 sister's life - if,
from any constrained scruples about the legality of her performing the office of
an affectionate sister and a good subject, by appearing in a court held under
the authority of the law and government, you become the means of deterring her
from the discharge of this duty, I must say, though the truth may sound harsh in
your ears, that you, who gave life to this unhappy girl, will become the means
of her losing it by a premature and violent death.«
    So saying, Mr. Middleburgh turned to leave him.
    »Bide awee - bide awee, Mr. Middleburgh,« said Deans, in great perplexity
and distress of mind; but the Bailie, who was probably sensible that protracted
discussion might diminish the effect of his best and most forcible argument,
took a hasty leave, and declined entering farther into the controversy.
    Deans sunk down upon his seat, stunned with a variety of conflicting
emotions. It had been a great source of controversy among those holding his
opinions in religious matters how far the government which succeeded the
Revolution could be, without sin, acknowledged by true Presbyterians, seeing
that it did not recognise the great national testimony of the Solemn League and
Covenant? And latterly, those agreeing in this general doctrine, and assuming
the sounding title of »The anti-Popish, anti-Prelatic, anti-Erastian,
anti-Sectarian, true Presbyterian remnant,« were divided into many petty sects
among themselves, even as to the extent of submission to the existing laws and
rulers, which constituted such an acknowledgment as amounted to sin.
    At a very stormy and tumultuous meeting, held in 1682, to discuss these
important and delicate points, the testimonies of the faithful few were found
utterly incodsistent with each other.36 The place where this conference took
place was remarkably well adapted for such an assembly. It was a wild and very
sequestered dell in Tweeddale, surrounded by high hills, and far remote from
human habitation. A small river, or rather a mountain torrent, called the Talla,
breaks down the glen with great fury, dashing successively over a number of
small cascades, which has procured the spot the name of Talla Linns. Here the
leaders among the scattered adherents to the Covenant, men who, in their
banishment from human society, and in the recollection of the severities to
which they had been exposed, had become at once sullen in their tempers, and
fantastic in their religious opinions, met with arms in their hands, and by the
side of the torrent discussed, with a turbulence which the noise of the stream
could
