time left the room, to avoid, probably, any appeal which might be made to him upon this new exaction) and he never engages for ony thing like that."
"In God's name," said Bertram, "let me have what is decent, and make any charge you please."
"Aweel, aweel, that's sune settled; we'll no excise you neither, though we live sae near the custom-house. And I maun see to get you some fire and some dinner too, I'se warrant; but your dinner will be but a puir ane the day, no expecting company that wad be nice and fashions."—So saying, and in all haste, Mrs. Mac-Guffog fetched a skuttle of live coals, and having replenished "the rusty grate, unconscious of a fire" for months before, she proceeded with unwashed hands to arrange the stipulated bed-linen, (alas, how different from Ailie Dinmont's!) and, muttering to herself as she discharged her task, seemed, in inveterate spleen of temper, to grudge even those accommo-
