The Heart of Mid-Lothian - Penn State University

offended; an attempt the most likely of all others to
bring them once more into contact with law and legal
protection. She, therefore, resolved to be guided by her
while she was in so hopeful a disposition, and act for her
own safety according to circumstances.
They were now close by the village, one of those beautiful
scenes which are so often found in merry England,
where the cottages, instead of being built in two direct
lines on each side of a dusty high-road, stand in detached
groups, interspersed not only with large oaks and elms,
but with fruit-trees, so many of which were at this time
in flourish, that the grove seemed enamelled with their
crimson and white blossoms. In the centre of the hamlet
stood the parish church, and its little Gothic tower,
from which at present was heard the Sunday chime of
bells.
“We will wait here until the folk are a’ in the church—
they ca’ the kirk a church in England, Jeanie, be sure
you mind that—for if I was gaun forward amang them,
a’ the gaitts o’ boys and lasses wad be crying at Madge
Wildfire’s tail, the little hell-rakers! and the beadle would
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be as hard upon us as if it was our fault. I like their
skirting as ill as he does, I can tell him; I’m sure I often
wish there was a het peat doun their throats when they
set them up that gate.”
Conscious of the disorderly appearance of her own
dress after the adventure of the preceding night, and of
the grotesque habit and demeanour of her guide, and
sensible how important it was to secure an attentive and
impatient audience to her strange story from some one
who might have the means to protect her, Jeanie readily
acquiesced in Madge’s proposal to rest under the trees,
by which they were still somewhat screened, until the
commencement of service should give them an opportunity
of entering the hamlet without attracting a crowd
around them. She made the less opposition, that Madge
had intimated that this was not the village where her
mother was in custody, and that the two squires of the
pad were absent in a different direction.
She sate herself down, therefore, at the foot of an oak,
and by the assistance of a placid fountain, which had
been dammed up for the use of the villagers, and which