The Heart of Mid-Lothian - Penn State University

CHAPTER TWENTY-THIRD
Lord! who would live turmoiled in a court,
And may enjoy such quiet walks as these?
Shakespeare.
WITHIN A REASONABLE time after Butler was safely and
comfortably settled in his living, and Jeanie had taken
up her abode at Auchingower with her father,—the precise
extent of which interval we request each reader to
settle according to his own sense of what is decent and
proper upon the occasion,—and after due proclamation
of banns, and all other formalities, the long wooing of
this worthy pair was ended by their union in the holy
bands of matrimony. On this occasion, David Deans
stoutly withstood the iniquities of pipes, fiddles, and
promiscuous dancing, to the great wrath of the Captain
Sir Walter Scott
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of Knockdunder, who said, if he “had guessed it was to
be sic a tamn’d Quakers’ meeting, he wad hae seen them
peyont the cairn before he wad hae darkened their
doors.”
And so much rancour remained on the spirits of the
gracious Duncan upon this occasion, that various
“picqueerings,” as David called them, took place upon
the same and similar topics and it was only in consequence
of an accidental visit of the Duke to his Lodge
at Roseneath, that they were put a stop to. But upon
that occasion his Grace showed such particular respect
to Mr. and Mrs. Butler, and such favour even to old
David, that Knockdunder held it prudent to change his
course towards the latter. He, in future, used to express
himself among friends, concerning the minister and his
wife, as “very worthy decent folk, just a little over strict
in their notions; put it was pest for thae plack cattle to
err on the safe side.” And respecting David, he allowed
that “he was an excellent judge of nowte and sheep,
and a sensible eneugh carle, an it werena for his tamn’d
Cameronian nonsense, whilk it is not worth while of a