Page:Scott - Tales of my Landlord - 3rd series, vol. 2 - 1819.djvu/249

Rh "I live by twa trades, sir," replied the blythe old man; "fiddle, sir, and spade; filling the world, and emptying of it; and I suld ken baith cast of customers by headmark in thirty years practice."

"You are mistaken, however, this morning," replied Ravenswood.

"Am I?" said the old man, looking keenly at him, "troth and it may be; since, for as brent as your brow is, there is something sitting upon it this day, that is as near akin to death as to wedlock. Weel, weel, the pick and shovel are as ready to your order as bow and fiddle."

"I wish you," said Ravenswood, "to look after the decent interment of an old woman, Alice Gray, who lived at the Craigfoot in Ravenswood Park."

"Alice Gray! blind Alice!" said the sexton; "and is she gane at last? that's another jow of the bell to bid me be ready. I mind when Habbie Gray brought her down to this land; a likely lass she was then, and looked ower her southland nose at us a'. I