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haunts of virtue and repose? Oh, let the soft infection touch your soul !"

"It shall, it does, my noble friend," replied the youth, strongly affected. "Then hear me, Hubert," returned the bard: "erring and guilty as you have been, in leaguing yourself with those men of violence, you have yet a strong plea for mercy and for pardon, since, as I understand, the whole neighbourhood confesses that to Roland is to be attributed that forbearance and humanity which, contrary to their former habits, these men have lately shown. On this foundation, provided you will instantly break off all connection with them, I will pledge myself to obtain for you, from our gracious sovereign, a full and unreserved amnesty for what has passed."

"I feel the obligation at my heart,” cried Hubert, deeply moved by the extraordinary benevolence of the offer; "but never, never shall it be said of Hubert Gray, that he saved his life at the expense of his associates! No, my friend, your kindness, and words are wanting to express my sense of it,

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must be in vain;

for unless those to whom I have sworn to be

faithful can be partakers of the mercy extended to myself, we live and die together!"

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They shall be pleaded for, my son," rejoined the poet: "I will accept of your conditions; for am I not, in fact, indebted to those who could so promptly act up to your wishes,— who could spare the gentle bard, in deference to the muse he loved!"

"But will the boon you proffer me, most generous of men," replied the youth, relapsing into deep despondency," will life itself be worth preserving, unless I may aspire to that which alone can render it desirable?-unless, owned by those who gave me being, I shall be sanctioned to address the heart on which my happiness depends? Oh! pardon me; but I had rather spill my life-blood on the rocks of M- -ton dale, and die the death of Roland, the freebooter, than be the thing I was, contemned, neglected, and forgotten !"

"You are wrong, you are greatly wrong, young man," answered Shakspeare, somewhat hurt and offended by this sudden burst of uncontrolled emotion. "Can it be that you have so soon forgotten those better thoughts, those

feelings of compunction and remorse, which so lately agitated your bosom? Remember, that as Hubert Gray, you were more sinned against than sinning; but can this be said of Roland the freebooter? Return, then, once more, my son, unto this vale of peace; again gladden the heart of him to whom you owe so much, the good old Simon Fraser; and trust me when I say, no effort on my part shall be wanting in your behalf with your former friends at Wyeburne Hall. Indeed, so strongly, both in person and manner, do you resemble, Hubert, one who was peculiarly dear to me, and who may, for aught I know, be yet living, though in a foreign land, that I do not absolutely despair of being able to discover some traces of your family and lineage."

This was strike upon every fibre of the heart of Hubert, and for some moments he appeared to be overcome by the intensity of his feelings.

an intimation which seemed to

"Tell

me," he at length exclaimed, in a voice scarcely articulate, "O tell me who are my parents, to whom I owe my being!"

"Nay, check this transport, my son," re

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plied Shakspeare, somewhat alarmed by the extreme energy of his manner ; perhaps I have already gone too far in intimating what I have done; for it has been solely on the ground of resemblance that the hope is suggested to my mind. More I cannot say at present; but rest assured, that the interest which is now awakened in my breast on the subject shall not sleep; I will make every possible enquiry, and, in the meantime, allow me to hope that when we next meet it may be in the cottage of Simon Fraser."

"It shall, it shall," replied Hubert, with emphatic tenderness; "I will again see that once happy roof; but my visits, for the present, must be short and seldom. I must rejoin my comrades by to-morrow's dawn; I must gradually prepare them for the mercy which you meditate; I must share their fate for evil or for good. Yes, strange as it may appear to you, my generous benefactor, it will require all my influence with these men, to induce them again to submit to the restrictions of civilisation,-to receive, long as they have been accustomed to a state of lawless independency, the pardon with

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the shackles of society. Yet I have no doubt I shall be able to effect this; but were I suddenly to break the ties which bind us, were I, their chosen leader, to accept what either they could not participate, or should hold in scorn, my destruction, and that, I have no doubt, of all connected with me, would be the probable result."

"I believe you are right, my son," returned the bard, "nor will I interfere as to the mode of carrying our wishes into effect; but where, let me ask you, ere we part, do you rest your head for the night, for you talked but just now of not rejoining your band until the dawn ?"

"Behold yon cavern," he said, pointing to the excavation which we have already noticed as visible on one side of the glen, "it is thither I occasionally fly from conscious guilt and strife. Whilst my steed is grazing in the valley, my couch of leaves is there, and there in silence and in solitude, on the banks of the stream which has witnessed the innocence of my childhood and my early youth, I love to pour out the anguish of my soul, the only solace which my wayward fate has left me!"

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