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"Ay, ay," answered Luckie Mucklebackit, "I see you hae gotten a' your braws on; ye're looking about for Steenie now but he's no at hame the night; and ye'll no do for Steenie, lass a feckless thing like you's no fit to mainteen a man." "Steenie will no do for me," retorted Jenny, with a toss of her head that might have become a higher-born damsel; "I maun hae a man that can mainteen his wife."
Ca' hooly, sirs, as ye, wad win an auld man's blessing! mind there's naebody below now to haud the gy Hae a care o' the Cat's-lug corner bide weel aff Crummie's-horn!" "Have a care indeed," echoed Oldbuck. "What! is it my rara avis my black swan my phoenix of companions in a post-chaise? take care of him, Mucklebackit."
The boat had indeed been overset; but Stephen, or, as he was called, Steenie Mucklebackit, was the only man who had been drowned.
She rose, while the chair in which she sate was kept steady by the line which Lovel managed beneath. With a beating heart he watched the flutter of her white dress, until the vehicle was on a level with the brink of the precipice. "Canny now, lads, canny now!" exclaimed old Mucklebackit, who acted as commodore; "swerve the yard a bit Now there! there she sits safe on dry land."
Ca' hooly, sirs, as ye, wad win an auld man's blessing! mind there's naebody below now to haud the gy Hae a care o' the Cat's-lug corner bide weel aff Crummie's-horn!" "Have a care indeed," echoed Oldbuck. "What! is it my rara avis my black swan my phoenix of companions in a post-chaise? take care of him, Mucklebackit."
But Maggie Mucklebackit, her first burst of grief being over, was by no means disposed in her own house to pay passive obedience to the commands of her mother-in-law, an authority which is peculiarly obnoxious to persons in her rank of life, and which she was the more astonished at hearing revived, when it seemed to have been so long relinquished and forgotten.
And she relapsed into silence, which she did not break again during the rest of the evening. "I wonder what that auld daft beggar carle and our son Steenie can be doing out in sic a nicht as this," said Maggie Mucklebackit; and her expression of surprise was echoed by her visitor.
Whiles she'll no speak a word in a week, unless it be to the bits o' bairns." "Hegh, Mrs. Mucklebackit, she's an awsome wife!" said Jenny in reply. "D'ye think she's a'thegither right? Folk say she downa gang to the kirk, or speak to the minister, and that she was ance a papist but since her gudeman's been dead, naebody kens what she is. D'ye think yoursell that she's no uncanny?"
Yet, with all this, there was about the inmates, Luckie Mucklebackit and her family, an appearance of ease, plenty, and comfort, that seemed to warrant their old sluttish proverb, "The clartier the cosier." A huge fire, though the season was summer, occupied the hearth, and served at once for affording light, heat, and the means of preparing food.
"I see them mysell weel eneugh," said Mucklebackit; "they are sitting down yonder like hoodie-craws in a mist; but d'yo think ye'll help them wi' skirling that gate like an auld skart before a flaw o' weather? Steenie, lad, bring up the mast Od, I'se hae them up as we used to bouse up the kegs o' gin and brandy lang syne Get up the pickaxe, make a step for the mast make the chair fast with the rattlin haul taught and belay!"
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