with a force and a stroke loud and painful in the extreme, struck first ten, then eleven, then twelve; but there was no return. Again and again were voices heard commingling with the tempest's rush; again and again did the outer door seem to move backwards on its hinges; but nothing entered save the shrill pipe of the blast, accompanied by the comminuted drift, which penetrated through every seam and cranny. This state of uncertainty was awful; even the ascertained reality of death, partial or universal, had perhaps less of soul-benumbing cold in it than this inconceivable suspense. It required Willie Wilson's utmost efforts and mine to keep the frantic woman from madly rushing into the drift; and the voice of lamentation was sad and loud amongst the children and the servant lasses--each of the latter class lamented, indeed, the fate of all, but there was always an under prayer offered up for the safety of Geordie, or Will, or Jamie, in particular. At last the three lads who had encompassed the Dod arrived--alive, indeed, but almost breathless and frozen to death. They had, however, surmounted incredible difficulties, and had succeeded in placing their hirsel in a position of comparative security; but where were Jamie Hogg and the guidman? The violence of the storm had nothing abated, the snow was every moment accumulating, and the danger and difficulty increasing tenfold. Spirits, heat, and friction gradually restored the three lads to their senses, and to the kind attentions of their several favourites of the female order; but _there_ sat the mother and the daughter, whilst the father was either, in all probability, dead or dying. The very thought was distracting; and, accordingly, the young bride, now turning to her lover with a look of inexpressible anguish, exclaimed-- "O Willie! my ain dear Willie, ye maun gang, after a', ye maun gang this instant," (Willie was on his feet and plaided whilst yet the sentence was unfinished,) "and try to rescue my dear, dear faither from this awfu' and untimely end; but tak care, oh tak care o' the big Scaur, and keep far west by Caplecleuch, and maybe ye'll meet them coming back that way." These last words were lost in the drift, whilst Willie Wilson, with his faithful follower, Rover, were penetrating, and flouncing, and floundering their way towards the place pointed out.