But it was not destined to be a perfectly calm summer evening’s spectacle. The hum of the full streets grew riotous even to the spectators on the hill. Voices rose above the hum, louder than peaceful voices ever rise. The triumph was a popular triumph, and like every other such, had its attendant mob of mischief. Shouts of rising clamor and a noise of rushing footsteps ran through the busy streets--then came a sharp rattle and peal like a discharge of musketry. What was it? The crowd on the hill poured down the descent, in fright, in excitement, in precaution--some into the mischief, some eager to escape out of it. “It’s the sodgers,” “it’s the police,” “it’s the Tories,” shouted the chorus of the crowd--one suggestion after another raising the fury of some and the terror of others; again a rattling, dropping, continued report--one after another, with rushes of the crowd between, and perpetual changes of locality in the sound, which at last indicated its nature beyond mistake. It was no interference of authority--no firing of “the sodgers.” It was a sound less tragic, yet full of mischief--the crash of unilluminated windows, the bloodless yet violent revenge of the excited mob. The sound--the swell--the clamor--the tramp of feet--the shouts--the reiterated volleys, now here, now there, in constant change and progress, the silent flicker and glow of the now neglected lights, the hasty new ones thrust into exposed windows, telling their story of sudden alarm and reluctance, and above all the pale, serene sky, against which the bold outline of Arthur’s Seat stood out as clear as in the daylight, and the calm, unimpassioned shining of the little moon, catching the windows of the Castle and church beneath with a glimmer of silver, made altogether a scene of the most singular excitement and impressiveness. But Cosmo Livingstone had forgotten that he was a poet--he was only a boy--a desperate, red-hot Radical--a friend of the people. Despite all Cameron’s efforts, the boy dragged him into the crowd, and hurried him along to the scene of action. The rioters by this time were spreading everywhere, out of the greater streets into the calm of the highest respectability, where not one window in a dozen was lighted, and where many had closed their shutters in defiance--far to the west in the moonlight, where the illuminations of the old town were invisible, and where wealth and conservatism dwelt together. Breathless, yet dragging his grave companion after him, Cosmo rushed along one of the dimmest and stateliest of these streets. The lad leaped back again into the heart of a momentary fancy, which was already old and forgotten, though it had been extremely interesting a month ago. He cried “Desirée!” to himself, as he rushed in the wake of the rioters through Moray Place. He did not know which was the house, yet followed vaguely with an instinct of defense and protection. In one of the houses