‘He is an innocent, sir,’ said the butler; ’there is one such in almost every town in the country, but ours is brought far ben.  He used to work a day’s turn weel eneugh; but he help’d Miss Rose when she was flemit with the Laird of Killancureit’s new English bull, and since that time we ca’ him Davie Do-little indeed we might ca’ him Davie Do-naething, for since he got that gay clothing, to please his honour and my young mistress (great folks will have their fancies), he has done naething but dance up and down about the toun, without doing a single turn, unless trimming the laird’s fishing-wand or busking his flies, or maybe catching a dish of trouts at an orra-time.  But here comes Miss Rose, who, I take burden upon me for her, will be especially glad to see one of the house of Waverley at her father’s mansion at Tully-Veolan.’

But Rose Bradwardine deserves better of her unworthy historian, than to be introduced at the end of a chapter.

In the meanwhile it may be noticed, that Waverley learned two things from this colloquy; that in Scotland a single house was called a town, and a natural fool an innocent. [6]

CHAPTER X

ROSE BRADWARDINE AND HER FATHER

Miss Bradwardine was but seventeen; yet, at the last races of the county town of—­, upon her health being proposed among a round of beauties, the Laird of Bumperquaigh, permanent feast-master and croupier of the Bautherwhillery Club, not only said more to the pledge in a pint bumper of Bourdeaux, but, ere pouring forth the libation, denominated the divinity to whom it was dedicated, ‘the Rose of Tully-Veolan;’ upon which festive occasion, three cheers were given by all the sitting members of that respectable society, whose throats the wine had left capable of such exertion.  Nay, I am well assured, that the sleeping partners of the company snorted applause, and that although strong bumpers and weak brains had consigned two or three to the floor, yet even these, fallen as they were from their high estate, and weltering—­I will carry the parody no further—­uttered divers inarticulate sounds, intimating their assent to the motion.

Such unanimous applause could not be extorted but by acknowledged merit; and Rose Bradwardine not only deserved it, but also the approbation of much more rational persons than the Bautherwhillery Club could have mustered, even before discussion of the first magnum.  She was indeed a very pretty girl of the Scotch cast of beauty, that is, with a profusion of hair of paley gold, and a skin like the snow of her own mountains in whiteness.  Yet she had not a pallid or pensive cast of countenance; her features, as well as her temper, had a lively expression; her complexion, though not florid, was so pure as to seem transparent, and the slightest emotion sent her whole blood at once to her face and neck.  Her form, though under the common size, was remarkably elegant, and her motions light, easy, and unembarrassed.  She came from another part of the garden to receive Captain Waverley, with a manner that hovered between bashfulness and courtesy.