Page:Guy Mannering Vol 1.djvu/244

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234
GUY MANNERING.

in vain. A bright idea then occurred, that Colonel Mannering might have employed some other person in the transaction—he would not have wasted a moment's thought upon the want of confidence in himself, which such a manœuvre would have evinced. But this hope also was groundless. After a solemn pause, Mr Glossin offered the upset price for the lands and barony of Ellangowan. No reply was made, and no competitor appeared; so, after a lapse of the usual interval by the running of a sand-glass, upon the intended purchaser entering the proper sureties, Mr Mac-Morlan was obliged, in technical terms, to "find and declare the sale lawfully completed, and to prefer the said Gilbert Glossin as the purchaser of the said lands and estate." The honest writer refused to partake of a splendid entertainment with which Gilbert Glossin, Esquire, now of Ellangowan, treated the rest of the company, and returned home in huge bitterness of spirit,