Since the torture to which the unhappy Ichabod Bummel had been subjected, and his subsequent imprisonment on the Bass Rock (where Peden of Glenluce, Scott of Pitlochie, Bennett of Chesters, Gordon of Earlston, Campbell of Cesnock, and others endured a strict captivity as the price of sedition), Lady Grizel and Lilian hoped that their involvement with the Orange spies, and their flight, would soon be alike forgotten, especially now, when they were so utterly ruined and impoverished by proscription, that they were forced to share the bounty of their humblest vassal. Near the old ruined chapel of St. Rocque, and close under the outspread branches of a clump of lofty beech trees, by the side of the ancient loan that led to Saint Giles' Grange, nestled the little thatched cottage of Elsie Elshender. It was low-roofed, and its thick heavy thatch was covered with grass and moss of emerald green. The white-washed walls were massive, and perforated by four small windows, each about a foot square, but crossed by an iron bar; two faced the loan in front, and two overlooked the kailyard and byre to the back. The cottage had one great clay-built chimney, at the back of which was a little eyelet hole, affording from the stone ingle-seats a view of the arid hills of Braid, and the solitary path that wound over their acclivities to the peel of Liberton, then the patrimony of the loyal Winrams. On one side of the door was a turf seat, on the other a daddingstone, where (in the ancient fashion) the barley was cleansed every morning, for the use of the family. This humble residence contained only a _but_ and a _ben_, or inner and outer apartment, and both were furnished with box-beds opening in front with doors. The first chamber, though floored with hard beaten clay, was as clean as whitening and sprinkled sand could make it; a large fire of wood and peats blazed on the rude hearth; and in its ruddy light the various rows of Flemish ware, beechwood luggies, milk-bowies, horn-spoons, and polished pewter arrayed above the wooden buffet or dresser, were all glittering in that shiny splendour which a smart housewife loves. Within the wide fireplace on a pivet hung a glowing Culross girdle, on which a vast cake was baking.