"Meinie, peace wi' this discourse, whilk beseems not!" said Elsie with great asperity. "I heard the lips o' the godly Renwick pray audibly, after his head lay in Pate Pincer's basket. Eh, sirs! what a head it is _now_. Yet the Netherbow guard watch it wi' cocked matches day and night, for there is mony a bold plot made by the Cameronians to carry it awa." "But our unfortunate friend the preacher--how dearly, by his crushed limbs, has he paid for his zeal in the cause of the Dutch prince! Yet, as Heaven knoweth, I knew not that letters of treason to our Scottish nobles were in his possession, or never would he have darkened the door of Bruntisfield. He deceived me; let it pass. Sir Archibald, thou rememberest well my husband, Elsie?--'tis well that he sleeps in his grave. Oh, judge what _he_ would have thought of our downfal and degradation!" "My mind misgives me, my lady, but Sir Archibald's kirk was the fushionless ane o' episcopacy, and, indeed, he just gaed wherever the troops marched, with trumpets blawing and kettle-drums beating waefu' to hear in the day o' the Lord." This last speech somewhat displeased Lady Grisel, who struck her cane thrice on the clay floor, and there ensued a long pause, broken only by creaking of the beeches in the adjoining grove, and the birr of Elsie's wheel as it whirled by the ruddy fire. "Come, your Leddyship," said Elsie, "let byegones be byegones, and we'll be canty while we may. Meinie can sing like a laverock in the summer morning; sae, lassie, gie forth your best sang to please our lady, and then we'll hae our luggies o' milk, and bit o' your bannocks, a screed o' the blessed gospel, and syne awa to our rest, for its waxing late." Meinie of course was about to enter some bashful protest, when the soft voice of her foster-sister said,-- "Do, dearest Meinie, and I will join thee; 'twill raise the spirits of good aunt Grisel. Ah, if I had only my spinnet, the cittern, or even my flageolet here!" "What is your pleasure, then, Madam Lilian?" asked Meinie, curtseying, "_Lady Anne Bothwell's Lament_, or _The Broom of the Cowdenknowes_?" "Anything but the last," said Lady Bruntisfield. "The Knowes of Cowden hath passed away from the house of Hume, and bonnie though the golden broom may be, it blooms for us no more." "Sing '_Dunbarton's drums_,' Meinie," said Lilian, "you hum it from morning till evening." "And so do _you_, Madam," said Meinie slyly and bluntly; "but I loe the merry measure." "Ewhow, that's because o' my wild son Hab!" said Elsie, laughing. "Mak' speed, lassie--our lady waits."