gaff with the officers: here a cargo taen--vera weel, that was
their luck; there another carried clean through, that was mine;
na, na! hawks shouldna pike out hawks' een.'

'And this Colonel Mannering?' said Brown.

'Troth, he's nae wise man neither, to interfere; no that I blame
him for saving the gangers' lives, that was very right; but it
wasna like a gentleman to be righting about the poor folk's pocks
o' tea and brandy kegs. However, he's a grand man and an officer
man, and they do what they like wi' the like o' us.'

'And his daughter,' said Brown, with a throbbing heart, 'is going
to be married into a great family too, as I have heard?'

'What, into the Hazlewoods'?' said the pilot. 'Na, na, that's but
idle clashes; every Sabbath day, as regularly as it came round,
did the young man ride hame wi' the daughter of the late
Ellangowan; and my daughter Peggy's in the service up at
Woodbourne, and she says she's sure young Hazlewood thinks nae
mair of Miss Mannering than you do.'

Bitterly censuring his own precipitate adoption of a contrary
belief, Brown yet heard with delight that the suspicions of
Julia's fidelity, upon which he had so rashly acted, were probably
void of foundation. How must he in the meantime be suffering in
her opinion? or what could she suppose of conduct which must have
made him appear to her regardless alike of her peace of mind and
of the interests of their affection? The old man's connexion with
the family at Woodbourne seemed to offer a safe mode of