Guy Mannering.

GUY MANNERING. 249
" Ay, Tib, that will be when the deil's blind,-and his
een's no sair yet. But hear ye, gudewife, I have been
through maist feck o' Galloway and Dumfries-shire, and
I have been round by Carlisle, and I was at the Staneshiebank fair the day, and I would like ill to be rubbit
sae near hame —so I'll take the gate."
"Hae ye been in Dumfiies and Galloway?" said the
old dame, who sate smoking by the fire-side, and who had
not yet spoken a word.
"' Troth have I, gudewife, and a weary round I've had
o't."
"Then ye'll maybe ken a place they ca' Ellangowan?"
"Ellangowan, that was lMr. Bertram's?-I ken the
place weel eneugh. The Laird died about a fortnight
since, as I heard."
"Died! "-said the old woman, dropping her pipe, and
rising and coming forward upon the floor-" died! —are
you sure of that?"
"Troth, am I," said Dinmont, "for it made nae sma'
noise in the country-side. He died just at the roup of
the stocking and furniture; it stoppit the roup, and mony
folk were disappointed. They said he was the last of an
auld family too, and mony were sorry-for gude blude's
scarcer in Scotland than it has been."
"Dead! " replied the old woman, whom our readers
have already recognised as their acquaintance, AMeg Merrilies -" dead! that quits a' scores. And did ye say he
died without an heir? "
" Ay did he, gudewife, and the estate's sell'd by the
same token; for they said, they couldna have sell'd it, if
there had been an heir-male."
"Sell'd!" echoed the gipsy, with something like a
scream; " and wha durst buy Ellangowan'that was not