he 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
with the 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 dragoons' 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 shake-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 half-mutchkin by getting through
first, after driving over the tollman, it was at the expense of poor
Robbie's being ejected from his stirrups like a battering-ram, and
disappearing headforemost through the toll-house window, which was open,
hat, wig, green umbrella, and all--the tollman's wife's bairn making a
providential escape from Robbie landing on all-fours, more than two yards
on the far-side of the cradle in which it was lying asleep, with its
little flann