“O my bairn, my bairn! be patient under the rod.  Who knows when He may lift His hand off from us?  Young Earnscliff, Heaven bless him, has taen the chase, with Davie of Stenhouse, and the first comers.  I cried to let house and plenishing burn, and follow the reivers to recover Grace, and Earnscliff and his men were ower the Fell within three hours after the deed.  God bless him! he’s a real Earnscliff; he’s his father’s true son—­a leal friend.”

“A true friend indeed; God bless him!” exclaimed Hobbie; “let’s on and away, and take the chase after him.”

“O, my child, before you run on danger, let me hear you but say, his will be done!”

“Urge me not, mother—­not now.”  He was rushing out, when, looking back, he observed his grandmother make a mute attitude of affliction.  He returned hastily, threw himself into her arms, and said, “Yes, mother, I can say, his will be done, since it will comfort you.”

“May He go forth—­may He go forth with you, my dear bairn; and O, may He give you cause to say on your return, his name be praised!”

“Farewell, mother!—­farewell, my dear sisters!” exclaimed Elliot, and rushed out of the house.

CHAPTER VIII.

     Now horse and hattock, cried the Laird,—­
     Now horse and hattock, speedilie;
     They that winna ride for Telfer’s kye,
     Let them never look in the face o’ me.—­Border Ballad.

“Horse! horse! and spear!” exclaimed Hobbie to his kinsmen.  Many a ready foot was in the stirrup; and, while Elliot hastily collected arms and accoutrements, no easy matter in such a confusion, the glen resounded with the approbation of his younger friends.

“Ay, ay!” exclaimed Simon of Hackburn, “that’s the gate to take it, Hobbie.  Let women sit and greet at hame, men must do as they have been done by; it’s the Scripture says’t.”

“Haud your tongue, sir,” said one of the seniors, sternly; “dinna abuse the Word that gate, ye dinna ken what ye speak about.”

“Hae ye ony tidings?—­Hae ye ony speerings, Hobbie?—­O, callants, dinna be ower hasty,” said old Dick of the Dingle.

“What signifies preaching to us, e’enow?” said Simon; “if ye canna make help yoursell, dinna keep back them that can.”

“Whisht, sir; wad ye take vengeance or ye ken wha has wrang’d ye?”

“D’ye think we dinna ken the road to England as weel as our fathers before us?—­All evil comes out o’ thereaway—­it’s an auld saying and a true; and we’ll e’en away there, as if the devil was blawing us south.”

“We’ll follow the track o’ Earnscliff’s horses ower the waste,” cried one Elliot.

“I’ll prick them out through the blindest moor in the Border, an there had been a fair held there the day before,” said Hugh, the blacksmith of Ringleburn, “for I aye shoe his horse wi’ my ain hand.”

“Lay on the deer-hounds,” cried another “where are they?”