‘Aye, afore the Ayr Bank; but the silly bodie the father was clean broken by that venture.’
‘That should be the greater reason, Mr. Walkinshaw, wi’ you to let your estate go in the natural way to Charlie.’
‘A’ that may be very true, Mr. Keelevin; I did na come here, however, to confer with you anent the like of that, but only of the law. I want you to draw the settlement, as I was saying; first, ye’ll entail it on Walter and his heirs-male, syne on Geordie and his heirs-male, and failing them, ye may gang back, to please yoursel, to the heirs-male o’ Charlie, and failing them, to Meg’s heirs-general.’
‘Mr. Walkinshaw,’ said the honest writer, after a pause of about a minute, ‘there’s no Christianity in this.’
‘But there may be law, I hope.’
‘I think, Mr. Walkinshaw, my good and worthy friend, that you should reflect well on this matter, for it is a thing by ordinare to do.’
‘But ye ken, Mr. Keelevin, when Watty dies, the Grippy and the Plealands will be a’ ae heritage, and will na that be a braw thing for my family?’
‘But what for would ye cut off poor Charlie from his rightful inheritance?’
‘Me cut him off frae his inheritance! When my grandfather brake on account o’ the Darien, then it was that he lost his inheritance. He’ll get frae me a’ that I inherited frae our forbears, and may be mair; only, I’ll no alloo he has ony heritable right on me, but what stands with my pleasure to gie him as an almous.’
‘But consider, he’s your own firstborn?’—