Page:Comical history of Simple John and his twelve misfortunes (8).pdf/4

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Willie the wilie weaver, his mother was a rattling rattle scull'd wife and they lived a' in æ house and every body held them as a family of fools. When John came to man's state, to the age of twenty one years, he told his mither, he would hae a wife of some sort, either young or auld, widow or lass, if they had but head and hips, tongue and tail, he should take them, and weel a wat mither, quoth he, they'll get a lumping penny-worth o me, tak me wha will. His mither tells him o' the black butcher on Tivot side, who had three daughters, and every ane o' them had something, there was Kate, Ann, and Girzy, had hundred merks the piece, Kate, and Ann had baith bastards, Girzy the eldest had a humph back, a high-breast, baker-legged, a short wry neck, thrawn mouth, and goggle-ey'd a perfect Æsop of the female kind with as many crooked conditions within as without, a very lump of loun-like ill-nature, row'd a' the gither, as if she had been nine months in a haggies, a second edition of crook backed Richard the old English King, that was born with teeth to bite a' around about him, and yet the wight gaed mad to be married.