Nancy Stair: A Novel

by Elinor Macartney Lane

and on the other:

"To Mistress Nancy, Mistress Stair,

At Mauchline race or Mauchline fair,

I shall be glad to meet you there.

We'll give one night's discharge to care,

If we forgither,

And have 'a-swap-of-rhyming-ware,'

With ane anither."

And it was this "swap o' rhyming ware" which brought about the tragedy toward which I draw.

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