ea is quite absurd."

"Carnegie, did you ever hear the classical couplet--

"Scarting and biting
Mak Scots fouk's 'ooing;"

and although I admit the description applies in the first instance to
milkmaids, yet there is a fair share of national character in the
Carnegies."

"Do you really think that Kate is in . . . has, well, a, eh, tenderness
to Carmichael? it would never have occurred to me."

"How would you look on Carmichael as a suitor?"

"Well, if Kate is to marry--and mind you I always prepared myself for
that--I would of course prefer Hay, not because he is a lord, or rich,
or any snobbery of that kind--you know me better than that, Sandie--but
because he 's . . . you know . . . belongs to our own set.

"Don't you think there is something in that?" and the General tried to
explain his honest mind, in which lived no unworthy or uncharitable
thought. "I have not one word to say against Carmichael; he 's
good-looking, and monstrous clever, and he has always made himself very
agreeable, very, and the people swear by him in the Glen; but . . . you
must understand what I mean, Davidson," and the General was in despair.

"You mean that though he 's a first-rate young fellow for a clergyman,
he does not belong to your world--has a different set of friends, has
different habits of living, has a different way of thinking and
speaking--is, in fact, an outsider."

"That's it--just what I was 'ettling' after--lucky fellows we Scots
with such words," and the General was immensely delighted to be
delivered of his idea in an inoffensive form.

"It is my own belief, Carnegie--and you can laugh at me afterwards if I
be wrong--that this will be the end of it, however. Yes, putting it
plainly, that Kate is in love with Carmichael, as he is certainly with
her; and you will have to make the best of the situation."

"You don't like the idea any more than I do, Davidson?"

"Speaking in perfect confidence and frankness, I do not. I look at the
matter this way"--the Doctor stood on the hearth-rug in a judicial
attitude, pulling down his waistcoat with his two hands, his legs
apart, and his eye-glass on his nose--"Carmichael has been brought up
among . . . plain, respectable people, and theological books, and
church courts, and Free Kirk society, all of which is excellent,
but . . . secluded"--the Doctor liked the word, which gave his mind
without offence--"secluded. Kate is a Carnegie, was educated in
France, has tr