This lady was one of those active members of society who take upon them faire lefrais de la conversation. She had just returned from the north, and informed Edward how nearly her regiment had cut the petticoat people into ribands at Falkirk, 'only somehow there was one of those nasty, awkward marshes, that they are never without in Scotland, I think, and so our poor dear little regiment suffered something, as my Nosebag says, in that unsatisfactory affair. You, sir, have served in the dragoons?' Waverley was taken so much at unawares that he acquiesced.
'O, I knew it at once; I saw you were military from your air, and I was sure you could be none of the foot-wobblers, as my Nosebag calls them. What regiment, pray?' Here was a delightful question. Waverley, however, justly concluded that this good lady had the whole army-list by heart; and, to avoid detection by adhering to truth, answered, 'Gardiner's dragoons, ma'am; but I have retired some time.'
'O aye, those as won the race at the battle of Preston, as my Nosebag says. Pray, sir, were you there?'
'I was so unfortunate, madam,' he replied, 'as to witness that engagement.'
'And that was a misfortune that few of Gardiner's stood to witness, I believe, sir—ha! ha! ha! I beg your pardon; but a soldier's wife loves a joke.'
'Devil confound you,' thought Waverley: 'what infernal luck has penned me up with this inquisitive hag!'
Fortunately the good lady did not stick long to one subject. 'We are coming to Ferrybridge now,' she said, 'where there was a party of OURS left to support the beadles, and constables, and justices, and these sort of creatures that are examining papers and stopping rebels, and all that.' They were hardly in the inn before she dragged Waverley to the window, exclaiming, 'Yonder comes Corporal Bridoon, of our poor dear troop; he's coming with the constable man. Bridoon's one of my lambs, as Nosebag calls 'ern. Come, Mr.—a—a—pray, what's your name, sir?'
'Butler, ma'am,' said Waverley, resolved rather to make free with the name of a former fellow-officer than run the risk of detection by inventing one not to be found in the regiment.
'O, you got a troop lately, when that shabby fellow, Waverley, went over to the rebels? Lord, I wish our old cross Captain Crump would go over to the rebels, that Nosebag might get the troop! Lord, what can Bridoon be standing swinging on the bridge for? I'll be hanged if he a'nt hazy, as Nosebag says. Come, sir, as you and I belong to the service, we'll go put the rascal in mind of his duty.'
Waverley, with feelings more easily conceived than described, saw himself obliged to follow this doughty female commander. The gallant trooper was as like a lamb as a drunk corporal of dragoons, about six feet high, with very broad shoulders, and very thin legs, not to mention a great scar across his nose, could well be. Mrs. Nosebag addressed him with something which, if not an oath, sounded very like one, and commanded him to attend to his duty. 'You be d—d for a ——,' commenced the gallant cavalier; but, looking up in order to suit the action to the words, and also to enforce the epithet which he meditated with an adjective applicable to the party, he recognised the speaker, made his military salaam, and altered his tone. 'Lord love your handsome face, Madam Nosebag, is it you? Why, if a poor fellow does happen to fire a slug of a morning, I am sure you were never the lady to bring him to harm.'