Tam was an Ayrshire farmer, considered fairly well-to-do in the neighborhood, while Souter (shoemaker) Johnny was the village cobbler, who seldom, if ever, worked at his trade nowadays. All the afternoon had they sat by the open fireplace, with its roomy, projecting chimney, watching the peat burn, seldom speaking, smoking their old smelly pipes, and sighing contentedly as the warmth penetrated their old bones.
Mrs. Burns glanced at her uninvited guests occasionally with no approving eye. If they must inflict their presence on her, why couldn’t they talk, say something, tell her some of the news, the gossip of the village? she thought angrily; their everlasting silence had grown very monotonous to the good dame. She wished they would go. It was nearing supper time, and Gilbert would soon be in from the field, and she knew that he did not approve of the two old cronies hanging around monopolizing the fireplace to the exclusion of everyone else, and she did not want any hard words between them and Gilbert. Suddenly with a final whirl she fastened the end of the yarn she was spinning, and getting up from her seat set the wheel back against the whitewashed wall.
Then going to the old deal dresser, she took from one of the drawers a white cloth and spread it smoothly over the table, then from the rack, which hung above it, she took the old blue dishes and quickly set the table for their evening meal. At these preparations for supper the old cronies looked eagerly expectant, for none knew better than they the excellence of the Widow Burns’ cooking, and a look of pleasant anticipation stole over their sober faces as they perceived the platter of scones on the table ready to be placed on the hot slab of stone in the fireplace.
Knocking the ashes from his pipe, Tam rose unsteadily to his feet, and standing with his back to the fire, he admiringly watched the widow as she bustled to and fro from table to dresser. “Ah, Mistress Burns, ye’re a fine housekeeper,” he remarked admiringly. “An’ ye’re a fine cook.”
Mrs. Burns turned on him sharply. “So is your guidwife,” she said shortly, glancing out through the low, deep, square window to where her second son could be seen crossing the field to the house. She hoped he would take the hint and go.
“Aye, Mistress, I ken ye’re recht,” replied Tam, meekly, with a dismal sigh. “But it’s a sorry bet o’ supper I’ll be gang hame to this night, an’ ye ken it’s a long journey, too, Mistress Burns,” he insinuated slyly.
“Sure it’s a lang, weary journey, Tam,” said Souter Johnny, commiseratingly. “But think o’ the warm welcome ye’ll be haein’ when ye meet your guidwife at the door,” and a malicious twinkle gleamed in his kindly but keen old eyes.
“How is your guidwife, Tam O’Shanter?” inquired Mistress Burns, as she placed some scones on the hot hearthstone to bake.
“She’s a maist unco woman, Mistress,” replied Tam sorrowfully. “There’s no livin’ wi’ her o’ late. She’s no a help or comfort to a mon at a’!” he whined. Here Tam got a delicious whiff of the baking scones, and his mouth as well as his eyes watered as he continued pathetically, “If she could only cook like ye, Mistress. Oh, ’twas a sorry day for Tam O’Shanter when he took such a scoldin’ beldame for wife,” and Tam sat down, the picture of abject distress.