t, ere he died, he had the satisfaction of feasting on his old
antagonist, who was man's meat next morning. They caught him in a net.
Sam knew him by the twist in his tail.]

I started to my feet, visions of sleepwalkers and lunatics thronging
through my imagination, but was caught hold of by Nanny, who, shaking
with suppressed laughter, whispered me, while the tears ran out and
danced upon her long lashes for very fun, that it was only precious
Aleck, "wham Jeanie had cled in her bit wyliecoat, since she dauredna
wake the house to look for aught else;" then, laying her hand upon my
shoulder (and the wet oozed from between her fingers), she proposed,
with a maidenly mixture of kindliness and hesitation, that I should go
and do so likewise. Who knows how I might have stood the temptation,
had she not in time perceived my error, and, blushing deeply,
explained, that as Aleck had done--undressed himself alone--so should
I. Under these stipulations, I declined parting with more than my
coat, for which she substituted a curiously quilted coverlet; then
bringing me warm water, insisted on my bathing my feet. I gladly
consented; but hardly had I pulled off the coarse stockings, and
washed the black soil from my hands, when there began a grievous
coughing and grumbling in the room from which the girls had come.

"Lord haud a grip o' us!" cried Aleck; "it's auld _Peg_
hoastin'--De'il wauken her, the cankered rush! she'll breed a bonny
splore gin she finds me here."

"Whisht, whisht," whispered Nanny, "she's as keen as colly i' the
lugs; and glegger than baudrons i' the dark."

The libelled Mistress Margaret gave no further time for calumniation;
slamming open the door, she came down upon us, gaunt, grim, and
unescapable--"Ye menseless tawpies! ye bauld cutties! ye wanton
limmers! ye--_wha's this_?" She snatched the light from Nannie's hand,
and poked it close to my face--"Wha's this? I say, wha's this?"

"Hoots, woman!" cried Nanny, spiritedly, yet with an air of
conciliation, "I'se bail ye mony a boy has come over the moss to crack
wi' yoursell when ye were a lassie."

"_When_ I was a lassie!"

I thought she would have choked; but her indignation at last made its
way up in thunder upon my devoted head.

"Wha are ye? what are ye? what fetches ye sornin' here? ye----"

Nanny again interposed. "He's just a weaver lad, I tell ye, that Aleck
Lowther fetched frae the Langslap Moss to keep him company."

"A weaver lad!" (I