“It is the handwriting of Master Edward,” said the servant, as he took the letter into his hand; and, having conducted them to a room, he delivered it to Sir Frederic.
In a few minutes the old knight hurried into the room, where the Covenanter, and his son and his daughter, stood. “Welcome, thrice welcome!” he cried, grasping the hand of the old man; “here you shall find a resting-place and a home, with no one to make you afraid.”
He ordered wine and food to be placed before them, and he sat down with them.
Now John marvelled at the kindness of his host, and his heart burned within him; and, in the midst of all, he thought of the long-lost Philip, and how he had driven him from his house—and his cheek glowed and his heart throbbed with anxiety. His son marvelled also, and Mary’s bosom swelled with strange thoughts—tears gathered in her eyes, and she raised the ring that had been the token of her father’s deliverance to her lips.
“Oh, sir,” said the Covenanter, “pardon the freedom o’ a plain blunt man, and o’ ane whose bosom is burning wi’ anxiety; but there is a mystery, there is something attending my deliverance, an’ the letter, and your kindness, that I canna see through—and I hope, and I fear—and I canna—I daurna comprehend how it is!—but, as it were, the past—the lang bygane past, and the present, appear to hae met thegither! It is makin’ my head dizzy wi’ wonder, for there seems in a’ this a something that concerns you, and that concerns me, and one that I mayna name.”
“Your perplexity,” said Sir Frederic, “may be best relieved, by stating to you, in a few words, one or two circumstances of my history. Having, from family affliction, left this country, until within these four years, I held a commission in the army of the Prince of Orange. I was present at the battle of Seneff; it was my last engagement; and in the regiment which I commanded, there was a young Scottish volunteer, to whose bravery, during the battle, I owed my life. In admiration and gratitude for his conduct, I sent for him after the victory, to present him to the prince. He came. I questioned him respecting his birth and his family. He was silent—he burst into tears. I urged him to speak. He said, of his real name he knew nothing—of his family he knew nothing—all that he knew was, that he had been the adopted son of a good and a Christian man, who had found him on Philiphaugh, on the lifeless bosom of his mother!”
“Merciful Heaven! my puir, injured Philip!” exclaimed the aged Covenanter, wringing his hands.
“My brother!” cried Daniel eagerly. Mary wept.
“Oh, sir!” continued Sir Frederic, “words cannot paint my feelings as he spoke! I had been at the battle of Philiphaugh! and, not dreaming that a conflict was at hand, my beloved wife, with our infant boy, my little Edward, had joined me but the day before. At the first noise of Lesly’s onset, I rushed from our tent—I left my loved ones there! Our army was stricken with confusion—I never beheld them again! I grasped the hand of the youth—I gazed in his face as though my soul would have leaped from my eyelids. ‘Do not deceive me!’ I cried; and he drew from his bosom the ring and the bracelets of my Elizabeth!”
Here the old knight paused and wept, and tears ran down the cheeks of John Brydone, and the cheeks of his children.