"So here the hale traffic o' Netherby Junction was stelled for maybe a quarter o' an hour, and the station-maister was nearly daft to think what he wad hae to enter on his detention sheet. A' at ance somebody cries, 'Here's Muckle Alick coming up the street.' And sure enough there he was, coming alang by the hill dyke wi' his hands in his pooches. For ye see this wasna his train, and he had ten minutes to spare. So wi' that the station-maister and the guaird and half-a-dozen lads frae the offices rins to the far side o' the platform, waving on Alick and crying on him to come on. Alick he juist looks aboot to see wha was late for the train. But no' seein' onybody he steps leisurely alang, drawin' on his weel-gaun pipe, proud-like as ye hae seen an elephant at the head o' a show.
"And the mair they cried and waved, the mair Alick looked aboot him for the man that was late for the train.
"'It maun be the provost at the least, wi' a' this fuss,' said he to himself; 'he'll be gaun to Loch Skerrow to fish!'
"At last a wee upsettin' booking-clerk, the size o' twa scrubbers, cam rinning and telled Alick a' aboot the drovers and the state the station-maister was in.
"'I'm no on duty at this train,' says Alick, 'but I'll come and speak to them.'
"So they made way for him, and Alick gaed through the crowd at the platform like a liner through the herring-fleet below the Tail o' the Bank.
"'Lads,' says he to the drovers, 'what's this?—what's this?'
"Then they mocked and jeered at him. For it so happened that nane o' them had been often at Netherby Market, and so no a man o' them was acquaint wi' Muckle Alick. Providence was no kind to the Paddies that time whatever.
"'Boys,' says Alick, as canny as if he had been courtin' his lass, 'this wull never do ava', boys. It's no nice conduck! It's clean ridiculous, ye ken. Ye'll hae to come oot o' that, boys!'
"But they were fair demented wi' drink and pridefulness at keepin' the train waitin', and so they miscaa'ed Alick for a muckle nowt-beast on stilts. And yin o' them let on to be an auctioneer, and set Alick up for sale.