John?'

'I don't say I can in words,' she answered; 'but I think I could put it
all into music.'

'But surely ye maun hae some notion o' what it's aboot afore you can do
that.'

'Yes; but I have some notion of what it's about, I think. Just lend it
to me; and by the time we have our next lesson, you will see whether I'm
not able to show you I understand it. I shall take good care of it,'
she added, with a smile, seeing Robert's reluctance to part with it. 'It
doesn't matter my having it, you know, now that you've read it to me, I
want to make you do it justice.--But it's quite time I were going home.
Besides, I really don't think you can see to read any more.'

'Weel, it's better no to try, though I hae them maistly upo' my tongue:
I might blunder, and that wad blaud them.--Will you let me go home with
you?' he added, in pure tremulous English.

'Certainly, if you like,' she answered; and they walked towards the
town.

Robert opened the fountain of his love for Ericson, and let it gush like
a river from a hillside. He talked on and on about him, with admiration,
gratitude, devotion. And Miss St. John was glad of the veil of the
twilight over her face as she listened, for the boy's enthusiasm
trembled through her as the wind through an AEolian harp. Poor Robert! He
did not know, I say, what he was doing, and so was fulfilling his sacred
destiny.

'Bring your manuscripts when you come next,' she said, as they walked
along--gently adding, 'I admire your friend's verses very much, and
should like to hear more of them.'

'I'll be sure an' do that,' answered Robert, in delight that he had
found one to sympathize with him in his worship of Ericson, and that one
his other idol.

When they reached the town, Miss St. John, calling to mind its natural
propensity to gossip, especially on the evening of a market-day, when
the shopkeepers, their labours over, would be standing in a speculative
mood at their doors, surrounded by groups of friends and neighbours,
felt shy of showing herself on the square with Robert, and proposed that
they should part, giving as a by-the-bye reason that she had a little
shopping to do as she went home. Too simple to suspect the real reason,
but with a heart that delighted in obedience, Robert bade her good-night
at once, and took another way.

As he passed the door of Merson the haberdasher's shop, there stood
William MacGregor, the weaver, looking at nothing and doing nothing. We
have