The Waverley novels, by Sir Walter Scott, complete in 12 vol., printed from the latest English ed., embracing the author's last corrections, prefaces & notes.

PEVERIL OF TIE PEAK. 473
self by looking out of the window, determined to avoid all intercourse until
it should be inevitably forced upon him.
In the meanwhile, the other stranger went straight up to the landlady,
where she toiled on household cares intent, and demanded of her, what she
meant by preparing bacon and eggs, when he had positively charged her to
get nothing ready but the fish.
The good woman, important as every cook in the discharge of her duty,
deigned not for some time so much as to acknowledge that Lhe heard the
reproof of her guest; and when she did so, it was only to repel it in a
magisterial and authoritative tone. -" If he did not like bacon-(bacon
from their own hutch, well fed on peas and bran)-if he did not like bacon
and eggs —(new-laid eggs, which she had brought in from the hen-roost
with her own hands) - why so put case - it was the worse for his honour,
and the better for those who did."
"The better for those who like them?" answered the guest; " that is as
much as to say I am to have a companion, good woman."
" Do not good woman me, sir," replied the miller's wife, "till I call you
good man; and, I promise you, many would scruple to do that to one who
does not love eggs and bacon of a Friday."
"Nav, my good lady," said her guest, " do not fix any misconstruction
upon me-I dare say the eggs and the bacon are excellent; only, they are
rather a dish too heavy for my stomach."
"Ay, or your conscience perhaps, sir," answered the hostess. "And
now, I bethink me, you must needs have your fish fried with oil, instead of
the good drippings I was going to put to them. I would I could spell the
meaning of all this now; but I warrant John Bigstaff, the constable, could
conjure something out of it."
There was a pause here;- but Julian, somewhat alai'med at the tone which
the conversation assumed, became interested in watching the dumb-show
which succeeded. By bringing his head a little towards the left, but without turning round, or quitting the projecting latticed window where he had
taken his station, he could observe that the stranger, secured, as he seemed
to think himself, from observation, had sidled close up to the landlady, and,
as he conceived, had put a piece of money into her hand. The altered tone
of the miller's moiety corresponded very much with this supposition.
"Nay, indeed, and forsooth," she said, " her house was Liberty-hall; and
so should every publican's be. What was it to her what gentlefolks ate or
drank, providing they paid for it honestly? There were many hofiest gentlemen, whose stomachs could not abide bacon, grease, or dripping, especially
on a Friday; and what was that to her, or any one in her line, so gentlefolks paid honestly for the trouble? Only, she would say, that her bacon
and eggs could not be mended betwixt this and Liverpool; and that. she
would live and die upon."'
"I shall hardly dispute it," said the stranger; and turning towards
Julian, he added, "I wish this gentleman, who I suppose is my trenchercompanion, much joy of the dainties which I cannot assist him in conSuming.'"
" I assure you, sir," answered Peveril, who now felt himself compelled to
turn about, and reply with civility, " that it was with difficulty I could
prevail on my landlady to add my cover to yours, though she seems now
such a zealot for the consumption of eggs and bacon."
"I am zealous for nothing," said the landlady, "save that men would eat
their victuals, and pay their score; and if there be enough in one dish to
serve two guests, I see little purpose in dressing them two; however, they
are ready now, and done to a nicety.-Here, Alice! Alice!"
Thle sound of that well-known name made Julian start; but the Alice
who replied to the call ill resembled the vision which his imLagination connected with the accents, being a dowdy slipihod wench, the drudge of the
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