“Nane o’ her ain dignity, like. Ye see she’s naething but bonny. She _has_ naething. An’ though she’s as guid a cratur as ever lived, the cauld grun’ o’ her poverty gaithers the fog o’ an ill report. Troth, for her faimily, the ill’s there, report or no report; but, a’ the same, gien she had been rich, an’ her father--I’ll no say the hangman, but him ’at he last hangt, there wad be fowth (_plenty_) o’ coonty-fowk wad hae her til her denner wi’ them. An’ I’m thinkin’ maybe she’s the prooder for her poverty, an’ winna gang til her inferriors sae lang as her aiquals dinna invete her. She gangs whiles to the doctor’s--but he’s a kin’ o’ a freen’ o’ the yerl’s, ’cause he likes stinks--but that’s the yoong doctor.” “Does her brother never go out to dinner anywhere, and take her with him?” “Naebody cares a bodle aboot his lordship i’ the haill country-side, sae far as I can learn. There’s ane or twa--great men, I daursay--whiles comes doon frae Lon’on, to smell hoo he’s gettin’ on wi’ ’s stinks, but deil a neebor comes nigh the hoose. Ow, he’s a great man, I mak nae doobt, awa’ frae hame! He’s aye writin’ letters to the newspapers, an’ they prent them--aboot this an’ aboot that--aboot beasties i’ the watter, an’ lectreesity, an’ I kenna what a’; an’ some says ’at hoo he’ll be a rich man some day, the moment he’s dune fin’in’ oot something or ither he’s been warslin’ at for the feck o’ a ten year or sae; but the gentry never thinks naething o’ a man sae lang as he’s only duin’ his best--or his warst, as the case may be--to lay his han’ upo’ the siller ’at’s fleein’ aboot him like a snaw-drift. Bide ye a bit, though! _Whan_ he’s gotten ’t, it’s doon they’re a’ upo’ their k-nees til ’im thegither. But gien they be prood, he’s prooder, an’ lat him ance get his heid up, an’ rid o’ the trustees, an’ fowk upo’ their marrow-banes til ’im, haith, he’ll lat them sit there, or I’m mistaen in ’im.” “Then has my lady no companions at all?” “She gangs whiles to see the doctor’s lass, an’ whiles she comes here an’ has her denner wi’ her, themsel’s twa: never anither comes near the place.” All this time, Cosmo had been turning over the cabbage-ground, working the harder that he still hoped to work off the sickness that yet kept growing upon him. The sun was hot, and his head, which had been aching more or less all day, now began to throb violently. The spade dropt from his hands, and he fell on his face in the soft mould. “What’s this o’ ’t?” cried the old man, going up to him in a fright. He caught hold of him by an arm, and turned him on his back. His face was colourless, and the life seemed to have gone out of him. CHAPTER XXVI. LOST AND FOUND.