‘What hae ye secur’d?’ exclaimed Leddy Grippy. ‘Is na it ordaint that Charlie, by his birthright, will get your lands? How is’t then that ye hae wrang’t Watty of his ain? the braw property that my worthy father left him both by will and testament. An he had been to the fore, ye durst na, gudeman, hae played at sic jookery-pookery; for he had a skill o’ law, and kent the kittle points in a manner that ye can never fathom; weel wat I, that your ellwand would hae been a jimp measure to the sauvendie o’ his books and Latin taliations. But, gudeman, ye’s no get a’ your ain way. I’ll put on my cloak, and, Betty Bodle, put on yours, and Watty, my ill-used bairn, get your hat. We’ll oure for Kilmarkeckle, and gang a’ to Mr. Keelevin together to make an interlocutor about this most dreadful extortioning.’ The old man absolutely shuddered; his face became yellow, and his lips white with anger and vexation at this speech. ‘Girzy Hypel,’ said he, with a troubled and broken voice, ‘were t’ou a woman o’ understanding, or had t’at haverel get o’ thine the gumtion o’ a sucking turkey, I could speak, and confound your injustice, were I no restrained by a sense of my own shame.’ ‘But what’s a’ this stoor about?’ said the young wife, addressing herself to her father-in-law. ‘Surely ye’ll no objek to mak me the wiser?’ ‘No, my dear,’ replied Claud, ‘I hope I can speak and be understood by thee. I hae gotten Mr. Auchincloss to mak an excambio of the Divethill for the Plealands, by the whilk the whole of the Kittlestonheugh patrimony will be redeemed to the family; and I intend and wis you and Watty to live at the Divethill, our neighbours here, and your father’s neighbours; that, my bairn, is the whole straemash.’ ‘But,’ said she, ‘when ye’re dead, will we still hae the Divethill?’ ‘No doubt o’ that, my dawty,’ said the old man delighted; ‘and even far mair.’ ‘Then, Watty Walkinshaw, ye gaumeril,’ said she, addressing her husband, ‘what would ye be at?--Your father’s a most just man, and will do you and a’ his weans justice.’ ‘But, for a’ that,’ said Leddy Grippy to her husband, somewhat bamboozled by the view which her daughter-in-law seemed to take of the subject, ‘when will we hear o’ you giving hundreds o’ pounds to Watty, as ye did to Charlie, for a matrimonial hansel?’ ‘I’m sure,’ replied the Laird, ‘were the like o’ that to quiet thy unruly member, Girzy, and be any satisfaction to thee, that I hae done my full duty to Walter, a five score pound should na be wanting to stap up the gap.’ ‘I’ll tell you what it is, father,’ interrupted Walter, ‘if ye’ll gie the whole soom o’ a hunder pound, I care na gin ye mak drammock o’ the Plealands.’ ‘A bargain be’t,’ said Claud, happy to be relieved from their importunity; but he added, with particular emphasis, to Watty’s wife,--