Nell M'Collum had often declared that "the wide earth did not carry a bein' she liked or loved, but one--not even excepting herself, that she hated most of all." This however was not necessary to prove that she acted rather from the gratification of some secret malice, than from the principle of benevolence.

The venomous leer of her eye, therefore, and an accurate knowledge of her character, induced him to connect some apprehension of approaching evil with the unpleasant information she had just given him.
"Well," said Meehaul, "if what you say is true, I'll make it a black business to Lamh Laudher.

I'll go directly and keep my eye on them; an' I'll have my fire-arms, Nell; an' by the life that's in me, he'll taste them if he provokes me; an Ellen knows that." Having thus spoken he left her.
The old woman stood and looked after him with a fiendish complacency.
"A black business, will you ?" she exclaimed, repeating his words in a soliloquy;--"do so--an' may all that's black assist you in it! Dher Chiernah, I'll do it or lose a fall--I'll make the Lamh Laudhers the Lamh Lhugs afore I've done wid 'em.

I've put a thorn in their side this many a year, that'll never come out; I'll now put one in their marrow, an' let them see how they'll bear that.

I've left _one_ empty chair at their hearth, an' it 'll go hard wid me but I'll lave another." Having thus expressed her hatred against a family to whom she attributed the calamities that had separated her from society, and marked her as a being to be avoided and detested, she also departed from the Common, striking her stick with peculiar bitterness into the ground as she went along..