"I little like lying a night in the Torwood," said John Hamilton; "preferring my snug bit housie at the Bowhead, wi my gudewife birling her wheel in the cosy ingle, and the bairns tumbling ilk owre the other on the floor; mairowre, I am a stranger hereawa. Johnnie Faa's gang o' Egyptians are abroad; and the saints forfend that I come not to harm!"
"Why you in particular! What fear you?" asked Florence.
"Gude kens! But this morning I put on my sark with the wrong side outwards, and placed my left shoe on the right foot."
"Let us ride on to the castle of the Torwood," said Hackerston. "I ken the good dame who bides there, and have got her cramosie kirtles from France, and vessels of delft and pewter from the Flemings of the Dam. She lost her spouse in a brawl wi' the Livingstones, and may make us a' the mair welcome that one of our company has the bluid o' one o' that name on his hands. She comes o' Highland kin—Muriel Mac Ildhui, and is the last o' the Neishes, a tribe extirpated by the Mac Nabs at Lochearn. Come on, sirs; I ken the way, and can guide you there."
Putting spurs to their horses, they turned aside from the fortalice of the Lord Livingstone, which stood on the side of a green and gentle slope, and skirting a morass named Callender Bog, penetrated into a denser part of the Torwood by a path which, though apparently familiar to Hackerston, was scarcely visible to his companions, for night had closed completely in, and the pale light of the diamond-like stars was intercepted by the thick foliage of the old primeval oaks, which tossed their rustling branches in the rising wind. The rich grass that covered the path muffled, to some extent, the sound of their horses' feet; thus, on hearing voices before them,—
"Hush!" said Florence in a loud whisper; "and look to your weapons, sirs; for the Torwood has but an indifferent reputation."
He had scarcely spoken, when a clear and jolly voice was heard singing merrily a song, the chorus of which was something to this purpose:—
"Saint George he was for England,
Saint Denis was for France:
Sing Honi soit, my merry men.
Qui mal y pense!"
"Englishmen, by this light!" exclaimed Florence.
"By this murk darkness, rather!" added Hackerston, unslinging his Jethart axe from his saddlebow. "And bold fellows they must be, to chorus thus in the Torwood!"