“Ay, I was in America then,” said the mendicant, “and no in the way to hear the country clashes.”
“There was little clash about it, man,” replied Macraw; “he liked this young leddy, ana suld hae married her, but his mother fand it out, and then the deil gaed o’er Jock Webster. At last, the peer lass clodded hersell o’er the scaur at the Craigburnfoot into the sea, and there was an end o’t.”
“An end o’t wi’ the puir leddy,” said the mendicant, “but, as I reckon, nae end o’t wi’ the yerl.”
“Nae end o’t till his life makes an end,” answered the Aberdonian.
“But what for did the auld Countess forbid the marriage?” continued the persevering querist.
“Fat for!—she maybe didna weel ken for fat hersell, for she gar’d a’ bow to her bidding, right or wrang—But it was ken’d the young leddy was inclined to some o’ the heresies of the country—mair by token, she was sib to him nearer than our Church’s rule admits of. Sae the leddy was driven to the desperate act, and the yerl has never since held his head up like a man.”
“Weel away!” replied Ochiltree:—“it’s e’en queer I neer heard this tale afore.”
“It’s e’en queer that ye heard it now, for deil ane o’ the servants durst hae spoken o’t had the auld Countess been living. Eh, man, Edie! but she was a trimmer—it wad hae taen a skeely man to hae squared wi’ her!—But she’s in her grave, and we may loose our tongues a bit fan we meet a friend.—But fare ye weel, Edie—I maun be back to the evening-service. An’ ye come to Inverurie maybe sax months awa, dinna forget to ask after Francie Macraw.”
What one kindly pressed, the other as firmly promised; and the friends having thus parted, with every testimony of mutual regard, the domestic of Lord Glenallan took his road back to the seat of his master, leaving Ochiltree to trace onward his habitual pilgrimage.
It was a fine summer evening, and the world—that is, the little circle which was all in all to the individual by whom it was trodden, lay before Edie Ochiltree, for the choosing of his night’s quarters. When he had passed the less hospitable domains of Glenallan, he had in his option so many places of refuge for the evening, that he was nice, and even fastidious in the choice. Ailie Sim’s public was on the road-side about a mile before him, but there would be a parcel of young fellows there on the Saturday night, and that was a bar to civil conversation. Other “gudemen and gudewives,” as the farmers and their dames are termed in Scotland, successively presented themselves to his imagination. But one was deaf, and could not hear him; another toothless, and could not make him hear; a third had a cross temper; and a fourth an ill-natured house-dog. At Monkbarns or Knockwinnock he was sure of a favourable and hospitable reception; but they lay too distant to be conveniently reached that night.