But I am
more doubtful of your treatment upon the road; Major Melville is
involuntarily obliged to intrust the custody of your person to another.'
'I am glad of it,' answered Waverley. 'I detest that cold-blooded
calculating Scotch magistrate. I hope he and I shall never meet more. He
had neither sympathy with my innocence nor with my wretchedness; and the
petrifying accuracy with which he attended to every form of civility,
while he tortured me by his questions, his suspicions, and his
inferences, was as tormenting as the racks of the Inquisition. Do not
vindicate him, my dear sir, for that I cannot bear with patience; tell me
rather who is to have the charge of so important a state prisoner as I
am.'
'I believe a person called Gilfillan, one of the sect who are termed
Cameronians.'
'I never heard of them before.'
'They claim,' said the clergyman, 'to represent the more strict and
severe Presbyterians, who, in Charles Second's and James Second's days,
refused to profit by the Toleration, or Indulgence, as it was called,
which was extended to others of that religion. They held conventicles in
the open fields, and, being treated with great violence and cruelty by
the Scottish government, more than once took arms during those reigns.
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