The Waverley novels, by Sir Walter Scott, complete in 12 vol., printed from the latest English ed., embracing the author's last corrections, prefaces & notes.

OLD MORTALITY. 691
it, but its gloom appeared to be doubled under the auspices of the old housekeeper. Everything, indeed, was in repair; there were no slates deficient
upon the steep grey roof, and no panes broken in the narrow windows. But
the grass in the court-yard looked as if the foot of man had not been there
for years; the doors were carefully locked, and that which admitted to the
hall seemed to have been shut for a length of time, since the spiders had
fairly drawn their webs over the door-way and the staples. Living sight or
sound there was none, until after much knocking, Morton heard the little
window, through which it was usual to reconnoitre visitors, open with
much caution. The face of Alison, puckered with some score of wrinkles,
in addition to those with which it was furrowed when Morton left Scotland,
now presented itself, enveloped in a toy, from under the protection of
which some of her grey tresses had escaped in a manner more picturesque
than beautiful, while her shrill tremulous voice demanded the cause of the
knocking.
"I wish to speak an instant with one Alison Wilson, who resides here,"
said Henry.
" She's no at hame the day," answered Mrs. Wilson, in propria persona,
the state of whose head-dress, perhaps, inspired her with this direct mode
of denying herself; " and ye are but a mislear'd person to speer for her in
sic a manner. Ye might hae had an M under your belt for _Mistress Wilson
of Milnwood."
" I beg pardon," said Morton, internally smiling at finding in old Ailie
the same jealousy of disrespect which she used to exhibit upon former occasions-" I beg pardon;-I am but a stranger in this country, and have been
so long abroad that I have almost forgotten my own lauguage."
"Did ye come frae foreign parts?" said Ailie; "then maybe ye may
hae heard of a young gentleman of this country that they ca' Henry
Morton?"
"I have heard," said Morton, " of such a name in Germany."
" Then bide a wee bit where ye are, friend-or stay-gang round by the
back o' the house, and ye'll find a laigh door; it's on the latch, for it's
never barred till sunset. Ye'll open't-and tak care ye dinna fa' ower the
tub, for the entry's dark - and then ye'll turn to the right, and then ye'll
haud straught forward, and then ye'll turn to the right again, and ye'll tak
heed o' the cellar stairs, and, then ye'll be at the door o' the little kitchen
- it's a' the kitchen that's at Milnwood now- and I'll come down t'ye,
and whate'er ye wad say to Mistress Wilson ye may very safely tell it
to me."
A stranger might have had some difficulty, notwithstanding the minuteness of the directions supplied by Ailie, to pilot himself in safety through
the dark labyrinth of passages that led from the back-door to the little
kitchen; but Henry was too well acquainted with the navigation of these
straits to experience danger, either from the Scylla which lurked on one
side in shape of a bucking tub, or the Charybdis which yawned on the
other in the profundity of a winding cellar-stair. His only impediment
arose from the snarling and vehement barking of a small cocking
spaniel, once his own property, but which, unlike to the faithful Argus,
saw his master return from his wanderings without any symptom of
recognition.
",The little dogs and all!" said Morton to himself, on being disowned by
his former favourite.-" I am so changed, that no breathing creature that I
have known and loved will now acknowledge me!"
At this moment he had reached the kitchen, and soon after the tread of
Alison's high heels, and the pat of the crutch-handled cane, which served
at once to prop and to guide her footsteps, were heard upon the stairs,
an annunciation which continued for some time ere she fairly reached the
kitchen.