The monastery; The abbot.

THE MONASTERY. 51
" How should that be,' said Tibb, " and you sic a weel-favoured woman
to this day?"
"Pie, fie, cummer," said the matron of Glendearg, hitching her seat of
honour, in her turn, a little nearer to the cuttie-stool on which Tibb was
seated; " weel-favoured is past my time of day; but I might pass then, for
I wasna sae tocherless but what I had a bit land at my breast-lace. My
father was portioner of Little-dearg."
"Ye hae tell'd me that before," said Tibb; "but anent the Hallowe'en?"
"Aweel, aweel, I had mair joes than ane, but I favoured nane o' them;
and sae, at Hallowe'en, Father Nicolas the cellarer-he was cellarer before
this father, Father Clement, that now is-was cracking his nuts and drinking his brown beer with us, and as blithe as might be, andthey would have
me try a cantrip to ken wha suld wed me: and the monk said there was
nae ill in it, and if there was, he would assoil me for it. And wha but I
into the barn to winnow my three weights o' naething-sair, sair my mind
misgave me for fear of wrang-doing and wrang-suffering baith; but I had
aye a bauld spirit. I had not winnowed the last weight clean out, and the
moon was shining bright upon the floor, when in stalked the presence of
my dear Simon Glendinning, that is now happy. I never saw him plainer
in my life than I did that moment; he held.up an arrow as he passed me,
and I swarf'd awa wi' fright. Muckle wark there was to bring me to
mysell again, and sair they tried to make ie believe it was a trick of Father
Nicolas and Simon between them, and thtlt the arrow was to signify Cupid's
shaft, as. the Father called it; and mony a time Simon wad threep it to me
after I was married - gude man, he liked not it should be said that he was
seen out o' the body I —But mark the end o' it, Tibb; we were married,
and the gray-goose wing was the death o' him after a'!"
" As it has been of ower mony brave men," said Tibb; "I wish there
wasna sic a bird as a goose in the wide warld, forby the decking that we
hae at the burn-side."
" But tell me, Tibb," said Dame Glendinning, " what does your leddy
aye do reading out o' that thick black book wi' the silver clasps? - there
are ower mony gude words in it to come frae ony body but a priest-An it
were about Robin Hood, or some o' David Lindsay's ballants, ane wad ken
better what to say to it. I am no misdoubting your mistress nae way,
but I wad like ill to hae a decent house haunted wi' ghaists and gyrecarlines."
"Ye hae nae reason to doubt my leddy, or ony thing she says or does,
Dame Glendinning," said the faithful Tibb, something offended; "and
touching the bairn, it's weel kend she was born on Hallowe'en, was nine
years gane, and they that are born on Hallowe'en whiles see mair than
ither folk."
" And that wad be the cause, then, that the bairn didna mak muckle din
about what it saw?-if it had been my Halbert himself, forby Edward,
who is of softer nature, he wad hae yammered the haill night of a constancy. But it's like Mistress Mary hae sic sights mair natural to her."
" That may weel be," said Tibb; " for on Hallowe'en she was born, as I
tell ye, and our auld parish priest wad fain hae had the night ower, and
All-Hallow day begun. But for a' that, the sweet bairn is just like ither
bairns, as ye may see yourself; and except this blessed night, and ance
before when we were in that weary bog on the road here, I kenna that it
saw mair than ither folk."
"But what saw she in the bog, then," said Dame Glendinning, "forby
moor-cocks and heather-blutters?"
" The wean saw something like a white leddy that weised us the gate,"
said Tibb; "when we were like to hae perished in the moss-hags - certain it was that Shagram reisted, and I ken Martin thinks he saw something."