r in that sad and sore estate, with many other fond
cajoleries, most odious to my grandfather to hear from a man so far
advanced in years, and who, by reason of the reverence of his office,
ought to have had his tongue schooled to terms of piety and temperance.

The poor husband meanwhile said nothing, but my grandfather heard his
heart panting audibly, and three or four times he was obligated to brush
away his hand, for, having no arms himself, the bailie clutched at the
hilt of his sword and would have drawn it from the scabbard.

The Antichrist, seeing his lemane in such great malady as she so well
feigned, he at last, to her very earnest supplication, consented to
leave her that night, and kissed her as he came away; but her husband
broke in upon them with the rage of a hungry lion, and seizing his
Grace by the cuff of the neck, swung him away from her with such
vehemence that he fell into the corner of the room like a sack of duds.
As for madam, she uttered a wild cry, and threw herself back on the
couch where she was sitting and seemed as if she had swooned, having no
other device so ready to avoid the upbraidings and just reproaches of
her spouse. But she was soon roused from that fraudulent dwam by my
grandfather, who, seizing a flagon of wine, dashed it upon her face.

CHAPTER VIII

Mrs Kilspinnie uttered a frightful screech, and, starting up, attempted
to run out of the room, but her husband caught her by the arm, and my
grandfather was empowered, by a signal grant of great presence of mind
to think that the noise might cause alarm, whereupon he sprang instanter
to the door that led into the garden just as the damsel was coming up,
and the fat friar hobbling as fast as he could behind her; and he had
but time to say to her, as it was with an inspiration, to keep all quiet
in the garden and he would make his escape by the other door. She, on
hearing this, ran back to stop the pandarus, and my grandfather closed
and bolted fast that back door, going forthwith to the one by which he
had been himself admitted, and which, having opened wide to the wall, he
returned to the scene of commotion.

In the meantime the prelatic dragon that was so ravished from the woman
had hastily risen upon his legs, and, red with a dreadful wrath, raged
as if he would have devoured her husband. In sooth, to do his Grace
justice, he lacked not the spirit of a courageous gentleman, and he
could not, my grandfather often said,