"Eh, sirs?" added Elsie.
"Clermistonlee," continued Lilian, shuddering, "would have had him torn limb from limb, but for the intercession of Claverhouse."
"And for what does he hate the youth?"
"Permitting me to escape, I presume," replied Lilian, raising her head with a little hauteur.
"Claverse'!" said Elsie, in a low voice; "then this is the first gude I have heard o' him. Folk say he is in league wi' the de'il (Heaven keep us!) and that when the satanic spirit is in him, his black een flash like wildfire in a moss-hagg. Certes! I'll no forget that fearfu' day when he would hae dookit me to death for a word or twa."
"Colonel Grahame was guilty of most abominable ungallantry, Elsie; and yet I do not think he would have ducked me."
"Ungallantry, Lilian!" said Lady Grisel, grasping her cane, "ye should say a breach of law, ye sillie lassie. Our barony hath power of pit and gallows by charter from Robert the Auld Farrand, and it was a daring act and a graceless, to drag a vassal from our bounds, when I could have hanged her myself on the dule-tree, by a word of my mouth!" (Elsie winced.) "But he stood the youth's friend, you say?"
"Yes, and what dost think, nurse Elsie, so did old Beardie Dalyel!"
"Marvellous! but mind ye the proverb, Hawks dinna pyke out hawks' een. The lad wears buff and steel, and eats his beef and bannock by tuck of drum; and sae baith Claverse' and Dalyel shewed him that mercy whilk a sanct o' God's oppressed kirk, would hae sued in vain wi' clasped hands and bended knees."
"Ah, nurse, you don't know this young man. He is so mild-eyed and gentle, that Dalyel—"