woven
all in one piece, a cellar of old wine, a butler in black and flunkeys in
plush--is that your notion?'

Donald and I laughed, and Dugald looked cross.

Moncrieff did not laugh: he had too much tact, and was far too
kind-hearted to throw cold water over our young brother's ambitions and
aspirations.

'And what sort of a house do you propose?' he said to us.

As he spoke he took a chair at Dugald's side of the table and put his arm
gently across the boy's shoulders. There was very much in this simple act,
and I feel sure Dugald loved him for it, and felt he had some one to
assist his schemes.

'Oh,' replied Donald, 'a small tasteful cottage. That would suit well for
the present, I think. What do you think, Murdoch?'

'I think with you,' I replied.

After having heard Moncrieff speaking so much about cutting coats
according to cloth and looking before 'louping,' and all the rest of it,
we were hardly prepared to hear him on the present occasion say boldly,

'And _I_ think with Dugald.'

'Bravo, Moncrieff!' cried Dugald. 'I felt sure--'

'Bide a wee, though, lad. Ca' canny.[7] Now listen, the lot o' ye. Ye see,
Murdoch man, your proposed cottage would cost a good bit of money and
time and trouble, and when you thought of a bigger place, down that
cottage must come, with an expense of more time and more trouble, even
allowing that money was of little object. Besides, where are you going to
live after your cottage is knocked down and while your mansion is
building? So I say Dugald is right to some extent. Begin building your big
house bit by bit.'

'In wings?'

'Preceesely, sirs; ye can add and add as you like, and as you can afford
it.'

It was now our time to cry, 'Bravo, Moncrieff!'

'I wonder, Donald, we didn't think of this plan.'

'Ah,' said Moncrieff, 'ye canna put young he'ds on auld shoulders, as my
mither says.'

So Moncrieff's plan was finally adopted--we would build our house wing by
wing.

It took us weeks, however, to decide in what particular style of
architecture it should be built. Among the literature which Moncrieff had
brought out from England with him was a whole library in itself of the
bound volumes of good magazines; and it was from a picture in one of these
that we finally decided what our Coila Villa should be like, though, of
course, the plan would be slightly altered to suit circumstances of
climate, &c. It was to be--briefly stated--a winged bungalow of only one
story