ze. Auld Jock
found a dry, knitted Tam-o'-Shanter bonnet in his little bundle and set
it on his head. It was a moment or two before he could speak without the
humiliating betrayal of chattering teeth.

"Ay, it's a misty nicht," he admitted, with caution.

"Misty! Man, it's raining like all the seven deils were abroad." Having
delivered himself of this violent opinion, Mr. Traill fell into his
usual philosophic vein. "I have sma' patience with the Scotch way of
making little of everything. If Noah had been a Lowland Scot he'd 'a'
said the deluge was juist fair wet."'

He laughed at his own wit, his thin-featured face and keen gray eyes
lighting up to a kindliness that his brusque speech denied in vain.
He had a fluency of good English at command that he would have thought
ostentatious to use in speaking with a simple country body.

Auld Jock stared at Mr. Traill and pondered the matter. By and by he
asked: "Wasna the deluge fair wet?"

The landlord sighed but, brought to book like that, admitted that
it was. Conversation flagged, however, while he busied himself with
toasting a smoked herring, and dragging roasted potatoes from the little
iron oven that was fitted into the brickwork of the fireplace beside the
grate.

Bobby was attending to his own entertainment. The familiar place wore a
new and enchanting aspect, and needed instant exploration. By day it was
fitted with tables, picketed by chairs and all manner of boots. Noisy
and crowded, a little dog that wandered about there was liable to be
trodden upon. On that night of storm it was a vast, bright place, so
silent one could hear the ticking of the wag-at-the-wa' clock, the crisp
crackling of the flames, and the snapping of the coals. The uncovered
deal tables were set back in a double line along one wall, with the
chairs piled on top, leaving a wide passage of freshly scrubbed and
sanded oaken floor from the door to the fireplace. Firelight danced on
the dark old wainscoting and high, carved overmantel, winked on rows of
drinking mugs and metal covers over cold meats on the buffet, and even
picked out the gilt titles on the backs of a shelf of books in Mr.
Traill's private corner behind the bar.

Bobby shook himself on the hearth to free his rain-coat of surplus
water. To the landlord's dry "We're no' needing a shower in the house.
Lie down, Bobby," he wagged his tail politely, as a sign that he heard.
But, as Auld Jock did not repeat the order, he ignored