The friar then lifting up his huge portmanteau, went forth to the large paved gateway that surrounded the whole of the uppermost arches of the castle. It was so ample as to be like a small field, for it covered all the castle, save four small pointed turrets, and the square apartment which the party now left, that rose like a shapeless dome above all. In one corner of this level battlement there stood a leaden vessel that had once been used as a cistern. To that the friar went; and, laying down his huge walise, he took from thence a handful of blackish sand, and strinkled it all around the battlement on the one side to the opposite corner. He then stood and looked awfully around him. He looked to the heavens, but they were shrouded in a dark hideous cloud that now covered the mountains, and hung lowering over the uppermost spire of the castle. Neither the Cope-Law nor the hill of Eildon could be seen, nor could aught be seen save the dark and troubled cloud. The scene was truly impressive; and when the rest saw the friar looking on it with such apparent dread, all of them looked abroad with him, and whispered to one another, "He's gaun to be about some awesome enchantment now." The friar covered up his pormanteau with the leaden vessel, and then desired the Master to bring any weight he chose, and heap it on its bottom, which he had now turned uppermost, and, at one word or sign, he would make his goat-skin wallet carry the vessel, and all such weight, round the battlements of the castle. The Master, and every one present, pronounced the thing to be impossible,--the steward grinned in derision,--and, after mocking and taunting the friar on his art in the most gross and provoking terms, he proffered to hold down the leaden tub, wallet and altogether, or to forfeit his head if he failed. Then laying himself over it, in the attitude of holding it down, he called on the friar to proceed, and give him the promised canter round the walls, which he well deserved, he said, not only for his kindness to them all, and to their Miss in particular, but also for his kind intentions. Then he scoffed aloud, crying out, "Now thou poor vain fool and liar, be as good as thy word, and give me, an it were, but one hobble." "God do so to me, and more also," said the friar, "if I do not give thee such a hobble as eye hath not seen!"