ts
dark enfranchisement, and broke into such a blasphemy of sound as hath
not been heard since the angels alighted where they fell.

I have heard the deep roar of the ocean, and have listened to the
screech of the typhoon through befiddled sails; I have shuddered at the
savage yell of the hyena, and have grown cold, even in the tropics,
before the tooting of the wounded elephant; I have heard the eagle rend
the firmament and the midnight fog-horn ring the changes on
eternity--join them all together, and they will be still but as a
village choir compared to the infinite and full-orbed bray of the
highland bagpipes.

After the first shock of sky-quake had subsided, Donald turned and
looked at me with a rapt and heavenly smile, the thing emitting sundry
noises all the while, like fragments from a crash of sound,
comparatively mild, as a stream which has just run Niagara.

I stood, dripping with noise, fearful lest the tide might rush in again,
and looking about for my hat, if haply it might have been cast up upon
the beach.

"Wasna that a graun' ane?" said the machinator. "It's nae often ye'll
hear the like o' that in Canada. There's jist ae man beside masel' can
gie ye that this side o' Inverness--and he's broke i' the win'."

"Thank God!" I ejaculated fervently, not knowing what I said.

But Donald misunderstood me and I had nothing to fear.

"Ye're richt there," he cried exultantly; "it's what I ca' a sacred
preevilege to hear the like o' that, maist as sacred as a psalm. Ma
faither used to play that verra tune at funerals i' the hielands, and
the words they aye sang till't was these:--

"'Take comfort, Christians, when your friends
In Jesus fall asleep,'

an' it used to fair owercome the mourners. If ye were gaun by a hoose
i' the hieland glens, and heard thae words and that tune, ye cud mak'
sure there was a deid corpse i' the hoose."

"I don't wonder," was my response; but he perceived nothing in the words
except reverent assent.

"Ay," went on Donald, "it's a graun' means o' rest to the weary heart.
It's fair past everything for puttin' the bairns to sleep. Mony's the
time I hae lulled them wi' that same tune when their mither cud dae
naethin' wi' them. I dinna mind as I ever heard a bairn cry when I was
gien them that tune."

"I quite believe that," I replied, burning to ask him if they ever cried
again. But I refrained, and began my retreat towards the door.

"Bide a wee; I maun gie ye