"So, Mr. Ratcliffe," said the officer, conceiving it suited his dignity
to speak first, "you give up business, I find?"
"Yes, sir," replied Ratcliffe; "I shall be on that lay nae mair--and I
think that will save your folk some trouble, Mr. Sharpitlaw?"
"Which Jock DaIgleish" (then finisher of the law* in the Scottish
metropolis) "wad save them as easily," returned the procurator-fiscal.
* [Among the flying leaves of the period, there is one called
"Sutherland's Lament for the loss of his post,--with his advice, to John
Daglees his successor." He was whipped and banished 25th July 1722. There
is another, called the Speech and dying words of John Dalgleish, lockman
_alias_ hangman of Edinburgh, containing these lines:--
Death, I've a Favour for to beg,
That ye wad only gie a Fleg,
And spare my Life;
As I did to ill-hanged Megg,
The Webster's Wife."]
"Ay; if I waited in the Tolbooth here to have him fit my cravat--but
that's an idle way o' speaking, Mr. Sharpitlaw."
"Why, I suppose you know you are under sentence of death, Mr. Ratcliffe?"
replied Mr. Sharpitlaw.
"Aye, so are a', as that worthy minister said in the Tolbooth Kirk the
day Robertson wan off; but naebody kens when it will be executed.
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