‘Nor good neither,’ answered Dominie Sampson, in a voice whose untuneable harshness corresponded with the awkwardness of his figure.  They were the first words which Mannering had heard him speak; and as he had been watching with some curiosity when this eating, drinking, moving, and smoking automaton would perform the part of speaking, he was a good deal diverted with the harsh timber tones which issued from him.  But at this moment the door opened, and Meg Merrilies entered.

Her appearance made Mannering start.  She was full six feet high, wore a man’s great-coat over the rest of her dress, had in her hand a goodly sloethorn cudgel, and in all points of equipment, except her petticoats, seemed rather masculine than feminine.  Her dark elf-locks shot out like the snakes of the gorgon between an old-fashioned bonnet called a bongrace, heightening the singular effect of her strong and weather-beaten features, which they partly shadowed, while her eye had a wild roll that indicated something like real or affected insanity.

‘Aweel, Ellangowan,’ she said, ’wad it no hae been a bonnie thing, an the leddy had been brought to bed, and me at the fair o’ Drumshourloch, no kenning, nor dreaming a word about it?  Wha was to hae keepit awa the worriecows, I trow?  Ay, and the elves and gyre-carlings frae the bonnie bairn, grace be wi’ it?  Ay, or said Saint Colme’s charm for its sake, the dear?’ And without waiting an answer she began to sing—­

Trefoil, vervain, John’s-wort, dill, Hinders witches of their will, Weel is them, that weel may Fast upon Saint Andrew’s day.

     Saint Bride and her brat,
     Saint Colme and his cat,
     Saint Michael and his spear,
     Keep the house frae reif and wear.

This charm she sung to a wild tune, in a high and shrill voice, and, cutting three capers with such strength and agility as almost to touch the roof of the room, concluded, ’And now, Laird, will ye no order me a tass o’ brandy?’

’That you shall have, Meg.  Sit down yont there at the door and tell us what news ye have heard at the fair o’ Drumshourloch.’

‘Troth, Laird, and there was muckle want o’ you, and the like o’ you; for there was a whin bonnie lasses there, forbye mysell, and deil ane to gie them hansels.’

‘Weel, Meg, and how mony gipsies were sent to the tolbooth?’

’Troth, but three, Laird, for there were nae mair in the fair, bye mysell, as I said before, and I e’en gae them leg-bail, for there’s nae ease in dealing wi’ quarrelsome fowk.  And there’s Dunbog has warned the Red Rotten and John Young aff his grunds—­ black be his cast! he’s nae gentleman, nor drap’s bluid o’ gentleman, wad grudge twa gangrel puir bodies the shelter o’ a waste house, and the thristles by the roadside for a bit cuddy, and the bits o’ rotten birk to boil their drap parritch wi’.  Weel, there’s Ane abune a’; but we’ll see if the red cock craw not in his bonnie barn-yard ae morning before day-dawing.’