he minister's. He had nothing more to say with his lips, but
oh, how eloquent were his great, sad, imploring eyes! They went
together to the manse door, and then the minister followed him to
the gate of the small croft. And as they stood, one on either side
of it, David murmured:

"Good-by, minister."

"Good-by, David, and see that you don't think hardly of either your
God or your creed. Your God will be your guide, even unto death; and
as for your creed, whatever faults men may find in it, this thing
is sure: Calvinism is the highest form ever yet assumed by the moral
life of the world."

The next morning, in the cold white light of the early dawn, David
left Lerwick. The blue moon was low in the west, the mystery and
majesty of earth all around him. At this hour the sea was dark
and quiet, the birds being still asleep upon their rocky perches,
and the only noise was the flapping of the sails, and the water
purring softly with little treble sounds among the clincher chains
and against the sides of the boat. David was a passenger on the
mail-boat. He had often seen her at a distance, but now, being
on board, he looked her over with great interest. She seemed to be
nearly as broad as she was long, very bluff at the bows, and so
strongly built that he involuntarily asked the man at the wheel:
"What kind of seas at all is this boat built for?"

"She's built for the Pentland Firth seas, my lad, _weather
permitting_. And there's no place on God's land or water where
them two words mean so much; for I can tell you, weather _not_
permitting, even this boat couldn't live in them."

Gradually David made his way to Glasgow, and from Glasgow to
London. Queen Victoria had then just been crowned, and one day
David saw her out driving. The royal carriage, with its milk-white
horses, its splendid outriders and appointments, and its military
escort, made a great impression on him, but the fair, girlish face of
the young, radiant queen he never forgot. Hitherto kings and queens
had been only a part of his Bible history; he had not realized their
relation to his own life. Shetland was so far from London that
newspapers seldom reached Lerwick. Politics were no factor in its
social or religious life. The civil lords came to try criminal
cases, but the minister was the abiding power. Until David saw the
young queen he had not heard of her accession to the throne, but with
the first knowledge of her "right" there sprang up in his hear