Come awa wi' my saxpence noo."

The belief that this day had not come to Henders unexpectedly was borne
out by the method of the crafty callant. His charges varied from
sixpence to half-a-crown, according to the wealth and status of his
victims; and when, later on, there were rivals in the snow, he had the
discrimination to reduce his minimum fee to threepence. He had the
honour of digging out three ministers at one shilling, one and
threepence, and two shillings respectively.

Half a dozen times within the next fortnight the town was reburied in
snow. This generally happened in the night-time; but the inhabitants
were not to be caught unprepared again. Spades stood ready to their
hands in the morning, and they fought their way above ground without
Henders Ramsay's assistance. To clear the snow from the narrow wynds
and pends, however, was a task not to be attempted; and the Auld
Lichts, at least, rested content when enough light got into their
workshops to let them see where their looms stood. Wading through beds
of snow they did not much mind; but they wondered what would happen to
their houses when the thaw came.

The thaw was slow in coming. Snow during the night and several degrees
of frost by day were what Thrums began to accept as a revised order of
nature. Vainly the Thrums doctor, whose practice extends into the
glens, made repeated attempts to reach his distant patients, twice
driving so far into the dreary waste that he could neither go on nor
turn back. A ploughman who contrived to gallop ten miles for him did
not get home for a week. Between the town, which is nowadays an
agricultural centre of some importance, and the outlying farms
communication was cut off for a month; and I heard subsequently of one
farmer who did not see a human being, unconnected with his own farm,
for seven weeks. The schoolhouse, which I managed to reach only two
days behind time, was closed for a fortnight, and even in Thrums there
was only a sprinkling of scholars.

On Sundays the feeling between the different denominations ran high,
and the middling good folk who did not go to church counted those who
did. In the Established Church there was a sparse gathering, who
waited in vain for the minister. After a time it got abroad that a
flag of distress was flying from the manse, and then they saw that the
minister was storm-stayed. An office-bearer offered to conduct
service; but the others present thought they had d