United States or Guadeloupe ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Erchie," she continued, with a change of voice, "ye maunna think that I canna sympathise wi' ye. Ye maunna think that I havena been young mysel'. Lang syne, when I was a bit lassie, no twenty yet " She paused and sighed. "Clean and caller, wi' a fit like the hinney bee," she continued.
Mind, Maister Erchie dear, that this life's a' disappointment, and a mouthfu' o' mools is the appointed end." "Ay, but Kirstie, my woman, you're asking me ower much at last," said Archie, profoundly moved, and lapsing into the broad Scots. "Ye're asking what nae man can grant ye, what only the Lord of heaven can grant ye if He see fit. Ay! And can even He?
"O, my dear, that'll no dae!" said Kirstie. "It's ill to blend the eyes of love. O, Mr. Erchie, tak' a thocht ere it's ower late. Ye shouldna be impatient o' the braws o' life, they'll a' come in their saison, like the sun and the rain. Ye're young yet; ye've mony cantie years afore ye. See and dinna wreck yersel' at the outset like sae mony ithers!
Erchie, there was a lad cam' courtin' me, as was but naetural. Mony had come before, and I would nane o' them. But this yin had a tongue to wile the birds frae the lift and the bees frae the foxglove bells. Deary me, but it's lang syne! Folk have dee'd sinsyne and been buried, and are forgotten, and bairns been born and got merrit and got bairns o' their ain.
And then, with a most unusual gentleness of tone, "Puir bitch," said he, "puir bitch!" Then suddenly: "Where's Erchie?" Kirstie had decoyed him to her room and given him "a jeely-piece." "Ye have some kind of gumption, too," observed the judge, and considered his housekeeper grimly. "When all's said," he added, "I micht have done waur I micht have been marriet upon a skirting Jezebel like you!"
Hae patience they telled me aye that was the owercome o' life hae patience, there's a braw day coming yet. Gude kens it never cam to me; and here I am, wi' nayther man nor bairn to ca' my ain, wearying a' folks wi' my ill tongue, and you just the first, Mr. Erchie!" "I have a difficulty in knowing what you mean," said Archie. "Weel, and I'll tell ye," she said.
Perhaps none but Archie knew she could be eloquent; perhaps none but he had seen her her colour raised, her hands clasped or quivering glow with gentle ardour. On such days, upon the sudden view of it, her hand would tighten on the child's fingers, her voice rise like a song. "I to the hills!" she would repeat. "And O, Erchie, arena these like the hills of Naphtali?" and her tears would flow.
Sinsyne woods have been plantit, and have grawn up and are bonny trees, and the joes sit in their shadow, and sinsyne auld estates have changed hands, and there have been wars and rumours of wars on the face of the earth. And here I'm still like an auld droopit craw lookin' on and craikin'! But, Mr. Erchie, do ye no think that I have mind o' it a' still?
In the meantime, Kirstie had escaped into the kitchen, and before her vassal gave vent to her feelings. "Here, ettercap! Ye'll have to wait on yon Innes! I canna haud myself in. `Puir Erchie! I'd `puir Erchie' him, if I had my way! And Hermiston with the deil's ain temper! God, let him take Hermiston's scones out of his mouth first.
Something it might be in the comparative disorder of her dress, it might be the emotion that now welled in her bosom had touched her with a wand of transformation, and she seemed young with the youth of goddesses. "Mr. Erchie," she began, "what's this that's come to ye?" "I am not aware of anything that has come," said Archie, and blushed, and repented bitterly that he had let her in.
Word Of The Day