'Confusion!' thought Glossin; 'if I cannot put a stop to this all will be out. O the devil take all ballads and ballad-makers and ballad-singers! and that d--d jade too, to set up her pipe!'--'You will have time enough for this on some other occasion,' he said aloud; 'at present' (for now he saw his emissary with two or three men coming up the bank)--'at present we must have some more serious conversation together.' 'How do you mean, sir?' said Bertram, turning short upon him, and not liking the tone which he made use of. 'Why, sir, as to that--I believe your name is Brown?' said Glossin. 'And what of that, sir?' Glossin looked over his shoulder to see how near his party had approached; they were coming fast on. 'Vanbeest Brown? if I mistake not.' 'And what of that, sir?' said Bertram, with increasing astonishment and displeasure. 'Why, in that case,' said Glossin, observing his friends had now got upon the level space close beside them--'in that case you are my prisoner in the king's name!' At the same time he stretched his hand towards Bertram's collar, while two of the men who had come up seized upon his arms; he shook himself, however, free of their grasp by a violent effort, in which he pitched the most pertinacious down the bank, and, drawing his cutlass, stood on the defensive, while those who had felt his strength recoiled from his presence and gazed at a safe distance. 'Observe,' he called out at the same time, 'that I have no purpose to resist legal authority; satisfy me that you have a magistrate's warrant, and are authorised to make this arrest, and I will obey it quietly; but let no man who loves his life venture to approach me till I am satisfied for what crime, and by whose authority, I am apprehended.'