was
performed by adding a short red cloak to a petticoat, which was at first her
sole covering, and which reached scantily below her knee, the child was
dismissed with the fish in a basket, and a request on the part of Monkbarns that
they might be prepared for dinner. »It would have been long,« said Oldbuck, with
much self-complacency, »ere my womankind could have made such a reasonable
bargain with that old skin-flint, though they sometimes wrangle with her for an
hour together under my study window, like three sea-gulls screaming and
sputtering in a gale of wind. But come, wend we on our way to Knockwinnock.«
 

                                Chapter Twelfth

 Beggar? - the only freeman of your commonwealth;
 Free above Scot-free, that observe no laws,
 Obey no governor, use no religion
 But what they draw from their own ancient custom,
 Or constitute themselves, yet they are no rebels.
                                                                          Brome.
 
With our reader's permission, we will outstep the slow, though sturdy pace of
the Antiquary, whose halts, as he turned round to his companion at every moment
to point out something remarkable in the landscape, or to enforce some favourite
topic more emphatically than the exercise of walking permitted, delayed their
progress considerably.
    Notwithstanding the fatigues and dangers of the preceding evening, Miss
Wardour was able to rise at her usual hour, and to apply herself to her usual
occupations, after she had first satisfied her anxiety concerning her father's
state of health. Sir Arthur was no farther indisposed than by the effects of
great agitation and unusual fatigue, but these were sufficient to induce him to
keep his bedchamber.
    To look back on the events of the preceding day, was, to Isabella, a very
unpleasing retrospect. She owed her life, and that of her father, to the very
person by whom, of all others, she wished least to be obliged, because she could
hardly even express common gratitude towards him without encouraging hopes which
might be injurious to them both. »Why should it be my fate to receive such
benefits, and conferred at so much personal risk, from one whose romantic
passion I have so unceasingly laboured to discourage? Why should chance have
given him this advantage over me? and why, oh why, should a half-subdued feeling
in my own bosom, in spite of my sober reason, almost rejoice that he has
attained it?«
    While Miss Wardour thus taxed herself with wayward caprice, she beheld
advancing down the avenue, not her younger and more dreaded preserver, but the
old beggar who had made