“For God’s sake,” said Ellieslaw, “spare us your folly at present, Mareschal.”

“Well, then,” said his kinsman, “I’ll bestow my wisdom upon you instead, such as it is.  If we have gone forward like fools, do not let us go back like cowards.  We have done enough to draw upon us both the suspicion and vengeance of the government; do not let us give up before we have done something to deserve it.—­What, will no one speak?  Then I’ll leap the ditch the first.”  And, starting up, he filled a beer-glass to the brim with claret, and waving his hand, commanded all to follow his example, and to rise up from their seats.  All obeyed-the more qualified guests as if passively, the others with enthusiasm “Then, my friends, I give you the pledge of the day—­The independence of Scotland, and the health of our lawful sovereign, King James the Eighth, now landed in Lothian, and, as I trust and believe, in full possession of his ancient capital!”

He quaffed off the wine, and threw the glass over his head.

“It should never,” he said, “be profaned by a meaner toast.”

All followed his example, and, amid the crash of glasses and the shouts of the company, pledged themselves to stand or fall with the principles and political interest which their toast expressed.

“You have leaped the ditch with a witness,” said Ellieslaw, apart to Mareschal; “but I believe it is all for the best; at all events, we cannot now retreat from our undertaking.  One man alone” (looking at Ratcliffe) “has refused the pledge; but of that by and by.”

Then, rising up, he addressed the company in a style of inflammatory invective against the government and its measures, but especially the Union; a treaty, by means of which, he affirmed, Scotland had been at once cheated of her independence, her commerce, and her honour, and laid as a fettered slave at the foot of the rival against whom, through such a length of ages, through so many dangers, and by so much blood, she had honourably defended her rights.  This was touching a theme which found a responsive chord in the bosom of every man present.

“Our commerce is destroyed,” hollowed old John Rewcastle, a Jedburgh smuggler, from the lower end of the table.

“Our agriculture is ruined,” said the Laird of Broken-girth-flow, a territory which, since the days of Adam, had borne nothing but ling and whortle-berries.

“Our religion is cut up, root and branch,” said the pimple-nosed pastor of the Episcopal meeting-house at Kirkwhistle.

“We shall shortly neither dare shoot a deer nor kiss a wench, without a certificate from the presbytery and kirk-treasurer,” said Mareschal-Wells.

“Or make a brandy jeroboam in a frosty morning, without license from a commissioner of excise,” said the smuggler.

“Or ride over the fell in a moonless night,” said Westburnflat, “without asking leave of young Earnscliff; or some Englified justice of the peace:  thae were gude days on the Border when there was neither peace nor justice heard of.”