etter than
ever Patie Birnie. I'll get my fiddle in the turning of a coffin-screw."

"Take yourself away, sir," said the Marquis.

"And if your honour be a north-country gentleman," said the persevering
minstrel, "whilk I wad judge from your tongue, I can play 'Liggeram
Cosh,' and 'Mullin Dhu,' and 'The Cummers of Athole.'"

"Take yourself away, friend; you interrupt our conversation."

"Or if, under your honour's favour, ye should happen to be a
thought honest, I can play (this in a low and confidential tone)
'Killiecrankie,' and 'The King shall hae his ain,' and 'The Auld Stuarts
back again'; and the wife at the change-house is a decent, discreet
body, neither kens nor cares what toasts are drucken, and what tunes
are played, in her house: she's deaf to a'thing but the clink o' the
siller."

The Marquis, who was sometimes suspected of Jacobitism, could not help
laughing as he threw the fellow a dollar, and bid him go play to the
servants if he had a mind, and leave them at peace.

"Aweel, gentlemen," said he, "I am wishing your honours gude day. I'll
be a' the better of the dollar, and ye'll be the waur of wanting music,
I'se tell ye. But I'se gang hame, and finish the grave in the tuning o'
a fiddle-string, lay by my spade, and then get my tother bread-winner,
and awa' to your folk, and see if they hae better lugs than their
masters."

CHAPTER XXV.

True love, an thou be true,
Thou has ane kittle part to play;
For fortune, fashion, fancy, and thou,
Maun strive for many a day.

I've kend by mony a friend's tale,
Far better by this heart of mine,
What time and change of fancy avail
A true-love knot to untwine.

HENDERSOUN.

"I WISHED to tell you, my good kinsman," said the Marquis, "now that we
are quit of that impertinent fiddler, that I had tried to discuss this
love affair of yours with Sir William Ashton's daughter. I never saw
the young lady but for a few minutes to-day; so, being a stranger to her
personal merits, I pay a compliment to you, and offer her no offence, in
saying you might do better."

"My lord, I am much indebted for the interest you have taken in my
affairs," said Ravenswood. "I did not intend to have troubled you in any
matter concerning Miss Ashton. As my engagement with that young lady has
reached your lordship, I can only say, that you must necessarily suppose
that I was aware of the objections to my marrying into her father's