"I cudna say, mam."

"Thank you; no, you need not ask Mrs. M'Collop; it is of no
consequence."

Susanna Crum is a most estimable young woman, clean, respectful,
willing, capable, and methodical, but as a Bureau of Information she
is painfully inadequate. Barring this single limitation she seems
to be a treasure-house of all good practical qualities; and being
thus clad and panoplied in virtue, why should she be so timid and
self-distrustful?

She wears an expression which can mean only one of two things:
either she has heard of the national tomahawk and is afraid of
violence on our part, or else her mother was frightened before she
was born. This applies in general to her walk and voice and manner,
but is it fear that prompts her eternal `I cudna say,' or is it
perchance Scotch caution and prudence? Is she afraid of projecting
her personality too indecently far? Is it the indirect effect of
heresy trials on her imagination? Does she remember the thumbscrew
of former generations? At all events, she will neither affirm nor
deny, and I am putting her to all sorts of tests, hoping to discover
finally whether she is an accident, an exaggeration, or a type.

Salemina thinks that our American accent may confuse her. Of course
she means Francesca's and mine, for she has none; although we have
tempered ours so much for the sake of the natives, that we can
scarcely understand each other any more. As for Susanna's own
accent, she comes from the heart of Aberdeenshire, and her