es, and would be takin' a look at the beasts in the parks as we
went, and often the beasts would be turned on the roadside, for a man
might buy on Monday what he only saw on Sunday. Once, going by
Hector's, the lassies wi' their shoon in their hands, were walkin'
easier barefit and savin' shoe leather, and a young Embro' leddy, wi' a
hooped skirt wi' the braidin' like theek rope on a stack, and
high-heeled shoon, looked disdainfu' at them. Well, well, the pigs
were on the roadside at Hector's, and they kent the barefit lassies;
but the grand lady they didna ken at all, and one caught her gown by
the braidin' and scattered away reivin' and tearin', and set the lady
spinning like a peerie, and the lassies laughed and cried 'suckie,
suckie,' and put on their boots to go into the kirk, well put on, and
in a rale godly frame o' mind."

Belle had the wean wrapped in the cloak the servant had provided and
was croonin' ower it, and the body-servant was waitin' for orders, and
there stood Dan and the Laird as though loath to part, and them on
business that might mean worse than burnin' stackyards. And it came to
me that Scaurdale was not the man to be cherishing any tinker's whelp,
not even if he had fair claim to.

"And what lesson did ye get that day, Sir Churchman?"

"Pride goeth before a fall," says Dan, "but that was a bad day for me."

"And how?" cried Scaurdale, and I could see he was wasting time on
purpose.

"Indeed it was no fault o' mine, for between the shepherds' dogs
huntin' aboot till the church scaled, and the pigs lookin' for
diversion, a kind o' hunt got up, and a pig came into the church wi' a'
the collies in full cry and made a bonny to-do among the Elect. The
poor beast made a breenge and got a hat on its snout, and then a fling
o' its heid ended matters, and there was the pig in the deacon's hat,
and sair pit aboot was the pig, and sairer the deacon.

"Aweel, I was reproved and reminded o' the time when I had had a sermon
a' tae masel'; but the end crowned a', for I had killed an adder that
morning on the road, and put the beast in my pouch for Hamish. In the
middle o' the sermon, after the Gadarene swine and the dogs were
outside, the adder somewie cam' alive and crawled on to the aisle, and
the minister eyed it, and then me, and I felt hot and caul', for I
didna ken o' any new evil that might hiv reached him, and I didna see
the beast till the preacher stopped and pointed.

"'Man o' evil,' he