 his hosts had respected his engagements with the
existing government, and though enough passed by accidental innuendo that might
induce him to reckon the Baron and the Chief among those disaffected gentlemen
who were still numerous in Scotland, yet until his own connection with the army
had been broken off by the resumption of his commission, he had no reason to
suppose that they nourished any immediate or hostile attempts against the
present establishment. Still he was aware that unless he meant at once to
embrace the proposal of Fergus Mac-Ivor, it would deeply concern him to leave
the suspicious neighbourhood without delay, and repair where his conduct might
undergo a satisfactory examination. Upon this he the rather determined, as
Flora's advice favoured his doing so, and because he felt inexpressible
repugnance at the idea of being accessary to the plague of civil war. Whatever
were the original rights of the Stuarts, calm reflection told him, that,
omitting the question how far James the Second could forfeit those of his
posterity, he had, according to the united voice of the whole nation, justly
forfeited his own. Since that period, four monarchs had reigned in peace and
glory over Britain, sustaining and exalting the character of the nation abroad,
and its liberties at home. Reason asked, was it worth while to disturb a
government so long settled and established, and to plunge a kingdom into all the
miseries of civil war, for the purpose of replacing upon the throne the
descendants of a monarch by whom it had been wilfully forfeited? If, on the
other hand, his own final conviction of the goodness of their cause, or the
commands of his father or uncle, should recommend to him allegiance to the
Stuarts, still it was necessary to clear his own character by showing that he
had not, as seemed to be falsely insinuated, taken any step to this purpose,
during his holding the commission of the reigning monarch.
    The affectionate simplicity of Rose, and her anxiety for his safety - his
sense too of her unprotected state, and of the terror and actual dangers to
which she might be exposed, made an impression upon his mind, and he instantly
wrote to thank her in the kindest terms for her solicitude on his account, to
express his earnest good wishes for her welfare and that of her father, and to
assure her of his own safety. The feelings which this task excited were speedily
lost in the necessity which he now saw of bidding farewell to Flora Mac-Ivor,
perhaps for ever. The pang attending this reflection was inexpressible; for her
high-minded elevation of character, her self-devotion to
