"Ow, as weel as could hae been expectit," said Muckle Alick, with just the proper amount of hypocritical resignation demanded by custom on these occasions. Mistress Fraser, whose mind ran naturally on the lines along which Muckle Alick had directed it, was completely taken in. "An' what has Mirren gotten?—a lassie, I'll wager," said the excited mother of eleven, dusting her hands of the crumblings of the pudding suet, and then beginning breathlessly to smooth her hair and take off her baking apron. So excited was she that she could not find the loop. "Aye," said Alick, quietly, "there's a lassie!" "I juist kenned it," said Mistress Fraser, drawing up wisdom from the mysterious wells of her experience; "muckle men and wee wives aye start aff wi' a lassie—contrarywise they begin wi' a laddie. Noo me and my man——" What terrible revelation of domestic experience would inevitably have followed, remains unfortunately unknown. For the words which at that moment Muckle Alick delicately let drop, as the chemist drops a rare essence into two ounces of distilled water, brought Mistress Fraser to a dead stop in the fulness of her career after the most intimate domestic reminiscences. "But there's a laddie come too!" said Muckle Alick, and looked becomingly at the ground. Mistress Fraser held up her hands. "Of a' the deceitfu', hidin', unneighbourly craiturs," said Mistress Fraser, "Mirren Terregles is the warst—an' me to hae drank my tea wi' her only last week. I'll wager if I live to hae fifty bairns——" "The Lord forbid," said her husband, unexpectedly, from the doorway. "We hae plenty as it is——" "And wha's faut's that?" cried his wife over her shoulder. "Oh the deceitfu' randy——" "In fact," said Muckle Alick, dropping another word in, "there's twa laddies—_and_ a lassie!" Mistress Fraser sat down quite suddenly. "Gie me a drink frae the water can, Tam!" she said; "haste ye fast, Alick's news has gi'en me a turn. Twa laddies and a lassie—I declare it's a Queen's bounty! Preserve me, it's no a cradle ye want, man, but a mill happer! A time or twa like this, and ye'll hae to plant taties in the front yaird—ye will hae to pay soundly for your ploy at this rate, my man. Three at a whup disna gang wi' cancy-lairies in the cabbage plots, my lad." "It's a maist notoriously curious thing," began Tam Fraser, unexpectedly, "that I saw Mirren carryin' twa cans o' water this very mornin'——" Muckle Alick gave him a warning look, which made him catch his next unspoken sentence as a wicket-keeper holds the ball before the field has seen it leave the bat. "But—but she didna look weel——" added Tam.