CHAPTER VIII.
A REVOLUTION THAT FAILED.
But at first the two young men—especially when they were in the society of the young women—professed to make light of the threatened invasion. What harm could come of allowing a parcel of notoriety-hunting adventurers to air their eloquence—and their ignorance? The crofters would at once perceive that Ogden, M.P., knew no more about them and their ways of life than he knew about the inhabitants of the moon. As for Mademoiselle Ernestine—the fiery Ernestine would find it difficult to set the Highland peat-bogs in a blaze with her little tin can of paraffin. And as for Mrs. Jackson Noyes of Connecticut—but here the young men had to confess that they knew nothing of Mrs. Jackson Noyes; and so, to amuse themselves, at dinner, they set to work to construct an imaginary Mrs. Noyes out of a series of guesses.
"She is a passionate sympathiser with all suffering races—especially married women," said Mr. Meredyth, confidently.
"Men are brutes," observed Fred Stanley.
"She will denounce the hideous cruelty of landlords stalking grouse with express rifles," said Meredyth, keeping the ball rolling.
"She will call on the crofters to arise in their wrath and demand that of every stag killed two haunches must be delivered over to them, the remaining two to be retained by the landlord."
"But doesn't that sound reasonable?" said Käthchen, innocently—whereat there was a roar.
"Miss Glendinning," said Meredyth, apologetically, "you forget: the haunches of a stag are limited in number. It was Mrs. Jackson Noyes's idea of a stag we were dealing with. Well, Fred, what next?"
"Any landlord or farmer," continued the younger man, with a matter-of-fact air, "found guilty of killing a sheep without the aid of chloroform to be sent to jail for twenty-five years. No lamb to be taken away from its mother without the mother's consent—in writing, stamped, sealed, and delivered before the Sheriff of Dingwall."