t let us send a civil message to the gossips, Sandy; and hadna ye
better say I am sair laid with a sudden sickness? though it's sinful-like
to send the poor messenger a mile agate with a lie in his mouth without a
glass of brandy.'

"'To such a messenger, and to those who sent him, no apology is needed,'
said the austere laird; 'so let him depart.' And the clatter of a
horse's hoofs was heard, and the muttered imprecations of its rider on
the churlish treatment he had experienced.

"'Now, Sandie, my lad,' said his wife, laying an arm particularly white
and round about his neck as she spoke, 'are you not a queer man and a
stern? I have been your wedded wife now these three years; and, beside
my dower, have brought you three as bonnie bairns as ever smiled aneath a
summer sun. O man, you a douce man, and fitter to be an elder than even
Willie Greer himself, I have the minister's ain word for 't, to put on
these hard-hearted looks, and gang waving your arms that way, as if ye
said, "I winna take the counsel of sic a hempie as you;" I'm your ain
leal wife, and will and maun have an explanation.'

"To all this Sandie Macharg replied, 'It is written, "Wives, obey your
husbands"; but we have been stayed in our devotion, so let us pray;' and
down he knelt: his wife knelt also, for she was as devout as bonnie; and
beside them knelt their household, and all lights were extinguished.

"'Now this beats a',' muttered his wife to herself; 'however, I shall be
obedient for a time; but if I dinna ken what all this is for before the
morn by sunket-time, my tongue is nae langer a tongue, nor my hands worth
wearing.'

"The voice of her husband in prayer interrupted this mental soliloquy;
and ardently did he beseech to be preserved from the wiles of the fiends
and the snares of Satan; from witches, ghosts, goblins, elves, fairies,
spunkies, and water-kelpies; from the spectre shallop of Solway; from
spirits visible and invisible; from the Haunted Ships and their unearthly
tenants; from maritime spirits that plotted against godly men, and fell
in love with their wives--'

"'Nay, but His presence be near us!' said his wife, in a low tone of
dismay. 'God guide my gudeman's wits: I never heard such a prayer from
human lips before. But, Sandie, my man, Lord's sake, rise. What fearful
light is this? Barn and byre and stable maun be in a blaze; and Hawkie,
and Hurley, Doddie, and Cherrie, and Damsonplum will be smoored with
reek, and