heart, of the rising guest. A shilling for
breakfast, three shillings for dinner, including a pint of old port,
eighteenpence for a snug supper--such were the charges of the inn of St.
Ronan's, under this landlady of the olden world, even after the
nineteenth century had commenced; and they were ever tendered with the
pious recollection, that her good father never charged half so much, but
these weary times rendered it impossible for her to make the lawing
less.[I-5]

Notwithstanding all these excellent and rare properties, the inn at
Saint Ronan's shared the decay of the village to which it belonged. This
was owing to various circumstances. The high-road had been turned aside
from the place, the steepness of the street being murder (so the
postilions declared) to their post-horses. It was thought that Meg's
stern refusal to treat them with liquor, or to connive at their
exchanging for porter and whisky the corn which should feed their
cattle, had no small influence on the opinion of those respectable
gentlemen, and that a little cutting and levelling would have made the
ascent easy enough; but let that pass. This alteration of the highway
was an injury which Meg did not easily forgive to the country gentlemen,
most of whom she had recollected when children. "Their fathers," she
said, "wad not have done the like of it to a lone woman." Then the decay
of the village itself, which had formerly contained a set of feuars and
bonnet-lairds, who, under the name of the Chirupping Club, contrived to
drink twopenny, qualified with brandy or whisky, at least twice or
thrice a-week, was some small loss.

The temper and manners of the landlady scared away all customers of that
numerous class, who will not allow originality to be an excuse for the
breach of decorum, and who, little accustomed perhaps to attendance at
home, loved to play the great man at an inn, and to have a certain
number of bows, deferential speeches, and apologies, in answer to the
G--d d--n ye's which they bestow on the house, attendance, and
entertainment. Unto those who commenced this sort of barter in the
Clachan of Saint Ronan's, well could Meg Dods pay it back, in their own
coin; and glad they were to escape from the house with eyes not quite
scratched out, and ears not more deafened than if they had been within
hearing of a pitched battle.

Nature had formed honest Meg for such encounters; and as her noble soul
delighted in them, so her outward properti