Page:Traditional Tales of the English and Scottish Peasantry - 1887.djvu/275

Rh like a bright pageant; his eyes sparkled with that unholy light by which Mammon sums his treasure, and he stretched forth his hand to clutch the visionary gold, which deceitful fancy heaped up before him. But nature could not sustaiusustain [sic] the effort, the light faded in his eyes, his hand sank and his head declined, and sinking on the cushions, he muttered, "Na, na, it winna do, it winna do, I maun away to the worms, and my bits of bonnie gold will get a fearful scattering;" and fixing his looks on the old bag of coin, which was suspended in the chimney, he lay for a while in woeful rumination, and thus proceeded: "Ay, ay, ye'll no hang lang in that cozie place now; the hand of the spoiler will come, and thy braw broad pieces which I gathered with care and with sorrow, and regarded as gods, will gang to the silk shop and the maker of golden gimcracks, glancing with polished stones for woman's neck and bosom." And shutting his eyes in despair, and clutching his hands in agony of spirit, he resigned himself to his fate.

Meanwhile the devout twin-brother of Mammon seated himself in an old chair, laid his Bible on his knees, uncovered his head, placed his long iron fingers on the clasps, and with a prolonged preliminary cough, which hypocrisy had taught to imitate the listless and weary end of a dull sectarian sermon, he opened the volume. He glanced his eye around, to see if his auditors were composed, and commenced his search for a chapter befitting the perilous state of his friend. I was seated beside him, and thus I heard him converse with himself, as he turned over the leaves: "A chapter fit for a sinner's state! I mauna read about repentance, nor speak of the benefits of redemption. He'll never forgive me for directing his thoughts to such strange objects."

The laird uttered a low groan, and the devout man proceeded with his mutterings. "He's going gear, he's going gear; he winna shoot over the coming midnight: he'll be a stretched-out corse, and Bessie Lamond, his niece there, a braw rich heiress before the morning light. She'll be a weel tochered lass, when auld Gripagain travels. Let me see, there's Hurleyhawkie, a rich land and well watered; there's Auchenling, a dreary domain it's true, but there's gallant shooting on't, though it bears little but cranberries; then there's Wyliehole, and the sixteen acre parks of Warlsworm, forbye bails and bonds and gathered gold; my sooth, Bessie my lass, many a gallant will cast his cap at thee." And he