"Four hundred and sixty-two years ago," quoth the captain, after airing his subtraction a little; "ugh! how gloomy the place looks, compared to the cheerful hall--so gloomy, indeed, that I shall be here as little as possible before marching to-morrow." He flung off his belted plaid, badgerskin sporan, and sword-belt, wrung the water from his kilt and from the curls of his periwig, smoothed his queue, donned a pair of dry hose, and, after giving a casual glance to the primings and charges of his pistols, which were a pair of true steel-butted Doune pops, from the armoury of old Thomas Caddel, he turned to leave the chamber, from the ceiling of which a dried kingfisher hung by a thread; for it is an old superstition that the bird will turn his bill to _that_ point from which the wind blows. Taking one of the candles, the captain left the chamber, and was about to descend, when by some "glamour" he mistook the way; for being supperless, I am convinced that the hot wine had affected his head; he stumbled against a door; it flew open, and he found himself in the dressing apartment of a lady, whose face was turned towards him, and by the lights on a side-table he perceived at a glance that she was the same queenly dame who had recently crossed the landing-place. She gazed fixedly at the amazed intruder, as she stood before a mirror, with her round polished shoulders turned towards him, and her jet black hair gathered up in heavy masses on her slender fingers, for she seemed in the act of dressing it. From a faultless bust, her dark dress, brocaded with stars, hung in magnificent folds to her feet, where, crouching like a marmoset, the hideous little dwarf was sitting. Her figure was beautiful, but so motionless and still, as she gazed with eyes full of indignation and inquiry, that the words of apology hung half arrested on the lips of the bowing intruder, who, in another moment, discovered that he had before him a--picture--only a picture; but one painted in the first style of antique art. Nothing artistic could be more beautifully executed than the upturned and polished arms, from which the lace that foreign looms must have woven, hung in loops upheld by diamonds. A necklace of precious stones encircled her neck, and a large band of the same formed a coronet round her head, and gave an imperial grace to her lofty beauty of feature and of form. The captain gazed on it till the figure appeared to come forward and the canvas to recede, till the eyes seemed to fill with light and the proud lips to curl with a scornful smile; and then he turned away, for the strange picture bad a mysterious effect upon him, and hastily he sought the hall, where a hot and savoury supper smoked on the centre table, and where the bailie or castellan of the absent proprietor impatiently awaited him.