the help o' the
Almichty Ah'll smash the abomination into a thoosand splinters!'"

His stick came down upon the doorstone with a crash that prophesied
total destruction to the offending instrument.

"Hoots, toots, Andra!" cried Duncan Polite reprovingly, "it's jist
violent you will be; and, indeed, I will be thinkin' it would not be
right to drive the young folks."

"The Maister drove oot wi' a scourage them as misused the hoose o'
God," responded the apostle of force severely.

"Aye, the Master," said Duncan, his fine face lighting up. "The
Master!" he repeated the word tenderly. "Eh, but that would be a fine
word, Andra, a fine word. Yes, He would be doing that once, but that
would not be His spirit, ah, no indeed! For He was led as a lamb to
the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so He opened
not His mouth! Eh, eh, and yet He would be the Master o' the whole
Universe!" His voice died away, he sat motionless, his long slender
hands hanging at his side, his eyes seeing wondrous sights on the
purple slope of the opposite hillside.

Andrew Johnstone ceased his vicious whacking of Duncan's asters and
conveyed his stick to its decorous Sabbath position behind him. His
friend's sublime spirituality always cooled Splinterin' Andra's wrath.

There was a long silence, the sound of a bell tinkling away in the dark
forest opposite and the distant murmur of the village alone broke the
stillness. Andrew rose to go in a much better frame of mind. "You an'
me, Duncan," he said with some sadness, "belong to a past generation.
Maister Cameron's gone, an' the auld buddies are slippin' awa fast, an'
whiles Ah hae little patience wi' the new fangled notions. Will the
country be a God-fearin' one, Ah wonder, when we're a' awa?"

It was the question and also the tragedy of their lives, the question
Duncan Polite's whole life was given up towards answering.

"We must jist be trusting that to the Lord, Andra," he said with his
usual hopefulness. "Whatever changes come, He is the same yesterday,
to-day and forever."

But Duncan Polite realised the affair was not ended. He knew it was
not likely that the young people would defy Splinterin' Andra and drive
him to violence, but the fire of gossip would be set going and he
feared his friend's life would be embittered. He was thinking deeply
and sadly over the problem the next morning as he dug up the potatoes
from his garden. There was Coonie, now, if