Page:Comical tricks of Lothian Tom (2).pdf/9

 possibly he could get; then takes a piece of chalk, and brays it as small as meal, and steeps it in a little water, and therewith rubs over the cow’s face and back, which made her baith brocket and rigget. So Tom in the morning takes the cow to a public house within a little of the fair, and left her till the fair was over, and then drives her home before him; and as soon as they came home, the cow began to rout as she used to do, which made the old woman to rejoice, thinking it was her own cow, but when she saw her white, sighed and said, Alas! thou’lt never be like the kindly brute my Black Lady, and yet ye rout as like her as ony ever I did hear. But says Tom to himself, ’tis a mercy you know not what she says, or all would be wrong yet. So in two or three days the old woman put forth her braw rigget cow in the morning with the rest of her neighbours’ cattle, but it came on a sore day of heavy rain, which washed away all the white from her face and back; so the old woman’s Black Lady came home at night, and her rigget cow went away with the shower, and was never heard of. But Tom's father having some suspicion, and looking narrowly into the cow's face, found some of the chalk not washed away and then he gave poor Tom a hearty beating, and sent him away to seek his fortune with a skin full of sore bones.