Had Richard unconstrain’d resign’d the throne,
    A king can give no more than is his own;
    The title stood entail’d had Richard had a son.

You see, my dear Waverley, I can quote poetry as well as Flora and you.  But come, clear your moody brow, and trust to me to show you an honourable road to a speedy and glorious revenge.  Let us seek Flora, who perhaps has more news to tell us of what has occurred during our absence.  She will rejoice to hear that you are relieved of your servitude.  But first add a postscript to your letter, marking the time when you received this calvinistical colonel’s first summons, and express your regret that the hastiness of his proceedings prevented your anticipating them by sending your resignation.  Then let him blush for his injustice.’

The letter was sealed accordingly, covering a formal resignation of the commission, and Mac-Ivor despatched it with some letters of his own by a special messenger, with charge to put them into the nearest post-office in the Lowlands.

CHAPTER XXVI

AN ECLAIRCISSEMENT

The hint which the Chieftain had thrown out respecting Flora was not unpremeditated.  He had observed with great satisfaction the growing attachment of Waverley to his sister, nor did he see any bar to their union, excepting the situation which Waverley’s father held in the ministry, and Edward’s own commission in the army of George II.  These obstacles were now removed, and in a manner which apparently paved the way for the son’s becoming reconciled to another allegiance.  In every other respect the match would be most eligible.  The safety, happiness, and honourable provision of his sister, whom he dearly loved, appeared to be ensured by the proposed union; and his heart swelled when he considered how his own interest would be exalted in the eyes of the ex-monarch to whom he had dedicated his service, by an alliance with one of those ancient, powerful, and wealthy English families of the steady cavalier faith, to awaken whose decayed attachment to the Stuart family was now a matter of such vital importance to the Stuart cause.  Nor could Fergus perceive any obstacle to such a scheme.  Waverley’s attachment was evident; and as his person was handsome, and his taste apparently coincided with her own, he anticipated no opposition on the part of Flora.  Indeed, between his ideas of patriarchal power and those which he had acquired in France respecting the disposal of females in marriage, any opposition from his sister, dear as she was to him, would have been the last obstacle on which he would have calculated, even had the union been less eligible.

Influenced by these feelings, the Chief now led Waverley in quest of Miss Mac-Ivor, not without the hope that the present agitation of his guest’s spirits might give him courage to cut short what Fergus termed the romance of the courtship.  They found Flora, with her faithful attendants, Una and Cathleen, busied in preparing what appeared to Waverley to be white bridal favours.  Disguising as well as he could the agitation of his mind, Waverley asked for what joyful occasion Miss Mac-Ivor made such ample preparation.