again. But about you and Roddie,--do you mean to say that for his church crotchets he has dragged you out of the old manse where you were born? And that you and he are living down here? Where do you live, by the way? Not in the village tavern, surely!--with its pipe-smoking and toddy-drinking--and yet I see no place else.'

'We live in the cottages. Several of the villagers each give us a room, so we are not so badly off for space, though the rooms are pretty far apart.'

'I would not have believed that your brother could have behaved so badly as to bring you down to that. And I did not think my mother would have allowed it. Were you not asked to stay at Inchbracken?'

'I fear she and General Drysdale are too much displeased with my brother for bringing the Free Church controversy into the parish, and with me for following him, even to waste another thought upon either of us. And perhaps, Captain Drysdale, it is wrong in me to stand here talking to you, when I know how deeply we have offended your family. Perhaps they might not like it.'

'And what then? Miss Brown. Am I still in pinafores at eight-and-twenty, that my mamma is to give consent before I may be allowed to speak to my very oldest friend? Why! Mary, girl, I have had you in my arms before you could walk, and I have fished you out of more than one burn, where you might very well have been drowned if I had not been near. And you know when you were eight years old you promised'--

'Pray stop! Captain Drysdale. Those are old stories, and neither you nor I are to be bound by the foolish speeches of our childhood. Dear old Kilrundle! I shall never forget our happy days there. But things have changed--I think this must be your gig.'

It was his gig, and with a very hearty shake-hands on either side, he got into it, and drove away.

'Prettier than ever,' he kept saying to himself, and the touch of the soft hands and the light in the violet eyes seemed to remain with him, and to vibrate about his heart, like the echo of a pleasant strain, till an hour later be alighted at Inchbracken.

Mary Brown strolled back to the village, her thoughts running on many things at once, the pleasant memories of the long ago and the somewhat sordid experiences of the present. Had Mrs. Sangster of Auchlippie been by, and known what was passing in her mind, she would surely have told her she was looking back to the fleshpots of Egypt, and exhorted her to take warning by the melancholy fate of Lot's wife.

Mrs. Sangster was a lady who took a particular interest in her own side of the ecclesiastical contest; and indeed it paid her to do so. She was the wife of the great man of the congregation, and seeing how mightily her consequence had prospered under the schism, she might well be zealous. From being an unpretending gentleman farmer, and the smallest heritor in the parish, her husband was now one of the few landed proprietors adhering to the Free Church, and one of those, therefore, whom she delighted to honour. Their snug home with its arable land and pastures, had now become a territorial designation attached to his name by an accented 'of,' like a German 'von,' and when he attended the General Assembly at Edinburgh he found himself sitting in committee and on platforms with the Church's solitary Marquis and the great magnates of the cause, while Madame had her seat in the Assembly among the honourable women, behind the Moderator's chair.

Fortunately for Mary, Mrs. Sangster did not appear. It was only her messenger in the person of a bare-foot herd laddie, who brought an invitation to drink tea; so Mary might let her thoughts linger in Egypt as they would. Indeed, in her case the rebuke could hardly be held to apply, seeing it was not the Free Church she had followed into the wilderness, but only the steps of her dear brother, that she might support and minister to him wherever and however he might need her help; consequently her religion manifested itself only as it had always done, in charities and good deeds, and as she had little to say on controversial subjects she was held to be 'juist a wee cauldrife'--a weakly sister after the pattern of Martha, troubled about many things and much serving, but hardly sound on the importance of the Headship, seeing she was disposed to look on all ministers as alike good, whether they had come out or stayed in.

Mary lingered long over her breakfast, but at length it was concluded, and she rose and returned to the study over the way. In the distance coming down the hill road, she now descried her brother jogging slowly down towards her.

'Eppie,' she cried, 'here comes my brother at last; will you make him some tea?'

'Hoot, mem! He's no wantin' his breakfast, I'm thinkin', or he'd be for makin' mair speed, saw ye e'er a hungry man danderin' down the road like yon? But preserve us a'! What's yon he's carryin' afore him on the bit pownie? It micht e'en be a bairn by the looks o' the bun'le, an' the tent he taks on't.' 'A' weel, sir!' she shouted as he drew near, 'Ye've had a sore traivel. Hoo's a' wi' ye, sir? An' wad ye like a dish o' tea, sir! Or a drap kale? My pat's on this twa hour, an I'm thinkin' there's a hantle mair fushion in that, nor a' yer dribblin' teapats. Tak tent, sir!' she added as he proceeded to alight before the door, 'gie us the bun'le an' ye'll licht easy. Lord sakes! sir, wha's acht the bairn? A gangin' fit's aye gettin', folk says, but wha'ar gat ye the wein?'

'Well Eppie! It's a poor little shipwrecked sailor, and I believe an orphan. I picked it up among the wreck of a ship that was lost at Effick Mouth last night, and we must care for it till we find out whom it belongs to. Though I fear its parents are among those lost in the shipwreck. Poor little soul! See how it takes to you already, Eppie!'

'The bonny lamb! an' sae it diz, an' it micht tak up wi' waur folk nor Eppie Ness. I'se tent ye, my birdie! Hoot awa! Miss Mary, what ken a young thing like you about fendin' for a bairnie? Young folk hae muckle to learn, an' yer time 'ull come, hinnie, or I'm muckle mistaen. I'll seek out the bit cradle whaur my ain bonny wee lambie lay, 'at's been wi' the Lord noo gaun on twenty year, gin ye'll haud this wee birdie, Miss Mary. An' ye can be seein' til its claes, an' we'll hae to mak meat til't.'

So the baby was carried into the house, undressed and bathed and fed, and put to sleep in Eppie's cradle. When the shawls were removed they disclosed a little girl dressed in many delicate embroideries, and around its body was entwined part of a gold chain corresponding to the links which Roderick had observed in the grasp of the drowned woman on the beach. These properties they carefully folded up and put away to assist in the future identification of the child, and Roderick wrote a letter to the Edinburgh Witness describing the waif he had rescued from the sea, in hopes it might meet the eye of some friend or relation.