edom from earthly restraint, if she were
as much alive in faith, and as free from the bonds of Satan."

"The Lord protect us!" said Jeanie.--"Can the unhappy bairn hae left you
for that villain?"

"It is ower truly spoken," said Deans--"She has left her auld father,
that has wept and prayed for her--She has left her sister, that travailed
and toiled for her like a mother--She has left the bones of her mother,
and the land of her people, and she is ower the march wi' that son of
Belial--She has made a moonlight flitting of it." He paused, for a
feeling betwixt sorrow and strong resentment choked his utterance.

"And wi' that man?--that fearfu' man?" said Jeanie. "And she has left us
to gang aff wi' him?--O Effie, Effie, wha could hae thought it, after sic
a deliverance as you had been gifted wi'!"

"She went out from us, my bairn, because she was not of us," replied
David. "She is a withered branch will never bear fruit of grace--a
scapegoat gone forth into the wilderness of the world, to carry wi' her,
as I trust, the sins of our little congregation. The peace of the warld
gang wi' her, and a better peace when she has the grace to turn to it! If
she is of His elected, His ain hour will come. What would her mother have
said, that famous and memorable matron, Rebecca MacNaught, whose memory
is like a flower of sweet savour in Newbattle, and a pot of frankincense
in Lugton? But be it sae--let her part--let her gang her gate--let her
bite on her ain bridle--The Lord kens his time--She was the bairn of
prayers, and may not prove an utter castaway. But never, Jeanie, never
more let her name be spoken between you and me--She hath passed from us
like the brook which vanisheth when the summer waxeth warm, as patient
Job saith--let her pass, and be forgotten."

There was a melancholy pause which followed these expressions. Jeanie
would fain have asked more circumstances relating to her sister's
departure, but the tone of her father's prohibition was positive. She was
about to mention her interview with Staunton at his father's rectory;
but, on hastily running over the particulars in her memory, she thought
that, on the whole, they were more likely to aggravate than diminish his
distress of mind. She turned, therefore, the discourse from this painful
subject, resolving to suspend farther inquiry until she should see
Butler, from whom she expected to learn the particulars of her sister's
elopement.

But when was she to see Bu