The World's Greatest Books [Volumes 1-15, 17-20]

A few days later, when his baggage had arrived from Edinburgh, Mr. Lovel went forth to pay his respects at Monkbarns, and received a cordial welcome from Mr. Oldbuck. They parted the best of friends, but the antiquary was still at a loss to know what this well-informed young man, without friends, connections, or employment, could have to do as a resident at Fairport. Neither port wine nor whist had apparently any charms for him. A coffee-room was his detestation, and he had as few sympathies with the tea-table. There was never a Master Lovel of whom so little positive was known, but nobody knew any harm of him.

"A decent, sensible lad," said the Laird of Monkbarns to himself, when these particulars of Lovel had been reported to him. "He scorns to enter into the fooleries and nonsense of these idiot people at Fairport. I must do something for him--I must give him a dinner, and I will write to Sir Arthur to come to Monkbarns to meet him. I must consult my womankind."

Accordingly, such consultation having been held, the following letter was sent to Sir Arthur Wardour, of Knockwinnock Castle:

"Dear Sir Arthur,--On Tuesday, the 17th inst, I hold a symposium at Monkbarns, and pray you to assist thereat, at four o'clock precisely. If my fair enemy, Miss Isabel, can and will honour us by accompanying you, my womankind will be but too proud. I have a young acquaintance to make known to you, who is touched with some stain of a better spirit than belong to these giddy-paced times, reveres his elders, and has a pretty notion of the classics. And as such a youth must have a natural contempt for the people about Fairport, I wish to show him some rational as well as worshipful society. I am, dear Sir Arthur, etc., etc."

In reply to this, at her father's request, Miss Wardour intimated, "her own and Sir Arthur's compliments, and that they would have the honour of waiting upon Mr. Oldbuck. Miss Wardour takes this opportunity to renew her hostility with Mr. Oldbuck, on account of his long absence from Knockwinnock, where his visits give so much pleasure."

II.--The Treacherous Sands

Sir Arthur and his daughter had set out, on leaving Monkbarns, to return to Knockwinnock by the turnpike road; but when they discerned Lovel a little before them Miss Wardour immediately proposed to her father that they should take another direction, and walk home by the sands.

Sir Arthur acquiesced willingly, and the two left the high road, and soon attained the side of the ocean. The tide was by no means so far out as they had computed; but this gave them no alarm; there was seldom ten days in the year when it approached so near the cliffs as not to leave a dry passage.

As they advanced together in silence a sudden change of weather made Miss Wardour draw close to her father. As the sun sank the wind rose, and the mass of waters began to lift itself in larger ridges, and sink in deeper furrows. Presently, through the drizzling rain, they saw a figure coming towards them, whom Sir Arthur recognised as the old blue-gowned beggar, Edie Ochiltree.

"Turn back! Turn back!" exclaimed the vagrant. "The tide is running on Halket-head, like the Fall of Fyers! We will maybe get back by Ness Point yet. The Lord help us--it's our only chance! We can but try."

The waves had now encroached so much upon the beach, that the firm and smooth footing which they had hitherto had on the sand must be exchanged for a rougher path close to the foot of the precipice, and in some places even raised upon its lower ledges. It would have been utterly impossible for Sir Arthur Wardour or his daughter to have found their way along these shelves without the guidance and encouragement of the beggar, who had been there before in high tides, though never, he acknowledged, "in sae awsome a night as this."