Page:Traditional Tales of the English and Scottish Peasantry - 1887.djvu/181

Rh "All turned their eyes on me at this address, and the uproar subsided for a time to hear my answer to this singular appeal.

A soul in his body,' shouted a rustic, in a tone which implied something like a suspicion of my right to the spark immortal, 'have ye not heard the scoffing sang that's ringing from side to side of the country? I wonder the subject of such verses presumed to show his face among sponsible folk!'

"And, to my utter shame and confusion of face, he proceeded to chant the following rude verse, looking all the while on me with an eye sparkling with scorn and derision:

"As the verse ended, a laugh burst out which made the roof shake over our heads, to show how fickle men's passions are and the mortification I was doomed to endure. To be the subject of ludicrous rhymes is to have an infection about one equal to the plague. My fellow- suitors shunned me, and the capricious maiden herself assumed an air so haughty and decided that I saw my cause was cureless. All this was witnessed by one who sympathized in my sufferings, and whose ready wit suggested an instant remedy. The milkiness of my nature had already given way to the accumulating reproach; I had started to my feet, and taken one stride towards my rhyming persecutor with a clenched fist, and a face burning in anger, when the young girl who brought me the invitation to this unlucky tryste uttered a scream, and, holding up her hand, laid her ear to the floor like one listening intensely. We all stood mute and motionless: she darted to the door with the rapidity of light, returned in a moment half-breathless, and exclaimed in a voice of seeming despair, 'Oh! Bess, Bess, what will become of ye? Here's Hazelbank—here's our ain father coming up the road. If he sees what I see, he'll burn Solway, be it for him or against him.'