d arm-in-arm to the tavern, to lay in a stock of provisions.

Peter Farrel was a warm-hearted, thorough-going fellow, and did not like
half-measures, such as swollowing the sheep and worrying on the tail; so,
after having ate as many strawberries as we could well stow away, he
began trying to fright me with stories of folk taking the elic
passion--the colic--the mulligrubs--and other deadly maladies, on account
of neglecting to swallow a drop of something warm to qualify the coldness
of the fruit; so, after we had discussed good part of a fore-quarter of
lamb and chopped cabbage--the latter a prime dish--we took first one jug,
and syne another, till Peter was growing tongue-tied, and as red in the
face as a bubbly-jock; and, to speak the truth, my own een began to reel
like merligoes. In a jiffy, both of us found our hearts waxing so brave
as to kick and spur at all niggardly hesitation; and we leuch and thumped
on the good-man of the inn-house's mahogany table, as if it had been
warranted never to break. In fact, we were as furious and obstrapulous
as two unchristened Turks; and it was a mercy that we ever thought of
rising to come away at all. At the long and the last, however, we found
ourselves mounted and trotting home at no allowance, me telling Peter, as
far as I mind, to give the beast a good creish, and not to be frighted.

The evening was fine and warmer than we could have wished, our cheeks
glowing like dragons' jackets; and as we passed like lightning through
among the trees, the sun was setting with a golden glory in the west,
between the Pentland and the Corstorphine Hills, and flashing in upon us
through the branches at every opening. About half-way on our road back,
we foregathered with Robbie Maut, drucken body, with his Shetland
rig-and-fur hose on, and his green umbrella in his hand, shug-shugging
away home, keeping the trot, with his tale, and his bit arm shak-shaking
at his tae side, on his grey sheltie; so, after carhailing him, we
bragged him to a race full gallop for better than a mile to the toll.
The damage we did I dare not pretend to recollect. First, we knocked
over two drunk Irishmen, that were singing "Erin-go-Bragh,"
arm-in-arm--syne we rode over the top of an old woman with a wheelbarrow
of cabbages--and when we came to the toll, which was kept by a fat man
with a red waistcoat, Robbie's pony, being, like all Highlanders, a
wilful creature, stopped all at once; and though he won the