“That is not one of your fisher songs, David?”
“Na, na; it is a sang made aboot Skye, and our mither was a Skye woman; sae Maggie learned it to please her. I dinna think much o’ it.”
“It is the most touching thing I ever heard.” The melody was Gaelic, slow and plaintive, and though Maggie gave the English words with her own patois, the beauty and simplicity of the song was by no means injured. “Put by the books, David,” said Allan. “I have no heart now for dry-as-dust lessons. Let us speak of Maggie. How is she going to live when you go to Glasgow?”
“She will just bide where she is. It is her ain hame, and she is amang her ain folk.”
“Surely she will not live alone?”
“Na, na, that wed gie occasion for ill tongues to set themsel’s to wark. Aunt Janet Caird is coming to be company for her. She is fayther’s sister, and no quite beyond the living wi’. I thocht o’ taking the boat the morn, and going for her.”
“Where to?”
“About twenty miles to the nor’ward, to a bit hamlet, thae call Dron Point.”
“What kind of a woman is she, David? I hope she is kind and pleasant.”
“We can hope sae, sir; but I really dinna expect it. Aunt Janet had a bad name wi’ us, when we were bairns, but bairns’ judgment isn’t to lippen to.”