'And to see poor Grizzy and Crumbie,' said his wife, 'turning back their necks to the byre, and routing while the stony-hearted villains were brogging them on wi' their lances! '
'There were but four of them,' said Martin, 'and I have seen the day forty wad not have ventured this length. But our strength and manhood is gane with our puir maister.'
'For the sake of the holy rood, whisht, man,' said the goodwife, 'our leddy is half gane already, as ye may see by that fleightering of the ee-lid—a word mair and she's dead outright.'
'I could almost wish,' said Martin, 'we were a' gane, for what to do passes my puir wit. I care little for mysell, or you, Tibb; we can make a fend—work or want—we can do baith, but she can do neither.'
They canvassed their situation thus openly before the lady, convinced by the paleness of her look, her quivering lip, and dead-set eye, that she neither heard nor understood what they were saying.
'There is a way,' said the shepherd, 'but I kenna if she could bring her heart to it; there 's Simon Glendinning's widow of the glen yonder, has had assurance from the Southern loons, and nae soldier to steer them for one cause or other. Now, if the leddy could bow her mind to take quarters with Elspeth Glendinning till better days cast up, nae doubt it wad be doing an honour to the like of her, but'
'An honour!' answered Tibb, 'aye, by my word, sic an honour as wad be pride to her kin mony a lang year after her banes were in the mould. Oh! gudeman, to hear ye even the Lady of Avenel to seeking quarters wi' a kirk-vassal's widow!'
'Loath should I be to wish her to it,' said Martin; 'but what may w e do? To stay here is mere starvation; and where to go, I'm sure I ken nae mair than ony tup I ever herded.'
'Speak no more of it,' said the widow of Avenel, suddenly joining in the conversation, 'I will go to the tower. Dame Elspeth is of good folk, a widow', and the mother of orphans: she will give us house-room until something be thought
