Mag. A wae worth them filthy hureing dogs, if I wadna’ a libbet them mysel, I wonder that the gentle fouks and lairds lote them do the like o’ that.
Jan. A dear woman the gentle fouks and the lairds keepet ay in wi’ them, for they said they had the command o’ the de’il and the dead fouk, and the gentles durst na cast out wi’ them, for they got a’ their sins pardon’d for the less siller.
Mag. A dear woman that was unko like, the de’il wad get nae body then but the poor fouk, and them that had nae siller.
Jan. A well a wat that was true, for an they pay’d the priest well, the de’il durst na middle wi’ them.
Mag. A wow woman, a what’s come o’ them a’ now, am sure the like o’ thae fouks it had sae meikle power, needed neither die nor yet be sick: they wad live a’ their days.
Jan. A wat well did they, for the maist o’ them is dead and rotten, and the rest o’ them gade awa’ to Italy, where the auld Pape their father, the de’il, the witches, brownies and faries dwal,[124] and then we gat anither sort o’ gospel fouks it they ca’d curits,[125] fine sort o’ dainty honest foulks they war, but gay and greedy, they did na’ like sculdudery wark, but said na meikle against it, for a hantle o’ bits a callans wad a gotten twa or three bastards before they wad a gotten breeks; they beit to hae their tithes of every thing that grew, mony a time my father wist they wad take the tithes of his hemp too, an it were to hang themsels, they were ay warst whare a poor man or wife died, altho’ they left weans fatherless and mitherless, a deed they wad a sent their bellman, and wi’ his lang prelatic fingers he wad a harled the upper pair o’ blankets aff o’ the poor things bed, for some rent that they gard fouks pay for dying, a sae did they e’en, and yet they keepit a hantle o’ bra haly days, and days o’ meikle meat, Fastrens-e’en and Yule days, when we gat our wames fou o’ fat brose, and a sippet Yule sowens till our sarks had been like to rive, and after that a eaten roasted cheese and white puddings well spiced, O bra times for the guts, well I wat every body might live than that had ony thing to live on.
Mag. But dear Janet ye’er bra an lang o’ the memory, do ye mind o’ the waefu blast, when the foul thief was raging in the air, and the de’il dang doun a’ the kail yard dykes cutted the corn stacks, tirr’d the houses and blew giddy Wille’s wig in the wall, they said it was some young minister it had rais’d the de’il, and for want o’ a cock, a cat, or some unkirsen’d creature to gi’ him, they could na’ get laid again, an he brake the bridle slipped his head an ran awa frae them.[126]
Jan. A deed woman I heard tell o’ that, and how wood Willie M‘Neel met him on the staps in the mids o’ the water, an shot him o’er, and thought to drown him, but he gade doun the water like a meikle branded bill roaring, a’ burning fire; but I hae mind the first time it the de’il came to this kintrey was on a Sunday, I was a wi’ bit gaun lassie my father and a’ the men fouk was at the kirk, the ware twa o’ them, a humeld ane an a horn’d ane, a goodman de’il, and a goodwife de’il as we took them to be, we ran a’ into the house, and my mither barr’d the door and hunted the dogs at the byre hole, thinking the de’il wou’d rin frae the dogs, but, na, na, they got up on their tae end like twa auld men, they were a rugh lang hair like a pyet horse, wi’ lang bairds aneath their chin, and the meikle horn’d de’il box’d the dogs in at the hole agen, we ran a’ ben the house and grat, but our Jock wha wis a little gabby gaun laddock, cry’d ay, mither, mither, what is the de’il seeking here, he’ll be wanting to tak a’ the auld wives an cats to mak witches o’ them,[127] I true whan my gran mither heard that, she gat up and ran ben to the spence, and crap in the bear meal barrel to hide hersel frae the de’il, and curr’d there ’till the kirk skaild, a deed she was sae fear’d, she made her burn in the barrel; and what was’t true ye after a’ but a tupe and a ewe of the highland gaits, it the laird had gotten to gie the lady milk, but mony a day we leugh at the twa de’ils.
Mag. But dear woman, what an a body is that de’il, it ev’ry body is sae fear’d for him, is’t na him they ca’ auld nick, what fore do they ca’ him auld nick?