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.

PEVERIL OF THE PEAK. 3,15
emotions, which men whose courage was in any respect liable to suspicion,
would have thougiht it imprudent to acknowledge.
"Adad," said the old knight, " may I never taste claret again, if that is
not the very tune with which the prick-eared villains began their onset at
Wiggan-lane, where they trowled us down like so many ninepins! Faith,
neighbours, to say truth, and shame the devil, I did not like the sound of
it above half."
" If I thought the round-headed rogues did it in scorn of us," said Dick
Wildblood of the Dale, "I would cudgel their psalmody out of their peasantly throats with this very truncheon;" a motion which, being seconded
by old Roger Raine, the drunken tapster of the Peveril Arms in the village,
might have brought on a general battle, but that Sir Jasper forbade the feud.
" We'll have no ranting, Dick," said the old Knight to the young Franklin; "adad, man, we'll havei none, for three reasons; first, it would be
ungentle to Lady Peveril; then, because it is against the King's peace; and,
lastly, Dick, because if we did set on the psalm-singing knaves, thou
Lightest come by the worst, my boy, as has chanced to thee before."
"Who, I! Sir Jasper?" answered Dick-" I come by the worst!-I'll be
d-d if it ever happened but in that accursed lane, where we had no more
flank, front, or rear, than if we had been so many herrings in a barrel."
" That was the reason, I fancy," answered Sir Jasper, " that you, to mend
the matter, scrambled into the hedge, and stuck there, horse and man, till
I beat thee through it with my leading-staff; and then, instead of charging
to the front, y6u went right-about, and away as fast as your feet would
carry you. "
This reminiscence produced a laugh at Dick's expense, who was known,
or at least suspected, to have more tongue in his head than mettle in his
bosom. And this sort of rallying on the part of the Knight having fortunately abated'the respntment whichblad begun to awaken in the breasts of
the royalist cavalc-ade, fartlier catiseT fr offence was removed, by the sudden
ceasing of the sounds which they had been disposed to interpret into those
of premeditated insult.
This was owing to the arrival of the Puritans at the bottom of the large
and wide breach, which had been formerly made in the wall of the Castle
by their victorious cannon. The sight of its gaping heaps of rubbish, and
disjointed masses of building, up which slowly winded a narrow and steep
path, such as is made amongst ancient ruins by the rare passage of those
who occasionally visit them, was calculated, when contrasted with the gray
and solid massiveness of the towers and curtains which yet stood uninjured,
to remind them of their victory over the stronghold of their enemies, and
how they had bound nobles and princes with fetters of iron.
But feelings more suitable to the purpose of their visit to Martindale
Castle, were awakened in the bosom even of these stern sectaries, when the
Lady of the Castle, still in the very prime of beauty and of womanhood,
appeared at the top of the breach with her principal female attendants, to
receive her guests with the honour and courtesy becoming her invitation.
She had laid aside the black dress which had been her sole attire for several
years, and was arrayed with a splendour not unbecoming her high descent
and quality. Jewels, indeed, she had none; but her long and dark hair
was surmounted with a chaplet made of oak-leaves, interspersed with lilies;
the former being the emblem of the King's preservation in the Royal Oak,
and the latter, of his happy Restoration. What rendered her presence still
more interesting to those who looked on her, was the presence of the two
children whom she held in either hand; one of whom was well known to
them all to be the child of their leader, Major Bridgenorth, who had been
restored to life and health by the almost maternal care of the Lady Peveril.
If even the inferior persons of the party felt the healing influence of her
presence, thus accompanied, poor Bridgenorth was almost overwhelmed