“Never in Bedlam?” said Madge, as if with some surprise.—“But ye’ll hae been in the cells at Edinburgh!”
“Never,” repeated Jeanie.
“Weel, I think thae daft carles the magistrates send naebody to Bedlam but me—thae maun hae an unco respect for me, for whenever I am brought to them, thae aye hae me back to Bedlam. But troth, Jeanie” (she said this in a very confidential tone), “to tell ye my private mind about it, I think ye are at nae great loss; for the keeper’s a cross-patch, and he maun hae it a’ his ain gate, to be sure, or he makes the place waur than hell. I often tell him he’s the daftest in a’ the house.—But what are they making sic a skirling for?—Deil ane o’ them’s get in here—it wadna be mensfu’! I will sit wi’ my back again the door; it winna be that easy stirring me.”
“Madge!”—“Madge!”—“Madge Wildfire!”—“Madge devil! what have ye done with the horse?” was repeatedly asked by the men without.
“He’s e’en at his supper, puir thing,” answered Madge; “deil an ye were at yours, too, an it were scauding brimstone, and then we wad hae less o’ your din.”
“His supper!” answered the more sulky ruffian—“What d’ye mean by that!—Tell me where he is, or I will knock your Bedlam brains out!”
“He’s in Gaffer Gablewood’s wheat-close, an ye maun ken.”
“His wheat-close, you crazed jilt!” answered the other, with an accent of great indignation.
“O, dear Tyburn Tam, man, what ill will the blades of the young wheat do to the puir nag?”
“That is not the question,” said the other robber; “but what the country will say to us to-morrow, when they see him in such quarters?—Go, Tom, and bring him in; and avoid the soft ground, my lad; leave no hoof-track behind you.”