“And what news do you bring us from Edinburgh, Monkbarns?” said Sir Arthur; “how wags the world in Auld Reekie?”
“Mad, Sir Arthur, mad—irretrievably frantic—far beyond dipping in the sea, shaving the crown, or drinking hellebore. The worst sort of frenzy, a military frenzy, hath possessed man, woman, and child.”
“And high time, I think,” said Miss Wardour, “when we are threatened with invasion from abroad and insurrection at home.”
“O, I did not doubt you would join the scarlet host against me—women, like turkeys, are always subdued by a red rag—But what says Sir Arthur, whose dreams are of standing armies and German oppression?”
“Why, I say, Mr. Oldbuck,” replied the knight, “that so far as I am capable of judging, we ought to resist c*m toto corpore regni—as the phrase is, unless I h
