We have done eneugh for them; and
to do mair would be mair against the credit of the family than in its
favour."
"Well, Caleb," said the Master, "I give you the best possible credit for
your good advice on this occasion; but as I do not go to Ravenswood to
seek a bride, dead or alive, I hope I shall choose a better stable for
my horse than the Kelpie's quicksand, and especially as I have always
had a particular dread of it since the patrol of dragoons were
lost there ten years since. My father and I saw them from the tower
struggling against the advancing tide, and they were lost long before
any help could reach them."
"And they deserved it weel, the southern loons!" said Caleb; "what had
they ado capering on our sands, and hindering a wheen honest folk frae
bringing on shore a drap brandy? I hae seen them that busy, that I
wad hae fired the auld culverin or the demi-saker that's on the south
bartizan at them, only I was feared they might burst in the ganging
aff."
Caleb's brain was now fully engaged with abuse of the English soldiery
and excisemen, so that his master found no great difficulty in
escaping from him and rejoining his guests.
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