‘And what can your hacking away at yon reptile have to do with the health or lives of others, friend Donald?’
‘I tell you again, sir, my name is Eachainn, and no Donald, and I’ll no be wondering that you don’t know about this, for the Southern duine-uasal, she’ll often not be knowing the things that the poor Highlander herself’ll be knowing all aboot.’
‘And prythee what good is there in your wasting twenty minutes in cutting up and burying a snake?’
‘As you’ll be a stranger, sir,’ said Eachainn, after he had succeeded in catching the traveller’s nag for him, which the other mounted, and trotted on in the path pointed out to him, ‘as you’ll be a stranger, sir, I must be of good manners, and shust be telling you the things you’ll not know yourself. I may tell you that if you’ll not be cutting a nathair in five pieces, besides her head, she’ll be sure to come alive again, and bigger and more stronger than she’ll was before, and if you’ll be leaving the pieces on the ground, they’ll shust be creeping together again and join. Sometimes her head will join where her tail was before, and her tail in the place where her head was before, and then she’ll be shust awful, worst than she’ll be before twenty times. But that’ll not be all we’ll be burying them for. If the bits of the nathair will be left on the ground, in the sun and in the moonlight, they’ll turn into awful bad and great big flies, dark green and yellow, with spots like the nathair herself, and they’ll be so poison that when they touch a mans or a baiste, there will come a cancer, which no doctor can cure.’
While thus speaking, Eachainn began to grow very pale, his voice trembled, and at last, sitting down on the heather, he groaned aloud.
‘Why, my poor fellow, what’s the matter with you?’ kindly inquired the exciseman.
‘I doot, sir,’ said Eachainn in a feeble tone, ‘I doot, sir, the sting of the nathair has been stronger on me than I’ll be thinking, I’m shust crippled, sir, and my leg is stiff and sore like, and I’m sick, sick at my heart.’ Poor Eachainn, in finishing these words, attempted to rise, but immediately staggered, and fell down insensible.
The gauger, greatly disconcerted, threw himself from his steed with such alacrity that he almost overturned the gearran, as well as himself. ‘What?’ he exclaimed: ‘Hoot, toot, man, never give way; ’tis but a dwam, puir fellow! His jaw drops just like Fraser, the supervisor, when Red Chisholm, the smuggler, stuck his dirk into his doup. If the lad should die here, and no one but me with him, why, what would folk say? Gude save us! how swelled his leg is, and all black and green; ’tis fearsome; would to heaven I were weel out o’ the scrape, or had never entered the vile country!’ Here, however, a bright idea struck the alarmed traveller, and hastily going to the bundle suspended from the right horn of the strathair, he hurriedly turned over its miscellaneous contents, until he found his whisky flask, which he uncorked, and poured with a trembling hand, for fear of the remedy being too late, a good portion of the liquor down the throat of the unconscious Highlander. The stimulus was powerful. The fainting lad, in spite of himself, gave a desperate gulp, which caused some of the spirit to enter his windpipe, consequently the first symptoms of returning animation on the part of Eachainn was a succession of hideous gaspings. For fully two minutes he choked and coughed, until the bewildered gauger feared he had done for him in earnest. At length, to his unspeakable relief, Eachainn opened his eyes, and getting the use of his tongue once more, he most zealously and piously recommended the Southron to the good offices of his majesty, Domhnull Dubh. As he, however, spoke in his native tongue, Gillespie could not appreciate the extent of the kindness intended for him. The first use Eachainn made of his hands was, with the left to gently scratch the bitten foot, and with the right he took the flask from the still confused gauger, and taking a good pull at the contents, again attempted to rise, but found he was unable to walk. On perceiving this, the gauger insisted on his mounting behind him. The gearran, however, apparently resenting that his consent had not been asked to the new arrangement, gave a sharp smarting neigh, and commenced to back. These hostile demonstrations on the part of the pony were not at all displeasing to Eachainn, who thought that if the gearran continued restive, he might have him all to himself. He accordingly kept giving sly kicks with his uninjured foot in the animal’s groin. The consequence was that every moment the pony became more indignant and unmanageable; but the gauger, recollecting that he was in his Majesty’s service, strove to maintain his position with the dignity due to that office. He pulled hard at the taod, but finding that of no use, he followed the example of honest John Gilpin, and grasped the animal’s mane with both hands, receiving, through every kick-up of the pony, sore thumps from the strathair, which caused him much uneasiness. Eachainn, holding on ‘like grim death,’ continued teasing the gearran, at the same time pretending to coax him by saying ‘Sheo! sheo!’ The pony heeded neither that, nor the ‘Huish! huish!’ of the exciseman, but kept kicking, prancing, and rearing with a zeal and energy worthy of a better cause. The commotion at length ended by the gauger tumbling over the animal’s head.
Eachainn, beginning to think that he had carried the joke too far, dismounted, and seeing the discomfited Southron lying at full length without signs of life, in his turn became frightened. At this trying moment he bethought him of the specific, which had proved so useful in his own case. He had no difficulty in finding the flask, and was about to administer a dose, when the gauger, who had been only a little confused at his sudden fall, got on his feet; but nothing would induce him to remount, so Eachainn rode at his ease, while the annoyed gauger stalked along with heavy strides, cordially abusing the country, its moors, its gearrans, and its whisky. The shades of evening began to lengthen, the scene gradually changed, our travellers began to leave the heathery moor behind, and enter on arable land, with patches here and there under cultivation, chiefly oats and potatoes, while an occasional cow grazing, or a horse tethered, showed them that they were approaching their journey’s end.