"--And for your contumacy in presence of the Right Honourable the Lords of His Majesty's Privy Council, you are to be confined in the lowest dungeon of the common prison-house of Edinburgh, for the space of six calendar months from the date hereof, to have your tongue bored by the Doomster at the Tron-beam, to teach it the respect which is due to superiors; and thereafter to be sent as a felon, with ane collar of steel rivetted round your neck, to the coal heughs of the right worshipful the Laird of Craigha' for such a period as the Lords of the said Privy Council shall deem fitting--subscribitur Perth." "Such mercy may ye all meet in the day of award!" muttered Walter. "Withdraw!" said Lord Clermistonlee, with a bitter smile of undisguised ferocity and malice. "Begone, and remember to thank Sir Thomas of Binns and the Laird of Claverhouse, that your tongue is not bored this instant, and thereafter given to feed the crows." Walter bowed, and was led out by the macer, while the council proceeded to "worry" and terrify the remaining prisoners, Lady Bruntisfield's household, and, after nearly scaring them out of their senses, dismissed them all, (save two stout ploughmen, who were given to Sir Thomas Dalyel as troopers,) with warning to take care of themselves in all time coming, and with a promise of a thousand marks if they gave intimation of their lady's retreat. CHAPTER IX. DEJECTION. A mournful one am I, above whose head, A day of perfect bliss hath never passed; Whatever joys my soul have ravished, Soon was the radiance of those joys o'ercast. LAYS OF THE MINNESINGERS. Walter was conducted back to the prison-house in Gourlay's Close, the Heart of Mid Lothian being already filled with nonconforming culprits.