Page:Guy Mannering Vol 1.djvu/127

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GUY MANNERING.
117

remove at next term. Still, however, they showed no symptoms either of submission or of compliance. At length the termday, the fatal Martinmas, arrived, and violent measures of ejection were resorted to. A strong posse of peace-officers, sufficient to render all resistance vain, charged the inhabitants to depart by noon; and, as they did not obey, the officers, in terms of their warrant, proceeded to unroof the cottages, and pull down the wretched doors and windows,—a summary and effectual mode of ejection still practised in some remote parts of Scotland, when a tenant proves refractory. The gypsies, for a time, beheld the work of destruction in sullen silence and inactivity; then set about saddling and loading their asses, and making preparations for their departure. These were soon accomplished, where all had the habits of wandering Tartars, and they set forth on their journey to seek new settlements, where their patron should neither be of the quorum, nor custos rotulorum.