lady drew up, and the provost said, half aside, 'The sooth
bourd is nae bourd. [The true joke is no joke.] You will find the
horseshoe hissing hot, Summertrees.'

'You can speak from experience, doubtless, provost,' answered the
laird; 'but I crave pardon--I need not tell Mrs. Crosbie that I have all
respect for the auld and honourable House of Redgauntlet.'

'And good reason ye have, that are sae sib to them,' quoth the lady,
'and kend weel baith them that are here, and them that are gane.'

'In troth, and ye may say sae, madam,' answered the laird; 'for poor
Harry Redgauntlet, that suffered at Carlisle, was hand and glove with
me; and yet we parted on short leave-taking.'

'Aye, Summertrees,' said the provost; 'that was when you played
Cheat-the-woodie, and gat the by-name of Pate-in-Peril. I wish you would
tell the story to my young friend here. He likes weel to hear of a sharp
trick, as most lawyers do.'

'I wonder at your want of circumspection, provost,' said the
laird,--much after the manner of a singer when declining to sing the
song that is quivering upon his tongue's very end. 'Ye should mind there
are some auld stories that cannot be ripped up again with entire safety
to all concerned. TACE is Latin for a candle,'

'I hope,' said the lady, 'you are not afraid of anything being said out
of this house to your prejudice, Summertrees? I have heard the story
before; but the oftener I hear it, the more wonderful I think it.'

'Yes, madam; but it has been now a wonder of more than nine days, and it
is time it should be ended,' answered Maxwell.

Fairford now thought it civil to say, 'that he had often heard of Mr.
Maxwell's wonderful escape, and that nothing could be more agreeable to
him than to hear the right version of it.'

But Summertrees was obdurate, and refused to take up the time of the
company with such 'auld-warld nonsense.'

'Weel, weel,' said the provost, 'a wilful man maun hae his way. What do
your folk in the country think about the disturbances that are beginning
to spunk out in the colonies?'

'Excellent, sir, excellent. When things come to the worst; they will
mend; and to the worst they are coming. But as to that nonsense ploy
of mine, if ye insist on hearing the particulars,'--said the laird, who
began to be sensible that the period of telling his story gracefully was
gliding fast away.

'Nay,' said the provost, 'it was not for myself, but this young
gentlemen.'

'Aweel, what for