"They were built by squatters fifty or sixty years ago. One is uninhabited; the foresters are going to take it down, as soon as the other is dead, poor old fellow! Look--there he is--I must go and speak to him. He is so deaf you will hear all our secrets."
The old man stood bareheaded in the sun, leaning on his stick at the front of his cottage. His stiff features relaxed into a slow smile as Margaret went up and spoke to him. Mr. Lennox hastily introduced the two figures into his sketch, and finished up the landscape with a subordinate reference to them--as Margaret perceived, when the time came for getting up, putting away water, and scraps of paper, and exhibiting to each other their sketches. She laughed and blushed: Mr. Lennox watched her countenance.
"Now, I call that treacherous," said she. "I little thought that you were making old Isaac and me into subjects, when you told me to ask him the history of these cottages."

'One is uninhabited,' said she; 'the foresters are going to take it down, as soon as the old man who lives in the other is dead, poor old fellow! Look - there he is - I must go and speak to him.'
The old man stood bareheaded in the sun, leaning on his stick in front of his cottage. His stiff features relaxed into a slow smile as Margaret went up to him. Mr. Lennox hastily added the two figures to his sketch - as Margaret perceived later, when they were putting away the paints. She laughed and blushed.
'Now, I call that treacherous,' said she. 'I little thought you were drawing old Isaac and me.'
