Here Mrs.Heathcote and Kate Daly found the old lady sitting at work, all alone, in the veranda.

She was a handsome old woman, with gray hair, seventy years of age, with wrinkled face, and a toothless mouth, but with bright eyes, and with no signs of the infirmity of age.
"This is gey kind of you to run so far to see an auld woman," she said.
Mrs.Heathcote declared that they were used to the heat, and that after the rain the air was pleasant.
"You're two bright lassies, and you're hearty," she said.

"I'm auld, and just out of Cumberland, and I find it's hot enough--and I'm no guid at horseback at all.

I dinna know how I'm to get aboot." Then Mrs.Heathcote explained that there was an excellent track for a buggy all the way to Gangoil.
"Giles is aye telling me that I'm to gang aboot in a bouggey, but I dinna feel sure of thae bouggeys." Mrs.Heathcote, of course, praised the country carriages, and the country roads, and the country generally.

Tea was brought in, and the old lady was delighted with her guests.