"O, sirs, me! that's no kind of language!" "Killed or kept!" repeated Alan.
"O, keepit, keepit!" wailed my uncle.

"We'll have nae bloodshed, if you please." "Well," says Alan, "as ye please; that'll be the dearer." "The dearer ?" cries Ebenezer.

"Would ye fyle your hands wi' crime ?" "Hoot!" said Alan, "they're baith crime, whatever! And the killing's easier, and quicker, and surer.

Keeping the lad'll be a fashious* job, a fashious, kittle business." * Troublesome.
"I'll have him keepit, though," returned my uncle.

"I never had naething to do with onything morally wrong; and I'm no gaun to begin to pleasure a wild Hielandman." "Ye're unco scrupulous," sneered Alan.
"I'm a man o' principle," said Ebenezer, simply; "and if I have to pay for it, I'll have to pay for it.