“So, Major Douglas, your servant,” said she, in answer to the constrained formal bow with which he saluted her on her entrance.  “Why, it’s so long since I’ve seen you that you may be a grandfather for ought I know.”

The poor awkward Misses at that moment came sneaking into the room:  “As for you, girls, you’ll never be grandmothers; you’ll never be married, unless to wild men of the woods.  I suppose you’d like that; it would save you the trouble of combing your hair, and tying your shoes, for then you could go without clothes altogether—­humph!  You’d be much better without clothes than to put them on as you do,” seizing upon the luckless Miss Baby, as she endeavoured to steal behind backs.

And here, in justice to the lady, it must be owned that, for once, she had some grounds for animadversion in the dress and appearance of the Misses Douglas.

They had stayed out, running races and riding on a pony, until near the dinner hour; and, dreading their father’s displeasure should they be too late, they had, with the utmost haste, exchanged their thick morning dresses for thin muslin gowns, made by a mantua-maker of the neighbourhood in the extreme of a two-year-old fashion, when waists were not.

But as dame Nature had been particularly lavish in the length of theirs, and the stay-maker had, according to their aunt’s direction, given them full measure of their new dark stays, there existed a visible breach between the waists of their gowns and the bands of their petticoats, which they had vainly sought to adjust by a meeting.  Their hair had been curled, but not combed, and dark gloves had been hastily drawn on to hide red arms.

“I suppose,” continued the stern Lady Maclaughlan, as she twirled her victim round and round; “I suppose you think yourself vastly smart and well dressed.  Yes, you are very neat, very neat indeed; one would suppose Ben Jonson had you in his eye when he composed that song.”  Then in a voice like thunder, she chanted forth—­

   “Give me a look, give me a face
    That makes simplicity a grace;
    Robes loosely flowing, hair as free,
    Such sweet neglect more taketh me.”

Miss Grizzy was in the utmost perplexity between her inclination to urge something in extenuation for the poor girls, and her fear of dissenting from Lady Maclaughlan, or rather of not immediately agreeing with her; she therefore steered, as usual, the middle course, and kept saying, “Well, children, really what Lady Maclaughlan says is all very true; at the same time”—­turning to her friend—­“I declare it’s not much to be wondered at; young people are so thoughtless, poor lambs!”

“What’s aw this wark aboo?” said the old gentleman angrily; “the girlies are weel eneugh; I see naething the matter wi’ them; they’re no dresse like auld queens or stage-actresses;” and he glance his eye from Lady Maclaughlan to his elegant daughter-in-law, who just then entered, hanging, according to custom, on her husband, and preceded by Cupid.