 added, free,
generous, noble. But he is still a Ravenswood, and may bide his time. Remember
the fate of Sir George Lockhart.«8
    The Lord Keeper started as she called to his recollection a tragedy so deep
and so recent. The old woman proceeded: »Chiesley, who did the deed, was a
relative of Lord Ravenswood. In the hall of Ravenswood, in my presence, and in
that of others, he avowed publicly his determination to do the cruelty which he
afterwards committed. I could not keep silence, though to speak it ill became my
station. You are devising a dreadful crime, I said, for which you must reckon
before the judgment-seat. Never shall I forget his look, as he replied, I must
reckon then for many things, and will reckon for this also. Therefore I may well
say, beware of pressing a desperate man with the hand of authority. There is
blood of Chiesley in the veins of Ravenswood, and one drop of it were enough to
fire him in the circumstances in which he is placed - I say, beware of him.«
    The old dame had, either intentionally or by accident, harped aright the
fear of the Lord Keeper. The desperate and dark resource of private
assassination, so familiar to a Scottish baron in former times, had even in the
present age been too frequently resorted to under the pressure of unusual
temptation, or where the mind of the actor was prepared for such a crime. Sir
William Ashton was aware of this; as also that young Ravenswood had received
injuries sufficient to prompt him to that sort of revenge, which becomes a
frequent though fearful consequence of the partial administration of justice. He
endeavoured to disguise from Alice the nature of the apprehensions which he
entertained; but so ineffectually, that a person even of less penetration than
nature had endowed her with must necessarily have been aware that the subject
lay near his bosom. His voice was changed in its accent as he replied to her,
that the Master of Ravenswood was a man of honour; and were it otherwise, that
the fate of Chiesley of Dalry was a sufficient warning to any one who should
dare to assume the office of avenger of his own imaginary wrongs. And having
hastily uttered these expressions, he rose and left the place without waiting
for a reply.
 

                                 Chapter Fourth

 -- Is she a Capulet?
 O dear account! my life is my foe's debt.
                                                                    Shakespeare.
 
The Lord Keeper walked for nearly a quarter of a mile in profound silence. His
daughter, naturally timid, and bred up in those
