“I never h’ard hoo he cam to the teetle: they say he was but some far awa’ cousin!” remarked a farmer-looking man, florid and stout.
“Hoots! he was ain brither to the last yerl, wi’ richt to the teetle, though nane to the property. That he’s but takin’ care o’ till his niece come o’ age. He was a heap aboot the place afore his brither dee’d, an’ they war freen’s as weel ’s brithers. They say ’at the lady Arctoora—h’ard ye ever sic a hathenish name for a lass!—is b’un’ to merry the yoong lord. There ’s a sicht o’ clapper-clash aboot the place, an’ the fowk, an’ their strange w’ys. They tell me nane can be said to ken the yerl but his ain man. For mysel’ I never cam i’ their coonsel—no even to the buyin’ or sellin’ o’ a lamb.”
“Weel,” said a fair-haired, pale-faced man, “we ken frae scriptur ’at the sins o’ the fathers is veesitit upo’ the children to the third an’ fourth generation—an’ wha can tell?”
“Wha can tell,” rejoined another, who had a judicial look about him, in spite of an unshaven beard, and a certain general disregard to appearances, “wha can tell but the sins o’ oor faithers may be lyin’ upo’ some o’ oorsel’s at this varra moment?”
“In oor case, I canna see the thing wad be fair,” said a fifth: “we dinna even ken what they did!”
“We’re no to interfere wi’ the wull o’ the Almichty,” rejoined the former. “It gangs its ain gait, an’ mortal canna tell what that gait is. His justice winna be contert.”
Donal felt that to be silent now would be to decline witnessing. He feared argument, lest he should fail and wrong the right, but he must not therefore hang back. He drew his chair towards the table.
“Wad ye lat a stranger put in a word, freen’s?” he said.
“Ow ay, an’ welcome! We setna up for the men o’ Gotham.”
“Weel, I wad speir a queston gien I may.”