Mith. Hout tout ay, ye that's auld wives is ay fa' o' freets and religious fashions, them that look to freets, freets follows them, but it is six and thirty years since I was a married wife, and never kend a Sabbath day by anither ane, money a time till the bell rang.
Mar. Dear guidwife, what need ye cry sae loud? ye fright the wean wi' crying sae, see as it starts.
Mith. Ay, ay. the bystarts is a' that way, but ken ye the reason o' that.
Mar. Ye, that kens the reason of every thing, may soon find out that too.
Mith. A deed thau, woman, I ll tell you, the merry begotten weans, 'tis bystarts I mean, is red wood, half wittet hillocket sort o' creatures; for an it be na ane amang twenty o' them, they're a' scar'd o' the getting, for there's few o' them gotten in beds like honest fouk's bairns: but in out houses, auld barns, backs o' dykes, an kill-logies: whare there's ay some body wandering about to fear poor needfu' persons at their job o' journey-wark: for weel ken I the gates o't, experience gars me speak.
Jock. A deed mither that's very true, for whan I was getting that wean at the black hole o' the peat ſtack, John Gammel's muckle colley came in behind us wi' a bow wow, o' a great goul just aboon my buttocks; an as I'm a sinner, he gart me loup laverock height, an yet we got the wean for a' that.
Mith. A weel than, Johnny, that maks my words good yet.
Jenny answers out o' the bed. A shame fa' your fashions ye hae na muckle to keep when ye tell how it was gotten, or what was at the getting o't.
Jock. A. shame fa' yoursel, Jenny, for I hae gotten my part o' the shame else, an gin ye hadna tell'd first, there wad nane kend, for nae body saw us but Johu Gammel's auld colley an he's no a sufficient witness.
Mar. Now, guidwife, amang a' the tales ye hae tell'd me, how is this wean to be maintain'd?
C 2
