“She possessed a good deal of ‘character,’ and might also be taken for the original of Mause Headrigg. As the wife of a ruling elder, she possibly imagined that she was entitled to exercise a certain authority in ecclesiastical matters. An anecdote is told of her having once taken the venerable Dr. Dalgliesh, the parish minister, through hands. In presence of a number of neighbours, she thought fit to lecture him on that particularly delicate subject, his wife’s dress: ‘It was a sin and a shame to see sae mickle finery.’ “The minister did not deny the charge, but dexterously encouraged her with the Socratic method of argument: ‘So, Margaret, you think that ornament is useless and sinful in a lady’s dress?’ “‘Certainly I do.’ “‘Then, may I ask why you wear that ribbon around your cap? A piece of cord would surely do quite as well.’ “Disconcerted with this unforeseen turn of affairs, Margaret determinedly rejoined in an under-tone: ‘Ye’ll no hae lang to speer sic a like question.’ “Next day her cap was bound with a piece of white tape; and never afterwards, till the day of her death, did she wear a ribbon, or any morsel of ornament. I am doubtful if we could match this out of Scotland. For a novelist to depict characters of this kind, he would require to see them in real life; no imagination could reach them. Sir Walter Scott both saw and talked with them, for they were not extinct in his day. “The mortifying rebuff about the ribbon perhaps had some influence in making my ancestress a Seceder. As she lived near the manse, I am afraid she must have been a good deal of a thorn in the side of the parish minister, notwithstanding all the palliatives of her good-natured husband, the elder. At length an incident occurred which sent her abruptly off to a recently-erected meeting-house, to which a promising young preacher, Mr. Leckie, had been appointed. “It was a bright summer morning, about five o’clock, when Margaret left her husband’s side as usual, and went out to see her cow attended to. Before three minutes had elapsed, her husband was aroused by her coming in with dismal cries: ‘Eh, sirs! eh, sirs! did I ever think to live to see the day? O man, O man, O William—this is a terrible thing, indeed! Could I ever have thought to see’t?’ “‘Gracious, woman!’ exclaimed the worthy elder, by this time fully awake, ‘what is’t? is the coo deid?’ for it seemed to him that no greater calamity could have been expected to produce such doleful exclamations. “‘The coo deid!’ responded Margaret; ‘waur, waur, ten times waur. There’s Dr. Dalgliesh only now gaun hame at five o’clock in the morning. It’s awfu’, it’s awfu’! What will things come to?’