better close what I hae to say," he assured me, "than by the
use o' the plowboy's words, slightly changed for the occasion:

"'Better lo'ed ye canna be
Will ye no' abide at hame?'"

With this he reached behind him (this too, a time-honoured custom),
seized the aforesaid caudal parts of his coat, removed them from the
path of descending danger, and lowered his stalwart form with easy
dignity, his kindly eyes aglow with friendship's light.

David Carrick was the next to speak. Cautious and severe, his chief aim
was to express the hope that I was sincere in my indecision.

"We had a sair shock wi' a former minister long years ago," he said, "he
had a call, like yirsel', but he aye kept puttin' us off, tellin' us he
was aye seekin' licht frae above; but Sandy Rutherford saw an or'nary
licht in the manse ae nicht after twal o'clock. He peekit in the window,
an' he saw the minister wi' his coat off, packin' up the things. The twa
lichts kind o' muddled him, ye ken."

His colleagues may have thought David unnecessarily severe. In any case
several of them began signalling to Geordie Bickell to take the floor.
Geordie responded with much modesty and misgiving, for he was the
saintliest man amongst us; and his own estimate of himself was in direct
antagonism to our own.

"We willna urge ye, sir," he said, with a winsome smile, "but I'm sure
the maist of us hae been pleadin' hard afore a higher court than this.
A' I want to tell ye is this--there hasna been wound or bruise upon yir
relation to yir people. An' there's but ae hairt amongst us, an' we're
giein' ye anither call this day--an' we're hopin' it's the will o' God."

The interview was almost closed, when a voice was heard from the back of
the room, a very eager voice, and charged with the import of its
message:

"It's mebbe no' worth mentionin'," said Archie Blackwood, a fiery Scot
whose father had fought at Balaclava, "but it's gey important for a'
that. Gin ye should gang to Charleston ye'll hae to sing sma' on their
Fourth o' July, for that's their screechin' time, they tell me; an' ye
wudna hae a psalm frae year's end to year's end to wet yir burnin'
lips--an' ye wadna ken when it was the Twenty-fourth o' May. They tell
me they haena kept the Twenty-fourth o' May in Ameriky since 1776."
Archie knew his duty better than his dates.

I assured him of the importance of his warnings, and acknowledged the
various deprivations he had foretold.

"Juist a