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.

TII.E HEART OF MID-LOTHIAN. 433
self to wear. So that there occurred nothing in her external appearance
which could mark out to her father, with any thing like certainty, her intentions on this occasion.
The preparations for their humble meal were that morning made in vain.
The father and daughter sat, each assuming the appearance of eating,
when the other's eyes were turned to them, and desisting from the effort
with disgust, when the affectionate imposture seemed no longer necessary.
At length these moments of constraint were removed. The sound of St.
Giles's heavy toll announced the hour previous to the commencement of the
trial; Jeanie arose, and, with a degree of composure for which she herself
could not account, assumed her plaid, and made her other preparations for
a distant walking. It'as a strange contrast between the firmness of her
demeanour, and the vacillation and cruel uncertainty of purpose indicated
in all her father's motions; and one unacquainted with both could scarcely
have supposed that the former was, in her ordinary habits of life, a docile,
quiet, gentle, and even timid country-maiden, while her father, with a mind
naturally proud and strong, and supported by religious opinions, of a stern,
stoical, and unyielding character, had in his time undergone and withstood
the most severe hardshipS, and the most imminent peril, without depression of spirit, or subjugation of his constancy. The secret of this difference was, that Jeanie's mind had already anticipated the line of Conduct
which she must adopt, with all its natural and necessary consequences;
while her father, ignorant of every other circumstance, tormented himself
with imagining what the one sister might say or swear, or what effect her
testimony might have upon the awful event of the trial.
He watched his daughter, with a faltering and indecisive look, until she
looked back upon him, with a look of unutterable anguish, as she was
about to, leave the apartment.
" My dear lassie," said he, " I will." - His action, hastily and confusedly
searching for his worsted mittans* and staff, showed his purpose of accompanying her, though his tongue failed distinctly to announce it.
" Father," said Jeanie, replying rather to his action than his words, "ye
had better not."
"In the strength of my God," answered Deans, assuming firmness, " I
will go forth."
And, taking his daughter's arm under his, he began to walk from the door
with a step so hasty, that she was almost unable to keep up with him. A
trifling circumstance, but which marked the perturbed state of his mind,
checked his course. —" Your bonnet, father?" said Jeanie, who observed he
had come out with his grey hairs uncovered. He turned back with a slight
blush on his cheek, being ashamed to have been detected in an omission
which indicated so much mental confusion, assumed his large blue Scottish
bonnet, and with a step slower, but more composed, as if the circumstance
had obliged him to summon up his resolution, and collect his scattered
ideas, again placed his daughter's arm under his, and resumed the way to
Edinburgh.
The courts of justice were then, and are still, held in what is called the
Parliament Close, or, according to modern phrase, Parliament Square, and
occupied the buildings intended for the accommodation of the Scottish
Estates. This edifice, though in an imperfect and corrupted style of architecture, had then a grave, decent, and, as it were, a judicial aspect, which
was at least entitled to respect from its antiquity. For which venerable
front, I observed, on my last occasional visit to the metropolis, that modern
taste had substituted, at great apparent expense, a pile so utterly inconsistent with every monument of antiquity around, and in itself so clumsy at
the same time and fantastic, that it may be likened to the decorations of
* A kind-'of worsted gloves, used by the lower orders.'Oki. n, 3 —- 28