“I had no thought to entrap you,” said he.
“I am sure of that,” said I.
“Let me see,” he continued. “To-morrow is the Sabbath. Come to me on Monday by eight in the morning, and give me your promise until then.”
“Freely given, my lord,” said I. “And with regard to what has fallen from yourself, I will give it for an long as it shall please God to spare your days.”
“You will observe,” he said next, “that I have made no employment of menaces.”
“It was like your lordship’s nobility,” said I. “Yet I am not altogether so dull but what I can perceive the nature of those you have not uttered.”
“Well,” said he, “good-night to you. May you sleep well, for I think it is more than I am like to do.”
With that he sighed, took up a candle, and gave me his conveyance as far as the street door.
CHAPTER V.
IN THE ADVOCATE’S HOUSE
The next day, Sabbath, August 27th, I had the occasion I had long looked forward to, to hear some of the famous Edinburgh preachers, all well known to me already by the report of Mr Campbell. Alas! and I might just as well have been at Essendean, and sitting under Mr. Campbell’s worthy self! the turmoil of my thoughts, which dwelt continually on the interview with Prestongrange, inhibiting me from all attention. I was indeed much less impressed by the reasoning of the divines than by the spectacle of the thronged congregation in the churches, like what I imagined of a theatre or (in my then disposition) of an assize of trial; above all at the West Kirk, with its three tiers of galleries, where I went in the vain hope that I might see Miss Drummond.