im in. And we rose and took our breakfast, and daunered to
the far fields, and inspected the young beasts, picking out the good
ones with many a knowing observation on heads and pasterns and hocks,
and then round the wrought land, and over the fields where a drain had
choked, and the rushes marked its course. We mapped out how this
should be mended and strolled back to the stable, and lay in an empty
stall where some hay had been left, and waited until dinner, with the
shepherd's dogs lying watching their masters, and the herds and
ploughmen telling terrible stories of one Mal-mo-Hollovan. Into this
peaceful scene came rushing a lass with the word that the Laird was at
church, as he should be, and Belle the gipsy wanted speech wi' the
mistress.

"An' why no', my lass?" said Dan; "she'll no' bite the mistress."

"The black eyes o' her, and the air o' her,--speech wi' the mistress,
indeed--the tinker!"

"Jean," said Dan, "be canny wi' Belle, or she'll put such a spell on ye
that ye'll no' hear your lad whistling ootside your window, and the
first thing ye'll ken he'll be inside, and you maybe in your sark."

"Ye ken too much aboot sich truck and trollop and the wey in by
windows," cried Jean, her face like the heart o' the fire; for her lad
was looking sheepishly at her from the corn-kist.

"Well, well, let Belle alane, or I'll be puttin' mysel' in Tam's
place," and poor Tam could only grin with a very red face.

And so it came that Belle made her way to the old room where the
mistress, my uncle's wife, was abed, after the birth of her son, about
whom the women-folk talked and laughed in corners, and looked so
disdainful at poor men-folk, that Dan said--

"It's a peety for the wean, wi' a' these weemen waitin' till he grows
up. I'm dootin' he'll be swept oot o' his ain hoose wi' petticoats,
and take up wi' the dark-skinned beauties in the far glens, like Esau."

And sorely put out were the women when Dan, referring to the heir, said
he'd come in time for the best o' the grass.

"If the colt has got plenty o' daylight below him, and middlin' clean
o' the bane, he'll thrive right enough!" The heir of all Nourn a leggy
colt! There was nothing but black looks and pursed-up lips till even
the easy-going cause o' the change said drily enough: "They're damned
ill tae leeve wi' whiles, a man's ain weemen-folk, Hamish, an' I meant
the bairn nae ill either."

Well, Belle was ta'en to the old room where the mistress