“Ay, he said muckle waur nor that. He said some gayan ill–farr’d things about him. But I cam away and left him; I thought he was saying mair than gude manners warrantit.” “Were you in the Hope, as you call it; on that day that the king’s soldiers were slain?” “Ay, that I was; I was the first wha came on them whan they war just new dead, an’ a’ reeking i’ their warm blude—Gude keep us a’ frae sic sights again!—for my part, I never gat sic a confoundit gliff sin’ I was born o’ my mother.” “Describe the place where the corpses were lying.” “It is a deep cleuch, wi’ a sma’ sheep rodding through the linn not a foot wide; and if ye war to stite aff that, ye wad gang to the boddom o’ the linn wi’ a flaip.” “Were the bodies then lying in the bottom of that linn?” “Odd help ye, whar could they be lying else?—D’ye think they could lie on the Cleuch–brae? Ye might as weel think to lie on the side o’ that wa’ gin ye war dead.” “How did it appear to you that they had been slain—were they cut with swords, or pierced with bullets?” “I canna say, but they war sair hashed.” “How do you mean when you say they were hashed?” “Champit like—a’ broozled and jurmummled, as it war.” “Do you mean that they were cut, or cloven, or minced?” “Na, na—no that ava—But they had gotten some sair doofs—They had been terribly paikit and daddit wi’ something.” “I do not in the least conceive what you mean.” “That’s extrordnar, man—can ye no understand folk’s mother–tongue?—I’ll mak it plain to you. Ye see, whan a thing comes on ye that gate, that’s a dadd—sit still now. Then a paik, that’s a swapp or a skelp like—when a thing comes on ye that way, that’s a paik. But a doof’s warst ava—it’s”—— “Prithee hold; I now understand it all perfectly well.—What, then, is your opinion with regard to these men’s death? How, or what way do you think they were killed?” “O, sir, there’s naebody can say. It was some extrordnar judgment, that’s out of a’ doubt. There had been an unyerdly raid i’ the Hope that day.” “What reason have you for supposing such a thing?” “Because there wasna a leevin soul i’ the hale Hope that day but theirsels—they wadna surely hae felled ane another—It’s, by an’ attour, an awsome bit where they war killed; there hae been things baith seen and heard about it; and I saw an apparition there mysel on the very night before.” “You saw an apparition at the place the night before, did you? And, pray, what was that apparition like?” “It was like a man and a woman.” “Had the figure of the woman no resemblance to any one you had ever seen before? Was it in any degree, for instance, like your master’s daughter?” “No unlike ava.” “Then I think I can guess what the other form was like—Had it a bonnet on its head?” “Not a bonnet certainly, but it had the shape o’ ane.” “I weened as much—And was it a tall gigantic figure?” “Na, na, sir; the very contrair o’ that.” “Are you certain of that you say? Was it not taller than the apparition of the woman?”