ome to
mind till he was some miles on the road, and that was the obligation it
put him under of passing through Lithgow, where he was so well known,
and where all his kith and kin lived--there being then no immediate
route from Edinburgh to Glasgow but by Lithgow. And he debated with
himself for a space of time whether he ought to proceed, or turn back
and go the other way, and his mind was sorely troubled with doubts and
difficulties. At last he considered that it was never deemed wise or
fortunate to turn back in any undertaking, and besides, having for the
service of the Saviour left his father's house and renounced his
parents, like a bird that taketh wing and knoweth the nest where it was
bred no more, he knit up his ravelled thoughts into resolution, and
clapping spurs to his horse, rode bravely on.

But when he beheld the towers of the palace, and the steeples of his
native town, rising before him, many remembrances came rushing to his
heart, and all the vexations he had suffered there were lost in the
sunny recollections of the morning of life, when everyone was kind, and
the eyes of his parents looked on him with the brightness of delight, in
so much, that his soul yearned within him, and his cheeks were wetted
with fast-flowing tears. Nevertheless, he overcame this thaw of his
fortitude, and went forward in the strength of the Lord, determined to
swerve not in his duty to the Earl of Glencairn, nor in his holier
fealty to a far greater Master. But the softness that he felt in his
nature made him gird himself with a firm purpose to ride through the
town without stopping. Scarcely, however, had he entered the port, when
his horse stumbled and lost a shoe, by which he was not only constrained
to stop, but to take him to his father's smiddy, which was in sight when
the mischance happened.

On going to the door, he found, as was commonly the case, a number of
grooms and flunkies of the courtiers, with certain friars, holding
vehement discourse concerning the tidings of the time, the burden of
which was the burning of the aged Master Mill, a thing that even the
monks durst not, for humanity, venture very strenuously to defend. His
father was not then within; but one of the prentice lads, seeing who it
was that had come with a horse to be shod, ran to tell him; and at the
sight of my grandfather, the friars suspended their controversies with
the serving-men, and gathered round him with many questions. He replied,
h