‘And who, then, in the name of Heaven, has bought this property?’

‘That,’ said the Colonel, ’it is this gentleman’s profession to explain.’

The Bailie, whom this reference regarded, and who had all this while shifted from one foot to another with great impatience, ‘like a hen,’ as he afterwards said, ‘upon a het girdle’; and chuckling, he might have added, like the said hen in all the glory of laying an egg, now pushed forward.  ’That I can, that I can, your honour,’ drawing from his pocket a budget of papers, and untying the red tape with a hand trembling with eagerness.  ’Here is the disposition and assignation by Malcolm Bradwardine of Inch-Grabbit, regularly signed and tested in terms of the statute, whereby, for a certain sum of sterling money presently contented and paid to him, he has disponed, alienated, and conveyed the whole estate and barony of Bradwardine, Tully-Veolan, and others, with the fortalice and manor-place—­’

‘For God’s sake, to the point, sir; I have all that by heart,’ said the Colonel.

‘—­To Cosmo Comyne Bradwardme, Esq.,’ pursued the Bailie, ’his heirs and assignees, simply and irredeemably, to be held either a me vel de me—­’

‘Pray read short, sir.’

’On the conscience of an honest man, Colonel, I read as short as is consistent with style—­under the burden and reservation always—­’

’Mr. Macwheeble, this would outlast a Russian winter; give me leave.  In short, Mr. Bradwardine, your family estate is your own once more in full property, and at your absolute disposal, but only burdened with the sum advanced to re-purchase it, which I understand is utterly disproportioned to its value.’

‘An auld sang—­an auld sang, if it please your honours,’ cried the Bailie, rubbing his hands; ‘look at the rental book.’

’—­Which sum being advanced, by Mr. Edward Waverley, chiefly from the price of his father’s property which I bought from him, is secured to his lady your daughter and her family by this marriage.’

‘It is a catholic security,’ shouted the Bailie,’ to Rose Comyne Bradwardine, alias Wauverley, in life-rent, and the children of the said marriage in fee; and I made up a wee bit minute of an antenuptial contract, intuitu matrimonij, so it cannot be subject to reduction hereafter, as a donation inter virum et uxorem.’

It is difficult to say whether the worthy Baron was most delighted with the restitution of his family property or with the delicacy and generosity that left him unfettered to pursue his purpose in disposing of it after his death, and which avoided as much as possible even the appearance of laying him under pecuniary obligation.  When his first pause of joy and astonishment was over, his thoughts turned to the unworthy heir-male, who, he pronounced, had sold his birthright, like Esau, for a mess o’ pottage.