We have all been miserable about you since an early hour in the morning--invisible to mortal eye since yester bed-going gong--regal couch manifestly unslept in--tent after tent scrutinised as narrowly as if for a mouse--Swiss Giantess searched as if by custom-house officers--no Christopher in the Encampment--what can I compare it to--but a Bee-hive that had lost its Queen. The very Drones were in a ferment--the workers demented--dismal the hum of grief and rage--of national lamentation and civil war. NORTH. Billy could have told you of my retreat. SEWARD. Billy was in a state of distraction--rushed to the Van--and, finding it empty, fainted. NORTH. Billy saw me in the Van--and I told him to shut the spring smartly--and be mum. BULLER. Villain! NORTH. Obedience to orders is the sum-total of Duty. Most of the men seem tolerably sober--those whom despair had driven to drink have been sent to sleeping-quarters--the Camp has recovered from its alarm--and is fit for Inspection by the General Commanding the Forces. SEWARD. But have you breakfasted, my dear sir? NORTH. Leave me alone for that. What have you all been about? TALBOYS. We three started at Five for Luib, in high glee. NORTH. What! in face of my prediction? Did I not tell you that in that dull, dingy, dirty, ochre sunset--in that wan moon and those tallow-candle stars--I saw the morning's Deluge. BULLER. But did you not also quote Sir David Brewster? "In the atmosphere in which he lives and breathes, and the phenomena of which he daily sees, and feels, and describes, and measures, the philosopher stands in acknowledged ignorance of the laws which govern it. He has ascertained, indeed, its extent, its weight, and its composition; but though he has mastered the law of heat and moisture, and studied the electric agencies which influence its condition, he cannot predict, or even approximate to a prediction, whether on the morrow the sun shall shine, or the rain fall, or the wind blow, or the lightning descend." NORTH. And all that is perfectly true. Nevertheless, we weather-wise and weather-foolish people--not Philosophers but Empirics--sailors and shepherds--with all our eyes on the lower and the higher heavens--gather up prognostications of the character of the coming time--an hour or a day--take in our canvass and set our storm-jib--or run for some bay where the prudent ship shall ride at anchor, as safe and almost as motionless as if she were in a dry-dock; or off to the far hill-side to look after the silly sheep--yet not so silly either--for there they are, instinctive of a change, lying secured by that black belt of Scotch-Firs against the tempest brewing over Lockerby or Lochmaben--far from the loun Bilholm Braes!--You Three, started at Five o'clock for Luib? TALBOYS.