"I'll e'en begin our potations myself," said he, filling out a flaskful of his liquor, and drinking it off. "By him that brewed it, it tastes well after my long walk! Wat Webster, wilt thou pledge me, man—
"'And let us all, my friends, be merry,
And set nocht by this world a cherry;
Now while there is good wyne to sell,
He that does on dry bread worry,
I gif him to the devil of hell.'"
And he trowled the flask upon the table while he sung, as a kind of bass chorus to his song.
"There's for thee, Wat!" continued he, filling out a flask.
Wat kept his hand upon the holy book.
"Wilt thou, honest John Wilson, pledge thy old friend in this red liquor, which formerly claimed so strong an acquaintanceship with the secret power of the topers' hearts of merry Christ's Kirk?"
"For the luve o' heaven," whispered Jenny, as she clung closer to him, "touch it not!—it will scald yer liver like brimstone, and may, besides, be the price o' yer soul's purchase."
John looked at the liquor, and would have spoken; but his heart failed him.
"Wilt thou, Meg Johnston, empty this flask to the health of thy old friend?"
"Guid faith, I, lad," muttered Meg, safe as she thought within the walls of her necromantic circumvallation—"I ken ye owre weel. Ye needna think to cheat me. I'm no a spunk to be dipped in brimstone, and then set lowe to. But [aside] how can he stand the look o' the haly rude! and the haly book? The deevil o' sic a deevil I ever heard, saw, or read o'. Avaunt ye, avaunt ye, in the name o the seven churches! The deil a bane ye'll get here—yere owre weel kenned. Set aff in a flash o' yer ain fire to Falkland."