When a's confessed o' them.

Bethankit! what a bonny creed!
What mair would ony Christian need?--
The braw words rummle ower his heid,
Nor steer the sleeper;
An' in their restin' graves, the deid
Sleep aye the deeper.

NOTE.--It may be guessed by some that I had a certain parish in my
eye, and this makes it proper I should add a word of disclamation. In my
time there have been two ministers in that parish. Of the first I have a
special reason to speak well, even had there been any to think ill. The
second I have often met in private and long (in the due phrase) "sat
under" in his church, and neither here nor there have I heard an unkind
or ugly word upon his lips. The preacher of the text had thus no
original in that particular parish; but when I was a boy, he might have
been observed in many others; he was then (like the schoolmaster)
abroad; and by recent advices, it would seem he has not yet entirely
disappeared.--[R. L. S.]

VI

THE SPAEWIFE

O, I wad like to ken--to the beggar-wife says I--
Why chops are guid to brander and nane sae guid to fry.
An' siller, that's sae braw to keep, is brawer still to gi'e.
--_It's gey an' easy speirin'_, says the beggar-wife to me.

O, I wad like to ken--to the beggar-wife says I--
Hoo a' things come to be whaur we find them when we try.
The lassies in their claes an' the fishes in the sea.
--_It's gey an' easy speirin'_, says the beggar-wife to me.

O' I wad like to ken--to the beggar-wife says I--
Why lads are a' to sell an' lasses a' to buy;
An' naebody for dacency but barely twa or three.
--_It's gey an' easy speirin'_, says the beggar-wife to me.

O, I wad like to ken--to the beggar-wife says I--
Gin death's as shuere to men as killin' is to kye,
Why God has filled the yearth sae fu' o' tasty things to pree.
--_It's gey an' easy speirin'_, says the beggar-wife to me.

O, I wad like to ken--to the beggar-wife says I--
The reason o' the cause an' the wherefore o' the why,
Wi' mony anither riddle brings the tear into my e'e.
--_It's gey an' easy speirin'_, says the beggar-wife to me.

VII

THE BLAST--1875

It's rainin'. Weet's the gairden sod,
Weet the lang roads whaur gangrels plod--
A maist unceevil thing o' God
In mid July--
If ye'll just curse the sneckdraw, dod!
An' sae wull I!

He's a braw place in Heev'n, ye ken,
An' lea's us puir, forjaskit men
C