osphere of--what shall
I call it? avertedness that surrounded her. She had always lived in a
dream of unrealities; and the dream had almost devoured her life.

One evening Shargar was later than usual in coming home from the walk,
or ramble rather, without which he never could settle down to his work.
He knocked at Robert's door.

'Whaur do ye think I've been, Robert?'

'Hoo suld I ken, Shargar?' answered Robert, puzzling over a problem.

'I've been haein' a glaiss wi' Jock Mitchell.'

'Wha's Jock Mitchell?'

'My brither Sandy's groom, as I tellt ye afore.'

'Ye dinna think I can min' a' your havers, Shargar. Whaur was the comin'
gentleman whan ye gaed to drink wi' a chield like that, wha, gin
my memory serves me, ye tauld me yersel' was i' the mids o' a' his
maister's deevilry?'

'Yer memory serves ye weel eneuch to be doon upo' me,' said Shargar.
'But there's a bit wordy 'at they read at the cathedral kirk the last
Sunday 'at's stucken to me as gin there was something by ordinar' in
't.'

'What's that?' asked Robert, pretending to go on with his calculations
all the time.

'Ow, nae muckle; only this: "Judge not, that ye be not judged."--I
took a lesson frae Jeck the giant-killer, wi' the Welsh giant--was 't
Blunderbore they ca'd him?--an' poored the maist o' my glaiss doon my
breist. It wasna like ink; it wadna du my sark ony ill.'

'But what garred ye gang wi' 'im at a'? He wasna fit company for a
gentleman.'

'A gentleman 's some saft gin he be ony the waur o' the company he gangs
in till. There may be rizzons, ye ken. Ye needna du as they du. Jock
Mitchell was airin' Reid Rorie an' Black Geordie. An' says I--for I
wantit to ken whether I was sic a breme-buss (broom-bush) as I used to
be--says I, "Hoo are ye, Jock Mitchell?" An' says Jock, "Brawly. Wha
the deevil are ye?" An' says I, "Nae mair o' a deevil nor yersel', Jock
Mitchell, or Alexander, Baron Rothie, either--though maybe that's no
little o' ane." "Preserve me!" cried Jock, "it's Shargar."--"Nae mair o'
that, Jock," says I. "Gin I bena a gentleman, or a' be dune,"--an' there
I stack, for I saw I was a muckle fule to lat oot onything o' the kin'
to Jock. And sae he seemed to think, too, for he brak oot wi' a great
guffaw; an' to win ower 't, I jined, an' leuch as gin naething was
farrer aff frae my thochts than ever bein' a gentleman. "Whaur do ye
pit up, Jock?" I said. "Oot by here," he answert, "at Luckie
Maitlan's."--"That's a queer place