A few resolute men might easily have cut
off the detachment; but of the inhabitants some were favourable, many
indifferent, and the rest overawed. So nothing memorable occurred in the
course of the evening, except that Waverley's rest was sorely interrupted
by the revellers hallooing forth their Jacobite songs, without remorse or
mitigation of voice.
Early in the morning they were again mounted and on the road to
Edinburgh, though the pallid visages of some of the troop betrayed that
they had spent a night of sleepless debauchery. They halted at
Linlithgow, distinguished by its ancient palace, which Sixty Years Since
was entire and habitable, and whose venerable ruins, NOT QUITE SIXTY
YEARS SINCE, very narrowly escaped the unworthy fate of being converted
into a barrack for French prisoners. May repose and blessings attend the
ashes of the patriotic statesman who, amongst his last services to
Scotland, interposed to prevent this profanation!
As they approached the metropolis of Scotland, through a champaign and
cultivated country, the sounds of war began to be heard. The distant yet
distinct report of heavy cannon, fired at intervals, apprized Waverley
that the work of destruction was going forward.
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