She was one day seated in the tapestried withdrawing-room, from whose large and deep-set windows the Earl had taken his last sad look over his vast possessions; her eye was also mechanically following the mazes of the Nith as it wound through the valley below; when Amy Evans hastily entered, with a joyful countenance, and a thick packet for her lady. "News from my lord!" she exclaimed, all breathless; "and Walter Elliot, who is even now from the army, says they are coming to lay siege to Dumfries immediately, my lady; and we shall have my lord at home again in his own castle. And oh! how glad I shall be to see my lord's own noble bearing as he mounts the entrance-steps, and to hear his firm tread as he paces his own hall, and to see my own dear lady smile once more!" Lady Nithsdale meanwhile had with trembling hands and a flushed cheek opened the packet which Amy hoped would have proved so welcome; but the words of gratulation died away on her lips while watching the fallen countenance, the blanched cheek of her mistress, as she perused the letter. "Alas! my good Amy, you are a flattering, but most false, prophet. The English counsels have prevailed; they are even now withdrawing the troops towards the borders, and have sent to recall the horse which had advanced as far as Ecclefechan. I never knew my lord write so despondingly. How strange it is, Amy, that when he is there to tell them what had best be done, to point out to them the advantages of occupying all the west of Scotland, of gaining easy possession of Dumfries, of Glasgow, and of Stirling, they should persist in their infatuation. Oh! if the king were but in Scotland, he would surely know who were his true friends! Then my lord's counsels would be attended to, as it is fitting they should be." "Indeed, my lady! And are they not coming to Dumfries after all? Why, Walter Elliot said it was the talk of all the army; and that the Highlanders said they would fight the enemy to the last in their own country, but that they never would be marched across the borders, to be kidnapped and made slaves of, as their forefathers had been in Cromwell's time! And can it be, my lady, that they will really turn back, when my lord says it is more advisable that they should advance?"