ailie MacConachie. Laddies,
was't at the _Black Bull_ they're expectin' me?"

"The very place, Bailie; but ye maun say juist a word at the Seminary in
passin'," and Speug signalled to a ticket-collector who had just come
upon the scene.

"Would ye mind helpin' Bailie MacConachie oot o' the carriage, for he's
forgotten an engagement at the Seminary, and he's juist a wee thingie
faint with the heat?"

"It's no the heat, man," as the amazed collector helped the magistrate
on to the platform, "it's family trouble. Are ye connected with the
_Black Bull_? Well, at any rate, ye seem a well-behaved young man, and
these are twa fine laddies." And outside the station, surrounded by a
sympathising circle of drivers, who were entering into the spirit of
Speug's campaign, this astonishing Bailie warned every one to beware of
strong drink, and urged them to take the pledge without delay. He also
inquired anxiously whether there was a cab there from the _Black Bull_
and explained that the Rector of the Seminary, with his laddies, was
waiting for him in that place of hospitality. He added that he had been
on his way to the General Assembly of the Kirk, where he sat as a ruling
elder, and he warmly denounced the spread of false doctrine. But at last
they got him into the cab, where, after a pathetic appeal to Speug and
his companion to learn the Catechism and sing the Psalms of David, he
fell fast asleep.

By a happy stroke of strategy, Howieson engaged the attention of the
sergeant in the back-yard, who considered that Jock was playing truant
and was anxious to arrest him, while the cabman, fortunately an
able-bodied fellow, with Speug's assistance induced the Bailie to leave
the cab and convoyed him upstairs and to the door of the Rector's
class-room. At this point the great man fell into low spirits, and
bemoaned the failure of a strenuous life, in which he had vainly fought
the immorality of Muirtown, and declared, unless he obtained an
immediate tonic, he would succumb to a broken heart. He also charged
Speug with treachery in having brought him to the County Gaol instead of
to the _Black Bull_. It was painfully explained him that he was now in
the Seminary, and within that door an anxious school was waiting for
him--Bailie MacConachie--and his address.

"Who said I wasna Bailie MacConachie, and that I was a drunken body?
I'll teach them to smuggle me oot o' Muirtown as if I was a waufie
(disreputable character). He thinks I'