Norna of the Fitful-head has still those feelings which link her to her kind. Mark me-there is an eagle, the noblest that builds in these airy precipices, and into that eagle's nest there has crept an adder-wilt thou lend thy aid to crush the reptile, and to save the noble brood of the lord of the north sky?"

"You must speak more plainly, Norna," said Mordaunt," if you would have me understand or answer you. I am no guesser of riddles.'

"In plain language, then, you know well the family of Burgh-Westra-the lovely daughters of the generous old udaller, Magnus Troil,-Minna and Brenda, I mean. You know them, and you love them."

"I have known them, mother," replied Mordaunt, and I have loved them-none knows it Detter than you yourself."

"To know them once," said Norna, emphatically, "is to know them always.-To love them once, is to love them for ever."

"To have loved them once, is to wish them well for ever," replied the youth; "but it is nothing more. To be plain with you, Norna, the family at BurghWestra have of late totally neglected me. But show me the means of serving them; I will convince you how much I have remembered old kindness, how little I resent late coldness,"

"It is well spoken, and I will put your purpose to the proof," replied Norna. "Magnus Troil has taken a serpent into his bosom-his lovely daughters are delivered up to the machinations of a villain."

"You mean the stranger, Cleveland?" said Mordaunt.

"The stranger who so calls himself," replied Norna-" the same whom we found flung ashore like a waste heap of sea-weed at the foot of the Sumburgh-cape. I felt that within me, that would have

prompted me to let him lie till the tide floated him off, as it had floated him on shore. I repent me I

gave not way to it."

"But," said Mordaunt, "I can not repent that I did my duty as a christian man. And what right have I to wish otherwise? If Minna, Brenda, Magnus, and the rest, like that stranger better than me, I have no title to be offended; nay, I might well be laughed at for bringing myself into comparison." "It is well, and I trust they merit thy unselfish friendship."

"But I can not perceive," said Mordaunt, “in what you can propose that I should serve them. I have but just learned by Bryce the jagger, that this Captain Cleveland is all in all with the ladies at Harfra, and with the Udaller himself. I would like ill to intrude myself where I am not welcome, or to place my home-bred merit in comparison with Captain Cleveland's. He can tell them of battles, when I can only speak of birds-nests-can speak of shooting Frenchmen, when I can only tell of shooting seals he wears gay clothes, and bears a brave countenance; I am plainly dressed, and plainly nurtured. Such gay gallants as he can noose the hearts of those he lives with, as the fowler nooses the guillemot with his rod and line."

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"You do wrong to yourself," replied Norna, wrong to yourself, and greater wrong to Minna and Brenda; and trust not the reports of Bryce-he is like the greedy chaffer-whale, that will change his course and dive for the most petty coin which a fisher can cast at him. Certain it is, that if you have been lessened in the opinion of Magnus Troil, that sordid fellow hath had some share in it. But let him count his vantage, for my eye is upon him." "And why, mother," said Mordaunt, "do you not tell to Magnus what you have told to me?"

"Because," replied Norna, " they who wax wise in their own conceit must be taught a bitter lesson

by experience. It was but yesterday that I spoke with Magnus, and what was his reply? Good Norna, you grow old.' And this was spoken by one bounden to me by so many and such close ties -by the descendant of the ancient Norse Earlsthis was from Magnus Troil to me; and it was said in behalf of one whom the sea flung forth as wreckweed! Since he despises the counsel of the aged, he shall be taught by that of the young; and well that he is not left to his own folly. Go, therefore, to Burgh-Westra, as usual, upon the Baptist's festival."

"I have had no invitation," said Mordaunt; "I am not wanted, not wished for, not thought ofperhaps I shall not be acknowledged if I go thither, and yet, mother, to confess the truth, thither I had thought to go.

"It was a good thought, and to be cherished," replied Norna; "we seek our friends when they are sick in health, why not when they are sick in mind, and surfeited with prosperity? Do not fail to goit may be, we shall meet there. Meanwhile our roads lie different. Farewell, and speak not of this meeting."

They parted, and Mordaunt remained standing by the lake with his eyes fixed on Norna, until her tall dark form became invisible among the windings of the valley down which she wandered, and Mordaunt returned to his father's mansion, determined to follow counsel which coincided so well with his own wishes.

CHAPTER XI.

"All your ancient customs,

And long descended usages I'll change.

Ye shall not eat nor drink, nor speak nor move,
Think, look, or walk, as ye were wont to do;
Even your marriage beds shall know mutation;
The bride shall have the stock, the groom the wall,
For all old practice will I turn and change,
And call it reformation-marry, will I!"

'Tis Even that we're at Odds.

THE festal day approached, and still no invitation arrived for that guest, without whom, but a little space since, no feast could have been held in the island; while, on the other hand, such reports as reached them on every side spoke highly of the favour which Captain Cleveland enjoyed in the family of the old Údaller of Burgh-Westra. Swertha and the old Ranzelar shook their heads at these mutations, and reminded Mordaunt, by many a half-hint and inuendo, that he had incurred this eclipse by being so imprudently active to secure the safety of the stranger when he lay at the mercy of the next wave beneath the cliff of Sumburgh-head. "It is best to let saut water take its gait," said Swertha; "luck never came of crossing it."

"In troth," said the Ranzelar, "they are wise folks that let wave and withy haud their ain-luck never came of a half-drowned man, or a half-hanged ane either. Who was't shot Will Paterson off the Noss?-the Dutchman that he saved from sinking, I trow. To fling a drowning man a plank or a tow, may be the part of a Christian; but I say keep hands aff him, if ye wad live and thrive free frae his dan

"Ye are a wise man, Ranzelar, and a worthy," echoed Swertha with a groan, "and ken how and whan to help a neighbour, as weel as ony man that ever drew a net.'

"In troth, I have seen length of days," answered the Ranzelar," and I have heard what the auld folk said to each other, anent sic matters; and nae man in Zetland shall go farther than I will in any Christian service to a man on firm land; but if he cry help out of the saut waves, that's another story."

"And yet, to think of this lad Cleveland standing in our Master Mordaunt's light," said Swertha, "and with Magnus Troil, that thought him the flower of the island but on Whitsunday last, and Magnus, too, that's both held (when he's fresh, honest man,) the wisest and wealthiest of Zetland."

"He canna win by it," said the Ranzelman, with a look of the deepest sagacity. "There's whiles, Swertha, that the wisest of us (as I am sure I humbly confess mysel) may be a little better than gulls, and can no more win by doing deeds of folly than I can step over Sumburgh-head. It has been my own case once or twice in my life. But we will see soon what ill is to come of all this, for good there can not come."

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And Swertha answered, with the same tone of prophetic wisdom, " Na, na, gude can never come on it, and that is ower truly said."

These doleful predictions, repeated from time to time, had some effect upon Mordaunt. He did not indeed suppose, that the charitable action of relieving a drowning man had subjected him, as a necessary and fatal consequence, to the unpleasant circumstances in which he was placed, yet he felt as if a sort of spell were drawn around him, of which he neither understood the nature nor the extent;that some power, in short, beyond his own con