Thus wounded, and nearly naked, having only a shirt on, and an old sack about him, the ancestor of the great poet was sitting, along with his brother and a hundred and fifty unfortunate gentlemen, in a granary at Preston.

The wounded man fell sick, as the story goes, and vomited the scarlet cloth which the ball had passed into the wound.

"O man, Wattie," cried his brother, "if you have a wardrobe in your wame, I wish you would vomit me a pair o' breeks." But, after all, it was amongst the old ladies that the great abundance of choice pungent Scottish expressions, such as you certainly do not meet with in these days, was to be sought.

In their position of society, education either in England, or education conducted by English teachers, has so spread in Scottish families, and intercourse with the south has been so increased, that all these colloquial peculiarities are fast disappearing.

Some of the ladies of this older school felt some indignation at the change which they lived to see was fast going on.