a command for many pounds' worth of
work, and Father Michel is much pleasured by that.

"I have just had a letter from Janet McGillavorich. 'Seeing that ye
write,' she says, 'ye may be interested in a plowman-poet that we
have down here, whose name has made some noise in this part of the
country. His name is Burns, an Ayr man, and the gentry are a'
makin' much of him. Well, any time ye've the fancy, ye can look out
of the spence window and see heedless Rab Burns, his eyes a-shine
like twa stars, coming over the braeside, drunk as a laird, roaring
out, 'How are thy servants, blessed, O Lord,' having spent the
night Gude alane kens wheer. God kens and most of the neighbors,
too, when you come to think about it, for the lad has a Biblical
shamelessness for his misdeeds, and what he forgets to tell himself
(and that's little enough) he goes home and writes out for all the
parish to read. So if ye'd like a crack wi' him, just come right
down, now your father's left ye, and I'll have him till dinner with
you, and you can bob at each ither to your heart's content.'

"Isn't it strange, Jock, that a thing I have wanted so long should
just happen by, as it were? And so I'm off for Mauchline to-morrow,
with Dickenson, whose silence bespeaks a shrewish disapproval, and
will write how Mr. Burns and I get on at some soon date.

"Give my love to Mr. Pitcairn, and tell him the prints are full of
his new book.

"Danvers Carmichael has not been here since the time you know of,
and the Duke of Borthwicke is on some sudden business to the
Highlands.

"With my heart held in my hands toward you,

"Your own child,

[Signed: Nancy Stair]

In a green tabby velvet, laced with silver, and a huge feathered hat,
Nancy set out from Stair about eight in the morning with Dame Dickenson
in the Stair coach, driven by Patsy MacColl. By a change of horse at
Balregal, she arrived at Mauchline just as the lamp-lighter was going
his rounds, and the coach was turning by the manse when a serving-man,
evidently heavy with the business, came toward the vehicle, signalling.

"Are ye for Mrs. McGillavorich?" cries he.

"Ay," Patsy answered.

"Well, I'm put here to tell ye that her house fell into the cellar of
itself the morn, and she's at the 'King's Arms,' where 'tis her wish
your young lady should be fetched at once."

Amazed at this su