"Here he lies!" cried the old woman, drawing him toward the rushy bier;
and before he had time to demand, "Who?" she pulled down the shroud and
disclosed the body of Sir Ronald Crawford. Wallace gazed on it, with a
look of such dreadful import that Edwin, whose anxious eyes then sought
his countenance, trembled with a nameless horror. "Oh," thought he,
"to what is this noble soul reserved! Is he alone doomed to extirpate
the enemies of Scotland, that every ill falls direct upon his head!"

"Sorry, sorry bier, for the good Lord Ronald!" cried the old woman; "a
poor wake to mourn the loss of him who was the benefactor of all the
country round! But had I not brought him here, the salt sea must have
been his grave." Here sobs prevented her utterance; but after a short
pause, with many vehement lamentations over the virtues of the dead,
and imprecations on his murderers, she related that as soon as the
woful tidings were brought to Monktown kirk (and brought too by the
Southron, who was to take it in possession!) she and the clan's-folk
who would not swear fidelity to the new lord, were driven from the
house. She hastened to the bloody theater of massacre; and there
beheld the bodies of the murdered chiefs drawn on sledges to the
seashore. Elspa knew that of her master, by the scar on his breast,
which he had received in the battle of Largs. When she saw corpse
after corpse thrown, with a careless hand, into the waves, and the man
approached who was to cast the honored chief of Monktown, to the same
unhallowed burial, she threw herself frantically on the body, and so
moved the man's compassion, that, taking advantage of the time when his
comrades were out of sight, he permitted her to wrap the dead Sir
Ronald in her plaid, and so carry him away between her sister and
herself. But ere she had raised her sacred burden, the man directed
her to seek the venerable head from amongst the others, which lay
mingled in a sack; drawing it forth, she placed it beside the body, and