Having cooled our brows and temples in the neighbouring stream, we were agreeably surprised with the appearance of vessels full of curds and cream, accompanied with that delicious soft cake which the maidens of Dumfries-shire bake from wheat flour, mingled with potatoes. This enabled us to bear the distance of the dinner-hour with patience; for a more regular and substantial entertainment was preparing in the mansion of Lilly-cross. Hamish Machamish, over whom disappointment had flown like a cloud, snatched up the instrument, which failed in exciting the hands of his kinsmen in the harvest-field, but which, addressing its voice to the feet, called up to the sward with a bound Highlander and Lowlander; and even the old men forgot their grey hairs for a moment, and prepared to dance with the alacrity of seventeen. On the banks of the rivulet were several patches of flat green sward, nibbled smooth by the sheep, and studded thickly in spring with the earliest gowans; on these the dance began; and the sound of feet, and the laugh, and the shout, made all the stream-banks ring and re-murmur.

So passed the hours of afternoon, and ere the sun had reached the summit of the pasture-hills of Keir, we began our march for Lilly-cross, and music and mirth, and noisy joy and open laughter, accompanied us. And mirth and prank no less abounded in the sober mansion of the Cameronian. As I entered the door, the milk-maid showered a whole reaming cap-full of cream on my head, and called out, "Confound ye, callan, wad ye bring cauldrife winter at yere back without something to creesh her frozen mou'? -take that, and cannie Crummie will gie cream at Candlemas." I rewarded the nymph of the milking-pail by a kiss, which returned to her face and bosom a moiety of the rich liquid-she flew into a dark corner to avoid another from Ronald Rodan, who had not escaped her libation,-there she received a caress from old Hugh Halberson, whose black and stubbly beard shone, moistened in cream, by the exploit. Even the douce Cameronian elder rewarded his household for a twelvemonths' austerity, by partaking of their mirth, and giving a loose to the honest joy of his nature, which penitential devotion had long dammed up. He rebuked the increasing extravagance in

that arch tone which sounds to a renewal of the offence; and, meeting with the upland maiden, Mag Macfarlane, whose lips looked provokingly enticing, he bestowed on them the benediction of a kiss, saying, "There! that'll enable thee to keep thae rosie lips out o' harm's way till lips mair to thy liking cast up." Nor was the widow Keturah neglected-when she had submitted with a "haud awa, wilful man; lips havenae been laid on me since a twelmonth afore Roodsmass,"

to the salute of Ronald Rodan."Come, let me hae a mouthfou too o' the widow's mite,” said the Cameronian elder; and a clamorous smack of Keturah's lips told how willingly the request was conceded." Hout, haud awa, gudeman o' Crumocomfort," said the widow; 66 preserve us, Marion Morehead, your ain gudeman, douce and decent as I aye took him to be, is the wantonest o' us a', young though we are." A certain maiden of discreet years exclaimed, "Ay, sirs, but young fowk be daft," and hid herself in a dark corner, to provoke the salute that no one threatened her with. "Young diels!" said auld Archibald Brydone,

five-and-thirty, faith! yet, auld as ye're horn is, ye're welcome to a smack."

In the midst of all this singular merriment, who was merrier than Hamish Machamish and his Highlanders; they laughed, they leaped, and shouted and yelloched, "heugh! heugh! troth, Hamish! troth, Ion! troth, Gillivert !" and the piper called out, in the ecstacy of enjoyment, "Got! she hasnae been sae blythe since Hiver Macivor, and plack Peter Tarbet, and her, kissed the six and the seven lass at the Brigg o' Johnstone." Even Marion Morehead, demure and sedate as she seemed, and looking on the revelry with an eye in which devotion appeared to weigh how far it could go without compromising its character, moved by the boundless joy of the scene, was observed to whisper some curious counsel in the ear of Ronald Rodan, to give variety of mirth. The Cameronian elder himself, unbonnetting, laid his arm round her neck, and said, "Bless thee, thou art a dainty lass yet,-I have seen thee on a day the pride of seven parishens." While all this went forward, one of the bandsmen ascended a hillock, and, putting the harvest-horn to his mouth, winded it three distinct

times, to warn the neighbours to the merry-making and the joys of the kirn. I have heard, that in the homely amusements and observances at the close of a Scottish harvest, certain learned men, who call themselves antiquarians, have discovered the remains of heathen ceremonies, and raised scruples and doubts in pious bosoms on the Christian legitimacy of holding communion with a maiden's lips, and dancing to the heathen melody of flute and bagpipe. It is certainly to be lamented that the remains of the Druidic Baal and Ashtaroth should still be visible in the land, and that our sons and daughters should continue to worship those dormant divinities at a kirn-feast or a Christmas pastime, when the cleftwood burns so brightly. To learn that the Scottish bregwort, or mead, so plentiful at a harvest supper, is the self-same drink with which the votaries of Rimmon cheered themselves, may well alarm a devout mind; and really there are so many relics of ancient superstition still lingering in the land, and worshipped under the deluding and endearing names of "Gude all has-beens," that the amount disturbs the repose of those unfortunate peasants before whom the will-o'-wisp fantern of the Antiquarian Society has been glimmering. For my own part, it mattered little to me whether the venerable grey-headed peasants, who came hastening from hill and glen at the sound of the harvest-horn, were acquainted that the pastime they came to partake of was of that perilous kind called heathenish, or whether the damsel, who, with snooded locks and jimp boddice, tripped joyously by the side of some favoured peasant, was darting a bright glance over a rank of rustics, who, in her imagination, were alike influenced by the love she so plenteously showered from her eyes, and the melody of Rimmon's sworn ministers, the Lowland pipe and fiddle. In the mind of the Cameronian elder, these scruples were entirely overclouded and lost in the boundless joy of the moment. The sparkling of his eyes, as, with palm smiting on palm, he welcomed the men, and, with lip laid warmly to lip, he welcomed the maidens, bore token alone of that active spirit of friendship and charity, glimmerings of which men may trace in the days of darkness of the Scottish Cimbri.

The harvest dinner-table, though

arranged by no other hands-than those of my fair Cameronian Mary, presented various dishes which scrupulous Presbyterians might have sought scripture warrant for consuming; they were dubious compounds, and claimed their descent from Moloch himself, or the Lady of the Seven Hills, or the culinary good taste of the ambitious Hierarchy. But, as among sea-faring men there is no Sunday in seven fathom of water, so there are times when the conscience, which has held severe rule over the stomach, and administered meagre soup instead of the fatness of rams and bulls, relinquishes her sway, and, casting her bridle on the neck of appetite, lets it stray among the flesh-pots of the heathen. Even so it happened at the harvest dinner of the Cameronian. Hamish Machamish and his upland companions heeded not whether the puddings and haggis were stuffed with scripture-prohibited blood and meal or prelatical spices, but let loose their knives and spoons with a licence and free-will which the sanction of the General Assembly would have failed to increase; while the Lowlanders themselves, who with Christian scruples had heathen stomachs, assisted their Highland auxiliaries so effectually that the vast dinner-heap of the Cameronian sank before their knives as fast as the ripe corn fell under their sickles in the field. Besides the general license of the time for this unscrupling consumption of food, the impatience of the young men for the dance assisted its speedy disappearance. The dinner seemed an impediment in the high-way of mirth, and no labour of the noble art of cookery was ever sooner demolished.

A brief grace was barely endured, when out gushed a flood of young and over-boiling spirits to the barn, which, clean swept, and lighted by candles, fastened to the walls in cloven sticks, above dancing height, presented ample room for entertainment. A fiddler, whose instrument had delighted the simple husbandmen of the vale of Ae for several generations, and the tone of which was as distinguishable above the ordinary note of all mercenary crowds as the voice of her we love is sweeter than the voice of all other maidens, seated himself on a sack of corn, and instantly passing his thumb o'er the extended thairm, it emitted a sound as pleasant and as shrill as the spring-note of the blackbird. The floor, was instantly filled

with youths and maidens, and the fiddler, slaunting his ear along the strings, and smiling, conscious of the glory of his craft, drew a gallant bow, and bounded the impatient peasants, making the roof-tree quiver, from gabel to gabel, with the fall of their feet on the pine-floor. It was a scene capable of infusing the love of dancing into the most intractable feet. The waving of so many beautiful heads of hair, the beaming of so many bright eyes among those luxuriant tresses, the motion of so many white hands, and the descent of so many sympathetie feet, in exact measurement to the note of the fiddle, operated on the performers like intoxication. The faded eyes of the old fiddler waxed brighter and brighter as he witnessed the effects of the inspiration which he poured from his thairms among the multitude. On the beautiful Highland maiden, Mag Macfarlane, he threw one glance, and on the rosie young widow, Keturah, another; and every look he gave he drew a nobler bow and poured a deeper strain. At length his eye fell on my sweet Cameronian Mary, who was dan cing with that native ease and modest grace which became the daughter of so devout a father. Her temple-locks danced in clusters to the motion of her feet, and her eye beamed with that holy light which inspires reverence and love. The old man addressed his speech to his fiddle: "Thou mayest be a proud piece o' timmer as ever bore melodious thairm, for many a white foot and merry black eye have bounded and laughed as the gallant bow passed o'er thee; but, by the powers o' horse hair, and the magic o' thairms !-never to speak o' my right hand, that has the craft to make the dumb speak,-I never saw a sweeter maid nor a fairer dancer than that Cameronian quean, Mary Macmuckle. May the fiend clap his flint hoof on my bassstring, and mar its merry-making, gin I ever heard a foot that mingled its sounds sae melodiously with the music. Ane wad swear the lassie's foot was a part o' the instrument." While my fair Cameronian danced with such modest glee and grace as to attract universal notice, her father and mother, accompanied by several old farmers, and shepherds, and cotters, entered the barn, and seated themselves around a large table, dispensing looks over the youthful assembly, by which the mirth

as nae

single man could ever see the bottom o' the tane or the tither,"-diffused a smoke, so thick and so fragrant as induced Hugh Halberson to declare, that he heard the very mice cheeping in the riggen for gladness. In this pool of inspiration the ancient worthies of Glene vale sought solace and refreshment from the fatigues of harvest,— not without whispering a sad word or two about the annually diminishing number of their coevals. From another bowl, which formed a kind of supplemental pond of punch to the basin on the table, a variety of quaighs and cups kept up a diligent communication with the dancers; and, as the night advanced, a basket full of country dainties followed the vessels; for good cheer is the stuff that mirth is made of. The old men, as they became warm with the music and the presence of so much youth and beauty, laid their bonnets aside, and rivalled the swains in the grace, if not in the activity of dancing. "Eh, sirs!" said the rosie widow Keturah," the last time I danced was at a Lochmaben market, and the lad I danced with is lying low and lonely in the cold kirk-yard mools. He wore boot-hose, and was weel arrayed; for he had twa tap-coats and a plaid on. He came to me wi' a binge and a bow, and said, Lass, will ye dance? and I said, I caredna. And, oh, sirs! I mind the very tune they played-it was "Bab at the bowster." Wha wad hae thought then that I should haud his head i' the death-pang, and greet o'er his grave in Kirkmahoe kirk-yard!-We maun a' gang that gate at last, whether we sigh or sing.-Preserve me, bodie!" addressing the fiddler, "ye'll souk the laggin-gird off the quaigh, and mar yere minstrelsy and our mirth. Come, gie the horse-hair to the thairms, my cunning auld carle, and kittle us out Nelly Weems; or haith my feet will grow to the floor."

In the middle of our mirth, a loud knocking was heard at the door; the dance ceased, and the meeting, late so joyous, became as mute and still as the summer air. The old husbandmen who had been leaning in a ring round my fair Cameronian, whose feet beat witchcraft to more hearts than mine, all retired to their seats, and, with an eye

of comicexpectation, looked towards the door, on which the knocks continued to be repeated. Young Ronald Rodan, with a voice of assumed churlishness, demanded, “Who comes so late to mar our harvest mirth?" A rough loud voice responded,- -"Ay! wha think ye, beardless questioner? Wha should it be but Auld Glenae, seeking in sorrow for a night's lodging-and wad rather make mirth than mar it-let him in and take a look at him." The youth accordingly opened the door, and a strange figure stalked slowly in, and gazed on the meeting with a look of comic consciousness and alarm. I could not imagine, for some time, whether this ancient mendicant was a real patriarchal beggar, or a peasant prepared to make a dramatic representation for the amusement of the meeting. From beneath an unusual projection of bonnet, in which the feathers of the tail of a midden cock supplied the place of the eagle's wing, streamed out a profusion of hair as white and abundant as a well combed head of the longest flax, and might have graced the robe of my fair Cameronian herself. The garment, something like a Spanish mantle, over which these ringlets fell, had, I afterwards learned, been worn by the doughty portioner of Bonshaw at the battle of Drumclog, and remained as a relique among the CameroniIn order to give devotion some of that gall of bitterness, in which sectarian creeds are so wonderously preserved, the garment of the persecutor was hung before the possessor's eyes then anathemas abounded, and the destroying angel was placed in the path of all other creeds and persuasions. A large pike-staff served as a support to this apparition, who, almost bent twofold, and tottering with the oppression of seeming years, awaited the tardy decision of the youth. Ronald Rodan, surveying him from foot to head, with a look of unlimited curiosity, thus addressed him :-"Ye seem a thriftless and fizzenless carle; what can ye do for a night's lodging? Can ye prepare hemp for the wheel?" "Brake hemp, my bonnie lad," said the mendicant, in a tone of great submission and sorrow "let me keep my hands lang frae touching that detested weed; muckle ado hae I had to keep a tenderer place than my hands frae't. I wish the knave who sows such evil seed, to be choked in his own production." "Aweel, thrift

ans.

less bodie," said the youth, half in scorn and commiseration, can ye kame wool? that's dainty wark for sic a daidlen bodie." " Kame wool," said the old man in Bonshaw's mantle, with a smile and a look of satisfaction; pure 66 conscience, there was nae sic a kamer o' wool in the port of pleasant Nith, and the green glen of Ae, to boot, in ancient days, as Auld Glenae. But if he ever touch sic gear again, I'se give ye leave to sew him up in a shroud of seventeen hunder linen, wi' a saft sappy young lass aside him. Conscience! gang and ask Kate Corson gin I canna handle woo rarely. Only for touching some ance or twice, in my daffin, the hem o' an woollen garment, I had to endure sic rebuke and scorn afore a hale congregation, I'll never be my ain man again, that's certain." "Indeed, honest looking man," said the youth, "I pity thy fecklessness-but thy white hairs-and whiter never came under the hackle, canna buy thy up-putting. What d'ye say to binding sheaves behind a rank of sonsie young lasses?" "Aye, there now," said the reverend dramatist, "that sounds mair like a Christian proposal-put me as near to the lasses, and as far frae the sheaves as ye like; and yet this hard cough would make the pleasure o' my presence dubious. Dost thou think, youth, that warld's flesh can last for ever?-Look at my gray haffets-gray did I say? they're as white as the unsunned snow, and as ripe for the grave as the bent corn is for the sickle. Besides, its a matter o' special reservation atween me and my conscience, never to stoop and bind. I think there be scripture warrant for that?" " Truly, old man," said Ronald Rodan, " the dark road and you maun get speedily acquaint, unless ye can gie some return for kindness-ye'll no be able to clean the laggen o' a supper cog, unless some handy hizzie help ye wi't." "A supper dish, and a gude horn spoon! just let Auld Glenae see them, he wad do muckle to oblige ye, and wad drink ye're best browst, to show he had nae ill will to the house. Now I begin to understand ye." "Gude truly, my auld man," said the youth, "thou art but a daunderer a-down the dyke sides, and can lie in the sun and warm thee, while the sweat of sore labour reeks on honest men's brows-yet unwilling am I to turn the footsteps, even of the thriftless, frae the threshhold of Lillycross; yet something thou

must do to purchase a bield by; so make thy election, and be ready to redeem thy speech by deeds." " Fair fa' thee, youth," said the old man, with a voice dropping into the most persuasive softness, "that's spoke with the tongue of discretion. Sae I shall even make mine election. I'm faun away, waes me, from the pith of strapping manhood, and am nae better than a thrashed head of wheat, or a shelled peascod-all, therefore, that I dow do, gaun down the back o' the hill o' life, is to shorten the way with a sang. Sae, therefore, youth, I shall sing thee a sang of kirk feud with my own proper self-may ye all have the grace to listen, and the sense to profit by my verse." So saying, Auld Glenae strode into the middle of the floor, and the fiddler, who was conversant with this amusing kind of interlude, prepared his instrument for the ancient and provincial

tune which accompanies the traditional ballad. The old man, with many an awkward obeisence, bespoke the atten→ tion of the meeting-then laying aside his bonnet, he said: "Auld Glenae must first hallow his lips for the task," and suddenly striding up to a rosy young maiden from the moorlands, he bestowed on her a clamorous kiss, which was echoed back by the laughter of the audience, and the damsel, blushing from brow to bosom, exclaimed, with true northern naivete, "Haith, bodie, but ye're wondrous at fourscore!" -The old man began with a tongue, in which good will seemed struggling with the infirmities of age, to fit his voice to the note of the fiddle, while Ronald Rodan took one of those rude pipes, made of sycamore, the common manufacture of schoolboys knives, with which he swelled the repetitions of the song with singular ease and effect.

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