Noo that he loved a lassie as he'd never dreamed he could love anyone, he found he could say nowt to her he had no said to a dozen or a score before her.

The protestations that he made rang wi' a familiar sound in his ain ears--hoo could he mak' them convincing to her?
And it was sae different wi' Jamie; he'd ne'er wasted his treasure o' love, and thrown a wee bit here and a wee bit there.

He had it a' to lay at the feet o' his true love, and there was little doot in ma mind, when I saw hoo things were gae'in, o' what the end on't wad be.
And, sure enow, it was no Andy, the graceful, the popular one, who married her--it was the puir, salt Jamie, who'd saved the siller o' his love--and, by the way, he'd saved the ither sort o' siller, tae, sae that he had a grand little hoose to tak' his bride into, and a hoose well furnished, and a' paid for, too.
Aye, I'll no be denyin' the Scot is a close fisted man.

But he's close fisted in more ways than one.

Ye'll ca' a man close fisted and mean by that just that he's slow to open his fist to let his siller through it.