But truly I must needs think this young leddy--if you call
Watchie Ramsay's daughter a young leddy--demeans herself more like a
leddy of pleasure than a leddy of honour."
"You do her egregious wrong, Sir Mungo," said Nigel; "or rather you
have been misled by appearances."
"So will all the world be misled, my lord," replied the satirist,
"unless you were doing that to disabuse them which your father's son
will hardly judge it fit to do."
"And what may that be, I pray you?"
"E'en marry the lass--make her Leddy Glenvarloch.--Ay, ay, ye may
start--but it's the course you are driving on. Rather marry than do
worse, if the worst be not done already."
"Sir Mungo," said Nigel, "I pray you to forbear this subject, and
rather return to that of the mutilation, upon which it pleased you to
enlarge a short while since."
"I have not time at present," said Sir Mungo, hearing the clock strike
four; "but so soon as you shall have received sentence, my lord, you
may rely on my giving you the fullest detail of the whole solemnity;
and I give you my word, as a knight and a gentleman, that I will
myself attend you on the scaffold, whoever may cast sour looks on me
for doing so. I bear a heart, to stand by a friend in the worst of
times."
So saying, he wished Lord Glenvarloch farewell; who felt as heartily
rejoiced at his departure, though it may be a bold word, as any person
who had ever undergone his society.
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