Page:Salem - a tale of the seventeenth century (IA taleseventeenth00derbrich).pdf/256

 on'y child.' An' mair he said to me, an' mair to the purpose; but, whist! lassie, young girls are aye silly—an' luve is blin', an' deaf too; I wa' jist like a colt fra' the heather, an' I wad na' hear till him.

"'Ye may tell yer braw wooer, Elsie,' he said to me are day, 'if he courts ye for the siller, he wi' marry ye wi' an empty han'; for I tell ye noo that niver a baubee o' my honest arnings sall gae into his pouch, to be squandered ower the mess-table; an' ye may tell him so fra' me.'

"But I did na' tell him—I could na'; I thought, puir silly lass, that it wa' as if I dooted his luve; an' so when my father an' mither baith held out agin' him, an' talked hard to me about Robin, I jist rinned awa' fra' them, to follow the fortunes of my gay soger lad.

"He married me, Allie—yes, he made me his honest wife; ah! he took tent o' that, for he counted sure upon my little fortin; but my father—alas, he better onderstood his flathering tongue than I did, for whin he wrote him word that a' his sma' property wad gae to his brither's son, my husband