine attendant on
the queen, and witnesses the deeply in-
teresting scenes in which Mary resigns
her crown, to which she is directed by
a scroll concealed within the sheath of
Roland's mysterious sword. The fol-
lowing is the picture of the first audi-
ence of the messengers from the Regent
with the Queen whom they were com-
missioned to depose:-

"At this moment the door of the inner apartment opened, and Queen Mary presented herself, advancing with an air of peculiar grace and majesty, and seeming totally unruffled, either by the visit, or by the rude manner in which it had been enforced. Her dress was a robe of black velvet; a small ruff, open in front, gave a full view of her beautifully formed chin and neck, but veiled the bosom. On her head she wore a small cap of lace, and a transparent white veil hung from her shoulders over the long black robe, in large loose folds, so that it could be drawn at pleasure over the face and person. She wore a cross of gold around her neck, and had her rosary of gold and ebony hanging from her girdle. She was closely followed by her two ladies, who remained standing behind her during the conference. Even Lord Lindesay, though the rudest noble of that rude age, was surprised into something like respect by the unconcerned and majestic mien of her, whom he had expected to find frantic with impotent passion, or dissolved in useless and vain sorrow, or overwhelmed with the fears likely in such a situation to assail fallen royalty. "We fear we have detained you, my Lord of Lindesay," said the Queen, while she courtsied with dignity in answer to his reluctant obeisance; "but a female does not willingly receive her visitors without some minutes spent at the toilette. Men, my lord, are less dependent on such ceremonies."

Lord Lindesay, casting his eye down on his own travel-stained and disordered dress, muttered something of a hasty journey, and the Queen paid her greeting to Sir Robert Melville with courtesy, and even, as it seemed, with kindness. There was then a dead pause, during which Lindesay looked towards the door, as if expecting with impatience the colleague of their embassy. The Queen alone was entirely unembarrassed, and, as if to break the silence, she addressed Lord Lindesay, with a glance at the large and cumbrous sword which he wore, as already mentioned, hanging from his neck.

"You have there a trusty and a weighty I trust you travelling companion, my lord. expected to meet with no enemy here, against whom such a formidable weapon could be necessary? It is, methinks, somewhat a singular ornament for a court, though I am, as I well need to be, too much of a Stuart to fear a sword."

"It is not the first time, madam," replied Lindesay, bringing round the weapon so as to rest its point on the ground, and leaning one hand on the huge cross-handle, "it is not the first time that this weapon has intruded itself into the presence of the House of Stuart."

"Possibly, my lord," replied the Queen, "it may have done service to my ancestors -Your ancestors were men of lovalty."

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Ay, madam,” replied he, "service it

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