exertion of his own. He lay as silent and inactive in their hands
as a dead corpse, incapable of opposing, but in no way aiding,
their operations. When he was dragged into daylight and placed
erect upon his feet among three or four assistants who had
remained without the cave, he seemed stupefied and dazzled by the
sudden change from the darkness of his cavern. While others were
superintending the removal of Meg Merrilies, those who remained
with Hatteraick attempted to make him sit down upon a fragment of
rock which lay close upon the high-water mark. A strong shuddering
convulsed his iron frame for an instant as he resisted their
purpose. 'Not there! Hagel! you would not make me sit THERE?'

These were the only words he spoke; but their import, and the deep
tone of horror in which they were uttered, served to show what was
passing in his mind.

When Meg Merrilies had also been removed from the cavern, with all
the care for her safety that circumstances admitted, they
consulted where she should be carried. Hazlewood had sent for a
surgeon, and proposed that she should be lifted in the meantime to
the nearest cottage. But the patient exclaimed with great
earnestness, 'Na, na, na! to the Kaim o' Derncleugh--the Kaim o'
Derncleugh; the spirit will not free itself o' the flesh but
there.'

'You must indulge her, I believe,' said Bertram; 'her troubled
imagination will otherwise aggravate the fever of the wound.'

They bore her accordingly to the vault. On the way her mind seemed
to run more upon the scene which had just passed than on her own