“I thocht ye wantit me, my leddy! I beg yer pardon,” answered Malcolm, springing to his feet, and turning to go.
“Do you ever read?” she asked.
“Aften that,” replied Malcolm, turning again, and standing stock-still. “An’ I like best to read jist as yer leddyship’s readin’ the noo, lyin’ o’ the san’-hill, wi’ the haill sea afore me, an naething atween me an’ the icebergs but the watter an’ the stars an’ a wheen islands. It’s like readin’ wi’ fower een, that!”
“And what do you read on such occasions?” carelessly drawled his persecutor.
“Whiles ae thing an’ whiles anither—whiles onything I can lay my han’s upo’. I like traivels an’ sic like weel eneuch; an’ history, gien it be na ower dry-like. I div not like sermons, an’ there’s mair o’ them in Portlossie than onything ither. Mr Graham—that’s the schoolmaister—has a gran’ libbrary, but it’s maist Laitin an’ Greek, an’ though I like the Laitin weel, it’s no what I wad read i’ the face o’ the sea. When ye’re in dreid o’ wantin’ a dictionar’, that spiles a’.”
“Can you read Latin then?”
“Ay: what for no, my leddy? I can read Virgil middlin’; an’ Horace’s Ars Poetica, the whilk Mr Graham says is no its richt name ava’, but jist Epistola ad Pisones; for gien they bude to gie ’t anither it sud ha’ been Ars Dramatica. But leddies dinna care aboot sic things.”
“You gentlemen give us no chance. You won’t teach us.”
“Noo, my leddy, dinna begin to mak’ ghem o’ me, like my lord. I cud ill bide it frae him, an’ gien ye tak till ’t as weel, I maun jist haud oot o’ yer gait. I’m nae gentleman, an’ hae ower muckle respeck for what becomes a gentleman to be pleased at bein’ ca’d ane. But as for the Laitin, I’ll be prood to instruck yer leddyship whan ye please.”
“I’m afraid I’ve no great wish to learn,” said Florimel.