Then the manuscript proceeds:--

"The Lord hath spared me, Harry Wedderburn, these many years, delaying

the setting of my sun till once more the grass grows green where I saw

the blood lie red, and I wait in patience to lay my old head beneath the

sod of a quiet land.

"This is my story writ at the instance of good Mr. Patrick Walker, and

to be ready at his next coming into our parts. The slack between hay

and harvest of the Year of Deliverance, 1689, is the time of writing.

"I, Harry Wedderburn, of Black Craig of Dee, in the country of Galloway,

acknowledging the mercies of God, and repenting of my sins, set these

things down in my own hand of write. Sorrow and shame are in my heart

that my sun was so high in the heavens before I turned me from evil to

seek after good.

"We were a wild and froward set in those days in the backlands of the

Kells. It was not long, indeed, since the coming of a law stronger than

that of the Strong Hand. Our fathers had driven the cattle from the

English border--yea, even out of the fat fields of Niddisdale, and over

the flowe of Solway. And if a man were offended with another, he went

his straightest way home and took gun and whinger to lie in wait for his

enemy. Or he met him foot to foot with staff on the highway, if he were

of ungentle heart and possessed neither pistol nor musketoon.

"I mind well that year 1636, more than fifty years bygone--I being then

in the twenty-second year of my age, a runagate castaway loon, without

God and without hope in the world. My father had been in his day a

douce sober man, yet he could do little to restrain myself or my brother

John, who was, they said, 'ten waurs' than I. For there was a wild set

in the Glen of Kells in those days, Lidderdale of Slogarie and Roaring

Raif Pringle of Kirkchrist being enough to poison a parish. We four

used to forgather to drink the dark out and the light in, two or three

times in the week at the change house of the Clachan. Elspeth Vogie

keeped it, and no good name it got among those well-affected to

religion--aye, or Elspeth herself either.

"But these are vain thoughts, and I have had of a long season no

pleasure in them. Yet will I not deny that Elspeth Vogie, though in

some things sore left to herself, was a heartsome quean and

well-favoured of her person.

"So at Elspeth's some half-dozen of us were drinking down the short dark

hours of an August night. It was now the lull between the hay-winning

and the corn-shearing. For hairst was late that year, and the weather

mostly backward and dour. There had come, however, with the advent of

the new month, a warm drowsy spell of windless days, the sun shining

from morn to even through a kind of unwholesome mist, and the corn

standing on the knowes with as little motion as the grey whinstane

tourocks and granite cairns on the hilltaps. The farmers and cottiers

looked at their scanty roods of ploughland, and prayed for a rousing

wind from the Lord to winnow away the still dead easterly mist, and gar

the corn reestle ear against ear so that it might fill and ripen for the

ingathering.

"But we that were hand-fasted to sin and bonded to iniquity, young

plants of wrath, ill-doers and forlorn of grace, cared as little for the

backward year as we did for the sad state of Scotland and the strifes

that were quickly coming upon that land. So long as our pint-stoup was

filled, and plack rattled on plack in the pouch, sorrow the crack of the

thumb we cared for harvest or sheep-shearing, king or bishop, Bible or

incense-pot.

"To us sitting thus on the Sabbath morning (when it had better set us to

have been sleeping in our naked beds) there came in one Rab Aitkin of

Auchengask, likeminded with us. Rab was seeking his 'morning' or

eye-opening draught of French brandy, and to us bleared and leaden-eyed

roisterers, he seemed to come fresh as the dew on the white thorn in the

front of May. For he had a clean sark upon him, a lace ruffle about his

neck, and his hair was still wet with the good well water in which he

had lately washen himself.

"'Whither away, Rab?' we cried; 'is it to visit fair Meg o' the Glen so

early i' the mornin'?'

"'He is on his way to holy kirk!' cried another, daffingly.

"'If so--'tis to stand all day on the stool of repentance!' declared

another. Then in the precentors whining voice he added: 'Robert Aitkin,

deleted and discerned to compear at both diets of worship for the

heinous crime of--and so forth!' This was an excellent imitation of the

official method of summoning a culprit to stand his rebuke. It was

Patie Robb of Ironmannoch who said this. And this same Patie had had

the best opportunities for perfecting himself in the exercise, having

stood the session and received the open rebuke on three several

occasions--two of them in one twelve-month, which is counted a shame

even among shameless men.

"'No, Patie,' said Rab in answer, 'I am indeed heading for the kirk, but

on no siccan gowk's errand as takes you there twice in the year, my man.

I go to hear the Gospel preached. For there is to be a stranger frae

the south shore at the Kirk of Kells this day, and they say he has a

mighty power of words; and though ye scoff and make light o' me, I care

not. I am neither kirk-goer nor kirk-lover, ye say. True, but there is

a whisper in my heart that sends me there this day. I thank ye, bonny

mistress!'

"He took the pint-stoup, and with a bow of his head and an inclination

of his body, he did his service to Mistress Elspeth. For that lady,

looking fresh as himself, had just come forth from her chamber to

relieve Jean McCalmont, who, poor thing, had been going to sleep on her

feet for many weary hours.

"Then Roaring Raif Pringle cried out, 'Lads, we will a' gang. I had

news yestreen of this ploy. The new Bishop, good luck to him, has outed

another of the high-flying prating cushion-threshers. This man goes to

Edinburgh to be tried before his betters. He is to preach in Kells this

very morn on the bygoing, for the minister thereof is likeminded with

himself. We will all gang, and if he gets a hearin' for his rebel's

cant--why, lads, you are not the men I tak you for!'

"So they cried out, 'Weel said, Roaring Raif!' and got them ready to go

as best they could. For some were red of face and some were ringed of

eye, and all were touched with a kind of disgust for the roysterous

spirit of the night. But a dabble in the chill water of the spring and

a rub of the rough-spun towel brought us mostly to some decent

presentableness. For youth easily recovers itself while it lasts,

though in the latter end it pays for such things twice over.

"We partook of as mickle breakfast as we could manage, and that was no

great thing after such a night. But we each drank down a stirrup-cup

and with various good-speeds to Elspeth Vogie and Jean her maid, we wan

to horseback and so down the strath to the Kirk of Kells. It sits on the

summit of a little knowe with the whin golden about it at all times of

the year, and the loch like a painted sheet spread below.

"We could see the folk come flocking from far and near, from their

mailings and forty-shilling lands, their farm-towns and cot-houses in

half-a-dozen parishes.

"'We are in luck's way, lads,' cried Lidderdale, called Ten-tass

Lidderdale because he could drink that number of stoups of brandy neat;

'it is a great gathering of the godly. Lads, the shutting of this man's

mouth will make such a din as will be heard of through all Galloway!'

"And so to our shame and my sorrow we made it up. We were to go the

rounds of the meeting, and gather together all the likely lads who would

stand with us. There were sure to be plenty such who had no goodwill to

preachings. And with these in one place we could easily shut the mouth

of this fanatic railer against law and order. For so in our ignorance

and folly we called him. Because all this sort (such as I myself was

then) hated the very name of religion, and hoped to find things easier

and better for them when the king should have his way, and when the

bishops would present none to parishes but what we called 'good

fellows'--by which we meant men as careless of principle as

ourselves--loose-livers and oath-swearers, such as in truth they mostly

were themselves.

"But when we arrived that August morning at the Kirk of Kells, lo! there

before us was outspread such a sight as my eyes never beheld. The Kirk

Knowe was fairly black with folk. A little way off you could see them

pouring inward in bands like the spokes of a wheel. Further off yet,

black dots straggled down hill sides, or up through glens, disentangling

themselves from clumps of birches and scurry thorns for all the world

like the ants of the wise king gathering home from their travels.

"Then we were very well content and made it our business to go among the

gay young blades who had come for the excitement, or, as it might be,

because all the pretty lasses of the countryside were sure to be there

in their best. And with them we arranged that we should keep silence

till the fanatic minister was well under way with his treasonable

paries. Then we would rush in with our swords drawn, carry him off down

the steep and duck him for a traitorous loon in the loch beneath.

"To this we all assented and shook hands upon the pact. For we knew

right sickerly what would be our fate, if in the battle which was coming

on the land, the Covenant men won the day. Perforce we must subscribe to

deeds and religious engagements, attend kirks twice a day, lay aside gay

colours, forswear all pleasant daffing with such as Elspeth Vogie and

Jean her maid (not that there was anything wrong in my own practice with

such--I speak only of others). The merry clatter of dice would be heard

no more. The cartes themselves, the knowledge of which then made the

gentleman, would be looked upon as the 'deil's picture-books.' A good

broad oath would mean a fine as broad. Instead of chanting loose

catches we should have to listen to sermons five hours long, and be

whipt for all the little pleasing transgressions that made life worth

living.

"So 'Hush,' we said--'we will salt this preacher's kail for him. We

will drill him, wand-hand and working-hand, so that he cannot stir. We

will make him drink his fill of Kells Loch this day!'

"All this while we knew not so much as the name of the preacher--nor,

indeed, cared. He came from the south, so much we knew, and he had a

great repute for godliness and what the broad-bonnets called

'faithfulness,' which, being interpreted, signified that he condemned

the king and the bishops, and held to the old dull figments about

doctrine, free grace, and the authority of Holy Kirk.

"The man had not arrived when we reached the Kirk of Kells. Indeed, it

was not long before the hour of service when up the lochside we saw a

cavalcade approach. Then we were angry. For, as we said, 'This spoils

our sport. These are doubtless soldiers of the king who have been sent

to put a stop to the meeting. We shall have no chance this day. Our

coin is spun and fallen edgewise between the stones. Let us go home!'

"But I said: 'There may be some spirity work for all that, lads. Better

bide and see!'

"So they abode according to my word.

"But when they came near we could see that these were no soldiers of the

king, nor, indeed, any soldiers at all, though the men were armed with

whingers and pistolets, and rode upon strong slow-footed horses like

farmers going to market. There was a gentleman at the head of them,

very tall and stout, whom Roaring Raif, in an undertone, pointed out as

Gordon of Earlstoun, and in the midst, the centre of the company, rode a

little fair man, shilpit and delicate, whom all deferred to, clad in

black like a minister. He rode a long-tailed sheltie like one well

accustomed to the exercise and bore about with him the die-stamp of a

gentleman.

"This was the preacher, and these other riders were mostly his

parishioners, come to convoy him through the dangerous and ill-affected

districts to the great Popish and Prelatic city of Aberdeen, where for

the time being he was to be interned.

"Then Roaring Raif whispered amongst us that we had better have our

swords easy in the sheath and our pistols primed, for that these men in

the hodden grey would certainly fight briskly for their minister.

"'Gordon of Cardoness is there also,' he said, 'a stout angry carle.

Him in the drab is Muckle Ninian Mure of Cassencarry. Beyond is Ugly

Peter of Rusco, and that's Bailie Fullerton o' Kirkcudbright, the man

wi' the wame swaggin' and the bell-mouthed musket across his saddle-bow.

There will be a rare tulzie, lads. This is indeed worth leavin'

Elspeth's fireside for. We will let oot some true blue Covenant bluid

this holy day!'

"And when the Little Fair Man dismounted there was a rush of the folk

and some deray. But we of the other faction kept in the back part and

bided our time.

"Then the Little Fair Man went up into the pulpit, which was a box on

great broad, creaking, ungreased wheels, which they had brought out from

the burial tool-house as soon as they saw that the mighty concourse

could in no wise be contained in the kirk--no, not so much as a tenth

part of them!

"After that there was a great hush which lasted at least a minute as the

minister kneeled down with his head in his hands. Then at last he rose

up and gave out the psalm to be sung. It was the one about the

Israelites hanging their harps on the trees of Babylon. And I mind that

he prefaced it with several pithy sayings which I remembered long

afterwards, though I paid little heed to them at the time. 'This tree

of Babylon is a strange plant,' he said; 'it grows only in those

backsides of deserts where Moses found it, or by Babel streams where men

walk in sorrow and exile. It is an ever-burning bush, yet no man hath

seen the ashes of it.'

"Then the people sang with a great voice, far-swelling, triumphant, and

the Little Fair Man led them in a kind of ecstasy. I do not mind much

about his prayer. I was no judge of prayers in those days. All I cared

about them was that they should not be too long and so keep me standing

in one position. But I can recall of him that he inclined his face all

the time he was speaking towards the sky, as if Someone Up There had

been looking down upon him. At that I looked also, following the

direction of his eyes. And so did several others, but could see

nothing. But I think it was not so with the Little Fair Man.

"Now it was not till the sermon was well begun that we were to break in

and 'skail' the conventicle with our swords in our hands. I could hear

Lidderdale behind me murmuring, 'How much longer are we to listen to

this treason-monger?'

"'Let us give him five minutes by the watch lads!' I said, 'the same as

a man that is to be hanged hath before the topsman turns him off. And

after that I am with you.'

"Then Roaring Raif said in my ear, 'We have them in the hollow of our

hand. This will be a great day in the Kells. We will put the broad

bonnets to rout, so that no one of them after this shall be able to show

face upon the causeway of Dumfries. There are at least fifty staunch

lads, good honest swearing blades, in and about the kirkyard of Kells

this day!'

"For even so we delighted to call ourselves in our ignorance and

headstrong folly--as the Buik sayeth, glorying in our shame.

"And according to my word we waited five minutes on the minister. He

had that day a text that I will always mind, 'God is our refuge and our

strength,' from the 46th Psalm--one that was ever afterwards a great

favourite with me. And when at first he began, I thought not muckle

about what he said, but only of the great ploy and bloody fray that was

before me. For we rejoiced in suchlike, and called it among ourselves a

'bloodletting of the whey-faced knaves!'

"Then the Little Fair Man began to warm to his work, and just when the

five minutes drew on to their end, he was telling of a certain Friend

that he had, One that loved him, and had been constantly with him for

years--so that his married wife was not so near and dear. This Friend

had delivered him, he said, from perils of great waters, and from the

edge of the sword. He had also put up with all the evil things he had

done to Him. Ofttimes he had cast this Friend off and buffeted Him, but

even then He would not go away from him or leave him desolate.

"So, as I had never heard of such strange friendship, I was in a great

sweat to find out who this Friend might be, so different from the

comrades I knew, who drew their swords at a word and gave buffet for

buffet as quick as drawing a breath.

"So I whispered again, 'Give him another five minutes!'

"And I could hear them growl behind me, Tam Morra of the Shields, called

Partan-face Tam, Glaikit Gib Morrison, and the others--'What for are ye

waitin'? Let the grey-breeks hae it noo!'

"But since I was by much the strongest there, and in a manner the

leader, they did not dare to counter me, fearing that I might give them

'strength-o'-airm' as I did once in the vennel of Dumfries to Mathew

Aird when he withstood me in the matter of Bonny Betty Coupland--a

rencontre which was little to my credit from any point of view.

"And then the Little Fair Man threw himself into a rapture like a man

going out of the body, and his voice sounded somehow uncanny and of the

other world. For there was a 'scraich' in it like the snow-wind among

the naked trees of the wood at midnight. Yet for all it was not

unpleasant, but only eery and very affecting to the heart.

"He told us how that he had shamed and grieved his Friend, how he had

oftentimes wounded Him sore, and once even crucified Him----

"Then when he said that I knew what the man was driving at, and if I had

been left to myself I would have fallen away and thought no more of the

matter. But at that moment, with a sudden calm, there fell a hush over

the people. They seemed to be waiting for something. Then the Little

Fair Man leaned out of the pulpit and stretched his arm toward me, where

I stood like Saul, taller by a head than any about me.

"'There is a great strong young man there,' he said, 'standing by the

pillar, that hitherto has used his strength for the service of the

devil, but from this forward he shall use it for the Lord. Even now he

is plotting mischief. He, too, hath wounded my Friend, even Jesus

Christ, and smitten Him on the cheekbone. But to-day he shall stand in

the breach and fight for Him. Young man, I bid you come forward!'

"And with that he continued, pointing at me with his finger a little

crooked. At first I was angry, and could have made his chafts ring with

my neive had I been near enough. But presently something uprose in my

heart--great, and terrible, and melting all at once. I took a step

forward. But my companions held me back. I could feel Lidderdale and

Roaring Raif with each a hand on a coat tail.

"'Harry,' they said, 'do not mind him--cry the word and we will fall on

and pull the wizard down by the heels!'

"'Come hither!' said the Little Fair Man again, in a stronger voice of

command. 'Come up hither, friend. Thou didst come to this place to do

evil; but the Spirit hath thee now by the head, though well do I see

that a pair of black deils have thee yet by the tail. Come hither,

friend, resist not the Spirit!'

"Then there arose a mighty flame in my heart, the like of which I never

felt before. It was a very gale of the Spirit--a breaking down of dams

that imprisoned waters might flow free. And before I knew what I did I

took my hand and dealt a buffet right and left, so that Roaring Raif

roared amain. And as for Jock Lidderdale, I know not what became of

him, for they carried him over the heads of the crowd and laid him under

a tree to come to himself again.

"'Thou shalt know a Friend to-day, young man,' the minister said, when,

being thus enlarged, I came near. 'Thou shall be the firstfruits to the

Lord in the Kells this day. There is to be a great ingathering of

sheaves here, though some of them shall yet have bloody shocks. But

thou, young sir, shalt be the first of all and shalt stand the longest!'

"Then on the outskirts of the crowd there arose a mighty turmoil. For

all those that had been of my party made a rush forward, that they might

rescue me from what they thought was rank witchcraft.

"'Overturn! Overturn!' they cried, 'ding doon the wizard! He hath

bewitched "Harry Strength-o'-Airm"! Fight, Harry--for thine own hand,

and we will rescue thee!'

"And so ardent was their onset that they had well-nigh opened a way to

where the Little Fair Man stood, as unmoved and smiling as if he had

been sitting in his own manse. So great became the crowd that the very

preaching-box rocked. The men of the cavalcade drew their swords and met

the assailants hand to hand. In another minute there had been

bloodshed.

"But by some strange providence there came into my hand the pole of a

burying bier, whereon men bear coffins to the kirkyard. I know not how

it came there, unless, peradventure, they had used it to roll out the

preaching-box. But, in any case, it made a goodly and a gruesome

weapon.

"Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon me, and I shouted aloud: 'I am on

the Little Fair Man's side--and on the side of his Friend! Peace!

Peace!'

"And with that I laid about me as the Lord gave me strength, and I heard

more than one sword snap, and more than one head crack.

"Then, again, I cried louder than before: 'Let there be peace--and God

help ye if ye come in Harry Wedderburn's road this day--all ye that are

set on mischief!'

"And lo! by means of the bier-pole, a way was opened, a large and an

effectual, before me; and, like Samson, I smote and smote, and stayed

not, till I was weary. For none could stand against me, and such as

could, ran out to their horses. But the most part of them, I, with my

grave-pole, caused to remain--that they, too, might be turned to the

Lord by the Word of the preacher.

"So they came back, and I bade the Little Fair Man preach to them, while

I kept guard. And at that he smiled and said: 'Did I not say that thou

also shouldst be a soldier of God? Thine arm this day hath been indeed

an arm of flesh. But thou shalt yet wield in thy time the sword of the

Spirit, which is the word of God!' And of a truth, there was a great

work and an effectual that day in the Kells. For they say that more

than four score turned them from their evil way, and many of these

blessed me thereafter for the breaking of their heads--yes, even upon

their dying beds.

"Now I have myself backslidden since that, but have not altogether

fallen away or shamed my first love. And when the cavalcade rode away

up the muir road, I heard them tell that the Little Fair Man, who had

called me out of my heady folly, was no other than the famous Mr. Samuel

Rutherfurd, minister of Anwoth, on his way to his place of exile in

Aberdeen, for conscience sake.

"That these things are verity I vouch for with my soul. The truth is

thus, neither less nor more. Which is the testimony of me, Harry

Wedderburn, written in this year of Grace and a freed Israel, 1689."

*THE LITTLE FAIR MAN*

*II.--THE HUMBLING OF STRENGTH-O'-AIRM*

_The continuation of the Adventure of Mr. Harry Wedderburn, called

"Strength-o'-Airm" written by himself, and transcribed by Alexander

McQuhirr, M.D._

"All this fell out exceeding well, and the fact was much bruited abroad

throughout all the southland of Galloway, how that with the tram of a

bier I convertit thirty-three men, in and about the kirkyaird of Kells,

in one day. But (what was not so good) the first man that I brak the

head of was Roaring Raif Pringle of Kirkchrist--and, I was engaged in

the bands of affection with his sister Rachel, expecting indeed to wed

her with the first falling of the leaf.

"Now Roaring Raif was so worshipfully smitten on the pate, that before

he could sit up to hearken to the voice of the Little Fair Man, Mr.

Rutherfurd had ridden northwards on his way and all his folk with him.

Now when at last Raif sat up and drew his hand across his brow he asked

who had done this, and when they told him that it was his friend Harry

Wedderburn of the Black Craig who had broke his own familiar head with

the tram of the dead bier, who but Raif Pringle was a wild man, and

swore in his unhallowed wrath to shoot me if ever I came anigh the house

of Kirkchrist, either to see his sister or for any other purpose!

"Now I was not anxious about Rachel herself. I knew that when it came to

the point, she cared not a doit either for Roaring Raif or for Slee Todd

Pringle, her cunning father. She was a fell clever lass, and had always

been a great toast among us--though continually urging me to forswear

sitting drinking at the wine with wild runagates in public places and

change houses, if I hoped to stand well in her favour. But once, having

been with her and Roaring Raif at Dumfries, it was my good fortune to

carry her across the ford at Holywood when Nith Water was rising fast,

and since that day somehow she had always thought better than well of

me. For we left the Roaring One on the Dumfries shore.

"'I will go over and bring him hither on my back,' said I. And would

have plunged in again to do it. For I thought nothing of perils of

waters, being tall and a good swimmer to boot. But this Rachel would in

no wise permit. She caught me by the arm and would not let me go back.

"''Deed will you do somewhat less, Harry Wedderburn; if Raif thinks so

little of his sister as to convoy her home disguised in liquor, e'en let

him stand there on the shore, or else take his way home by the Brig of

Dumfries!'

"And this I was very content to do, delivering Rachel into the hands of

her uncle, Lancelot Pringle of Quarrelwood, in due time--but a longer

time mayhap than in ordinary circumstances it takes to traverse the

distance between the fords of Holywood over against Netherholm and the

mansion house of Quarrelwood. For the pleasure that I had in carrying

of Rachel Pringle through the water had gone to my head some little, and

I was perhaps not so clear about my way as I might have been.

"So, minding me on that heartsome and memorable night, together with

other things more recent, I was not perhaps very anxious about the

affection of Rachel Pringle. For I thought that it would take more than

the word of Roaring Raif to change the heart of that little Rachel whom

I had carried in my arms over the swellings of Nith Water. I minded me

how tight she had held to me, and how, when we got over, she whispered

in my ear, before I set her down, 'Harry, I like strong men!' Which

saying somewhat delayed my putting of her down, for the ground grew

exceedingly boggy and unstable just at that spot.

"So, on the evening of the day after I had forsaken my ill courses at

the bidding of the Little Fair Man, I set out from the onsteading of

Black Craig of Dee, leaving all there in the keeping of my brother John,

a stark upstanding lad, and in those of Gilbert Grier, my chief hired

herd. I told them not where I was going, but I think they knew well

enough. For John brought me my father's broadsword, which he had

sharpened instead of my own smaller whinger, and Gib the herd took the

pistols out of my belt and saw to their priming anew. They were always

very loyal and sib to my heart, these two, and sped me on my love

adventures without a word.

"Now the turn or twist that I gat at the outdoor service before the Kirk

of Kells was strange enough. It may seem that the conduct of a man can

only be turned by the application of reason or argument. But it was not

so with me. The Little Fair Man crooked his finger and said: 'Come!'

and I came. So also was it with the others who were convertit that day,

aided maybe somewhat by my black quarter-staff. But I have since read

in the Book that even so did Mr. Rutherfurd's Friend, when on the shores

of the sea He called to Him his disciples. 'Come!' He said to the

fishermen, and forthwith they left all and followed Him.

"Now my call did not cause me to follow the Little Fair Man. It was not

of such a sort. He did not bid me to that of it. But those who have

been my neighbours will bear me witness that I never was the same man

again, but through many shortcomings and much warring of the flesh

against the spirit, have ever sought after better things, during all the

fifty-and-one years since that day.

"So out I set on my road to Kirkchrist with a rose in my coat, the

covenanted work of reformation in my heart--and my pistols primed. I

knew it would need all three to win bonny Rachel Pringle out of the hand

of the Slee Tod and his son Raif, the Roaring One.

"Now Kirkchrist is one of the farm-towns of Galloway, many of which in

the old days have been set like fortilices high on every defenced hill.

Indeed, the ancient tower still stands at one angle of the square of

houses, where it is used for a peat-shed. But by an outside stair it is

possible to get on the roof and view the country for miles round. On

one side the Cooran burn runs down a deep ravine full of hazel copses

feathering to the meadow-edges, where big bumble bees have their bykes,

and where I first courted Rachel, sitting behind a cole of hay on the

great day of the meadow ingathering. On the other three sides the

approach to Kirkchrist is as bare as the palm of my hand, all short

springy turf, with not so much as a daisy on it, grazed over by Slee

Tod's sheep, and cast up in places by conies, whose white tails are for

ever to be seen bunting about here and there among the warreny braes.

"Now somehow it never struck me that Roaring Raif would bear malice.

What mattered a broken head that he should take offence at his ancient

friend? Had I not had my own sconce broke a score of times, and ever

loved the breaker better, practising away with John and Gib till I could

break his for him in return? Why not thus Raif Pringle? It was true

that he had gotten an uncouth clour from the bier-tram of Kells, but I

was willing to give him his revenge any day in the week--and, for my

part, bore no malice.

"So in this frame of mind I strolled up towards Kirkchrist, when the

reek of the peat fires was just beginning to go up into a still heaven

from the cot-house in the dell, and the good cottier wives were putting

on their pots to make their Four-Hours. I was at peace with all the

world, for since the Kirk of Kells there had been a marvellous

lightening of my spirit.

"Rachel is yonder, I thought within me, as I went up the hillside

towards the low four-square homestead of Kirkchrist. Her hand will be

laying the peat and blowing up the kindling. She will be looking out

for me somewhere, most likely at yonder window in the gable end.

"Yes, so she was. For as I came in view of the yard gate I saw a white

thing waved vehemently, and then suddenly withdrawn.

"'Dear lass,' I thought, 'she is watching; and thinks thus to bid me

welcome. She has doubtless made my peace with the Roaring One.'

"And I smiled within myself, like a vain fool, well-content and secure.

"Also I quickened my steps a little, so that I might arrive in time for

the meal, being hunger-sharpened with my travel, and having out of

expectance and forgetfulness taken but little nooning provender with me

from the Black Craig of Dee.

"I watched the window eagerly, as I came nearer, for another glint of

the kerchief. But not the beck of a head or the flutter of a little

hand intimated that one of the bonniest lasses in Galloway was waiting

within. Yet it struck me as strange that there were no clamorous dogs

about, or indeed any sound of life whatever. And ever and anon I seemed

to hear my name called, but yet, when I stopped and listened, all was

still again on the moment.

"Now the entrance into the courtyard or inner square of Kirkchrist was

by a 'yett' or strong gate, closed when any raiders or doubtful

characters were in the neighbourhood, as well as in the night season.

But now this 'yett' stood wide open, and I could see the yellow straw in

the yard all freshly spread, the stray ears yet upon it--which last,

together with the empty look of the crofts, told me that the oats had

been gathered in that day. Where, then, were the men who had done the

work? It was a thing unheard of that they should depart without making

merry in the house-place, and drinking of the home-brewed ale, laced

with a tass of brandy to each tankard.

"The sun was low behind my back, and I was looking towards the onstead

of Kirkchrist, when suddenly I saw something glisten in one of the

little three-cornered wicket-windows of the barn. It was bright, and

shone like polished metal--a steel pistol stock belike. But,

nevertheless, I went on in the same dead, uncanny silence.

"Suddenly '_Blaff! Blaff! Blaff!_' Three or four shots went off in

front of me and to the right. I heard the smooth hissing sound of lead

bullets and the whistle of slugs. Something struck me on the muscle of

the forearm, stunning me like a blow, then I felt a kind of ragged tear

or searing of the flesh as with a hot iron. I cannot describe it

better--not very painful at first, but rather angering, and inclining

me, but for my recent conversion, to stamp and swear like a king's

trooper.

"This, however, I had small time to do, even if I had wished it; for,

after one glance at the barn, through the three-cornered wicks of which,

as through the portholes of a ship in action, white wreaths of the smoke

of gunpowder were curling, my right arm fell to my side, and I turned to

run. Even as I did so, a little cloud of men--perhaps

half-a-dozen--came rushing out of the mickle 'yett' with a loud shout,

and made for me across the level sward. Foremost of them was Roaring

Raif. Then I was advertised indeed that he had not forgiven the clour

on the head he had gotten. I knew him by his height and by the white

clout that was bound like a mutch about his brows.

"'Harry,' said I to myself, when I saw them thus take after me, 'the

Black Craig will never see you more. Ye are as a dead man. You cannot

run far with that arm draining the life from you, and there is no

shelter within miles.'

"Then I heard the brainge of breaking glass behind me, and a voice: 'The

linn--the linn, Harry Wedderburn; flee to the linn! It is your only

chance. They are mad to kill you, Harry!'

"And even then I was glad to hear the voice of my lass, for to know that

her heart and her prayers were with me. So I turned at the word, and

ran redwud for the Linn of Kirkchrist--a wild steep place, all cliffs

and screes and slithery spouts of broken slate. I felt my strength fast

leaving me as I ran, and ever the enemy shouted nearer to my back.

"'Kill him! Shoot him! Put a bullet into him!'

"Wondrous stimulating I found such remarks as these, made a hundred or

two yards to leeward, with an occasional pistol bullet whistling by to

mark the sense, as in a printed book. This made me run as I think I

never ran before. For, though I was a changed man, I did not want to

die and go straight to that Abraham's bosom, of which the Little Fair

Man had spoken as one that had lain there of a long season. I did not

surmise that the accommodation would suit me so well. No, not yet

awhile, with Rachel Pringle praying for my life half-a-mile behind. So

I ran and better ran, till the sweat of my brow ran into my eyes and

well nigh blinded me. Now in those days I was very young and limber.

And I am none so stiff yet for my age.

"At all events, when I came to the taking off of the linn I saw that

there was nothing for it but my callant's monkey trick of letting myself

down like a wheel. I had often practised it on the heathery slopes of

the Black Craig of Dee, so I caught myself behind the knees, and, with

my head bent like a hoop, flung myself over the edge. Presently I felt

myself tearing through the copses and plunging into little darksome

dells. I rebounded from tree trunks and bruised myself against rocks.

Stones I had started span whizzing about my ears, and I heard the risp

and rattle of shot fired after me from the margin of the linn. My

wounded arm seemed as if drawn from its socket. Then I felt the cool

plash of water, and I knew no more.

"I might very well have been drowned in Kirkchrist Linn that day, but it

had not been to be. For it so chanced that I fell into the deepest pool

for miles, and was carried downwards by the strongest current into the

place that is now called the 'Harry's Jaws.' This is a darksome spot,

half-cavern, half-bridge, under the gloomy arch of which the brown

peat-water foams white as fresh-poured ale, and the noise of its

thundering deafens the ear. When I came to myself I was lying half out

of the water and half in, on the verge of a great fall where the burn

takes a leap thirty or forty feet into a black pool. I looked over, and

there beneath me, with one of my own pistols in his hand, was Roaring

Raif, a terrifying sight, with his bloody clout all awry about his head.

He was looking at the pistol, dripping wet as it had gone over the fall

when I came down like a runaway cart wheel into the Linn of Kirkchrist.

"'He's farther doon the water, boys,' I heard him cry, and the sound was

sweet to my ear. 'Here's the pistol he has left behint him! Scatter,

boys, and a braw sheltie to the man that first puts an ounce o' lead

into him!'

"A pleasant forgiving nature had this same Roaring One. And I resolved

that, though a converted man, I would deal with him accordingly when I

gat him into my clutches.

"The place where I found me was not uncommodious. To make the most of

it I crawled backwards till I came to the end of the rocks. Here was a

little strip of sand, and over that a dry recess almost large enough for

a cave. Some light filtered in from unseen crevices above, so that I

think it was not roofed with solid rock overhead. Rather it was some

falling in of the sides of the linn which had made the hiding-place.

Here I was safe enough so long as the burn did not rise suddenly, for I

knew well from the 'glet' on the stones and the bits of stick and dried

rushes that the waters of the linn filled all the interior in time of

flood.

"Then I made what shift I could to bind up my arm. I was already faint

from loss of blood, but I bound a band tight about my upper arm,

twisting it with a stick till I almost cried out with the greatness of

the pain. Then I tied a rag, torn from my shirt, about the wound

itself, which turned out to be in the fleshy part, very red and angry.

However, it had bled freely, which, though it made me faint at the time,

together with the washing in the water of the linn, was probably the

saving of me. There was a soft fanning air as the night drew on, and,

in my wet clothes, I shivered, now hot, now cold. My head was throbbing

and over-full; and I began to see strange lights about me as the cave

alternately grew wide and high as the firmament, and anon contracted to

the size of a hazel-nut. That was the little touch of fever which always

comes after a gunshot wound.

"So after a while fell the darkness, or, rather, if there had not been a

full moon, the darkness would have fallen. But, being thirsty with my

wound, I crawled down to the water's edge and bent my head to drink,

with the drumming of the fall loud in my ears. And, lo! in the pool I

saw the round of the moon reflected. I was at the mouth of the little

cave, and there, to the north, the Plough hung as from a nail in the

August sky, while a little higher I saw one prong of silvery

Cassiopeia's broken-legged 'W.'

"The stars looked so remote and lonesome, so safe and careless up there.

They minded so little that I was wounded and helpless, that if I had not

been a changed man, I declare I could have cursed them in my heart.

"But suddenly from above came a sound that made all my heart beat and

quiver. It was a woman's cry. All you who have never heard how soft a

woman can make her speech when she fears for her true man's life, take

this word. There is no sound so sweet, so low, so far-searching in the

world.

"'Harry! Harry Wedderburn!' it said. And I knew that in the midnight

Rachel Pringle was searching and calling for me. Though there might be

danger, I could not bear that she should pass away from me.

"'I am here,' I answered as softly as I could. But the noise of the

waterfall drowned my voice, though my ears, grown accustomed to the

roar, had caught hers easily enough.

"So, steadying me on the crutch of a tree that grew perilously over the

fall, I went out and stood in the full light of the moon, taking my life

in my hand if it had so chanced that any of my enemies were in ambush

round about.

"Rachel saw me instantly, and I could see her clasp her hands over her

heart as she stood on the margin of the cleuch, black against the indigo

sky of night.

"'Harry--Harry Wedderburn!'

"'Here--dear love--here! By the waterfall.'

"In an instant she was flying down the slope, having lifted her skirt,

and, as we say, 'kilted' it, so that she might go the lighter. She wore

a white gown, and I could see her flit like a moth through the covert of

birk and hazel to the water-edge. In another moment, without stopping

either for direction or to draw breath, she was coming towards me, her

face to the precipice, swiftly, fearlessly, clinging to the little

ragged rock-rifts, from which scarce a wind-wafted seed would grow or a

tuft of gilly-flower protrude about which to clasp her fingers. But

Rachel Pringle came as lightly and easily as if she had been ascending

the steps of her father's ha'.

"'Go back,' she whispered, 'go back, dear love! They may see you. I am

coming--I know the way!'

"And with that I stepped back out of the moonlight, obedient to her

word. Yet I stood near enough to the wall of the cliff to reach my arm

over for her to take, so that she might have something to hold by during

the last and most difficult steps of the goats' path, the roaring linn

being above, the pool deep and black below.

"Now, either by chance or because it was the one which could reach

farthest, I tendered Rachel my wounded arm, and as soon as she clasped

my hand so rude a stound ran up my wrist that it seemed as though I had

been pierced through and through with a hot iron. So when at last

Rachel leaped lightly upon the wet rock, I was ready to droop like a

blown windlestrae in a December gale into her arms--yes, I, that was the

strong man, called Strength-o'-Airm, laid my head on her shoulder, and

she drew me within the shelter of the cave's mouth, crooning over me as

wood doves do to their mates, and whispering soft words to me as a

mother doth to a bairn that hath fallen down and hurt itself.

"But in a little the stound of pain passed away, what with the happiness

of her coming, the plash of the nearer waters, and the coolness of the

night winds which blew to and fro in our refuge place as through a

tunnel.

"Then Rachel told me that she had run from the house while they were all

searching for me everywhere. Roaring Raif and his brother Peter,

together with Gib Maxwell of Slagnaw, Paul Riddick of the Glen, and

Black-Browed Macclellane of Gregorie, Will of Overlaw, and Lancelot

Lindesay, the tutor of Rascarrel--as bloodthirsty a crew as ever raked

the brimstony by-roads of hell.

"Very well I knew that if they lighted on us together there was no hope

for me. But Rachel allayed my fear a little by telling me that she did

not believe that any in the house knew of the cave beneath the tumble of

rocks save only herself. It had long been her custom to seek it for

quiet, when the Roaring One brought his crew about the house of

Kirkchrist, and none had ever tracked her thither.

"So she examined my wound in the light of the moon, which shone in at

one end as we sat on the inmost crutch of the tree. Now Rachel had much

skill in wounds, for, indeed, her house was never free of them, her

brothers, Peter and the Roaring One, never both being skin-whole at the

same time. And so, with a handsbreadth torn from her white underskirt,

she bathed and bandaged the wound, telling me for my comfort that the

shot appeared to have gone through the fleshy part without lodging, so

that most likely the wound would come together sweetly and heal by the

first intention.

"Then, after this was done, we arrived at our first difference. For

Rachel vowed that she would in no wise go back to the onstead of

Kirkchrist, but would stop and nurse me here in the linn; which thing,

indeed, would have been mightily pleasant to the natural man. But,

being mindful of that which the Little Fair Man had said, and also of

the censorious clatter of the countryside, I judged this to be

impossible, and told Rachel so; who, in her turn, received it by no

means with meekness, but rose and stamped her little foot, and said that

she would go and never return--that she was sorry to her heart she had

ever come where she was so little thought of, with many other speeches

of that kind, such as spirity maids use when they are affronted and in

danger of not getting their own sweet way with the men of their hearts.

"Now it went sore against the grain thus to deal with Rachel. And yet I

could think of no way of appeasing her, but to feign a dwalm of

faintness and pain from my wound. So when I staggered and appeared to

hold myself up by the rock with difficulty, she stayed in the full flood

of her reproaches, and faltered, 'What is the matter, Harry?'

"Then, because I made no answer, she kneeled down beside me, and, taking

my head in both of her hands, she kissed my brow.

"'I did not mean it--indeed, I did not, Harry,' she said, with that

delicious contrition which at all times sat so well on her--even after

we were married, which is a strange thing and very uncommon.

"So I touched her cheek with my fingers and forgave her, as a man who

has been in the wrong forgives a loving woman who has not. (There is

ever a touch of superiority in a man's forgiving--in a woman's there is

only love and the desire for peace).

"'Then I may stay with you?' she said.

"And I will not deny but she tempted me sore.

"But swift as the sunbeam that strikes from cloud to hilltop, a thought

came to me.

"'Listen to me, Rachel,' I said. 'At the break of day or thereby all

will be quiet. The Roaring One and his crew will be snoring in bed----'

"'Or on the floor,' said Rachel, with a quick and dainty sniff of

distaste.

"'Either will suffice,' I said. 'Then will we go down and call up the

minister. We will cause him to marry us, and then we will fear neither

traitor nor slanderer.'

"'But he will not!' she cried. 'Donald Bain is a bishop's hireling,

and, besides, our Raif's boon companion.'

"Then I drew my dirk and held it aloft, so that the moonlight ran like

molten silver down the blade.

"'See,' said I, 'dear Rachel, if this does not gar the curate of

Kirkchrist marry us to a galloping tune, Harry Wedderburn kens not the

breed, that is all.'

"'Content!' said she. 'I will do what you say, Harry; only I will not

go back to Kirkchrist nor will I part from you now when I have gotten

you.'

"Which thing I was most glad to hear from her fair and loving lips. And

I thought, smilingly, that Rachel's manner of speaking these words

became her very well.

"So there in the din of the water-cavern and under the wheeling shafts

of silver light as the moon swung overhead, we two abode well content,

waiting for the dawn.

"And so, in this manner, and for all my brave words, the witch got her

way."

_But how--we shall see._

*THE LITTLE FAIR MAN*

*III.--THE CURATE OF KIRKCHRIST*

"The manse of Kirkchrist parish was less than a mile down the glen. It

had only a week or two before been taken possession of by one Donald

Bain, an ignorant fellow, so they said, intruded upon us by the new

bishop. For Mr. Gilbert, our old and tried minister and servant of God,

had been removed, even as Mr. Rutherfurd had been put out of Anwoth, and

at about the same time.

"Thither, then, we took our way, my dear betrothed and I, with my

wounded arm carried across me, the sleeve being pinned to my coat front

so that I could not move my hand.

"We kept entirely to the thickets by the waterside, Rachel leading the

way. For she had played all her life at the game which had now become

earnest and deadly. But we need not have troubled. For as we went,

from far away, light as a waft of wind blown athwart a meadow, we heard

the chorus of the roisterers in the house of Kirkchrist, and emergent

from the servile ruck, the voice of her brother, the Roaring One, urging

good fellows all to 'come drink with him.' Somewhat superfluously,

indeed, to all appearance, for the good fellows all had apparently been

'come-drink-ing' all night to the best of their ability and

opportunities.

"After this Rae and I went a little more openly and swiftly. This

chiefly for my sake, because the uneven ground and the little branches

of the hazel bushes caught and whipped my wounded arm, making me more

than once to wince with the pain.

"And Rachel kept a little beneath me on the brae, and bade me lean my

well hand on her shoulder, saying that I could not press over-hard, and

that the more I did so, the more would she know that I loved her. In

this not unpleasing fashion we came to the house of the curate that had

so lately been intruded upon the manse of godly Mr. Gilbert.

"The place was all dark, and the shutters put over the windows for fear

of shots from without. Then with my sword hilt I began to knock, and the

noise of the blows resounded through the house hollow and loud. For the

Highlandman had as yet put little furniture into it, save as they said a

sheave or two of rushes for a bed for himself, and another for the wench

that keeped house to him--his sister, as he averred.

"In no long space of time his reverence set a shock head out of the

window to ask what was the din. The which he did in a bold manner, as

though he were the lord and master of the neighbourhood. But I tamed

him, for I bade him do his curate's coat upon him, and bring his service

book, for that he was to marry two people there and then.

"'Who be you that seek to be married so untimeous?' he asked. 'Cannot

ye be content till the morning?'

"'That is just why we cannot be content,' I answered; 'we must be far

away by then!'

"So in a little he rose up grumbling and came down.

"'Have you not also a maid in the house?' I asked of him.

"'Aye,' said he, very dried like, 'my sister Jean!'

"'Bid her rise. We have need of a witness!' I bade him.

"'And I, of someone to hold the candle!' he added.

"It was about four of the clock, and the east little more than greying,

as we four stood in front of the manse of Kirkchrist. Had any been

abroad to see us we had seemed a curious company. The curate in his

white gown and black bands, his shambling nightgear peeping out above

and under--a red peaked nightcap on his head, the tassel of which nodded

continually over his right eye in a most ludicrous manner (only that

none thought of mirth that night). Beside him, a dripping candle in her

hand, stood his sister, a buxom quean, blowsed with health and ruddy as

the cherry.

"Before these two I stood, 'a black towering hulk with one arm in a

sling' (Rachel's words), and beside me, my sweet bride, dainty and light

as a butterfly at poise on a flower's lip.

"Overhead among the trees the wind began to move, blowing thin and chill

before the dawn. And even as the curate thumbed and mumbled beneath the

flicker of the candle, I saw the light break behind the Black Craig of

Dee, and wondered if ever Rae and I should dwell in peace and content in

the lee of it.

"And because neither Rachel nor I knew that form of words, Jean Bain

kept us right, prompting us how to kneel here, and what to answer there,

here to say our names over, and there promise to love each other--the

last not necessary, for if we had not done that already, we had hardly

been at the manse of Kirkchrist at four of the August morning in order

to be wed by an alien and uncovenanted priest.

"But scarcely had the blessing of Donald Bain made us man and wife, when

we heard the roysterers' chorus again abroad on the hills, and Jean Bain

came rushing upon us wild with alarm. She guessed well enough who we

were. For the searchers had been at the manse the night before swearing

to have my life.

"'Flee,' she said; 'take to the heather for your lives. They have sworn

to kill your husband!'

"This I knew well enough; but the perversity of fate which at that time

clung to me, made me ready to faint.

"'I cannot go--I am dizzy with my wound!' I said, and would have fallen

but that Rachel and the young Highland woman held me up in their arms.

"All this time the shouting and hallooing like the crying of hunters on

the hills came nearer, and the day was breaking fast.

"Rachel and I were, indeed, in a strait place. I bethought me on the

Little Fair Man, and almost repented that his counsels had brought me to

this. But even then, and in the house of the Philistine, help came.

"'Come in with you both,' said Jean Bain in a fierce voice, as if daring

contradiction. 'Donald, aff wi' your surplice and on wi' your coat.

You must meet them, and hold them in parley. It shall not be said that

a bridegroom was slaughtered like an ox upon our doorstep within an hour

of his wedding.'

"With that she bustled us upstairs to her own room. Truly enough, there

was but one broad pallet of heather covered with rushes spread on the

floor, and no other furniture whatever.

"Near the bed-head there was the low door of a little closet or deep

cupboard. Into this she bade us enter, and told us that she would hang

her clothing over it upon the wooden pegs which were there for the

purpose. Since no better might be we entered, for my head was running

round with my loss of blood and the pain in my wounded arm. I was glad

to lie down anywhere.

"Then through the buzzing bees' byke in my skull I could hear Jean Bain

giving her last orders to the curate.

"'Hear ye, Donald, lee to them weel. Ye hae seen nocht--ken nocht; and

if they offer to bide, tell them that it is the hour when ye engage in

family worship. That will flit them if nocht else will!'

"And though I could hear the raucous voice of that gomeril

brother-in-law of mine at the bottom of the stairs, I could not help

laying my head on Rachel's shoulder, and whispering in her ear the

words, 'Little wife!' To which she responded with no more than 'Hush!'

So there we abode, crouching and cowering in that dark cupboard while a

score of raging demons turned the curate's house upside down, crying for

jugs of brandy and tasses of aquavity, while Jean Bain shrilly declared

that no brandy could they expect in such a poverty-stricken land, but

good home-brewed ale--and even that they should not have unless they

behaved themselves more seemly.

"But ever as I lay the darkness seemed to stretch far above me, the

walls to mount and then swiftly come together again; now I was upheaved

on delicious billows of caller air, and anon I fell earthward again

through the illimitable vault of heaven. Yet every now and then I would

awake for a moment to find my head on a sweeter than Abraham's bosom,

and so fall to contemning my folly. But ere I had time to realise my

happiness I was off again ranging the universe, or at converse with

hundreds and hundreds of mocking spirits that mopped and mowed about my

path. For I was just falling into a fever, and my dear lass had to put

her skirt about my mouth to keep the man-hunters from hearing me moan

and struggle in my phantasy.

"By nine of the clock they had drunken all that was in the curate's

house, and poor Donald Bain had gone to convoy them on their way. They

were going (so they swore) to the Black Craig o' Dee to rout me out of

my den. And this made Rachel very sore afraid, for she knew well that

if we were to go back to the damp cave in the linn I would never rise

from my bed alive. And now, as she thought, the way was shut to our

only port of refuge. Also she feared for John, my brother--not being

acquaint with John, and conceiving tnat they might do him a mischief,

together with the innocent plough lads and herds in the house. But this

need not have troubled her, for indeed no one about the Black Craig o'

Dee desired anything better than that Roaring Raif and his crew should

come near at hand to receive the welcome prepared for him.

"But in the very hour of the storm-breaking there appeared a bieldy

dyke-back to shelter two poor lost wandering lambs. For no sooner was

Donald Bain out of the house with all the ungodly crew than Jean, his

sister, flew upstairs to us, with her gown all pulled awry as she had

escaped from the hands of the roysterers.

"'Come your ways out, you puir young things,' she cried; 'they are gane,

and the foul fiend ride ahint them. May they never come this road

again, that kenned neither how to behave themselves seemly in a manse

nor how to conduct them before a decent lass. Faith, they little

jalloused how near they were to gettin' a durk between the ribs!'

"But by the time Rachel and Jean Bain got me out of that darksome closet

I was fairly beside myself. The fever ran high, and I raved about

rivers of waters and the sound of great floods, and threeped with them

that I saw the Little Fair Man coming on the wings of seraphims and

cherubims and lifting me up out of the mire.

"And as soon as Jean Bain heard the yammer and yatter of my foolish

running on, she went to the closet for some simple herbs, and put them

in a pot over the fire to steam. Then she bade Rachel help me down to

the minister's chamber, and between them they undressed me, cutting the

sleeve from my coat so as to save the poor wounded arm. They got me

finally between the blankets, and made me drink of this herb-tea and

that, willy-nilly. For which, as I heard afterwards, I called them

'witch-wives,' 'black crows of a foul nest,' with many other names. But

Jean Bain held me by the arm that was whole, while Rachel fleeched with

me through her streaming tears; and so in time they gat me to take down

the naughty-tasting brew. Nevertheless, in a little it soothed me as a

mother's lullaby doth a fractious wean, and in time I fell on a

refreshing sleep.

"Yet Rachel would not be comforted, but mourned for me greatly, till

Jean Bain told her of the yet sorer case in which she and Donald had but

lately been. To which my lass rejoined, proud of her exceedingly recent

wifehood! 'Ah, but he is your brother--not your man! I would not care

what became of Raif, not if they hanged him on the Gallows hill, and the

craws pyked his banes!'

"For she was angry with her brother.

"Then all suddenly Jean Bain set her head between her hands, and began

to greet as if her poor heart were near the breaking.

"'He _is_ my man--he _is_ my man!' she cried. "And I wish we were back

again in bonny Banff, him a herd-laddie an' me a herd-lassie, and that

we could hear again the waves break amang the rocks at Tarlair!

"'Wedded--aye, that are we, firm and staunch,--but Donald daurna let on,

or Bishop Sydserf wad turn him awa'. He will hae nae wedded priests

amang them that he sets ower his parochins. But, as he says, men kinless

and cumberless that are neither feared to stand and fight or mount and

ride. It came aboot this gate. When Donald was comin' awa' to get his

lear, I was fair broken-hearted. For we had herded lang thegether on

the gowden braes, and lain mony a simmer day amang the broom wi' our een

on the sheep, but our hearts verra close the yin to the ither. The

bishop was o' our clan and country-side, and he made Donald graund

offers--siccan fat parishes as there were in the

Lawlands--stipend--house and gear--guid faith, he dazzled a' the

weel-doin' laddies there-aboot. And Donald gied his word to be a

curate, for he was weel-learned, and had been to the schule as mony as

four winters, me gangin wi' him, and carryin' his books when I could win

clear o' my mither.

"'So since I couldna bide frae him, Donald brocht me here to this cauld,

ill, ootland place, where we bide amang fremit and unco folk that hate

us. But we were married first and foremost by the minister o' Deer,

that was a third cousin o' Donald's aunt's--and a solid man that can

keep his tongue safe and siccar ahint his teeth.'

"'But oh--this place that we thocht to be a garden o' a delichts and an

orchard o' gowden fruit is hard and unkindly and bare. The gear and

plenishin' of this manse are nocht but the heather beds that our ain

fingers pu', and the blankets we brocht wi' us. And for meat we hae the

fish o' the stream an' the birds that Donald whiles shoots wi' his

gun--paitricks and wild ducks on the ponds. For no a penny's worth o'

steepend will they pay. And the bishop's warrandice runs nae farther

than the range o' the guns o' his bodyguard.'

"So, after this explanation, the two women mourned together as they

tended me, and presently the poor curate, Donald Bain, came back to find

them thus, and me raving at large, and trying to tear off the bandages

from my arm.

"So here in this house, ill-furnished and cheerless, this kindly couple

kept us safely hid till the blast had overblown and the bitterest of the

shower slacked. Five weeks we abode there before I could be moved, and

even then I was still as weak as water. But for the last fortnight we

lived in more comfort. For the curate went over on a sheltie which, as

he said, he 'had fand in a field,' to the Black Craig of Dee, and there

held a long parley with my brother in the gate, while John had all his

work to keep Gib Grier and his herd-laddies from shooting the curate for

a black hoodie craw o' Prelacy, as they named him.

"And John came back with his visitor to the manse of Kirkchrist on a

beast with store of provend upon it, together with good French wines and

other comforts, for the upbuilding of the sick.

"'I declare I will never speak against a curate again,' said John, when

he heard that which we had to tell him. And he kissed his new sister

Rachel with great and gracious goodwill, for John was ever fond of a

bonnie lass. Besides, we had had no woman body about the Black Craig

ever since our mother died, when we were but wild laddies herding the

craws off the corn in the long summer days, and hiding lest we should be

made to go with the funeral that wimpled over the moor to the Kirkyaird

of Kells.

"Likewise also he saluted Jean Bain, or she him--I am not sure which.

For Jean was in no wise backward in affection, but of a liberal,

willing, softish nature; fond of a talk with a lad over a 'yett,' and

fond, too, of a kiss at parting. Which last she gave to John with

hearty goodwill, and that, too, in the presence of the curate.

"And as we went slowly back over the heather, John walked on one side of

the horse which carried me, and Rachel rode on the sheltie on the other.

John was silent for a long while, and then he all at once said: 'Dod,

but I think I could fancy that Heelant lass mysel'!'

"So Rachel began to tell him how it was with Donald Bain the curate and

Jean his wife. For with a woman's love for a fair field and no favour

in matters of love, she did not wish John to spend himself on that which

could never be his. Then was John very doleful for a space.

"But in time he, too, changed his mind, and was most kind to poor Donald

Bain and his wife when in the year 1638 he was outed from his parish in

the same month that Sydserf, his master, was set aside by the parliament

and the people of Scotland. Then great evil might have befallen him but

that, being long fully recovered from my wound, Gib Grier and I set out

for the manse of Kirkchrist, and brought them both, Donald and Jean, to

the Black Craig of Dee, where in the midst of our great moors and black

moss-hags they were safe even as I had been in their house. And in our

spare chamber, too, was born to them a babe, a thing which, had it been

kenned, would have caused great scandal all over the land for the

wickedness of the curates. But none knew (save John and Gib, who were

sworn to secrecy) till we gat them convoyed away to the north again,

where they did very well, and Donald became chaplain to my Lord of

Sutherland. And every year for long and long the Edinburgh carrier

brought us a couple of haunches of venison well smoked, which served us

till Yule or Pasch, and very toothsome and sweet it was. This was a

memorial from Donald Bain and Jean his wife.

"Douce and sober we lived, Rachel and I, we who had been so strangely

joined. For the Slee Tod of Kirkchrist was glad enough to have his

daughter wed to one who asked neither dower nor wedding-gift, tocher nor

house linen; and as for Roaring Raif, he broke his neck-bone over the

linn coming home one night from the rood-fair of Dumfries. But I kept

my mind steadfastly set to make my new life atone for the faults of the

old--which may be bad theology, but is good sound fact. And Rachel,

like a valiant housewife, aided me in that as in all things. So that I

became in time a man of mark, and was chosen an elder by the Session of

the parish. But nevertheless the old Adam was not dead within me, but

only kept close behind bars waiting to be quits with me. For as the

years went by I was greatly taken up with my own righteousness, and so

in excellent case to backslide.

"Now it chanced that, being one day in the change house of the clachan,

I heard one speak lightly of our daughter Anne, that was now of

marriageable age, and of a most innocent and merry heart. So anger took

hold of me, and, unmindful of my great strength, I dealt the young man

such a buffet on the side of his head that he was carried out for dead,

and indeed lay long at his father's house between life and death.

"Now this was a mighty sorrow to me and to Rachel my wife. And though

little was said because of the provocation I had (which all had heard),

I thought it my duty to resign my office of the eldership, confessing my

hastiness and sin to my brethren, and offering public contrition. But

for all that I gat no ease, but was under a great cloud of doubt,

feeling myself once again without God and without hope in the world.

"Then it came to me that if I could but see the Little Fair Man again he

would tell me what I should do. I knew that he had been of a long

season regent of a college in the town of Sanct Anders. So I gave

myself no rest day nor night till my good wife, after vainly trying to

settle me by her loving words, made all preparation of provend in

saddle-bags, and guineas in pouch, and set me on a good beast at the

louping-on stone by our door. It was the first year of the restored

King Charles, the Second of that name, and the darkness was just

thickening upon the land, a darkness greater than the first, when I set

out to see Mr. Rutherfurd.

"For the early part of my travel all went well, but when I was passing

through the town of Hamilton, certain soldiers set upon me, asking for

my pass, and calling me 'Westland Whig' and 'canting rebel.' They would

have taken from me all that I had, having already turned my saddle-bags

outside in, and one of them even came near to thrust his hand into my

pocket, when a coach drove up with six horses and outriders mired to the

shoulders. Then a pair of grand servants sprang down from behind, and

cried: 'Room for my Lord Bishop!' And at this the soldiers desisted

from plundering me to do their obeisance.

"Then there came forth first a rosy buxom woman, breathing heavily, and

holding out a plump hand to the man-servant.

"But when she saw me with a soldier at either side, she took one long

look, and then cried out in a hearty voice: 'What's this--what's

this--my friend Harry Wedderburn in the gled's claws? Let be, scullions!

Donald, here's our host frae the Black Craig o' Dee!'

"And forthwith, the soldiers falling back abashed, the bishop's lady,

she that had been poor Jean Bain, came at me in her old reckless way,

and flung her arms about my neck, kissing me soundly and heartily--as I

had not been kissed of a long season by any save Rachel, me being no

more a young man.

"And the bishop was no other than Donald himself, the same who had been

curate of Kirkchrist--and a right reverend prelate he looked.

"Then nothing would do Jean and Donald but I must get into the carriage

with them, and have one of their men-servants ride my beast into

Edinburgh. Neither excuse nor nay-say would my lady bishop take. So in

this manner we travelled very comfortably, I sitting beside her, and at

Edinburgh we parted, I to Sanct Anders, they to a lodging near my Lord

of Sutherland's house, to whose influence with the king they owed their

advancement. For they were hand and glove with him. And the morning I

was to ride away came their carriage to the door, and lo! my lady

again--this time with a safe-conduct and letter of certification from

the Privy Council setting forth that I was a person notably

well-affected and staunch; that none were to hinder or molest me or mine

in body or estate under penalty of the King's displeasure. Which thing

in the troublous times to come more than once or twice stood me in great

stead.

"But when I came to Sanct Anders, the first thing I heard was that Mr.

Rutherfurd lay a-dying in his college of St. Mary's. I betook me

thither, and lo! a guard of soldiers was about the doors, and would in

no wise permit me pass. They were burning a pile of books, and I heard

say that it was done by order of the parliament, and that thereafter Mr.

Rutherfurd was to be carried out, alive or dead, and his bed set in the

open street. _Lex Rex_ was the name of the book I saw them turning this

way and that with sticks, so as to make the leaves burn faster. I know

not why it was so dour to catch, for out of curiosity I got me a copy

afterwards, and the Lord knows it was dry enough--at least to my taste.

"But after a while, showing the officer my Privy Council letter, I

prevailed on him that I had a mandate from government to see Mr.

Rutherfurd, and that I had come directly and of purpose from Edinburgh

to oversee the affair, and report on those who were diligent. So at

long and last they let me go up the stair.

"And at the top I found many doors closed, but one open, and the sound

of a voice I knew well speaking within.

"And still it was telling the praises of the Friend--yes, after a

lifetime of struggle and suffering. Nor do I think that, save for taking

rest in sleep, the voice had ever been silent on that theme.

"So though none knew me, I passed straight through the little company to

the deathbed of the man who spoke. He was the Little Fair Man no

longer. But his scant white hair lay soft as silk on the pillow. His

face was pale as ivory, his cheeks fallen in, only his eyes glowed like

live coals deep-sunken in his head.

"'So, friend--you have come to see an old man die,' he said, when his

eyes lighted on me; 'what, a bairn of mine, sayst thou--not after the

flesh but after the spirit. Aye, I do mind that day at Kells. A gale

from the Lord blew about us that day. So you are Harry of the Rude

Hand, and you have fallen into sin. Ah, you must not come to me--you

must to the Master! You had better have gone to your closet, and worn

the whinstone a little with the knees of your breeks. And yet I ken not.

None hath been a greater sinner or known greater mercy than Samuel

Rutherfurd. I am summoned by the Star Chamber--I go to the chamber of

Stars. I will see the King. I will carry Him your message, Harry.

Fear not, the young man you smote will recover. He will yet bless you

for laying a hand on him, even as this day you acknowledge the unworthy

servant who on the green sward of Kells called you out of darkness into

His marvellous light.

"'Sir, fare you well. Go home to your wife, nothing doubting. This

night shall close the door. At five of the morning I will fasten my

anchor within the veil.'

"And even as he said so it was. He passed away, and, as for me, secure

that he would carry my message to the Alone Forgiver of Sins I returned

home to find the youth recovered and penitent. He afterwards became a

noted professor and field preacher, and died sealing his testimony with

his blood on the victorious field of Loudon Hill.

"This is the testimony of me, Harry Wedderburn, sometime called

Strength-o'-Airm, who now in the valley of peace and a restored Israel

wait the consummation of all things. Being very lonely, I write these

things out to pass the time till I, too, cast mine anchor within the

veil. And I cheer myself with thinking that two shall meet me there,

one on either side of the gate--Rachel, my heart's dear partner, and the

Little Fair Man, who will take by either hand and lead into the presence

of the Friend, poor unworthy Harry Wedderburn, sometime bond-slave of

sin, but now servant most unprofitable of the Lord."

(Note by Mr. John Wedderburn.--"_My father departed this life on the

morning after finishing this paper, sleeping quietly away about five of

the clock._")

*MY FATHER'S LOVE STORY*

When I am putting together family stories, new and old, I may as well

tell my father's. Sometimes we of a younger day thought him stiff,

silent, out of sympathy with our interests and amusements; but the

saving salt of humour that was in him made this only seeming. In

reality tolerance and kindliest understanding beaconed from under the

covert of his bushy grey eyebrows.

There was the savour of an infinite discernment in the slow "Aye?" with

which he was wont to receive any doubtful statement. My mother said

ever ten words for his one, and it was his wont to listen to her gravely

and unsmilingly, as if giving the subject the profoundest attention,

while all the time his thoughts were far away--a fact well understood

and much resented by his wife.

"What am I talkin' aboot, Saunders?" she would say, pausing in the midst

of a commination upon some new and garish fashion in dress, or the late

hours kept by certain young men not a thousand miles away.

"Oh, breaking the second commandment, as usual," he would reply;

"discoursing of the heavens above, the earth beneath, and the waters

under the earth!"

"Havers," she would reply, her face, however, glancing at him bright as

a new-milled shilling, "your thochts were awa' on the mountains o'

vainity! Naething richt waukens ye up but a minister to argue wi'!"

And, indeed, that was a true word. For though an unusually silent man,

my father, Alexander (or Saunders) McQuhirr, liked nothing better than a

minister to argue with--if one of the Kirk of Scotland, well and good.

There was the Revolution Settlement, the Headship of Christ, the Power

of the Civil Magistrate. My father enjoyed himself thoroughly, and if

the minister chanced to be worthy, so did he. But it took a Cameronian

or an Original Secession divine really to rouse within him, what my

mother called "his bowels of wrath."

"There is a distinct Brownist strain in your opinions, Alexander," Mr.

Osbourne would say--his own minister from the Kirk on the Hill. "Your

father's name was not Abel for nothing!"[#]

[#] "Abel," "Jacob," "Abraham" were not common names in Scotland, and

such as occurred in families during last century might generally be

traced to the time of Cromwellian occupation. David and Samuel were the

only really common Old Testament names at that time.

Mr. Osbourne generally reminded him of this when he had got the worse of

some argument on the true inwardness of the Marrow Controversy. He did

not like to be beaten, and my father was a dour arguer. Once it is

recorded that the minister brought all the way up to Drumquhat on a

Communion Friday--the "off-day" as it were of the Scottish Holy

Week--the great Dr. Marcus Lawton himself from Edinburgh. It happened

to be a wettish day in the lull between hay and harvest. My father was

doing something in the outhouse where he kept his joinering tools, and

the two ministers joined him there early in the forenoon. They were

well into "Freewill" before my father was at the end of the board he had

been planing. "Predestination" was the overword of their conversation

at the noonday meal, which all three seemed to partake of as

dispassionately as if they had been stoking a fire--this to the great

indignation of my mother, who having been warned of the proposed honour,

had given herself even more completely to hospitality than was habitual

with her.

Mr. Osbourne, indeed, made a pretext of talking to her about the price

of butter, and how her hens were laying. But she saw through him even

as he spoke.

For, as she said afterwards, describing the scene, "I saw his lug cockit

for what the ither twa were saying, and if it hadna been for the

restrainin' grace o' God, I declare I wad hae telled him that butter was

a guinea a pound in Dumfries market, and that my hens were laying a

score o' eggs apiece every day--he never wad hae kenned that I was

tellin' him a lee!"

All day the great controversy went on. Even now I can remember the

echoes of it coming to me through the wet green leaves of the mallows my

mother had planted along the south-looking wall. To this day I can hear

the drip of the water from the slates mingling with such phrases as "the

divine sovereignty," the "Covenant of Works," "the Adamic dispensation."

I see the purple of the flowers and smell the sweet smell of the pine

shavings. They seemed to my childish mind like three Titans hurling the

longest words in the dictionary at each other. I know nothing wherewith

to express the effect upon my mind of this day-long conflict save that

great line in the fifth book of _Paradise Lost_:

"Thrones, dominations, princedoms, vertues, powers!"

It was years after when first I read it, but instantly I thought of that

wet summer day in Lammastide, when my father wrestled with his peers

concerning the deep things of eternity, and was not overcome.

My mother has often told me that he never slept all that night--how

waking in the dawn and finding his place vacant, she had hastily thrown

on a gown and gone out to look for him. He was walking up and down in

the little orchard behind the barn, his hands clasped behind his back.

And all he said in answer to her reproaches was: "It's vexin', Mary, to

think that I only minded that text in Ephesians about being 'sealed unto

the day of redemption' after he was ower the hill. It wad hae ta'en the

feet clean frae him if I had gotten hand o' it in time."

"What can ye do wi' a man like that?" she would conclude, summing up her

husband's character, mostly in his hearing.

"But remember, Mary, the pit from which I was digged!" he would reply,

reaching down the worn old leather-bound copy of Boston's _Fourfold

State_ out of the wall-press and settling himself to re-peruse a

favourite chapter.

* * * * *

My father's father, Yabel McQuhirr, was a fierce hard man, and seldom

showed his heart, ruling his house with a rod of iron, setting each in

his place, wife, child, man-servant and maid-servant, ox and ass--aye,

and the stranger within his gates.

My father does not talk of these things, but my mother has often told me

of that strange household up among the granite hills, to which, as a

maid of nineteen, she went to serve. In those days in all the Galloway

farm-towns, master and servant sat down together to meals. The head of

the house was lawgiver and potentate, priest and parent to all beneath

his roof. And if Yabel McQuhirr of Ardmannoch did not exercise the

right of pit and gallows, it was about all the authority he did not

claim over his own.

Yabel had a family of strong sons, silent, dour--the doctrine of

unquestioning obedience driven into them by their father's right arm and

oaken staff. But their love was for their mother, who drifted through

the house with a foot light as a falling leaf, and a voice attuned to

the murmuring of a hill stream. There was no daughter in the household,

and Mary McArthur had come partly to supply the want. She had brought a

sore little heart with her, all because of a certain ship that had gone

over the sea, and the glint of a sailor lad's merry blue eyes she would

see no more.

She had therefore no mind for love-making, and Thomas and Abel, the two

eldest sons, got very short answers for their pains when they "tried

their hand" on their mother's new house-lass. Tom, the eldest, took it

well enough, and went elsewhere; but Abel was a bully by nature, and

would not let the girl alone. Once he kissed her by force as,

hand-tied, she carried in the peats from the stack. Whereupon

Alexander, the silent third brother, found out the reason of Mary's red

eyes, and interviewed his brother behind the barn to such purpose that

his face bore the marks of fraternal knuckles for a week. Also

Alexander had his lip split.

"Ye hae been fechtin' again, ye blakes," thundered their father. "Mind

ye, if this happens again I will break every bane in your bodies. I

will have you know that I am a man of peace! How did you get that black

eye, Yabel?"

"I trippit ower the shaft o' a cairt!" said Abel, lying glibly in fear

of consequences.

"And you, Alexander--where gat ye that lip?"

"I ran against something!" said the defender of innocence, succinctly.

And stuck to it stubbornly, refusing all amplification.

"Well," said their father, grimly, "take considerably more heed to your

going, both of ye, or you may run against something more serious still!"

Then he whistled on his dogs, and went up the dyke-side towards the

hill.

* * * * *

After this, Alexander always carried in the peats for Mary McArthur,

and, in spite of the taunts and gibes of his brothers, did such part of

her work as lay outside the house. On winter nights and mornings he

lighted the stable lantern for her before she went to milk the kye, and

then when she was come to the byre he took his mother's stool and pail

and milked beside her cow for cow.

All these things he did without speaking a word of love, or, indeed,

saying a word of anything beyond the commonplaces of a country life. He

never told her whether or no he had heard about the sailor lad who had

gone over seas.

Indeed, he never referred to the subject throughout a long lifetime.

All the same, I think he must have suspected, and with natural

gentleness and courtesy set himself to ease the girl's heart-sore

burden.

Sometimes Mary would raise her eyes and catch him looking at her--that

was all. And more often she was conscious of his grave staid regard

when she did not look up. At first it fretted her a little. For, of

course, she could never love again--never believe any man's word. Life

was ended for her--ended at nineteen! So at least Mary McArthur told

herself.

But all the same, there--a pillar for support, a buckler for defence,

was Alexander McQuhirr, strong, undemonstrative, dependable. One day

she had cut her finger, and he was rolling it up for her daintily as a

woman. They were alone in the shearing field together. Alexander had

the lint and the thread in his pocket. So, indeed, he anticipated her

wants silently all his life.

It had hurt a good deal, and before he had finished the tears stood

brimming in her eyes.

"I think you must get tired of me. I bring all my cut fingers to you,

Alec!" she said, looking up at him.

He gave a kind of gasp, as if he were going to say something, as a

single drop of salt water pearled itself and ran down Mary's cheek; but

instead he only folded the lint more carefully in at the top, and went

on rolling the thread round it.

"She is learnin' to love me!" he thought, with some pleasure, but he was

too bashful and diffident to take advantage of her feeling. He

contented himself with making her life easier and sweeter in that hard

upland cantonment of more than military discipline, from whose rocky

soil Yabel and his sons dragged the bare necessities of life, as it

were, at the point of the bayonet.

All the time he was thinking hard behind his broad forehead, this quiet

Alexander McQuhirr. He was the third son. His father was a poor man.

He had nothing to look for from him. In time Tom would succeed to the

farm. It was clear, then, that if he was ever to be anything, he must

strike out early for himself. And, as many a time before and since, it

was the tears in the eyes of a girl that brought matters to the breaking

point.

Yes, just the wet eyes of a girl--that is, of Mary McArthur, as she

looked up at him suddenly in the harvest-field among the serried lines

of stocks, and said: "I bring all my cut fingers to you, Alec!"

Something, he knew not exactly what, appealed to him so strongly in that

word and look, that resolve came upon him sudden as lightning, and

binding as an oath--the man's instinct to be all and to do all for the

woman he loves.

He was unusually silent during the rest of the day, so that Mary

McArthur, walking beside him down the loaning to bring home the cows,

said: "You are no vexed wi' me for onything, Alec?"

But it was the man's soul of Saunders McQuhirr which had come to him as

a birthright--born out of a glance. He was a boy no longer. And that

night, as his father Yabel stood looking over his scanty acres with a

kind of grim satisfaction in the golden array of corn stooks, his son

Alexander went quietly up to him.

"Father," he said, "next week I shall be one-and-twenty!" In times of

stress they spoke the English of the schools and of the Bible.

His father turned a deep-set irascible eye upon him. The thick

over-brooding brows lowered convulsively above him. A kind of

illuminating flash like faint sheet lightning passed over the stern

face. A week ago, nay, even twenty-four hours ago, Saunders McQuhirr

would have trembled to have his father look at him thus. But--he had

bound up a girl's finger since then, and seen her eyes wet.

"Well, what of that?" The words came fiercely from Yabel, with a rising

anger in them, a kind of trumpet blare heralding the storm.

"I am thinking of taking a herd's place at the term!" said Alexander,

quietly.

Yabel lifted his great body off the dyke-top, on which he had been

leaning with his elbows. He towered a good four inches above his son,

though my father was always considered a tall man.

"You--you are going to take a herd's place--at the term---you?" he said,

slowly and incredulously.

"Yes," answered his son; "you will not need me. There is no outgate for

me here, and I have my way to make in the world."

"And what need have you of an outgate, sir?" cried his father. "Have I

housed you and schooled you and reared you that, when at last you are of

some use, you should leave your father and mother at a word, like a

day-labourer on Saturday night?"

"A day-labourer on Saturday night gets his wages--I have not asked for

any!"

At this answer Yabel stood tempestuously wrathful for a moment, his hand

and arm uplifted and twitching to strike. Then all suddenly his mood

changed. It became scornfully ironic.

"I see," he said, dropping his arm, "there's a lass behind this--that is

the meaning of all the peat-carrying and byre-milking and handfasting in

corners. Well, sirrah, I give you this one night. In the morning you

shall pack. From this instant I forbid you to touch aught belonging to

me, corn or fodder, horse or bestial. Ye shall tramp, lad, you and your

madam with you. The day is not yet, thank the Lord, when Abel McQuhirr

is not master in his own house!"

But the son that had been a boy was now a man. He stood before his

father, giving him back glance for glance. And an observer would have

seen a great similarity between the two, the same attitude to a line,

the massive head thrown back, the foot advanced, the deep-set eye, the

compressed mouth.

"Very well, father!" said Alexander McQuhirr, and he went away, carrying

his bonnet in his hand.

* * * * *

And on the morning that followed the sleepless night of thinking and

planning, Alexander McQuhirr went forth to face the world, his plaid

about his shoulders, his staff in his hand, his mother's blessing upon

his head--and, what was most of all to a young man, his sweetheart's

kiss upon his lips:

For in this part of his mandate Yabel had reckoned without his host.

His wife, long trained to keep silence for the sake of peace, had turned

and openly defied him--nay, had won the victory. The "Man of Wrath" knew

exactly how far it was wise to push the doctrine of unquestioning wifely

obedience. Mary McArthur was to bide still where she was, till--well,

till another home was ready for her. And though her eyes were red, and

there was no one to tie up her cut fingers any more, there was a kind of

pride upon her face too. And the image of the young sailor-man over

seas utterly faded away.

At ten by the clock, Yabel McQuhirr, down in his harvest-field, saw his

son set out. He gave no farewell. He waved no hand. He said no word.

All the same, he smiled grimly to himself behind the obedient backs of

Tom and Abel the younger.

"There's the best stuff o' the lot in that fule laddie," he growled;

"even so for a lass's sake left I my father's house!"

And of all his children, this dour, hard-mouthed, gnarl-fisted man loved

best the boy who for the sake of a lass had outcasted himself without

fear and without hesitation.

* * * * *

It was to a herd's house, shining white on a hillside, a burnie trilling

below, the red heather surging about the garden dyke on all sides, that

Alexander McQuhirr took his wife Mary, a year later. And there in the

fulness of time my brother Willie was born--the child of the cot-house

and of the kailyaird. In time followed other, if not better

things--first a small holding, then a farm--then I, Alexander the

second. And still, thank God, we, the children of Mary McArthur, run

with our cut fingers to that steadfast, loving, silent man, Saunders

McQuhirr, son of Yabel, the Man of Violence and Wrath.

*THE MAN OF WRATH*

A man of wrath was my grandfather, Yabel McQuhirr, from his youth up.

And I am now going to tell the story of how by a strange providence he

was turned aside from the last sin of Judas, and how he became in his

latter days a man of peace and a lover of young children.

He was my father's father, and I have already told how that son of his

to whom I owe my life, went forth to make a new hearthstone warm and

bright for the girl who was to be my mother. But after the departure of

that third son, darker and darker descended the gloom upon the lonely

uplying farm. Fiercer and ever fiercer fell the angers of Yabel

McQuhirr upon his remaining children, Thomas and Abel--the latter named

after his father, but whose Christian name never acquired the antique

and preliminary "Y" that marks the border-line between the old and the

new.

One dismal Monday morning in the back-end of the year there were bitter

words spoken in the barn at the threshing, between Thomas and his

father. Retort followed retort, till, with knotted fist, the father

savagely felled the youth to the ground. There was blood upon the clean

yellow straw when he rose. Thomas went indoors, opened his little

chest, took from it all the money he had, shook hands silently with his

mother, and took his way over the Rig of Bennanbrack, never to be heard

of more.

And after this ever closer and closer Yabel McQuhirr shut the door of

his heart. He hardened himself under the weight of his wife's gentle

sufferance and reproachful silences. He gripped his hands together

when, with the corner of an eye that would not humble itself to look, he

saw the tear trickling down the wasted cheek. He uttered no word of

sorrow for the past, nor did the name of either of his departed sons

pass his lips.

Nevertheless, he grew markedly kinder in deed to Abel, the one son who

remained--not much kinder in word perhaps, for still that loud and angry

voice could be heard coming from field and meadow, barn or byre, till

the fearful mother would steal silent-footed to the kitchen-door lest

the last part of her threefold sorrow should indeed have come upon her.

But not in this manner was the blow to fall.

Abel was the least worthy but greatly the handsomest of the sons of

Yabel McQuhirr. He had a large visiting acquaintance among the

farm-towns, and often did not seek his garret-bed till the small hours

of the morning. Then his mother, awake and vigilant, would incline her

ear on the pillow to hear whether her husband was asleep beside her.

Now, oftentimes Yabel, her husband, slept not, yet for his wife's sake,

and perhaps because Abel, with his bright smile and clean-limbed figure,

reminded him of a wild youth he had long put behind him, he bore with

the lad, even to giving him in one short year more money to spend than

had been his brothers' portion during all the time they had faithfully

served their father.

And this was not good for a young man.

So that early one spring, the wild oat crop that Abel had been sowing

began to appear with braird and luxuriant shoot. A whisper overran the

parish swifter than the moor-burn when the heather is dry on the moors.

Two names were coupled, not unto honour. And on a certain wild March

morning, Yabel McQuhirr, having called his son three times, clambered

fiercely up to the little garret stair to find an open skylight, a

pallet-bed not slept in, and a home that was now childless from flagged

hearth to smoke-browned roof-tree.

* * * * *

Yabel rode to market upon Mary Grey, his old rough-fetlocked mare, once

badger-grey, but now white as the sea-gulls that fluttered and settled

upon his springtime furrows. He heard no word of the story of Abel his

son and the gypsy lass, for none durst tell him--till one Rob Girmory of

Barscob, bolder or drunker than the rest, blurted it out with an oath

and a scurvy jest. The next moment he was smitten down, and Yabel

McQuhirr stood over him with his riding-whip clubbed in his hand, the

fierce irascible eyebrows twitching, and wide nostrils blown out with

the breath of the man's wrath.