In front of the fire sat the English lord over his wine; Mistress Warlock sat in her arm-chair, knitting and dozing--between her evanescent naps wide awake, and ever and anon sliding her eyes from the stocking which did not need her attention to the guest who little desired it; the laird had taken his place at the other corner, and was reading the Journal of George Fox; and Grizzie was bustling about with less noise than she liked, and wishing heartily she were free of his lordship, that she might get on with her work.

Scarcely a word was spoken.
It began to grow dark; the lid of the night was closing upon them ere half a summer-day would have been over.

But it mattered little: the snow had stayed the work of the world.

Grizzie put on the kettle for her mistress's tea.

The old lady turned her forty winks into four hundred, and slept outright, curtained in the shadows.
All at once his lordship became alive to the fact that the day was gone, shifted uneasily in his chair, poured out a bumper of claret, drank it off hurriedly, and hitched his chair a little nearer to the fire.