first I was
completely bamboozled, and almost dung stupid, though I kent one word of
French which I wanted to put to him, so I cried through, "Canna you speak
Scotcha, Mounseer?"

He had not the politeness to stop and make answer, but just went on with
his string of haivers, without either rhyme or reason, which we could
make neither top, tail, nor main of.

It was a sore trial to us all, putting us to our wit's end, and how to
come on was past all visible comprehension; when Tommy Staytape, giving
his elbow a rub, said, "Od, maister, I wager something that he's broken
loose frae Penicuik. We have him like a rotten in a fa'."

On Penicuik being mentioned, we heard the foreign creature in the coal-
house groaning out, "och," and "ochone," and "parbleu," and "Mysie
Rabble,"--that I fancy was his sweetheart at home, some bit French quean,
that wondered he was never like to come from the wars and marry her. I
thought on this, for his voice was mournful, though I could not
understand the words; and kenning he was a stranger in a far land, my
bowels yearned within me with compassion towards him.

I would have given half-a-crown at that blessed moment to have been able
to wash my hands free of him; but I swithered, and was like the cuddie
between the two bundles of hay. At long and last a thought struck me,
which was to give the deluded simple creature a chance of escape;
reckoning that, if he found his way home, he would see the shame and
folly of fighting against us any more; and, marrying Mysie Rabble, live a
contented and peaceful life, under his own fig and bay tree. So wishing
him a sound sleep, I cried through the door, "Mounseer, gooda nighta;"
decoying away Benjie and Tommy Staytape into the house. Bidding them
depart to their beds, I said to them after shutting the door, "Now,
callants, we have the precious life of a fellow-creature in our hand, and
to account for. Though he has a yellow jacket on, and speaks nonsense,
yet, nevertheless, he is of the same flesh and blood as ourselves. Maybe
we may be all obliged to wear green foraging-caps before we die yet!
Mention what we have seen or heard to no living soul; for maybe, if he
were to escape, we would be all taken up on suspicion of being spies, and
hanged on a gallows as high as Haman."--After giving them this wholesome
advice, I dispatched them to their beds like lamplighters, binding them
to never fash their thumbs, but sleep like tops, as I would keep