"I should be a Sybarite if I did," smiled Edward in reply. "Celia, I am bringing you into danger, and I am very sorry for it. I begin to think now that it was but a cowardly act to seek shelter here; yet when a man is riding for life he scarce pauses to choose his course."
"You have brought me into no danger, dear, into which I did not choose to be brought," she answered. "But if they found you, Edward, what would they do to you?"
"What they did but a few days since on Tower Hill to my friend Lord Derwentwater,"[[1]] he said, gravely.
Celia shuddered as the agony and ignominy of that horrible scaffold came up before her eyes.
"They will not do it without the Lord's permission," added he, quietly. "Celia, I am in grave doubt whether I have done right in this matter. Not that I could ever see it right to fight against King James, nor that I doubt which would have been the right side to take at the time of the Revolution. I cannot quite see—what I know would be Patient's view, and is the view of many good men—that we had no right to fight for a Popish King. I do not judge those who thought so—to our own Master we all stand or fall. But I see the matter in another light. It was not that King James, being a Papist, was made King out of his turn, but that, being heir to the throne, he became a Papist. I see an immense difference between the two. God, not we, made him our King; God made the present King James his son, knowing that he would be brought up a Papist. What right had we to cast him off? Now the case is altered; he is cast off; and, considering the danger of Popery, have I, now, any right to bring him in again? This is my difficulty; and if I can leave England in safety, I do not think I shall draw my sword in the Jacobite cause again, though I never could take the oath of allegiance to any other King. I will never dare to attempt the prevention of the Lord's will, if only I can be certain what the Lord's will is in this matter."
"Well, I do not see the question quite as you do. It seems to me that they were right to cast off a Popish King. But we have no time to discuss politics to-night. You will leave England, then, at once?"
"There is no hope of life otherwise. The Elector of Hanover and his Ministers can have no mercy for us who fought at Sheriffmuir."
"And when am I likely to see you again, Edward?"
"When the Heavenly Jerusalem descendeth out of Heaven from God," he answered, softly.
"No sooner?" responded Celia, tearfully.