All the wood and ornamental work, the pictures, reliques, furniture, vestments, &c., were piled in front of the palace, and committed to the flames amid the yells of the populace, whose cries seemed to rend the very welkin. Dashing spurs into his horse, Walter gave him the reins, and sweeping his sword around him, right, left, front and rear, he broke through the crowd, and, followed by a score of bullets, galloped up the Canongate and escaped,--the sole survivor of that night's slaughter at Holyrood. CHAPTER VIII. THE VEILED PICTURE. To the Lords of Convention 'twas Claver's that spoke, Ere the King's crown shall fall there are crowns to be broke; So let each Cavalier who loves honour and me, Come follow the bonnet of bonnie Dundee. SCOTT. Skirting the city, Walter soon left the roar of the angry multitude far behind him; he was galloping among fallow fields, hedge-rows, and solitary lanes, and the silence of the country was a relief to his excited spirit after the fierce tumult of the last six hours. The snow had melted; Dairy-burn, and other little rills that traversed the dark fields, gleamed like silver threads in the starlight. Walter passed the loch, and reached the old Place of Drumdryan; the house was ruined and desolate, roofless and windowless, and the roadway was strewn with fragments of furniture. His anxiety increased, and, goring his horse onward, he dashed up the dark dewy avenue of Bruntisfield, and reined up at the Barbican-gate. The perfect silence, unbroken even by the barking of a dog, and the strong odour of burned wood, had in some sort prepared him for the sight he witnessed. There, too, had been the hand of the destroyer, and a great part of the once noble mansion was a bare, blackened, and open ruin. Its corbie-stoned gables and round turrets stood bleakly in bold relief against the starry sky; and from the depths of its vaulted chambers, the remains of the smouldering conflagration sent forth at times a column of smoke into the calm winter atmosphere. The court and garden were strewn with broken furniture, torn hangings, books, and household utensils. The sudden snorting of his horse drew Walter's attention to two corpses that lay near the outer door. They were those of John Leekie the gardener, and Drouthy the aged butler, who, like true vassals, had both "with harness on their backs" perished at their lady's threshold. Both had on corslets and steel caps, and one yet grasped a broken partisan. Full of dire thoughts of vengeance, Walter galloped back to the city, every corner of which was now overflown with the tide of confusion and uproar that had been so long concentrated around Holyrood. He naturally sought the Castle-hill, where Dundee and Dunbarton, with their sixty followers, who of all the Lowlands seemed now alone to remain true to their fugitive king, were drawn up under the cannon of the Half-moon.