TOUR TO NORTH-WEST HIGHLANDS. 133 



pleasure to travel, after the rough bone-shaking we 

 have just had. I feel wonderfully recruited, and able 

 to perform miracles. 



Swivel. Vaunt not, Bill ; but take thine own creel, 

 an' thou be'est so valour-getting. These trout of thine 

 annoy my shoulders not a little. 



May. Ah ! Doctor, art thou failing at last ? But 

 hand the pannier this way why, it seems to me like 

 an air-bladder ! 



Swivel. So it ought, Bill, seeing its contents are one 

 and the same. 



May. What ! hast thou made away with my fish ? 

 Audacity indeed ! unexampled sacrilege ! flung what I 

 have toiled and sweated for to the base-born carrion- 

 crows ? 'Tis too much to endure meekly. Doctor 

 Swiveltop ! I abjure thy fellowship. Thou art a com- 

 mon cateran and body-spoiler. Away ! away ! lest I 

 inflict the bastinado, and pommel thee into shivers. 



Swivel. Most valiant May-fly ! we honour thy very 

 infirmities. Be not wroth as the roused lion, nor slay 

 us in the heat of thine anger ! What to thee, Bill, are 

 a few score of fingerlings ? 



May. Fingeiiings ! Doctor Swiveltop ? they were 

 pounders ay, two pounders ! 



Swivel. Oh I Bill, not a two-ounce fish amongst 

 them. 'Twas an absolute sin in thee to butcher such 

 fry. Saw you not how the very swallows, while thou 

 wert swinging them out, pounced upon them instead of 

 gad-flies ? 



