This was what lawyers call a fishing question, calculated to ascertain how far Waverley was disposed to submit to petty imposition.  ’My part to replace your horse’s shoe, you rascal!’ said Waverley, mistaking the purport of the intimation.

‘Indubitably,’ answered Mr. Cruickshanks; ’though there was no preceese clause to that effect, it canna be expected that I am to pay for the casualties whilk may befall the puir naig while in your honour’s service.—­Nathless, if your honour—­’

‘Oh, you mean I am to pay the farrier; but where shall we find one?’

Rejoiced at discerning there would be no objection made on the part of his temporary master, Mr. Cruickshanks assured him that Cairnvreckan, a village which they were about to enter, was happy in an excellent blacksmith; ’but as he was a professor, he would drive a nail for no man on the Sabbath, or kirk-fast, unless it were in a case of absolute necessity, for which he always charged sixpence each shoe.’  The most important part of this communication, in the opinion of the speaker, made a very slight impression on the hearer, who only internally wondered what college this veterinary professor belonged to; not aware that the word was used to denote any person who pretended to uncommon sanctity of faith and manner.

As they entered the village of Cairnvreckan, they speedily distinguished the smith’s house.  Being also a public, it was two stories high, and proudly reared its crest, covered with grey slate, above the thatched hovels by which it was surrounded.  The adjoining smithy betokened none of the Sabbatical silence and repose which Ebenezer had augured from the sanctity of his friend.  On the contrary, hammer clashed and anvil rang, the bellows groaned, and the whole apparatus of Vulcan appeared to be in full activity.  Nor was the labour of a rural and pacific nature.  The master smith, benempt, as his sign intimated, John Mucklewrath, with two assistants, toiled busily in arranging, repairing, and furbishing old muskets, pistols, and swords, which lay scattered around his workshop in military confusion.  The open shed, containing the forge, was crowded with persons who came and went as if receiving and communicating important news; and a single glance at the aspect of the people who traversed the street in haste, or stood assembled in groups, with eyes elevated, and hands uplifted, announced that some extraordinary intelligence was agitating the public mind of the municipality of Cairnvreckan.  ‘There is some news,’ said mine host of the Candlestick, pushing his lantern-jawed visage and bare-boned nag rudely forward into the crowd—­’there is some news; and if it please my Creator, I will forthwith obtain speirings thereof.’