at you wish it. But let those keen, black eyes
perceive something which he thinks sin, and down he comes on you in the
very manner of the old prophets. Yet show him that he has made a
mistake, and that your action was justified, and he begs your
forgiveness in a moment. And I never saw a man who seemed more fitted
to deal with broken-hearted sinners. To them he is tenderness and
comfort itself.

"He just takes pattern frae his Maister; that's whaur it is," said old
Elspie. "Mind ye, He was unco gentle wi' the puir despised publicans,
and vara tender to the wife that had been a sinner. It was the
Pharisees He was hard on. And that's just what the minister is. Miss
Cary, he's just the best blessing the Lord ever sent till Brocklebank!"

"I hardly thought, Elspie," said I, a little mischievously, "to hear you
speak so well of a Prelatist clergyman."

"Hoot awa', we a' ha'e our bees in our bonnets, Miss Cary," said the old
woman, a trifle testily. "The minister's no pairfect, I daur say. But
he's as gran' at praying as John Knox himself and he gars ye feel the
loue and loueliness o' Christ like Maister Rutherford did. And sae lang
's he'll do that, I'm no like to quarrel wi' him, if he do ha'e a fancy
for lawn sleeves and siccan rubbish, I wish him better sense, that's a'.
Maybe he'll ha'e it ane o' thae days."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

I cannot understand Hatty as she is now. For a while after that affair
with the Crosslands she was just like a drooping, broken-down flower;
all her pertness, and even her brightness, completely gone. Now that is
changed, and she has become, not pert again, but hard--hard and bitter.
Nobody can do anything to suit her, and she says things now and then
which make me jump. Things, I mean, as if she believed nothing and
cared for nobody. When Hatty speaks in that way, I often see my Aunt
Kezia looking at her with a strange light in her eyes, which seems to be
half pain and half hopefulness. Mr Liversedge, I fancy, is studying
her; and I am not sure that he knows what to make of her.

Yesterday evening, Fanny and Ambrose came in and sat a while. Fanny is
ever so much improved. She has brightened up, and lost much of that
languid, limp, fanciful way she used to have; and, instead of writing
odes to the stars, she seems to take an interest in her poultry-yard and
dairy. My Aunt Kezia says Fanny wanted an object in life, and I