"I'll pray for nane o' him," said Meg, "nor for you neither, you randy dog. The times are sair altered since I was a kinchin-mort. [*Girl.] Men were men then, and fought other in the open field, and there was nae milling in the darkmans. [*Murder by night.] And the gentry had kind hearts, and would have given baith lap and pannel [*Liquor and food] to ony puir gipsy; and there was not one, from Johnnie Faa the upright man, [*The leader (and greatest rogue) of the gang.] to little Christie that was in the panniers, would cloyed a dud [*Stolen a rag] from them. But ye are a' altered from the gude auld rules, and no wonder that you scour the cramp-ring, and trine to the cheat [*Get imprisoned and hanged.] sae often. Yes, ye are a' altered-you'll cat the gudeman's meat, drink his drink, sleep on the strammel [*Straw] in his barn, and break his house and cut his throat for his pains! There's blood on your hands, too, ye dogs--mair than ever came there by fair fighting. See how ye'll die then--lang it was ere he died--he strove, and strove sair, and could neither die nor live;--but you--half the country will see how ye'll grace the woodie." The party set up a hoarse laugh at Meg's prophecy. "What made you come back here, ye auld beldame?" said one of the gipsies; "could ye not have staid where you were, and spaed fortunes to the Cumberland flats?--Bing out and tour, [*Go out and watch] ye auld devil, and see that nobody has scented; that's a' you're good for now." "Is that a' I am good for now?" said the indignant matron. "I was good for mair than that in the great fight between our folk and Patrico Salmon's; if I had not helped you with these very fambles (holding up her hands), Jean Baillie would have frummagem'd you, [*Throttled you] ye feckless do-little!" There was here another laugh at the expense of the hero who had received this amazon's assistance. "Here, mother," said one of the sailors, "here's a cup of the right for you, and never mind that bully-huff." Meg drank the spirits, and, withdrawing herself from further conversation, sat down before the spot where Brown lay bid, in such a posture that it would have been difficult for any one to have approached it without her rising. The men, however, showed no disposition to disturb her. They closed around the fire, and held deep consultation together; but the low tone in which they spoke, and the cant language which they used, prevented Brown from understanding much of their conversation. He gathered in general, that they expressed great indignation against some individual. "He shall have his gruel,"--said one, and then whispered something very low into the ear of his comrade. "I'll have nothing to do with that," said the other "Are you turned hen-hearted, Jack?" "No, by G-d, no more than yourself,--but I won't--it was something like that stopped all the trade fifteen or twenty years ago you have heard of the 'Loup'?"