was fond of a lass and
fond of a glass, and fond of a ran-dan; but I could never hear tell that
he was muckle use for honest employment. Frae ae thing to anither, he
listed at last for a sodger, and was in the garrison of this fort, which
was the first way that ony of the Dales cam to set foot upon the Bass.
Sorrow upon that service! The governor brewed his ain ale; it seems it
was the warst conceivable. The rock was proveesioned frae the shore with
vivers, the thing was ill-guided, and there were whiles when they buet to
fish and shoot solans for their diet. To crown a', thir was the Days of
the Persecution. The perishin' cauld chalmers were a' occupeed wi' sants
and martyrs, the saut of the yerd, of which it wasna worthy. And though
Tam Dale carried a firelock there, a single sodger, and likit a lass and
a glass, as I was sayin', the mind of the man was mair just than set
with his position. He had glints of the glory of the kirk; there were
whiles when his dander rase to see the Lord's sants misguided, and shame
covered him that he should be hauldin' a can'le (or carrying a firelock)
in so black a business. There were nights of it when he was here on
sentry, the place a' wheesht, the frosts o' winter maybe riving in the
wa's, and he would hear ane o' the prisoners strike up a psalm, and the
rest join in, and the blessed sounds rising from the different
chalmers--or dungeons, I would raither say--so that this auld craig in
the sea was like a pairt of Heev'n. Black shame was on his saul; his
sins hove up before him muckle as the Bass, and above a', that chief
sin, that he should have a hand in hagging and hashing at Christ's Kirk.
But the truth is that he resisted the spirit. Day cam, there were the
rousing compainions, and his guid resolves depairtit.

In thir days, dwalled upon the Bass a man of God, Peden the Prophet was
his name. Ye'll have heard tell of Prophet Peden. There was never the
wale of him sinsyne, and it's a question wi' mony if there ever was his
like afore. He was wild's a peat-hag, fearsome to look at, fearsome to
hear, his face like the day of judgment. The voice of him was like a
solan's and dinnled in folk's lugs, and the words of him like coals of
fire.

Now there was a lass on the rock, and I think she had little to do, for
it was nae place for dacent weemen; but it seems she was bonny, and her
and Tam Dale were very well agreed. It befell that Peden was in the
gairden his lane at the praying wh