kitchen story, and
singing at full pitch of voice. The high notes were too shrill for a man,
the low seemed too deep for a woman. The words, as far as Mannering could
distinguish them, seemed to run thus:--

Canny moment, lucky fit!
Is the lady lighter yet?
Be it lad, or be it lass,
Sign wi' cross and sain wi' mass.

'It's Meg Merrilies, the gipsy, as sure as I am a sinner,' said Mr.
Bertram. The Dominie groaned deeply, uncrossed his legs, drew in the huge
splay foot which his former posture had extended, placed it
perpendicularly, and stretched the other limb over it instead, puffing
out between whiles huge volumes of tobacco smoke. 'What needs ye groan,
Dominie? I am sure Meg's sangs do nae ill.'

'Nor good neither,' answered Dominie Sampson, in a voice whose untuneable
harshness corresponded with the awkwardness of his figure. They were the
first words which Mannering had heard him speak; and as he had been
watching with some curiosity when this eating, drinking, moving, and
smoking automaton would perform the part of speaking, he was a good deal
diverted with the harsh timber tones which issued from him. But at this
moment the door opened, and Meg Merrilies entered.

Her appearance made Mannering start. She was full six feet high, wore a
man's great-coat over the rest of her dress, had in her hand a goodly
sloethorn cudgel, and in all points of equipment, except her petticoats,
seemed rather masculine than feminine. Her dark elf-locks shot out like
the snakes of the gorgon between an old-fashioned bonnet called a
bongrace, heightening the singular effect of her strong and
weather-beaten features, which they partly shadowed, while her eye had a
wild roll that indicated something like real or affected insanity.

'Aweel, Ellangowan,' she said, 'wad it no hae been a bonnie thing, an the
leddy had been brought to bed, and me at the fair o' Drumshourloch, no
kenning, nor dreaming a word about it? Wha was to hae keepit awa the
worriecows, I trow? Ay, and the elves and gyre-carlings frae the bonnie
bairn, grace be wi' it? Ay, or said Saint Colme's charm for its sake, the
dear?' And without waiting an answer she began to sing--

Trefoil, vervain, John's-wort, dill,
Hinders witches of their
will, Weel is them, that weel may
Fast upon Saint Andrew's day.

Saint Bride and her brat,
Saint Colme and his cat,
Saint Michael and his spear,
Keep the house frae reif a