"What the devil, then!" exclaimed Stubbs, passionately; "and am I to lose my dinner if your Hottentots shouldn't happen to know how to cook it? No! hang me, sir, I'll superintend the thing myself. I'll do it with my own hands, if you will show me the way to your kitchen." With this request Mr Cameron immediately complied, by marshalling the captain to the scene of his proposed labours. On arriving in the kitchen, he forthwith prepared himself for the work he was about to undertake, by throwing off his regimental coat, rolling up his shirt-sleeves to his shoulders, and seizing on a large carving-knife which happened to be lying within his reach. Thus prepared, Captain Stubbs, after having been provided, by his own special orders, with a pair of choice fowls, lemon juice, bacon, parsley, thyme, bay-leaf, cloves, &c. &c., commenced operations; and, forgetting his dignity in his devotion to good living, he might now be seen smeared, from finger-ends to elbows, with grease and offal, earnestly engaged in disembowelling, with his own hands, the fowls on which he meant to exercise his gastronomic skill. Leaving Captain Stubbs, of his majesty's ---- regiment of horse, thus becomingly employed, we shall return to a personage who, we should suppose, will be fully more interesting to the reader. This is Grace Cameron. That lady, on leaving the presence of her father, and him of the fowl _à la Condé_, returned to her own apartment, when, recollecting that the dragoons were still in front of the house, she walked up to the window, to gratify her curiosity by taking another peep at the warlike display; and it was while thus employed that Miss Cameron, for the first time, perceived that there was a prisoner amongst the soldiers. The prisoner was a boy of about thirteen or fourteen years of age. He was mounted behind one of the dragoons, to whom he was secured by a cord, which was passed round the bodies of both. Grace thought she perceived that the boy looked up at the windows of the house with more earnestness and anxiety than curiosity; and, when his eye at length rested on that she occupied, he threw a peculiar intelligence into his look, accompanied by certain expressive but almost imperceptible signs, that convinced her that he was desirous of holding some communication with her. Satisfied of this, Grace raised the window at which she stood, and beckoned to the serjeant of the troop to approach nearer. He rode up to within a few yards of the house. "Is that poor boy a prisoner, sir?" inquired Miss Cameron. "Yes, ma'am," replied the serjeant, touching his hat. "For what has he been taken up? What has he done?" "Done, ma'am! Lord love you, ma'am--excuse me--he has done nothing as I knows of; but our captain suspects him of being a rebel." "Where did you fall in with him?"