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 endow them with wealth and with heritages, and thou thinkst that there lives an other man offended even more deeply than thou, yet equally cold-livered and meanspirited, crawling upon the face of the earth, and hast dared to suppose that one other to be John Balfour?"

"For my own feelings," said Morton composedly, "I am answerable to none but Heaven—To you, Mr Balfour, I should suppose it of little consequence whether Basil Olifant or Lord Evandale possess these estates."

"Thou art deceived," said Burley; "both are indeed in outer darkness, and strangers to the light, as he whose eyes have never been opened to the day. But this Basil Olifant is a Nabal—a Demasa—base churl, whose wealth and power are at the disposal of him who can threaten to deprive him of them. He became a professor because he was deprived of these lands of Tillietudlem—he turned a papist to obtain possession of them—he called himself