"She will hae," replied I; "she maun hae, for her faither is in very bad health."
This new cause o' sorrow increased my paroxysm to a perfect buller.
"Ye are a maist sympathetic creature," said Mrs Kennedy, "to greet that way for anither's misfortunes."
"It's just my way," said I; "we canna restrain our heart or our stamach."
The mention o' the last word made the puir creature blush. It even stopped her tears. On hoo little springs do our passions depend!
This scene bein acted in the way I hae thus (I hope pretty graphically) described, I began to tak a mair philosophical view o' this important business. With an acuteness as natural to me as to a snip's tool, I penetrated the prudential course o' my operations in an instant o' inspired intuition. I fancy it wad smack considerably o' the inane gotium o' supererogation, besides being exposed to the charge o' anticipation, to lay my plan before my readers in the clumsy way o' a chart, where there's sae guid a pilot. I like to seize a subject as my father did my mother when he courted and won her; or as I did May Walker, when I courted and lost her. To the heart at ance! I premised my operations, by askin Mrs Kennedy, in spite o' the gladiator-like way she had o' handlin her knife and fork, to remain in my house for a day or twa, till we saw whether her husband would ca' upon me, to gie in the names o' him and his—alas! what a change!—his dulcinea! In the meantime, Beagle's precognition was still proceedin; and Gilbert Walker and his dochter wouldna, it was said, relent. For about eight days, Mrs Kennedy sat and watched at the window, to see if she could espy her faithless husband; while I sneaked about, to try if I could ascertain the absolute truth of her story, and the real facks o' my ain deplorable case. My inquiries, conducted under the disadvantage o' being obliged to skulk, and beg, as it were, an answer to my questions, were not very successful. I, however, discovered that a young man, wi' black routhy whiskers, and a long romantic nose juttin out frae amang them, like a promontory frae the side o' a thick wud, was busy courtin May Walker, whase heart had got entangled in the forest o' his face, and couldna be liberated by a' the ruggin o' her father and her friends. This description o' him agreed wi' that I got frae Mrs Kennedy, wha couldna describe the coverin o' his face without tears. I was satisfied it was the man; and my satisfaction was confirmed by a kind o' recollection—strugglin through the inspissated gloom o' the oblivion I experienced after being knocked doon in the Warlocks' Glen—o' the figure o' an Orson-like individual, wi' a great rung in his hand, mixed with the evanescent sounds o' "My love!—my love!—knock doun the spoiler!" which produced, thegither, the conviction that Mr Hugh Kennedy was the very man on whom May Walker was waitin on that eventfu Sabbath, and who felled me sae unmercifully to the earth.
CHAPTER V.
MY TALENTS BROUGHT STILL MORE IN REQUISITION.
Mrs Kennedy and I persevered, with the asperity o' hedgehogs, echini asperitate, (Pliny,) in our watch. Ae day, as I was sitting ben the house, where the parish register lies, the puir woman cam rinnin into the room, in a state of dreadful agitation, crying—