t a prodigious deal of
sentiment, repeated the name of the evil one twenty times over, to the
end of which, for the greater efficacy, he tacked on "damnable" and
"hellish." _Fas est ab hoste doceri_--disrespect is made more pungent by
quotation; and there is no doubt but he felt relieved, and went upstairs
into his tutor's chamber with a quiet mind. M'Brair sat by the cheek of
the peat-fire and shivered, for he had a quartan ague and this was his
day. The great nightcap and plaid, the dark unshaven cheeks of the man,
and the white, thin hands that held the plaid about his chittering body,
made a sorrowful picture. But Francie knew and loved him; came straight
in, nestled close to the refugee, and told his story. M'Brair had been
at the College with Haddo; the Presbytery had licensed both on the same
day; and at this tale, told with so much innocency by the boy, the
heart of the tutor was commoved.

"Woe upon him! Woe upon that man!" he cried. "O the unfaithful shepherd!
O the hireling and apostate minister! Make my matters hot for me? quo'
she! the shameless limmer! And true it is, that he could repose me in
that nasty, stinking hole, the Canongate Tolbooth, from which your
mother drew me out--the Lord reward her for it!--or to that cold,
unbieldy, marine place of the Bass Rock, which, with my delicate kist,
would be fair ruin to me. But I will be valiant in my Master's service.
I have a duty here: a duty to my God, to myself, and to Haddo: in His
strength, I will perform it."

Then he straitly discharged Francie to repeat the tale, and bade him in
the future to avert his very eyes from the doings of the curate. "You
must go to his place of idolatry; look upon him there!" says he, "but
nowhere else. Avert your eyes, close your ears, pass him by like a three
days' corp. He is like that damnable monster Basiliscus, which
defiles--yea, poisons!--by the sight."--All which was hardly claratory
to the boy's mind.

Presently Montroymont came home, and called up the stairs to Francie.
Traquair was a good shot and swordsman: and it was his pleasure to walk
with his son over the braes of the moorfowl, or to teach him arms in the
back court, when they made a mighty comely pair, the child being so
lean, and light, and active, and the laird himself a man of a manly,
pretty stature, his hair (the periwig being laid aside) showing already
white with many anxieties, and his face of an even, flaccid red. But
this day Francie's heart