"Likely enough; 'tis the crest of the late king's mistress, Diana, the Duchess of Valentinois; and this——"
"Was about the dawning of the day, madam."
"And since then," continued the lady impatiently, "she has not passed the Inch."
"There have been no storms to delay the ship?"
"None, save that made by Girzy Gowdie, of Salt Preston, by baptising a cat in the devil's name last week, as we a' ken."
"But that storm came and went to drown a skipper of Dunbar, who had slighted her daughter."
"And yesterday," added Nurse Maude, "she did her penance under a pile o' tarred barrels on Gulane Links."
"Rightly was she served, the accursed witch!" responded Roger of Westmains, recovering the wooden cup and applying it hastily to the spiggot of the barrel, from whence he achieved a draught of ale; "for 'tis now kenned that when she rode forth on a broom stick, in the auld fashion, thrice a year, to keep the devil's sabbath at Clootie's Croft, on the Lammermuir, she left in bed beside her gudeman, a three-legged stool in the likeness of herself; and the said stool (which was burned wi' her) only assumed its own form when Father John of Tranent, chanced to pass that way, telling his beads, about the matin time."
"Cease this gossip, bailie," said the lady, starting again to the north window; "a horseman!—see, see!—a horseman at last is ascending the brae side."
"But he wheels off to Carberry," added the nurse, in a voice like a moan.