I wonder at you."

"Of course his father was Scotch, that's one mercy," added Bell, not a bit annoyed at the reception of her pious opinions.

"That, is always something to be going on with," said Mr. Dyce, mockingly. "I hope he'll make the most of that great start in life and fortune. It's as good as money in his pocket."

Bell put up a tiny hand and pushed a stray curl (for she had a rebel chevelure) behind her ear, and smiled in spite of her anxiety about the coming nephew. "You may laugh if you like, Dan," she said, emphatically, perking with her head across the table at him, "but I'm proud, I'm proud, I'm PROUD I'm Scotch." ("Not apologizing for it myself," said her brother, softly.) "And you know what these Americans are! Useless bodies, who make their men brush their own boots, and have to pay wages that's a sin to housemaids, and eat pie even-on."

"Dear me! is that true, or did you see it in a newspaper?" said her brother. "I begin to be alarmed myself at the possibilities of this small gentleman now on his way to the north, in the complete confidence of Mr. Molyneux, who must think him very clever. It's a land of infant prodigies he comes from; even at the age of ten he may have more of the stars and stripes in him than we can eradicate by a diet of porridge and a curriculum of Shorter Catechism and Jane Porter's Scottish Chiefs. Faith, I was fond of Jane myself when I read her first: she was nice and bloody. A big soft hat with a bash in it, perhaps; a rhetorical delivery at the nose, 'I guess and calculate' every now and then; a habit of chewing tobacco" ("We'll need a cuspidor," said Ailie, sotto voce); "and a revolver in his wee hip-pocket. Oh, the darling! I can see him quite plainly."

"Mercy on us!" cried the maid, Kate, and fled the room all in a tremor at the idea of the revolver.

"You may say what you like, but I cannot get over his being an American," said Bell, solemnly. "The dollar's everything in America, and they're so independent!"

"Terrible! terrible!" said her brother, ironically, breaking into another egg fiercely with his knife, as if he were decapitating the President of the United States.

Ailie laughed again. "Dear, dear Bell!" she said, "it sounds quite Scotch. A devotion to the dollar is a good sound basis for a Scotch character. Remember there are about a hundred bawbees in a dollar: just think of the dollar in bawbees, and you'll not be surprised that the Americans prize it so much." "Renegade!" said Bell, shaking a spoon at her. "Provincial!" retorted Ailie, shaking a fork at Bell,