“Weel, I canna say but I am glad of that—I canna bide their yanking way of knapping English at every word.—I have kent decent lads amang them too—What for no?—But that was when they stopped up here whiles, like other douce folk; but since they gaed down, the hail flight of them, like a string of wild-geese, to the new-fashioned hottle yonder, I am told there are as mony hellicate tricks played in the travellers' room, as they behove to call it, as if it were fu' of drunken young lairds.”
“That is because they have not you to keep good order among them, Mistress Margaret.”
“Ay, lad?” replied Meg, “ye are a fine blaw-in-my-lug, to think to cuittle me off sae cleverly!” And, facing about upon her guest, she honoured him with a more close and curious investigation than she had at first designed to bestow upon him.
All that she remarked was in her opinion rather favourable to the stranger. He was a well-made man, rather above than under the middle size, and apparently betwixt five-and-twenty and thirty years of age—for, although he might, at first glance, have passed for one who had attained the latter period, yet, on a nearer examination, it seemed as if the burning sun of a warmer climate than Scotland, and perhaps some fatigue, both of body and mind, had imprinted the marks of care and of manhood upon his countenance, without abiding the course of years. His eyes and teeth were excellent, and his other features, though they could scarce be termed handsome, expressed sense and acuteness; he bore, in his aspect, that ease and composure of manner, equally void of awkwardness and affectation, which is said emphatically to mark the gentleman; and, although neither the plainness of his dress, nor the total want of the usual attendants, allowed Meg to suppose him a wealthy man, she had little doubt that he was above the rank of her lodgers in general. Amidst these observations, and while she was in the course of making them, the good landlady was embarrassed with various obscure recollections of having seen the object of them formerly; but when, or on what occasion, she was quite unable to call to remembrance. She was particularly puzzled by the cold and sarcastic expression of a countenance, which she could not by any means reconcile with the recollections which it awakened. At length she said, with as much courtesy as she was capable of assuming,—“Either I have seen you before, sir, or some ane very like ye?—Ye ken the Blue room, too, and you a stranger in these parts?”
“Not so much a stranger as you may suppose, Meg,” said the guest, assuming a more intimate tone, “when I call myself Frank Tyrrel.”
“Tirl!” exclaimed Meg, with a tone of wonder—“It's impossible! You cannot be Francie Tirl, the wild callant that was fishing and bird-nesting here seven or eight years syne—it canna be—Francie was but a callant!”
“But add seven or eight years to that boy's life, Meg,” said the stranger gravely, “and you will find you have the man who is now before you.”
“Even sae!” said Meg, with a glance at the reflection of her own countenance in the copper coffee-pot, which she had scoured so brightly that it did the office of a mirror—“Just e'en sae—but folk maun grow auld or die.—But, Maister Tirl, for I mauna ca' ye Francie now, I am thinking”——
“Call me what you please, good dame,” said the stranger; “it has been so long since I heard any one call me by a name that sounded like former kindness, that such a one is more agreeable to me than a lord's title would be.”
“Weel, then, Maister Francie—if it be no offence to you—I hope ye are no a Nabob?”