But if a
gentleman shall ask me the same question, I shall regard the incivility
as equivalent to an invitation to meet him in the Duke's Walk, and I
expect that he will rule himself accordingly."
A declaration so decisive admitted no commentary; and it was soon after
seen that Bucklaw had arisen from the bed of sickness a sadder and a
wiser man than he had hitherto shown himself. He dismissed Craigengelt
from his society, but not without such a provision as, if well employed,
might secure him against indigence and against temptation. Bucklaw
afterwards went abroad, and never returned to Scotland; nor was he known
ever to hint at the circumstances attending his fatal marriage. By many
readers this may be deemed overstrained, romantic, and composed by
the wild imagination of an author desirous of gratifying the popular
appetite for the horrible; but those who are read in the private family
history of Scotland during the period in which the scene is laid, will
readily discover, through the disguise of borrowed names and added
incidents, the leading particulars of AN OWER TRUE TALE.
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