Take it--use it, and may it thrive with you as it hath done with me!" "But I tell you," said Elliot, "it wasna about the gear that I was consulting you,--it was a braw barn-yard, doubtless, and thirty head of finer cattle there werena on this side of the Catrail; but let the gear gang,--if ye could but gie me speerings o' puir Grace, I would be content to be your slave for life, in onything that didna touch my salvation.

O, Elshie, speak, man, speak!" "Well, then," answered the Dwarf, as if worn out by his importunity, "since thou hast not enough of woes of thine own, but must needs seek to burden thyself with those of a partner, seek her whom thou hast lost in the WEST." "In the WEST?
That's a wide word." "It is the last," said the Dwarf, "which I design to utter;" and he drew the shutters of his window, leaving Hobbie to make the most of the hint he had given.
The west! the west!--thought Elliot; the country is pretty quiet down that way, unless it were Jock o' the Todholes; and he's ower auld now for the like o' thae jobs .-- West!--By My life, it must be Westburnflat.
"Elshie, just tell me one word.

Am I right?
Is it Westburnflat?
If I am wrang, say sae.

I wadna like to wyte an innocent neighbour wi' violence--No answer ?--It must be the Red Reiver--I didna think he wad hae ventured on me, neither, and sae mony kin as there's o' us--I am thinking he'll hae some better backing than his Cumberland friends .-- Fareweel to you, Elshie, and mony thanks--I downa be fashed wi' the siller e'en now, for I maun awa' to meet my friends at the Trysting-place--Sae, if ye carena to open the window, ye can fetch it in after I'm awa'." Still there was no reply.
"He's deaf, or he's daft, or he's baith; but I hae nae time to stay to claver wi' him." And off rode Hobbie Elliot towards the place of rendezvous which he had named to his friends.
Four or five riders were already gathered at the Trysting pool.

They stood in close consultation together, while their horses were permitted to graze among the poplars which overhung the broad still pool.