The moment that the man who came to the door saw, by the glimpse of the light, that both my brother and Esau Wardrop had swords at their sides, he uttered a cry of alarm, thinking the house was surrounded, at which all the riotous soldiers within flew to their arms, while the man who opened the door seized my brother by the throat and harl't him in. The panic, however, was but of short duration; for my brother soon expounded that they were two perishing men who came to surrender themselves; so the door was again opened and Esau Wardrop commanded to come in.

"It's but a justice to say of those rampageous troopers," said my brother, "that, considering us as prisoners of war, they were free and kind enough, though they mocked at our cause, and derided the equipage of our warfare. But it was a humiliating sight to see in what manner they deported themselves towards the unfortunate family."

Ringlewood himself, who had remonstrated against their insolence to his aged leddy, they had tied in his arm-chair and placed at the head of his own table, round which they sat carousing, and singing the roister ribaldry of camp songs. At first, when my brother was taken into this scene of military domination, he did not observe the laird; for in the uproar of the alarm the candles had been overset and broken, but new ones being sworn for and stuck into the necks of the bottles of the wine they were lavishly drinking, he discovered him lying as it were asleep where he sat, with his head averted, and his eyes shut on the iniquity of the scene of oppression with which he was oppressed.

Some touch of contrition had led one of the soldiers to take the aged matron under his care; and on his intercession she was not placed at the table, but allowed to sit in a corner, where she mourned in silence, with her hands clasped together, and her head bent down over them upon her breast. The laird's grandson and heir, a stripling of some fifteen years or so, was obligated to be page and butler, for all the rest of the house had taken to the hills at the approach of the troopers.

As the drinking continued the riot increased, and the rioters growing heated with their drink, they began to quarrel: fierce words brought angry answers, and threats were followed by blows. Then there was an interposition, and a shaking of hands, and a pledging of renewed friendship.

But still the demon of the drink continued to grow stronger and stronger in their kindling blood, and the tumult was made perfect by one of the men, in the capering of his inebriety, rising from his seat, and taking the old leddy by the toupie to raise her head as he rudely placed his foul cup to her lips. This called up the ire of the fellow who had sworn to protect her, and he, not less intoxicated than the insulter, came staggering to defend her; a scuffle ensued, the insulter was cast with a swing away, and falling against the laird, who still remained as it were asleep, with his head on his shoulder, and his eyes shut, he overthrew the chair in which the old gentleman sat fastened, and they both fell to the ground.

The soldier, frantic with wine and rage, was soon, like a tiger, on his adversary; the rest rose to separate them. Some took one side, some another; bottles were seized for weapons, and the table was overthrown in the hurricane. Their sergeant, who was as drunk as the worst of them, tried in vain to call them into order, but they heeded not his call, which so enraged him, that he swore they should shift their quarters, and with that seizing a burning brand from the chumla, he ran into a bedchamber that opened from the room where the riot was raging, and set fire to the curtains.

My brother seeing the flames rising, and that the infuriated war-wolves thought only of themselves, ran to extricate Ringlewood from the cords with which he was tied; and calling to the leddy and her grandson to quit the burning house, every one was soon out of danger from the fire.

The sense of the soldiers were not so overborne by their drink as to prevent them from seeing the dreadful extent of their outrage; but instead of trying to extinguish the flames, they marched away to seek quarters in some other place, cursing the sergeant for having so unhoused them in such a night.

At first they thought of carrying my brother and Esau Wardrop with them as prisoners; but one of them said it would be as well to give the wyte of the burning, at headquarters, to the rebels; so they left them behind.

Esau Wardrop, with the young laird and my grandfather, seeing it was in vain to stop the progress of the fire, did all that in them lay to rescue some of the furniture, while poor old Ringlewood and his aged and gentle lady, being both too infirm to lend any help, stood on the green, and saw the devouring element pass from room to room, till their ancient dwelling was utterly destroyed. Fortunately, however, the air was calm, and the out-houses escaping the ruinous contagion of the flames, there was still a beild left in the barn to which they could retire.

In the meantime the light of the burning spread over the country; but the people knowing that soldiers were quartered in Ringlewood, stood aloof in the dread of firearms, thinking the conflagration might be caused by some contest of war; so that the mansion of a gentleman much beloved of all his neighbours was allowed to burn to the ground before their eyes, without any one venturing to come to help him, to so great a degree had distrust and the outrages of military riot at that epoch altered the hearts of men.

My brother and Esau Wardrop staid with Ringlewood till the morning, and had, for the space of three or four hours, a restoring sleep. Fain would they have remained longer there, but the threat of the soldiers to accuse them as the incendiaries made Ringlewood urge them to depart; saying, that maybe a time would come when it would be in his power to thank them for their help in that dreadful night. But he was not long exposed to many sufferings; for the leddy on the day following, as in after-time we heard, was seized with her dead-ill, and departed this life in the course of three days; and the laird also, in less than a month, was laid in the kirk-yard, with his ancestors, by her side.