"Eh! sirs!" answered Ailsie Gourlay; "how bra' are we wi' our new black coat and our weel-pouthered head, as if we had never kenned hunger nor thirst oursells! and we'll be screwing up our bit fiddle, doubtless, in the ha' the night, amang a' the other elbo' jiggers for miles round—let's see if the pins haud, Johnnie—that's a', lad."
"I take ye a' to witness, gude people," said Mortheugh, "that she threatens me wi' mischief, and forespeaks me. If onything but gude happens to me or my fiddle this night, I'll make it the blackest night's job she ever stirred in. I'll hae her before Presbytery and Synod—I'm half a miniter mysel', now that I'm a bedral in an inhabited parish."
Although the mutual hatred betwixt these hags and the rest of mankind had steeled their hearts against all impressions of festivity, this was by no means the case with the multitude at large. The splendour of the bridal retinue—the gay dresses—the spirited horses—the blithesome ap-
