Thomas was so sorry for him and for what he had done that he did his best to cheer him up by telling him that what he had meant to say was twenty-five; but Tyne Drum was inconsolable, and went to sleep with the tear-drops on his cheeks.
When we got home in the evening Palestrina said, "We are far behind the Finlaysons in all things Scottish. I shall buy a Harris tweed skirt, and you and Thomas must buy something too." So we drove down in the coach to the ferry on a very wet and windy day to cross over to the "toon."
Our place on the coach was shared with a Scot, who was the most truculent defender of the Free Kirk I have ever met. He argued every single point of his creed, and became quite abusive at last, as he denounced the "Established" and all who belong to it.
The wind was high as we drove in the coach, and the rain fell heavily once or twice, but the voice of the gentleman rose higher and higher as the rain descended. Hughie, the coachman, chided him with no stint of words, and at every burst of eloquence on the passenger's part he remarked, "Anither worrd, and I'll pit ye in the ditch!"
This method of treating the argumentative passenger suggested the possibility of the coach being overturned in order to punish him, and Palestrina grew alarmed.
"I do hope," she said to Hughie, "that you will remember that we are not all Wee Frees, and that therefore we do not all require the same treatment meted out to us."
The guard at the back of the coach here showed his head over the pile of boxes covered with tarpaulin on the roof, and called out, "Pit him inside the coach wi' Mrs. Macfadyen, and she'll sort him! She'll gie him the Gaelic!"
Hughie chuckled and remarked, "Ay, she's the gran' wumman wi' her tongue!" And during the rest of the drive his threats to the eloquent passenger took the form of, "Anither worrd, and I'll pit ye in wi' Mrs. Macfadyen!"
There was a marked improvement in our friend's behaviour after this. He was in great difficulties when he came to get into the ferry-boat. It was easy enough to throw his first leg over the side while holding on by a thole-pin, but the balance required to convey the remaining limb into the boat was quite out of his power. And having made one or two ineffectual hops on the beach with the shore-loving member, he turned to the boatmen, and said gravely,—
"Lift in my leg, Angus! Juist gie me a hand wi' ma last leg!"