compliments he gied me, and tell'd owre again ony loose cracks [*Gossip ] I might hae had wi' him; now if ane was talking loosely to your honour, there's nae saying what might come o't.""I assure you, my good Rebecca, my character and your own age and appearance are your security, if you should talk as loosely as an amatory poet.""Aweel, if your honour thinks I am safe-the story is just this.--Ye see, about a year ago, or no just sae lang, my leddy was advised to go to Gilsland for a while for her spirits were distressing her sair. Ellangowan's troubles began to be spoken o' publicly, and sair vexed she was--or she was proud o' her family. For Ellangowan himsell and her, they sometimes 'greed, and sometimes no--but at last they didna 'gree at a' for twa or three year--for he was aye wanting to borrow siller, and that was what she couldna bide at no hand, and she was aye wanting it paid back again, and that the Laird he liked as little. So, at last, they were clean aff thegither. And then some of the company at Gilsland tells her that the estate was to be sell'd; and ye wad hae thought she had taen an ill will at Miss Lucy Bertram frae that moment, for mony a time she cried to me, 'O Becky, O Becky, if that useless peenging thing o' a lassie there, at Ellangowan, that canna keep her ne'er-do-weel father within bounds--if she had been but a lad-bairn, they couldna hae sell'd the auld inheritance for that fool-body's debt;'--and she would rin on that way till I was just wearied and sick to hear her ban the puir lassie, as if she wadna hae been a lad-bairn, and keepit the land, if it had been in her will to change her sect. And ae day at the spae-well below the craig at Gilsland, she was seeing a very bonny family o' bairns--they belonged to ane MacCrosky--and she broke out--'Is not it an odd like thing that ilka waf carlfe [*Every insignificant churl] in the country has a son and heir, and that the house of Ellangowan is without male succession?' There was a gipsy wife stood ahint and heard her--a muckle sture [*Strong]
fearsome-looking wife she was as ever I set een on.--'Wha is it,'
says she, 'that dare say the house of Ellangowan will perish without male succession?' My mistress just turned on her--she was a high-spirited woman, and aye ready wi' an answer to a' body. 'It's me that says it,' says she, 'that may say it with a sad heart.' Wi'
that the gipsy wife gripped till her hand; 'I ken you weel eneugh,'
said she, 'though ye kenna me--But as sure as that sun's in heaven, and as sure as that water's rinning to the sea, and as sure as there's an ee that sees, and an ear that hears us baith--Harry Bertram, that was thought to perish at Warroch Point, never did die there--he was to have a weary weird [*Cruel fate] o't till his ane-an-twentieth year, that was aye said o' him--but if ye live and I live, ye'll hear mair o' him this winter before the snaw lies twa days on the Dun of Singleside--I want nane o' your siller,' she said, 'to make ye think I am blearing [*Moistening ] your ee--fare ye weel till after Martimas;'--and there she left us standing.""Was she a very tall woman?" interrupted Mannering.
"Had she black hair, black eyes, and a cut above the brow?" added the lawyer.
"She was the tallest woman I ever saw, and her hair was as black as midnight, unless where it was gray, and she had a scar abune the brow, that ye might hae laid the lith [*joint ] of your finger in. Naebody that's seen her will ever forget her; and I am morally sure that it was on the ground o' what that gipsy-woman said that my mistress made her will, having taen a dislike at the young leddy o' Ellangowan, and she liked her far waur after she was obliged to send her 20L--for she said, Miss Bertram, no content wi' letting the Ellangowan property pass into strange hands, owing to her being a lass and no a lad, was coming, by her poverty, to be a burden and a disgrace to Singleside too.--But I hope my mistress's is a good will for a' that, for it would be hard an me to lose the wee bit legacy--I served for little fee and bountith, weel I wot."The counsellor relieved her fears on this head, then inquired after Jenny Gibson, and understood she had accepted Mr. Dinmont's offer;"and I have done sae mysell too, since he was sae discreet as to ask me," said Mrs. Rebecca; they are very decent folk the Dinmonts, though my lady didna dow to hear muckle about the friends on that side the house. But she liked the Charlies-hope hams, and the cheeses, and the muir-fowl, that they were aye sending, and the lamb's-wool hose and mittens--she liked them weel eneugh."Mr. Pleydell now dismissed Mrs. Rebecca. When she was gone, "Ithink I know the gipsy woman," said the lawyer.
"I was just going to say the same," replied Mannering.
"And her name--" said Pleydell.
"Is Meg Merrilies," answered the Colonel.
"Are you avised of that?" said the counsellor, looking at his military friend with a comic expression of surprise.
Mannering answered that he had known such a woman when he was at Ellangowan upwards of twenty years before; and then made his learned friend acquainted with all the remarkable particulars of his first visit there.