Woe, woe, son of the Lowlander,
     Why wilt thou leave thine own bonny Border? 
     Why comes thou hither, disturbing the Highlander,
     Wasting the glen that was once in fair order?

What added to Sergeant More M’Alpin’s distress upon the occasion was, that the chief by whom this change had been effected, was, by tradition and common opinion, held to represent the ancient leaders and fathers of the expelled fugitives; and it had hitherto been one of Sergeant More’s principal subjects of pride to prove, by genealogical deduction, in what degree of kindred he stood to this personage.  A woful change was now wrought in his sentiments towards him.

“I cannot curse him,” he said, as he rose and strode through the room, when Janet’s narrative was finished—­“I will not curse him; he is the descendant and representative of my fathers.  But never shall mortal man hear me name his name again.”  And he kept his word; for, until his dying day, no man heard him mention his selfish and hard-hearted chieftain.

After giving a day to sad recollections, the hardy spirit which had carried him through so many dangers, manned the Sergeant’s bosom against this cruel disappointment.  “He would go,” he said, “to Canada to his kinsfolk, where they had named a Transatlantic valley after the glen of their fathers.  Janet,” he said, “should kilt her coats like a leaguer lady; d—­n the distance! it was a flea’s leap to the voyages and marches he had made on a slighter occasion.”

With this purpose he left the Highlands, and came with his sister as far as Gandercleugh, on his way to Glasgow, to take a passage to Canada.  But winter was now set in, and as he thought it advisable to wait for a spring passage, when the St. Lawrence should be open, he settled among us for the few months of his stay in Britain.  As we said before, the respectable old man met with deference and attention from all ranks of society; and when spring returned, he was so satisfied with his quarters, that he did not renew the purpose of his voyage.  Janet was afraid of the sea, and he himself felt the infirmities of age and hard service more than he had at first expected.  And, as he confessed to the clergyman, and my worthy principal, Mr. Cleishbotham, “it was better staying with kend friends, than going farther, and faring worse.”

He therefore established himself and his domicile at Gandercleugh, to the great satisfaction, as we have already said, of all its inhabitants, to whom he became, in respect of military intelligence, and able commentaries upon the newspapers, gazettes, and bulletins, a very oracle, explanatory of all martial events, past, present, or to come.