her bairns brought up by him. The minister kenned her wishes well on that point, you may be sure. And besides, he could never cross the sea and leave any of them behind.”

“But what need to cross the sea?” cried Mrs Smith; “It’s a pity but folk should ken when they’re weel aff. What could the like o’ him do in a country he kens nothing about, and with so many bairns?”

“It’s for the bairns’ sake he’s thinking of it. They say there’s fine land there for the working, and no such a thing as payin’ rent, but every man farming his own land, with none to say him nay. And there’s room for all, and meat and clothes, and to spare. I’m no’ sure but it’s just the best thing the minister can do. They had near made up their minds afore, ye ken.”

“Hoot, woman, speak sense,” entreated her friend. “Is the minister to sell rusty knives and glass beads to the Indians? That’s what they do in yon country, as I’ve read in a book myself. Whatna like way is that to bring up a family?”

“Losh, woman, there’s other folk there beside red Indians; folk that dinna scruple to even themselves with the best in Britain, no’ less. You should read the newspapers, woman. There’s one John Caldwell there, a friend o’ the minister’s, that’s something in a college, and he’s aye writing him to come. He says it’s a wonderful country for progress; and they hae things there they ca’ institutions, that he seems to think muckle o’, though what they may be I couldna weel make out. The minister read a bit out o’ a letter the ither night to Miss Graeme and me.”

“Janet,” said her friend, “say the truth at once. The minister is bent on this fule’s errand, and you’re encouraging in it.”

“Na, na! He needs na encouragement from the like o’ me. I would gie muckle, that hasna muckle to spare, gin he were content to bide where he is, though it’s easy seen he’ll hae ill enough bringing up a family here, and these laddies needing more ilka year that goes o’er their heads. And they say yon’s a grand country, and fine eddication to be got in it for next to nothing. I’m no sure but the best thing he can do is to take them there. I ken the mistress was weel pleased with the thought,” and Janet tried with all her might, to look hopeful; but her truth-telling countenance betrayed her. Her friend shook her head gravely.

“It might have done, with her to guide them; but it’s very different now, as you ken yourself, far better than I can tell you. It would be little else than a temptin’ o’ Providence to expose these helpless bairns, first to the perils o’ the sea, and then to those o’ a strange country. He’ll never do it. He’s restless now; and unsettled; but when time, that cures most troubles, goes by, he’ll think better of it, and bide where he is.”

Janet made no reply, but in her heart she took no such comfort. She knew it was no feeling of restlessness, no longing to be away from the scene of his sorrow that had decided the minister to emigrate, and that he had decided she very well knew. These might have hastened his plans, she thought, but he went for the sake of his children. They might make their own way in the world, and he thought he could better do this in the New World than in the Old. The decision of one whom she had always reverenced for his goodness and wisdom must be right, she thought; yet she had misgivings, many and sad, as to the future of the children she had come to love so well. It was to have her faint hope confirmed, and her strong fears chased away, that she had spoken that afternoon to her friend; and it was with a feeling of utter disconsolateness that, she turned to her work again, when, at last, she was left alone.

For Janet had a deeper cause for care than she had told, a vague feeling that the worldly wisdom of her friend could not help her here, keeping her silent about it to her. That very morning, her heart had leaped to her lips, when her master in his grave, brief way, had asked,—

“Janet, will you go with us, and help me to take care of her bairns?”

And she had vowed to God, and to him, that she would never leave them while they needed the help that a faithful servant could give. But the after thought had come. She had other ties, and cares, and duties, apart from these that clustered so closely round the minister and his motherless children.

A mile or two down the glen stood the little cottage that had for a long time been the home of her widowed mother, and her son. More than half required for their maintenance Janet provided. Could she forsake them? Could any duty she owed to her master and his children make it right for her to forsake those whose blood flowed in her veins? True, her mother was by no means an aged woman yet, and her son was a well-doing helpful lad, who would soon be able to take care of himself. Her mother had another daughter too, but Janet knew that her sister could never supply her place to her mother. Though kind and well-intentioned, she was easy minded, not to say thriftless, and the mother of many bairns besides, and there could neither be room nor comfort for her mother at her fireside, should its shelter come to be needed.

Day after day Janet wearied herself going over the matter in her mind. “If it were not so far,” she thought, or “if her mother could go with her.” But this she knew, for many reasons, could never be, even if her mother could be brought to consent to such a plan. And Janet asked herself, “What would my mother do if Sandy were to die? And what would Sandy do if my mother were to die? And what would both do if sickness were to overtake them, and me far-away?” till she quite hated herself for ever thinking of putting the wide sea, between them and her.

There had been few pleasures scattered over Janet’s rough path to womanhood. Not more than two or three mornings since she could remember had she risen to other than a life of labour. Even during the bright brief years of her married-life, she had known little respite from toil, for her husband had been a poor man, and he had died suddenly, before her son was born. With few words spoken, and few tears shed, save what fell in secret, she had given her infant to her mother’s care, and gone back again to a servant’s place in the minister’s household. There she had been for ten years the stay and right hand of her beloved friend and mistress, “working the work of two,” as they told her, who would have made her discontented in her lot, with no thought from year’s end to year’s end, but how she might best do her duty in the situation in which God had placed her.

But far-away into the future—it might be years and years hence—she looked to the time when in a house of her own, she might devote herself entirely to the comfort of her mother and her son. In this hope she was content to strive and toil through the best years of her life, living poorly and saving every penny, to all appearance equally indifferent to the good word of those who honoured her for her faithfulness and patient labour, and to the bad word of those who did not scruple to call her most striking characteristics by less honourable names. She had never, during all these years, spoken, even to her mother, of her plans, but their fulfilment was none the less settled in her own mind, and none the less dear to her because of that. Could she give this up? Could she go away from her home, her friends, the land of her birth, and be content to see no respite from her labour till the end? Yes, she could. The love that had all these years been growing for the children she had tended with almost a mother’s care, would make the sacrifice possible—even easy to her. But her mother? How could she find courage to tell her that she must leave her alone in her old age? The thought of parting from her son, her “bonny Sandy,” loved with all the deeper fervour that the love was seldom spoken—even this gave her no such pang as did the thought of turning her back