Faith, spite of the grandmothers, many a lad of us would have desired to be of that company that day! But Alexander-Jonita would have none of us. We were to keep the castle, so she commanded, with gun and sword. We were to sit in our trenches about the kirk, and let the women be our advance guard. So when the trampling of horses was heard from the southward, and the cavalcade came to the narrows of the way, “Halt!” cried Alexander-Jonita suddenly. And leaping out of the thicket like a young roe of the mountains, she seized the Sheriff’s bridle rein. At the same moment her hundred and fifty women trooped out and stood ranked and silent right across the path of the horsemen. “What do ye here? Let go, besom!” cried the Sheriff. “Go back to those that sent ye, Sheriff,” commanded Alexander-Jonita, “for an’ ye will put out our minister, ye must ride over us and wet the feet of your horses in our women’s blood.” “Out upon you, lass! Let men do their work!” cried the Sheriff, who was a jolly, rollicking man, and, moreover, as all knew, like most sheriffs, not unkindly disposed to the sex. “Leave you our minister alone to do his work. I warrant he will not meddle with you,” answered Alexander-Jonita. “Faith, but you are a well-plucked one!” cried the Sheriff, looking down with admiration on her, “but now out of the way with you, for I must forward with my work.” “Sir,” said the lass, “ye may turn where ye are, and ride back whence ye came, for we will by no means let you proceed one step nearer to the kirk of Balmaghie this day!” “Forward!” cried the Sheriff, loudly, to his men, thinking to intimidate the women. “Stand firm, lasses!” cried Alexander-Jonita, clinging to the Sheriff’s bridle-rein. And the company of yeomanry stood still, for, being mostly householders and fathers of families, they could not bring themselves to charge a company of women, as it might be their own wives and daughters. “Forward!” cried the Sheriff again. “Aye, forward, gallant cavaliers!” cried Alexander-Jonita, “forward, and ye shall have great honour, Sheriff! More famous than my Lord Marlborough shall be ye. Ride us down. Put your horses to their speed. Be assured we will not flinch!” Time and again the Sheriff tried, now threatening and now cajoling; but equally to no purpose. At last he grew tired. “This is a thankless job,” he said, turning him about; “let them send their soldiers. I am not obliged to fight for it.” And so with a “right about” and a wave of the hand he took his valiant horsemen off by the way they came. And as they went they say that many a youth turned him on his saddle to cast a longing look upon Alexander-Jonita, who stood there tall and straight in the place where she had so boldly confronted the Sheriff.