"By my own saint, this town of Christ's Kirk has a change upon it!" he continued. "Last time I was here, it was as merry as King James when he sang of it. The young and the old hailed me as the prince of good fellows, and the wenches and wives--ha! ha! "'To dans thir damysells them dight, Thir lasses light of laits; They were sae skych when I them nicht, They squeild like ony gaits.'" Dame Lindsay, I perceive what thou wantest, to melt thee into thy former jollity. Thou'rt coquetting in the corner there for a kiss; and, by the holy rude, thou shalt not want it for the space of the twinkling of thine eye." He rose for the purpose of applying the emollient he had threatened; but a loud scream evinced that a woman, however much she may worship his Satanic Majesty, cares not for his familiarities. The widow fainted; and what may be supposed her feelings, when she found, on coming to herself, that that identical and terrific red liquor had had a share in her recovery! Again she screamed; but no kindly neighbour came to rescue her from her perilous situation. Those who heard her cries, had many strange thoughts as to what species of punishment she was undergoing, for her sins. The conjectures were endless. "What could he be doing to Widow Lindsay?" was the universal question. Some supposed that she was in the act of being carried off, and was struggling to get out of his talons; some looked for the passing flame, in the midst of which, the poor widow, clasped in his arms, would be seen on her luminous journey to the lower world; and there were not few who pretended to find, in the past life of the wretched victim, a very good legitimate cause for the visit of the stranger, and the severity he was clearly exercising towards her. "Thou'lt be the better for thy faint, Widow Lindsay," said the stranger, as she recovered, "seeing that what blood it has sent from thy heart, will be returned with the addition of that liquor which is truly the water of life. Dost forget, good widow, that, when I was last here, thou and Meg Johnston would have fought for a can of it, if I had not made the can two? Come now, and let us fuddle our noses till they be as red as the liquor itself, and thy spectacles shew thee two noses, before they melt with the heat of their ruby supporter. "'However this world do change and vary, Oh, let us in heart never more be sary.'" "Avaunt ye! in the name o' the five holy wounds!" muttered the widow, as she held up the Sathanifuge crow in his face. "Well, and if thou wilt not, here goes!" replied he, as he threw the contents of the bicker in the fire, which blazed up till the house seemed, to those waiting fearfully in the distance, to be in flames.