"Nay, sir," replied Dick, "you wrong us there; for on service we see every day the most terrible fulfilment of presentiments. I had a brother drowned upon the 16th of November--my father ever said it was _our fatal day_, and had been so for ages. He was wounded by my side on the 16th of November, when our Highlanders stormed one of the West India Isles, and on the 16th of November he was killed near the city of Alexandria, and with my own hands I buried him the day before we marched towards the Nile. Poor old man!"
"And there was poor old Major Wallace of Ours," said Grant, "who had always a presentiment that he would die on the 18th of March, the day he was wounded as an ensign at the blockade of Alexandria in 1801, and on the 18th of last March we found him dead in his tent, killed by a random shot, when we were covering the siege of Badajoz."
"Ay," sighed the priest, "there was poured forth the hot blood of many a gallant heart."
"So you see, my dear sir, that solemn presentiments are to be found in the camp as well as in the cloister," added Dick, draining his wine-horn, with a thoughtful smile.
"Our reverend rector is powerfully possessed by the idea that he will not outlive the 16th of this month of November, the day on which his patron----"
"Don't hesitate, my dear sir," said Dick; "for I am come of an old Catholic stock--say on."
"The day on which his patron-saint died, and for a year past this conviction has become stronger in his mind as the time approached; yet he is a hale man and well, though somewhat more feeble than he was wont to be. His patron is Margaret, Queen of Scotland, who died on the 16th of November, and this day is the _fifteenth_. A month ago, he felt this presentiment come more strongly, mysteriously, and solemnly upon him; so that he could no longer attend to his duties as rector, but spent his whole time in abstemious fasting and earnest prayer, as one preparing for a great change. He dismissed all the professors, students, servants, and other inmates to a country house which we possess, six miles from the city, telling us to enjoy ourselves for a brief space, as a dark day of mourning was at hand.
"Impressed by the solemnity of his manner, we set out for the place, and remained there anxiously waiting to hear tidings from him, for he is dearly loved by us all, and by none more than me. A week elapsed, but we heard nothing from Valladolid; at last, I turned back, being his dearest friend, and moreover, the oldest priest in the college--for I can remember the days when Charles of the Two Sicilies sat on the Spanish throne, and I was one of those who chanted the _De Profundis_ by the grave of Charles Edward Stuart; I can remember when the spires of seventy convents towered over Valladolid, for in El Campo every alternate house was a religious one; and now there are but sixteen and _only_ twenty-four convents. Well, gentlemen, I came back to inquire, and soon saw enough to fill me with alarm. In our absence the rector had hung the college chapel with black; he had moreover raised the pavement before the shrine of St. Margaret, and after measuring his own height, had there dug a grave for himself, eight feet deep, and as I crossed the aisle, its ghastly depth in the black and bone-impregnated earth that lay piled on each side, struck me with awe and terror. I searched for the rector, but was unable to find him in any of the dormitories, refectory, library, or garden. At last, barefooted and bareheaded, clad in sackcloth, and girt by a cord of discipline, I found him kneeling near the grave he had dug; he was praying earnestly, and never did the divine Murillo conceive a head more noble, or a face more expressive of piety, enthusiasm, worship, and prayer, in all its glory, than those of our rector as I saw him at that moment, with his eyes uplifted from a book of vespers towards the crowned statue of the Scottish Queen, around which twelve little lights were sparkling; and I could hear the words that came from his pale lips, though they fell faintly and slowly,