ion.--It had been a very wet and unpromising autumn. The
minister met a certain Janet of his flock, and accosted her very kindly.
He remarked, "Bad prospect for the har'st (harvest), Janet, this wet."
_Janet_--"Indeed, sir, I've seen as muckle as that there'll be nae
har'st the year." _Minister_--"Na, Janet, deil as muckle as that't
ever you saw."

As I have said, he was a clergyman of the Established Church, and had
many stories about ministers and people, arising out of his own pastoral
experience, or the experience of friends and neighbours. He was much
delighted with the not very refined rebuke which one of his own farmers
had given to a young minister who had for some Sundays occupied his
pulpit. The young man had dined with the farmer in the afternoon when
services were over, and his appetite was so sharp, that he thought it
necessary to apologise to his host for eating so substantial a
dinner.--"You see," he said, "I am always very hungry after preaching."
The old gentleman, not much admiring the youth's pulpit ministrations,
having heard this apology two or three times, at last replied
sarcastically, "Indeed, sir, I'm no surprised at it, considering the
_trash_ that comes aff your stamach in the morning."

What I wish to keep in view is, to distinguish anecdotes which are
amusing on account merely of the expressions used, from those which have
real wit and humour _combined_, with the purely Scottish vehicle in
which they are conveyed.

Of this class I could not have a better specimen to commence with than
the defence of the liturgy of his church, by John Skinner of Langside,
of whom previous mention has been made. It is witty and clever.

Being present at a party (I think at Lord Forbes's), where were also
several ministers of the Establishment, the conversation over their wine
turned, among other things, on the Prayer Book. Skinner took no part in
it, till one minister remarked to him, "The great faut I hae to your
prayer-book is that ye use the Lord's Prayer sae aften,--ye juist mak a
dishclout o't." Skinner's rejoinder was, "Verra true! Ay, man, we mak a
dishclout o't, an' we wring't, an' we wring't, an' we wring't, an' the
bree[163] o't washes a' the lave o' our prayers."

No one, I think, could deny the wit of the two following rejoinders.

A ruling elder of a country parish in the west of Scotland was well
known in the district as a shrewd and ready-witted man. He received many
a visit from persons w