them of their ancient «< city of refuge;» so that the petty warfare we have noticed continued for several months, without increase or abatement of hostilities on either side.

CHAPTER VIII.

So the red Indian, by Ontario's side,
Nursed hardy on the brindled panther's hide,
As fades his swarthy race, with anguish sees
The white man's cottage rise beneath the trees;
He leaves the shelter of his native wood,
He leaves the murmur of Ohio's flood,
And forward rushing in indignant grief,
Where never foot has trode the fallen leaf,
He bends his course where twilight reigns sublime,
O'er forests silent since the birth of time.

Scenes of Infancy.

In tracing the rise and progress of the Scottish Maroon war, we must not omit to mention that years had now rolled on, and that little Harry Bertram, one of the hardiest and most lively children that ever made a sword and grenadier's cap of rushes, now approached his fifth revolving birth-day. A hardihood of disposition, which early developed itself, made him already a little wanderer; he was well acquainted with every patch of lea ground and dingle around Ellangowan, and could tell in his broken language upon what baulks grew the bonniest flowers, and what copse had the ripest nuts. He repeatedly terrified his attendants by clambering about the

ruins of the old castle, and had more than once made a stolen excursion as far as the gypsey hamlet.

Upon these occasions he was generally brought back by Meg Merrilies, who, though she could not be prevailed upon to enter the Place of Ellangowan after her nephew had been given up to the press-gang, did not apparently extend her resentment to the child. On the contrary, she often contrived to way-lay him in his walks, sing him a gypsey song, give him a ride upon her jackass, and thrust into his pocket a piece of gingerbread or a red-cheeked apple. This woman's ancient attachment to the family, repelled and checked in every other direction, seemed to rejoice in having some object on which it could yet repose and expand itself. She prophesied an hundred times, « that young Mr Henry would be the pride o' the family, and there had nae been sick a sprout frae the auld aik, since the death of Arthur Mac-Dingawaie, that was killed in the battle o' the Bloody Bay; as for the present stick, it was good for naething but fire-wood.>> Upon one occasion, when the child was ill, she lay all night below the window, chaunting a rhyme which she believed sovereign as a febrifuge, and could neither be prevailed upon to enter the house, nor to leave the station she had chosen, till she was informed that the crisis was

over.

The affection of this woman became matter of suspicion, not indeed to the Laird, who was

never hasty in suspecting evil, but to his wife, who had indifferent health and poor spirits. She was now far advanced in a second pregnancy, she could not walk abroad herself, the woman who attended upon Harry was young and thoughtless, and she prayed Dominie Sampson to undertake the task of watching the boy in his rambles, when he should not be otherwise accompanied. The Dominie loved his young charge, and was enraptured with his own success, in having already brought him so far in his learning as to spell words of three syllables. The idea of this early prodigy of erudition being carried off by the gypseys, like a second Adam Smith, was not to be tolerated; and accordingly, though the charge was contrary to all his habits of life, he readily undertook it, and might be seen stalking about with a mathematical problem in his head, and his eye upon a child of five years old, whose rambles led him into an hundred awkward situations. Twice was the Dominie chased by a cross-grained cow, once he fell into the brook crossing at the stepping-stones, and another time was bogged up to the middle in the slough of Lochend, in attempting to gather a water-lily for the young Laird. It was the opinion of the village matrons who relieved Sampson on the latter occasion, that the Laird might as well trust the care of his child to a « potatoe-bogle;» but the good Dominie bore all his disasters with gravity and serenity equally imperturbable. Prodi-gi-ous!» was the only

"

ejaculation they ever extorted from the muchenduring man.

The Laird had, by this time, determined to make root and branch-work with the Maroons of Derncleugh. The old servants shook their heads at his proposal, and even Dominie Sampson ventured upon an indirect remonstrance. As, however, it was couched in the oracular phrase, « Ne moveas Camerinam,» neither the allusion, nor the language in which it was expressed, were calculated for Mr Bertram's edification, and matters proceeded against the gypseys in form of law. Every door in the hamlet was chalked by the ground officer, in token of a formal warning to remove at next term. Still, however, they showed no symptoms either of submission or of compliance. At length the term-day, the fatal Martinmas, arrived, and violent measures of ejection were resorted to. A strong posse of peace-officers, sufficient to render all resistance vain, charged the inhabitants to depart by noon; and, as they did not obey, the officers, in terms of their warrant, proceeded to unroof the cottages, and pull down the wretched doors and windows, -a summary and effectual mode of ejection still practised in some remote parts of Scotland, when a tenant proves refractory. The gypseys, for a time, beheld the work of destruction in sullen silence and inactivity; then set about saddling and loading their asses, and making preparations for their departure. These were soon accomplished, where all had the habits of wander