"Will you?" asked Greumoch, sullenly.
"Yes—you dour-looking Redshank."
"Well—my glass is full."
"Here's to the health of King George—and to the confusion of his enemies, including Rob Roy, the Pope, the Devil, and the Pretender!"
On hearing this offensive speech, Greumoch dashed the glass and its fiery contents full into the eyes of the sergeant and half-blinded him.
Inspired with rage, the non-commissioned officer ordered his men to secure the prisoner beyond all chance of escape during the night. The dragoons selected a heavy old-fashioned chair, in which they placed Greumoch, and tied thereto his hands, arms, and legs, lacing about him some twenty yards of rope, the knots of which were tied behind; and now, deeming him secure beyond all hope of flight, they stabled their horses, threw off their accoutrements, applied themselves to the whisky-bottle, and after making very merry, retired to rest in the outer room.
When all was dark and still, and poor Greumoch's hands and limbs were fast becoming swollen, benumbed, and stiff—all but powerless, in consequence of the cruel manner in which the soldiers had bound him—he remembered having seen a knife on the table, where the sergeant had left it by chance.
Could he but reach that knife! But, tied as he was, of what use could it be? Yet there occurred to him an idea, which he resolved at once to put in practice.
By vigorous, yet almost noiseless, efforts with his feet, he dragged the chair across the room towards the table. At last he reached it, and, after being so frequently baffled that he was about to relinquish the attempt in despair, he contrived to take up the knife in his mouth, and to grasp the handle firmly with his teeth.
Then, by turning his head on each side alternately, he applied the edge so successfully to the cords which crossed his shoulders, that he soon severed them. By this process he gradually got one hand loose; but for many minutes it hung powerless by his side. However, anon he grasped the knife with it, and in a short time was free; but on rising from the chair, so much were his limbs benumbed, that he staggered like a tipsy man, and overturned both chair and table. Heavily they fell with a crash on the floor!