The faither lookit to be a rich auld bool, baith from his manner of speaking and the rewards he seemed to offer for the apprehension of his daughter; but, to be sure, when so many of us were present that had an equal right to the spulzie it wadna be a great deal a thousand pounds when divided, still it was worth the looking after. So we just bidit a wee.
Things were brought to a bearing, whosoever, sooner than either themsel's, I daursay, or onybody else present seemed to ha'e the least glimpse of; for just in the middle of their fine going on the sound of a coming fit was heard, and the lassie, taking guilt to her, cried out, "Hide me, hide me, for the sake of gudeness, for yonder comes my old father!"
Nae sooner said than done. In he stappit her into a closet, and, after shutting the door on her, he sat down upon a chair, pretending to be asleep in a moment. The auld faither came bouncing in, and seeing the fellow as sound as a tap he ran forrit and gaed him sich a shake as if he wad ha'e shooken him a' sundry, which sune made him open his een as fast as he had steekit them. After blackguarding the chiel at no allowance, cursing him up hill and down dale, and ca'ing him every name but a gentleman, he haddit his staff ower his crown and, gripping him by the cuff o' the neck, askit him what he had made o' his daughter. Never since I was born did I ever see sic brazen-faced impudence! The rascal had the brass to say at ance that he hadna seen word or wittens o' his daughter for a month, though mair than a hundred folk sitting in his company had seen him dauting her with his arm round her jimpy waist not five minutes before. As a man, as a father, as an elder of our kirk, my corruption was raised, for I aye hated leeing as a puir cowardly sin and an inbreak on the ten commandments, and I fand my neebour, Mr. Glen, fidgetting on the seat as weel as me, so I thocht that whaever spoke first wad ha'e the best right to be entitled to the reward; whereupon, just as he was in the act of rising up, I took the word out of his mouth, saying, "Dinna believe him, auld gentleman, dinna believe him, friend; he's telling a parcel of lees. Never saw her for a month! It's no worth arguing or ca'ing witnesses; just open that press door and ye'll see whether I'm speaking truth or no."
The auld man stared and lookit dumbfoundered, and the young man, instead of rinning forrit wi' his double nieves to strike me, the only thing I was feared for, began a-laughing, as if I had dune him a good turn. But never since I had a being did I ever witness an uproar and noise as immediately took place. The haill house was sae glad that the scoundrel had been exposed that they set up siccan a roar o' lauchter and thumpit away at siccan a rate at the boards wi' their feet that, at lang and last, wi' pushing and fidgetting and hadding their sides, down fell the place they ca' the gallery, a' the folk in't being hurled tapsy-turvy head foremost amang the saw-dust on the floor below, their guffawing sune being turned to howling, ilka ane crying louder than anither at the tap of their voices, "Murder! murder! haud off me; murder! my ribs are in; murder! I'm killed—I'm speechless!" and ither lamentations to that effect; so that a rush to the door took place, in which everything was overturned—the door-keeper being wheeled away like wildfire, the furms strampit to pieces, the lights knockit out, and the twa blind fiddlers dung head foremost ower the stage, the bass fiddle cracking like thunder at every bruise. Siccan tearing, and swearing, and tumbling, and squeeling was never witnessed in the memory of man sin' the building of Babel, legs being likely to be broken, sides staved in, een knocked out, and lives lost—there being only ae door, and that a sma' ane—so that when we had been carried off our feet that length my wind was fairly gane, and a sick dwam cam' ower me, lights of a' manner of colours, red, blue, green, and orange dancing before me that entirely deprived me o common sense till, on opening my een in the dark, I fand mysel' leaning wi' my braid side against the wa' on the opposite side of the close. It was some time before I mindit what had happened, so, dreading scaith, I fand first the ae arm and then the ither to see if they were broken, syne my head, and syne baith o' my legs; but a', as weel as I could discover, was skinhale and scart free—on perceiving which, my joy was without bounds, having a great notion that I had been killed on the spot. So I reached round my hand very thankfully to tak' out my pocket napkin to gi'e my brow a wipe when, lo and behold, the tail of my Sunday's coat was fairly aff and away, dockit by the haunch buttons.
PHILISTINE IN THE COAL-HOLE.
It was about the month of March, in the year of grace anno domini eighteen hunder, that the haill country trummelled, like a man ill of the interminable fiver, under the consternation of Bonapartie and all the French vagabonds emigrating ower and landing in the firth. Keep us a'! the folk, dydit bodies, pat less confidence than became them in what our volunteer regiments were able and willing to do though we had a remnant amang us of the true bluid that with loud lauchter lauched the creatures to scorn, and I for ane keepit up my pluck like a true Hielander. Does ony leeving soul believe that Scotland could be conquered, and the like o' us sold, like Egyptian slaves, into captivity? Fie, fie; I could spit on siccan havers. Are we no descended, faither and son, frae Robert Bruce and Sir William Wallace, having the bright bluid of freemen in our veins and the Pentland Hills, as weel as our ain dear hames and firesides, to fight for? The fief that wadna gi'e cut-and-thrust for his country as lang as he had a breath to draw or a leg to stand on should be tied neck and heels, without benefit o' clergy, and thrown ower Leith Pier to swim for his life like a mangy dog!
It was sometime in the blasty month of March, the weather being rawish and rainy, wi' sharp frosty nights that left all the window soles whitewashed ower with frost-rind in the morning, that as I was going out in the dark, afore lying doun in my bed, to gi'e a look into the hen-house door and lock the coal cellar, so that I might pit the bit key intil my breek pouches, I happened to gi'e a keek in, and, lo and behold, the awfu' apparition of a man wi' a yellow jacket lying sound asleep on a great lump o' parrot coal in a corner.
In the hurry of my terror and surprise at seeing a man with a yellow jacket and a blue foraging cap in such a situation, I was like to drap the guid twopenny candle and faint clean away; but, coming to mysel' in a jiffy, I determined, in case it might be a highway rubber, to thraw about the key, and, rinning up for the firelock, shoot him through the head instantly, if found necessary. In turning round the key the lock, being in want of a feather o' oil, made a noise, and waukened the puir wretch, who, jumping to the soles of his feet in despair, cried out in a voice that was like to break my heart, though I couldna make out ae word of his paraphernally. It minded me, by a' the world, of a wheen cats fuffing and feighting through ither, and whiles something that sounded like "Sugar, sugar, measure the cord," and "dabble, dabble." It was waur than the maist outrageous Gaelic ever spoken in the height o' passion by a Hieland shearer.
"Oho!" thinks I, "friend, ye cannot be a Christian from your lingo, that's one thing poz; and I would wager tippence you're a Frenchy. Who kens keeps us all, but ye may be a Bonaparte himself in disguise, come over in a flat-bottomed boat, to spy the nakedness of the land. So ye may just rest content, and keep your quarters good till the morn's morning."
It was a wonderful business, and enough to happen to a man in the course of his lifetime to find Mounseer from Paris in his coal neuk, and have the enemy of his country snug under lock and key; so while he kept rampaging, fuffing, stamping, and diabbling away I went in and brought out Benjie with a blanket row'd round him, and my journeyman, Tommy Bodkin—who, being an orphan, I made a kind of parlour boarder of, he sleeping on a shake-down beyond the kitchen fire—to hold a consultation and be witness of the transaction.