THE HUNTLY CASKET. CHAPTER I. "The nimble trout delighteth in the mountain stream ;-the plaice and muddy eel love the fens.-Nature is a book that contains more pages than the sands which surround the great ocean." Gentle Angler. 66 HOOLY, hooly, my Lord!" exclaimed Davie Garrie; "saul, but my beast is blawin' like a huntet otter. Let us gang the day as we would gang the morn. We are only saxteen guid Scots miles frae Aberdeen. See, yonder's the auld keep o' Kintore throwing up its braid shoulders amidst the brown oak and siller pines." "True, Davie, true," replied a noble-looking youth, with a blue velvet bonnet, plumed with the pinion feathers of the mountain eagle, and a few sprigs of blooming heather-a riding tunic of fine English green cloth, and trews of the dark coloured tartan, with laced buskins, spurred with silver, and a good Ferrara by his side. "True, Davie; but did I not tell you that this is the birth-day of his sacred Majesty King James the Fifth-long may he reign; and, moreover, did I not say to thee, when I left Huntly Castle this morning, that this casket contains my lady-mother the Marchioness's jewels, which she requested me to get conveyed in safety to Aberdeen, that she may appear properly apparelled at the princely treat which the Marquis intends to give to the Nobles, Professors, and Magistrates, in honour of the day? So spur we must, and speed too; for the clouds of night begin to climb Bennohie's rugged steep, and see yon black cloud that is rearing its spiral form from the topmost pinnacle-now it clears away. Happy James Stuart! every mountain speaketh loyalty. I'd sooner be king of bonny Caledonia, than sit enthroned in Paris, and touch Rome with my sceptre. That part of Bennohie, Davie, is the property of John Horn Elphinston of Logie, as leal a gentleman as the north can boast; and the cloud you saw passing away was the kindling of |