.
    »Goot-morrow morning to ye, Leddy Staunton, and I hope I hae the pleasure to
see you weel - And goot-morrow to you, goot Mrs. Putler - I do peg you will
order some victuals and ale and prandy for the lads, for we hae peen out on
firth and moor since afore daylight, and a' to no purpose neither - Cot tam!«
    So saying, he sate down, pushed back his brigadier wig, and wiped his head
with an air of easy importance; totally regardless of the look of well-bred
astonishment by which Lady Staunton endeavoured to make him comprehend that he
was assuming too great a liberty.
    »It is some comfort, when one has had a sair tussel,« continued the Captain,
addressing Lady Staunton, with an air of gallantry, »that it is in a fair
leddy's service, or in the service of a gentleman whilk has a fair leddy, whilk
is the same thing, since serving the husband is serving the wife, as Mrs. Putler
does very weel know.«
    »Really, sir,« said Lady Staunton, »as you seem to intend this compliment
for me, I am at a loss to know what interest Sir George or I can have in your
movements this morning.«
    »O, Cot tam! - this is too cruel, my leddy - as if it was not py special
express from his Grace's honourable agent and commissioner at Edinburgh, with a
warrant conform, that I was to seek for and apprehend Donacha dhu na Dunaigh,
and pring him pefore myself and Sir George Staunton, that he may have his
deserts, that is to say, the gallows, whilk he has doubtless deserved, py peing
the means of frightening your leddyship, as weel as for something of less
importance.«
    »Frightening me!« said her ladyship; »why, I never wrote to Sir George about
my alarm at the waterfall.«
    »Then he must have heard it otherwise; for what else can give him sic an
earnest tesire to see this rapscallion, that I maun ripe the haill mosses and
muirs in the country for him, as if I were to get something for finding him,
when the pest o't might pe a pall through my prains?«
    »Can it be really true, that it is on Sir George's account that you have
been attempting to apprehend this fellow?«
    »Py Cot, it is for no other cause that I know than his honour's pleasure;
for the creature might hae gone on in
