Amen,
so be it! The blessed eyes of saints and martyrs, which see our
resolve, shall witness the execution; or their ears, which hear our
vow, shall hear our death-groan, drawn in the sacred cause!"
While thus speaking, she held Roland Graeme firmly with one hand,
while she pointed upward with the other, to leave him, as it were, no
means of protest against the obtestation to which he was thus made a
party. When she had finished her appeal to Heaven, she left him no
leisure for farther hesitation, or for asking any explanation of her
purpose; but passing with the same ready transition as formerly, to
the solicitous attentions of an anxious parent, overwhelmed him with
questions concerning his residence in the Castle of Avenel, and the
qualities and accomplishments he had acquired.
"It is well," she said, when she had exhausted her inquiries, "my gay
goss-hawk
[Footnote: The comparison is taken from some beautiful verses in an
old ballad, entitled Fause Foodrage, published in the "Minstrelsy of
the Scottish Border." A deposed queen, to preserve her infant son from
the traitors who have slain his father, exchanges him with the female
offspring of a faithful friend, and goes on to direct the education of
the children, and the private signals by which the parents are to hear
news each of her own offspring.
"And you shall learn my gay goss-hawk
Right well to breast a steed;
And so will I your turtle dow,
As well to write and read.
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