"Disturbance in the Highlands makes the hour of our old watchful
enemy," pursued his lordship, holding out a finger as he paced;
"and I give you my word we may have a '45 again with the Campbells
on the other side. To protect the life of this man Stewart--which
is forfeit already on half-a-dozen different counts if not on this-
-do you propose to plunge your country in war, to jeopardise the
faith of your fathers, and to expose the lives and fortunes of how
many thousand innocent persons? . . . These are considerations
that weigh with me, and that I hope will weigh no less with
yourself, Mr. Balfour, as a lover of your country, good government,
and religious truth."

"You deal with me very frankly, and I thank you for it," said I.
"I will try on my side to be no less honest. I believe your policy
to be sound. I believe these deep duties may lie upon your
lordship; I believe you may have laid them on your conscience when
you took the oath of the high office which you hold. But for me,
who am just a plain man--or scarce a man yet--the plain duties must
suffice. I can think but of two things, of a poor soul in the
immediate and unjust danger of a shameful death, and of the cries
and tears of his wife that still tingle in my head. I cannot see
beyond, my lord. It's the way that I am made. If the country has
to fall, it has to fall. And I pray God, if this be wilful
blindness, that He may enlighten me before too late."

He had heard me motionless, and stood so a while longer.

"This is an unexpected obstacle," says he, aloud, but to himself.