The consulting with
a personage of such importance was a plausible excise, which Ravenswood
used to Bucklaw, and probably to himself, for continuing his residence
at Wolf's Crag; and it was rendered yet more so by a general report
which began to be current of a probable change of ministers and measures
in the Scottish administration. The rumours, strongly asserted by
some, and as resolutely denied by others, as their wishes or interest
dictated, found their way even to the ruinous Tower of Wolf's Crag,
chiefly through the medium of Caleb, the butler, who, among his other
excellences, was an ardent politician, and seldom made an excursion
from the old fortress to the neighbouring village of Wolf's Hope without
bringing back what tidings were current in the vicinity.
But if Bucklaw could not offer any satisfactory objections to the delay
of the Master in leaving Scotland, he did not the less suffer with
impatience the state of inaction to which it confined him; and it was
only the ascendency which his new companion had acquired over him that
induced him to submit to a course of life so alien to his habits and
inclinations.
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