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“She’s fu’ to the muzzle, Wullie,” said the Old Tory; “I wadna rin, gin I war you.”

Willie did not run. On the contrary, he stood and shook visibly.

“She wad mak’ an awfu’ scatterment gin she war to gang aff. Ye had better be oot o’ her reach. Ye are braw climbers. I saw ye on my riggin’ the nicht already. Climb your ways back up again, and stick every man o’ ye a bit o’ the bonny yellow in your bonnets.”

So the four jesters very reluctantly climbed away up to the rigging of David Armitt’s house under the lowering threat of Mons Meg’s iron jaws.

Then the Old Tory took out his pipe, primed it, lighted it, and sat down to wait for the dawning with grim determination. With one eye he appeared to observe the waxing and waning of his pipe; and with the other, cocked at an angle, he watched the four men on his rigging.

“It’s a braw seat, up there, gentlemen. Fine for the breeks. Dinna hotch owre muckle, or ye’ll maybe gang doon through, and I’m tellin’ ye, ye’ll rue it gin ye fa’ on oor Meg and disturb her in her mornin’ sleep. Hearken till her rowtin’ like a coo! Certes, hoo wad ye like to sleep a’ yer life ayont that? Ye wad be for takin’ to the empty swine-ree that the sow gaed oot o’, as weel as me.”

So the Old Tory sat with his blunderbuss across his knees, and comforted the men on the roof with reminiscences of the snoring powers of his spouse Meg. But, in spite of the entertaining nature of the conversation, Jamie Wardhaugh and the others were more than usually silent. They sat in a row with their chins upon their knees and the ridiculous yellow favours streaming from their broad blue bonnets.

The morning came slowly. Gib Martin, the tailor, came to his door at ten minutes to six to look out. He had hastily drawn on his trousers, and he came out to spit and see what kind of morning it was; then he was going back to bed again. But he wished to tell the minister that he had been up before five that morning; and, as he was an elder, he did not want to tell a whole lie.

Gib glanced casually at the sky, looked west to the little turret on the kirk to see the clock, and was about to turn in again, when something black against the reddening eastern sky caught his eye.

“Preserve us a’, what’s yon on Davit Armitt’s riggin’?” he cried.

And so surprised was Gib Martin, that he came all the way down the street in three spangs, and that on his stocking-feet, though he was a married man.

But he did not see the Old Tory sitting by the side of the pig-sty–a thing he had cause to be sorry for.

“Save us, Jamie, what are ye doin’ sittin’ on Davit Armitt’s hoose-riggin’? Gin the doited auld Tory brute catches ye–“

“A fine mornin’ to ye, tailor,” said the Old Tory from the side of the dyke.

The tailor faced about with a sudden pallor.

The muzzle of Mons Meg was set fair upon him, and he felt for the first time in his life that he could not have threaded a needle had his life depended on it.

“Climb up there aside the other four,” commanded David Armitt.

“I’m on my stockin’-feet, Davit!” said the tailor.

“It’s brave an’ dry for the stockin’-feet up on the riggin’,” said the Old Tory. “Up wi’ ye, lad; ye couldna do better.”

And the tailor was beside the others before he knew it, a strand of the bright yellow streaming from the button-hole of his shirt. So one after another the inhabitants of Dullarg came out to wonder, and mounted to wear the badge of slavery; until, when the chariot of the Tory candidate dashed in at twenty minutes to seven on its way to the county town, the rigging of David Armitt’s house was crowded with men all decorated with his yellow colours. Never had such a sight been seen in the Radical and Chartist village of Dullarg.

Then the Old Tory leaped to his feet as the horses went prancing by.

“Gie a cheer, boys!” he cried; and as the muzzle of Mons Meg swept down the file, a strange wavering cry arose, that was half a gowl of anger and half a broken-backed cheer.

Then “Bang!” went Mons Meg, and David Armitt took down the street at full speed with sixteen angry men jumping at his tail. But, by good luck, he got upon the back of the Laird’s coach, and was borne rapidly out of their sight down the dusty road that led to the county town.

It was the Old Tory’s Waterloo. He did not venture back till the time of the bee-killing. Then he came without fear, for he knew he was the only man who could take off the honey from the village hives to the satisfaction of the parish.

The Old Tory kept the secret of his Toryism to the last.

Only the minister caught it as he lay a-dying. He was not penitent, but he wanted to explain matters.

“It’s no as they a’ think, minister,” he said, speaking with difficulty. “I cared nocht aboot it, ae way or the ither. I’m sure I aye wantit to be a douce man like the lave. But Meg was sair, sair to leeve wi’. She fair drave me till’t. D’ye think the like o’ that wull be ta’en into account, as it were–up yonder?”

The minister assured him that it would, and the Old Tory died in peace.