"If," said he, "Mrs Jean Todd had been hostile to this measure, would she not have declared it _manfully_, as is her uniform practice in similar cases?" The boxmaster could not answer the question satisfactorily; and the deacon, continuing his arguments, persuasions, promises, and flatteries, at last got the victim to put his name to the bill. Upon the instant the door opened, and Mrs Jean Todd appeared before them. She went forward to the table, and laid her hand upon the document. "Is that your signature, sir?" said she, looking calmly at her husband. "Ou ay--I believe, yes--I did put my name to that paper," replied Andrew, in great agitation; "but I thocht ye left me to do as I chose when ye gaed oot. If ye didna want me to sign it, ye shouldna hae left the room." "A bill is no a bindin document," continued she, without seeming to attend to what the boxmaster said, "until it be delivered. It's no delivered sae lang as it is in my hands; and never will be delivered by me sae lang as I recollect the words o' the wise man o' the east, wha said--'If thou be surety for thy friend, thou art snared with the words o' thy mouth.' Yet this paper is no my property. The stamp is yours, though my husband's name is still his." Turning to the boxmaster, who was shaking and retaining his breath with pure fear--"Do you stand by this, sir," said she, in a commanding voice, which increased his fear, "or do ye repent o't?" "I repent o't," replied Andrew, with dry lips, and a gurgling of the throat, as if he had been on the eve of choking. "Then, I fancy," continued Mrs Jean Todd, "ye would like yer name back again?" "Ou ay--surely," replied Andrew. "Well, then," said she, as she with the greatest coolness took up her scissors that hung by her side, and with affected precision cut away his name; "there it is"--handing it to him. And turning to the deacon--"The rest is yours, sir--I hae nae richt to meddle wi' your name--there's yer paper"--returning to him the mutilated bill.