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.

414 WAVERLEY NOVELS.
and those yet live who can compel you to drink the dregs of your poisoned
chalice. — I say, remember Porteous, - and say that you had good counsel
from "ONE OF HIS SLAYERS."
The magistrate read over this extraordinary letter twice or thrice. At
first he was tempted to throw it aside as the production of a madman, so
little did " the scraps from play-books," as he termed the poetical quotation,
resemble the correspondence of a rational being. On a re-perusal, however, he thought that, amid its incoherence, he could discover something
like a tone of awakened passion, though expressed in a manner quaint and
unusual.
"It is a cruelly severe statute," said the magistrate to his assistant, "and
I wish the girl could be taken from under the letter of it. A child may
have been born, and it may have been conveyed away while the mother was
insensible, or it may have perished for want of that relief which the poor
creature herself-helpless, terrified, distracted, despairing, and exhaustedmay have been unable to afford to it. And yet it is certain, if the woman is
found guilty under the statute, execution will follow. The crime has been
too common, and examples are necessary."
" But if this other wench," said the city-clerk, " can speak to her sister
communicating her situation, it will take the case from under the statute."
"Very true," replied the Bailie; " and I will walk out one of these days
to St. Leonard's, and examine the girl myself. I know something of their
father Deans - an old true-blue Cameronian, who would see house and
family go to wreck ere he would disgrace his testimony by a sinful complying with the defections of the times; and such he will probably uphold the
taking an oath before a civil magistrate. If they are to go on and flourish
with their bull-headed obstinacy, the legislature must pass an act to take
their affirmations, as in the case of Quakers. But surely neither a father
nor a sister will scruple in a case of this kind. As I said before, I will go
speak with them myself, when the hurry of this Porteous investigation is
somewhat over; their pride and spirit of contradiction will be far less
alarmed, than if they were called into a court of justice at once."
"And I suppose Butler is to remain incarcerated?" said the city clerk.
" For the present, certainly," said the magistrate, "But I hope soon to
set him at liberty upon bail."
" Do you rest upon the testimony of that light-headed letter?" asked the
clerk.
"Not very much," answered the Bailie; "and yet there is something
striking about it too — it seems the letter of a man beside himself, either
from great agitation, or some great sense of guilt."
"Yes," said the town-clerk, " it is very like the letter of a mad strolling
play-actor, who deserves to be hanged with all the rest of his gang, as your
honoui justly observes."
"I was not quite so bloodthirsty," continued the magistrate. " But to
the point. Butler's private character is excellent; and I am given to understand, by some inquiries I have been making this morning, that he did
actually arrive in town only the day before yesterday, so that it was impossible he could have been concerned in any previous machinations of these
unhappy rioters, and it is not likely that he should have joined them on a
suddenty."
" There's no saying anent that-zeal catches fire at a slight spark as fast
as a brunstane match," observed the secretary. "I hae kend a minister wad
be fair gude-day and fair gude-e'en wi' ilka man in the parochine, and hing
just as quiet as. a rocket on a stick, till ye mentioned the word abjuration
oath, or patronage, or siclike, and then, whiz, he was off, and up in the air
an hundred miles beyond common manners, common sense, and commen
comprehension."