The poor Dominie's brain was almost turned with joy on returning to his old habitation. He posted upstairs, taking three steps at once, to a little shabby attic, his cell and dormitory in former days, and which the possession of his much superior apartment at Woodbourne had never banished from his memory. Here one sad thought suddenly struck the honest man—the books!—no three rooms in Ellangowan were capable to contain them. While this qualifying reflection was passing through his mind, he was suddenly summoned by Mannering to assist in calculating some proportions relating to a large and splendid house, which was to be built on the site of the New Place of Ellangowan, in a style corresponding to the magnificence of the ruins in its vicinity. Among the various rooms in the plan, the Dominie observed, that one of the largest . vas entitled THE LIBRARY; and close beside was a snug well-proportioned chamber, entitled, MR. SAMPSON'S APARTMENT.—"Prodigious, prodigious, pro-di-gi-ous!" shouted the enraptured Dominie.
Mr. Pleydell had left the party for some time; but he returned, according to promise, during the Christmas recess of the courts. He drove up to Ellangowan when all the family were abroad but the Colonel, who was busy with plans of buildings and pleasure-grounds, in which he was well skilled, and took great delight.
"Ah ha!" said the counsellor, "so here you are! Where are the ladies? where is the fair Julia?"
"Walking out with young Haziewood, Bertram, and Captain Delaserre, a friend of his, who is with us just now. They are gone to plan out a cottage at Derncleugh. Well, have you carried through your law business?"
"With a wet finger," answered the lawyer; "got our youngster's special service retoured into Chancery. We had him served heir before the macers."
"Macers? who are they?"
"Why, it is a kind of judicial Saturnalia. You must know, that one of the requisites to be a macer, or officer in attendance upon our supreme court, is, that they shall be men of no knowledge."
"Very well!"
"Now, our Scottish legislature, for the joke's sake I suppose, have constituted those men of no knowledge into a peculiar court for trying questions of relationship and descent, such as this business of Bertram, which often involve the most nice and complicated questions of evidence."
"The devil they have? I should think that rather inconvenient," said Mannering.