"I can read a woman's brow as well, and better, than thou, and I can see no such matter on hers.

What, the foul fiend, man! there thou wast lying like a lord in thy elbow chair, as sound asleep as a judge, when, hadst thou been a lover of any spirit, thou wouldst have been watching the east for the first ray of the sun.

But there thou layest, snoring I warrant, thinking nought about her, or anything else; and the poor girl rises at peep of day, lest any one else should pick up her most precious and vigilant Valentine, and wakes thee with a grace which--so help me, St.Macgrider!--would have put life in an anvil; and thou awakest to hone, and pine, and moan, as if she had drawn a hot iron across thy lips! I would to St.John she had sent old Dorothy on the errand, and bound thee for thy Valentine service to that bundle of dry bones, with never a tooth in her head.

She were fittest Valentine in Perth for so craven a wooer." "As to craven, father," answered the smith, "there are twenty good cocks, whose combs I have plucked, can tell thee if I am craven or no.

And Heaven knows that I would give my good land, held by burgess' tenure, with smithy, bellows, tongs, anvil, and all, providing it would make your view of the matter the true one.