That being the next inhabited house to the eastward, Dan Chisholm and his yeomen landed all there; and in full assembly he related, to their terror and astonishment, how he had seen the devil himself and several of his monstrous agents, who had chased him from the castle, spuing fire and brimstone on him like a cataract. The rest said, that though they had not seen the devil, they had seen and heard enough to put any rational being out of his senses, and as much as to teach them never to go there again. Dan swore that they were not to be taught any such thing; for, said he, "Our captain's friends, and our own brethren in arms, are most unwarrantably, and I must also say unaccountably, confined there,--and we will either free them or perish in the attempt. I can find plenty of holy men that, with book and candle, can withstand the devil, and shall make him flee from his stronghold like fire from the flint. If I had the gospel friar on the one side of him, and Father Brand, or Capuchin Cairnabie, on the other, I shall gar him skip." While Dan was in the middle of this speech, in comes the great rough watch-dog; who, after fawning on some of the warriors as on old acquaintances, took his station in a dark corner of the miller's thronged hall, and began a licking his feet, but at the same time taking good heed to all that passed. It was finally agreed that Dan and a companion should ride straight to Melrose, and represent their case to the holy abbot there, who was devoted to the interests of their captain, and who, it was not doubted, would devise means of expelling the old demon from his guardship, and letting free their friends, who were all baptised men and good Christians. As they formed these sapient devices, many hard things were said of the devil; and our warriors seemed rather inclined to make a laughing-stock of him, till the miller's maid interrupted them with the following question: "Wha o' you trooper chaps does this maskis dog belang to?" "To nane o' us," was answered by several at the same time. "I wish ye wad tent him, then," said she, "for, this wee while bygane, his een hae been glentin like twa blue burnin candles: I wish he be nae a mad ane." "Sneck doors, and out swords," cried the miller: "We'll hae him proven."