because it is the same she will use to
twist yourself. Ay, it is a fine lass! She is as clean as hill well
water."

"She is e'en't!" I cried.

"Well, then, she told me her concerns," pursued Miss Grant, "and in what
a swither she was in about her papa, and what a taking about yourself,
with very little cause, and in what a perplexity she had found herself
after you was gone away. _And then I minded at long last,_ says she,
_that we were kinswomen, and that Mr. David should have given you the
name of the bonniest of the bonny, and I was thinking to myself 'If she
is so bonny she will be good at all events; and I took up my foot soles
out of that_. That was when I forgave yourself, Mr. Davie. When you was
in my society, you seemed upon hot iron; by all marks, if ever I saw a
young man that wanted to be gone, it was yourself, and I and my two
sisters were the ladies you were so desirous to be gone from; and now it
appeared you had given me some notice in the bygoing, and was so kind as
to comment on my attractions! From that hour you may date our
friendship, and I began to think with tenderness upon the Latin
grammar."

"You will have many hours to rally me in," said I, "and I think besides
you do yourself injustice, I think it was Catriona turned your heart in
my direction, she is too simple to perceive as you do the stiffness of
her friend."

"I would not like to wager upon that, Mr. David," said she. "The lasses
have clear eyes. But at least she is your friend entirely, as I was to
see. I carried her in to his lordship my papa; and his Advocacy, being
in a favourable stage of claret, was so good as to receive the pair of
us. _Here is Grey Eyes that you have been deaved with these days past_,
said I, _she is come to prove that we spoke true, and I lay the
prettiest lass in the three Lothians at your feet_--making a papistical
reservation of myself. She suited her action to my words; down she went
upon her knees to him--I would not like to swear but he saw two of her,
which doubtless made her appeal the more irresistible, for you are all a
pack of Mahomedans--told him what had passed that night, and how she had
withheld her father's man from following of you, and what a case she was
in about her father, and what a flutter for yourself; and begged with
weeping for the lives of both of you (neither of which was in the
slightest danger) till I vow I was proud of my sex because it was done
so pretty, and ashamed for it