Part II.
Up got Sawny in the morning, and swallowed o’er his sodden meat, slag by slag; and aff he goes to the coals and the courting, lilting and singing like a lav’rock in a May mornin, O to be married if this be the way. The colliers wonder’d a’ to see him sae well busket, wi’ a pair o’ wally side auld fashioned breeks o’ his father’s,[35] and a lang cravate like a minister, or Baillie Duff at a burial, a clean face and hands, and no less than a gun sleev’d linen sark on him, which made his cheeks to shine like a sherney weight, and the colliers swore he was as bra’ as a horse gawn to a cow’s dredgy.
But Sawny came aff wi’ his coals whistling, and whipping up the poor beast e’en as outragious as ony ram at riding time; well might ony body see there was a storm in Sawny’s nose, light where it like; for no sooner had he sell’d his coals than he left his horse to come hame wi’ a nibour callen, and gade keeking up the Cow-gate, and thro’ the closes, seeking auld Be-go his good-mither to be, then in thro’ the fish market where he bought a lang herrin, an’ twa baps, a pair of suters auld shoon greesed black and made new, to make his feet feasible like, as he kend the lass wad look at them, (for his mither tell’d him the women look’d ay to the men’s legs or they marry’d them, and the well-legged louns gade ay best aff.)
So Sawny came swaggering through a’ the shell wives, but she was nae there, but coming down the town beneath the guard, meets auld Be-go just in the teeth, and crys, hey laddie my dow, how’s your mither honest Mary? I thank you co’ Sawny, she’s meat-heal, and ay working some, how is a’ at hame, is Kate and the laddie well?
Mat. Fu’ well my dow, you’re a bra’ soncy dog grown, a wally fa’ me gin I kend ye.
Come, come, co’ Sawny, and I’ll gie you a nossock to heat your wame, it’s a cauld day, an’ ye’re my mither’s countryman.
Na’ fair fa’ you Sawny, I’ll no refus’t, a dram’s better the day nor a clap on the arse wi’ a cauld shule, sae fallow me my dow.
So away she took me, co’ Sawny, down a dark stair to ane o’ the how houses, beneath the yird, where it was mirk as in a coal heugh,[36] and they had a great fire, Sweet be wi’ me, co’ Sawny, for it minds me o’ the ill part, an’ a muckle pot like a little caldron, seething kail and roasting flesh, the wife forket them out as fast us she cou’d into cogs and caps, for there came in a whin sutor-like fallows wi’ black thumbs and creashy aprons, that cuttied them a’ up in a wee time, but they ne’er fashed wi’ us nor we with them; we first got a gill and then a het pint; a vow said I Matty, is nae Kate gawn to get a man yet?
A man laddie, a wha wad hae her? a muckle lazy useless jade, she can do naething but work at husband wark;[37] card and spin, wash ladies rooms, and scour gentlemen’s bonny things, she canna tak a creel on her back, and apply to merchandizing as I do to win a man’s bread.