he contents of mine carefully among the sawdust
on the floor.

And then my formidable "future" father-in-law got to the root of the
matter.

"Father know about this?" He shot out the question as from a catapult.

"No, sir," said I, "I did not think of troubling him just yet--till----"

"Till what?"

"Till things were a bit more settled," I faltered. He put his loosely
clenched fist on my knee. It appeared as large as the flat part of a
pair of smith's bellows.

"Well, that's what we are here now for, eh?" he said. "I doan't blame
ye, you young dog. Now I like a fine up-standing wench myself, well
filled out, none o' your flails done up in a bean-sack, nor yet a
tea-pot little body that makes the folk laugh as they see her trotting
alongside a personable man like me. Lottie will do ye fine. She's none
great at the books--takes after her mother in that, but she's a good
girl, and I'll warrant ye, she will keep up her end of an argument well
enough after a year or two's practice. But, mind you, lad, there's to be
nothing come of this till I see you safe through college as a doctor.
Fees? Nonsense! Go to the hospitals, man, I'll pay for that part. It can
come off what I have put aside to give the man that took Lottie off my
hands! A doctor--yes, that's the business, and one sore needed here in
this very Eden Valley! _Whisht_--there--who think ye bought old Andrew
Leith's practice and house? Who keeps the lads from the college there
and sends them packing at the end of every six months? Why, me--Anderson
of Birkenbog. So haste ye fast, and when ye are ready, the house is
ready, and the practice and the tocher--and as for the lass ye have made
it up with her yourself, as I understand."

Never was there a poorer-spirited wooer! No, never one. The very pour of
words stunned me. Had it not been for the coming and going of
Dutch-girthed brother-farmers, dumping bags of "samples" on the table,
and hauling at purses tied with leathern strings out of tight breeches
pockets, the "What's your will, sir?" of Tom the drawer, and the clink
of cannikins, I must have been found out even then.

But the part of the trouble which was to be mine personally was coming
to an end. After all, his daughter's future was only an item in
Birkenbog's programme of the day.

"Well, then, lad"--he clapped me again on the shoulder (I sitting there
with the soul of an oyster)--"we have arranged everything
comfortable--eh? Now you can go and tell