--
Look up, man, and see us in the face as an honest man should, instead
of beating thy noddle charged against us thus, like a battering-ram."
The scrivener did look up accordingly, with the action of an automaton
which suddenly obeys the impulse of a pressed spring. But, strange to
tell, not even the haste he had made to attend his patron's mandate, a
business, as Master Heriot's message expressed, of weight and
importance--nay not even the state of depression in which, out of
sheer humility, doubtless, he had his head stooped to the earth, from
the moment he had trod the demesnes of the Earl of Huntinglen, had
called any colour into his countenance. The drops stood on his brow
from haste and toil, but his cheek was still pale and tallow-coloured
as before; nay, what seemed stranger, his very hair, when he raised
his head, hung down on either cheek as straight and sleek and
undisturbed as it was when we first introduced him to our readers,
seated at his quiet and humble desk.
Lord Dalgarno could not forbear a stifled laugh at the ridiculous and
puritanical figure which presented itself like a starved anatomy to
the company, and whispered at the same time into Lord Glenvarloch's
ear--
"The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon,
Where got'st thou that goose-look?"
Nigel was too little acquainted with the English stage to understand a
quotation which had already grown matter of common allusion in London.
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