Johnnie, in himself, represented the home authorities, and feeling very doubtful in his own mind as to the views that might be taken of the affair, after much cogitation Angus determined to ascertain the sage Johnnie's opinion on the subject, and one morning, while he was dressing, broached the idea in a most artful way.
He was standing before the mirror brushing his hair, and Johnnie was hunting for some special necktie he had been told to find, when the following dialogue took place.
"Johnnie," asked Angus, without turning his head, "were you ever in love?"
Johnnie paused for a moment and rubbed his bald brow with one lean red hand.
"Weel, Maister," he said, with habitual Scotch caution, "I'll nae gang sae far as tae say I michtna hae been. There wis reed-heeded Mysie, ye ken a canty lass wi' a braw tocher. Ye'll mind her, sir, doon the burn near Kirsty Lachlan's but an' ben."
"Can't say I recollect her," replied Angus carelessly. "All the girls are red-headed about Dunkeld. Well, did you love Mysie?"
"Maybe I did," said Johnnie coolly, "an' maybe she would hae made me a decent gudewife if it hadna been for that blithering Sawney Macpherson--the gowk wi' the daft mither--whae yattered her saul oot wi' his skirlin' about her braw looks, an' sae she married him. It wasna a happy foregathering," concluded Mr. Armstrong spitefully, "for Sawney's ower fond o' whusky, an' the meenister had him warned fower times i' the Kirk o' Tabbylugs."
"How do you like the Italian girls?" asked the Master, who had been listening with some impatience to Johnnie's long-winded story.
"A puir lot, Maister, a puir lot. Feckless things whae warship the Scarlet Wuman wi' gew-gaws an' tinkling ornaments in high places. They're aye yelpin' fra morn till nicht wi' idolatrous processions an' graven images."
As these religious views of the godly Johnnie did not interest Otterburn, he proceeded: