rector who was more a
learned ghost than a human being, or the English master who had grown
stout and pursey, or some of the other masters who came and went like
shadows, Muirtown had not given another thought to the matter, but
Bulldog retiring, it was a very facetious idea, and Muirtown held its
sides. Perhaps it was delicate health was the cause; and then Dr. Manley
stormed through half Muirtown, declaring that he had never known Dugald
MacKinnon have an hour's sickness except once when that little scoundrel
Speug, or rather he should say Sir Peter McGuffie, consulting physician,
brought his master through triumphantly with a trifle of assistance from
himself as a general practitioner. Was it old age that ailed Bulldog?
Then Bailie MacConachie was constrained to testify in public places, and
was supported by all the other Bailies except MacFarlane, who got his
education at Drumtochty that the mathematical master of Muirtown Academy
had thrashed them all as boys, every man jack of them, being then not
much older than themselves, and that he was now--barring his white
hair--rather fresher than in the days of their youth? Had success
departed at last from the mathematical class-room, after resting there
as in a temple of wingless victory for three generations? Was it not
known everywhere that William Pirie, whose grandfather was a senior
pupil when Bulldog took the reins fifty-eight years ago, had simply
romped through Edinburgh University gathering medals, prizes, bursaries,
fellowships, and everything else that a mathematician could lay his
hands on, and then had won a scholarship at Trinity College, Cambridge,
with papers that were talked about in the College for fourteen days, and
were laid past by one examiner as a treasure of achievement. May be, and
this was no doubt the very heart of the jest, Bulldog had lost control
of the boys, and his right hand had forgotten its cunning! So the boys
were insulted in their homes by sympathetic inquiries as to when they
had their last interview with the tawse and whether the canings were as
nippy as ever, for Muirtown was proud to think that its favourite master
was an expert in every branch of his calling and dealt with the
grandchildren as thoroughly as he had done with the grandfathers. And
Bailie MacFarlane meeting Bulldog crossing the bridge one morning as
alert in step and austere in countenance as ever, asked him how he was
keeping with affected sympathy, and allowed him