"Is it not ten long years since we spoke together in this way ?" "Ten years!" said Butler.

"It's a long time--sufficient perhaps for a woman to weary." "To weary of her auld gown," said Jeanie, "and to wish for a new ane if she likes to be brave, but not long enough to weary of a friend--The eye may wish change, but the heart never." "Never!" said Reuben,--"that's a bold promise." "But not more bauld than true," said Jeanie, with the same quiet simplicity which attended her manner in joy and grief in ordinary affairs, and in those which most interested her feelings.
Butler paused, and looking at her fixedly--"I am charged," he said, "with a message to you, Jeanie." "Indeed! From whom?
Or what can ony ane have to say to me ?" "It is from a stranger," said Butler, affecting to speak with an indifference which his voice belied--"A young man whom I met this morning in the Park." "Mercy!" said Jeanie, eagerly; "and what did he say ?" "That he did not see you at the hour he expected, but required you should meet him alone at Muschat's Cairn this night, so soon as the moon rises." "Tell him," said Jeanie, hastily, "I shall certainly come." "May I ask," said Butler, his suspicions increasing at the ready alacrity of the answer, "who this man is to whom you are so willing to give the meeting at a place and hour so uncommon ?" "Folk maun do muckle they have little will to do, in this world," replied Jeanie.
"Granted," said her lover; "but what compels you to this ?--who is this person?
What I saw of him was not very favourable--who, or what is he ?" "I do not know," replied Jeanie, composedly.
"You do not know!" said Butler, stepping impatiently through the apartment--"You purpose to meet a young man whom you do not know, at such a time, and in a place so lonely--you say you are compelled to do this--and yet you say you do not know the person who exercises such an influence over you!--Jeanie, what am I to think of this ?" "Think only, Reuben, that I speak truth, as if I were to answer at the last day .-- I do not ken this man--I do not even ken that I ever saw him; and yet I must give him the meeting he asks--there's life and death upon it." "Will you not tell your father, or take him with you ?" said Butler.
"I cannot," said Jeanie; "I have no permission." "Will you let _me_ go with you?
I will wait in the Park till nightfall, and join you when you set out." "It is impossible," said Jeanie; "there maunna be mortal creature within hearing of our conference." "Have you considered well the nature of what you are going to do ?--the time--the place--an unknown and suspicious character ?--Why, if he had asked to see you in this house, your father sitting in the next room, and within call, at such an hour, you should have refused to see him." "My weird maun be fulfilled, Mr.Butler; my life and my safety are in God's hands, but I'll not spare to risk either of them on the errand I am gaun to do." "Then, Jeanie," said Butler, much displeased, "we must indeed break short off, and bid farewell.

When there can be no confidence betwixt a man and his plighted wife on such a momentous topic, it is a sign that she has no longer the regard for him that makes their engagement safe and suitable." Jeanie looked at him and sighed.

"I thought," she said, "that I had brought myself to bear this parting--but--but--I did not ken that we were to part in unkindness.

But I am a woman and you are a man--it may be different wi' you--if your mind is made easier by thinking sae hardly of me, I would not ask you to think otherwise." "You are," said Butler, "what you have always been--wiser, better, and less selfish in your native feelings, than I can be, with all the helps philosophy can give to a Christian--But why--why will you persevere in an undertaking so desperate?
Why will you not let me be your assistant--your protector, or at least your adviser ?" "Just because I cannot, and I dare not," answered Jeanie.--"But hark, what's that?
Surely my father is no weel ?" In fact, the voices in the next room became obstreperously loud of a sudden, the cause of which vociferation it is necessary to explain before we go farther.
When Jeanie and Butler retired, Mr.Saddletree entered upon the business which chiefly interested the family.