d.'

'What's come ower him?'

'A stroke.'

'That's what comes o' playin' the fiddle.'

'I never heard o' a stroke comin' frae a fiddle, grannie. It comes oot
o' a clood whiles. Gin he had hauden till 's fiddle, he wad hae been
playin' her the nicht, in place o' 's airm lyin' at 's side like a lang
lingel (ligneul--shoemaker's thread).'

'Hm!' said his grandmother, concealing her indignation at this freedom
of speech, 'ye dinna believe in God's judgments!'

'Nae upo' fiddles,' returned Robert.

Mr. Innes sat and said nothing, with difficulty concealing his amusement
at this passage of arms.

It was but within the last few days that Robert had become capable of
speaking thus. His nature had at length arrived at the point of so far
casting off the incubus of his grandmother's authority as to assert some
measure of freedom and act openly. His very hopelessness of a hearing
in heaven had made him indifferent to things on earth, and therefore
bolder. Thus, strange as it may seem, the blessing of God descended on
him in the despair which enabled him to speak out and free his soul from
the weight of concealment. But it was not despair alone that gave him
strength. On his way home from the shoemaker's he had been thinking what
he could do for him; and had resolved, come of it what might, that he
would visit him every evening, and try whether he could not comfort
him a little by playing upon his violin. So that it was loving-kindness
towards man, as well as despair towards God, that gave him strength to
resolve that between him and his grandmother all should be above-board
from henceforth.

'Nae upo' fiddles,' Robert had said.

'But upo' them 'at plays them,' returned his grandmother.

'Na; nor upo' them 'at burns them,' retorted Robert--impudently it must
be confessed; for every man is open to commit the fault of which he is
least capable.

But Mrs. Falconer had too much regard to her own dignity to indulge her
feelings. Possibly too her sense of justice, which Falconer always said
was stronger than that of any other woman he had ever known, as well as
some movement of her conscience interfered. She was silent, and Robert
rushed into the breach which his last discharge had effected.

'An' I want to tell ye, grannie, that I mean to gang an' play the fiddle
to puir Sanny ilka nicht for the best pairt o' an hoor; an' excep' ye
lock the door an' hide the key, I will gang. The puir sinner sanna be
desertit by God an'