she asked.

"O, for naething," says Dand. "Only I think ye're mair like me than the
lave of them. Ye've mair of the poetic temper, tho' Guid kens little
enough of the poetic taalent. It's an ill gift at the best. Look at
yoursel'. At denner you were all sunshine and flowers and laughter, and
now you're like the star of evening on a lake."

She drank in this hackneyed compliment like wine, and it glowed in her
veins.

"But I'm saying, Dand"--she came nearer him--"I'm for the muirs. I must
have a braith of air. If Clem was to be speiring for me, try and quaiet
him, will ye no?"

"What way?" said Dandie. "I ken but the ae way, and that's leein'. I'll
say ye had a sair heed, if ye like."

"But I havena," she objected.

"I daursay no," he returned. "I said I would say ye had; and if ye like
to nay-say me when ye come back, it'll no mateerially maitter, for my
chara'ter's clean gane a'ready past reca'."

"O, Dand, are ye a leear?" she asked, lingering.

"Folks say sae," replied the bard.

"Wha says sae?" she pursued.

"Them that should ken the best," he responded. "The lassies, for ane."

"But, Dand, you would never lee to me?" she asked.

"I'll leave that for your pairt of it, ye girzie," said he. "Ye'll lee
to me fast eneuch, when ye hae gotten a jo. I'm tellin' ye and it's
true; when you have a jo, Miss Kirstie, it'll be for guid and ill. I
ken: I was made that way mysel', but the deil was in my luck! Here, gang
awa' wi' ye to your muirs, and let me be; I'm in an hour of
inspiraution, ye upsetting tawpie!"

But she clung to her brother's neighbourhood, she knew not why.

"Will ye no gie's a kiss, Dand?" she said. "I aye likit ye fine."

He kissed her and considered her a moment; he found something strange in
her. But he was a libertine through and through, nourished equal
contempt and suspicion of all womankind, and paid his way among them
habitually with idle compliments.

"Gae wa' wi' ye!" said he. "Ye're a dentie baby, and be content wi'
that!"

That was Dandie's way; a kiss and a comfit to Jenny--a bawbee and my
blessing to Jill--and good-night to the whole clan of ye, my dears! When
anything approached the serious, it became a matter for men, he both
thought and said. Women, when they did not absorb, were only children to
be shoo'd away. Merely in his character of connoisseur, however, Dandle
glanced carelessly after his sister as she crossed the meadow. "The
brat's no that bad!" he thought with