u will
be pleased, and we stand to pray and sit to sing."

"Tuts, tuts, I am not minding about a bit hime at a time from a friend,
but it iss those Lowlanders meddling with everything I do not like, and
I am hoping to hear you sing again, for it wass a fery pretty tune;"
and the smith, passing along the road when Carmichael left that
evening, heard Janet call him "my dear," and invoke a thousand
blessings on his head.

When he called again in the end of the week to cement the alliance and
secure her presence on Sabbath, Janet was polishing the swords, and was
willing enough to give their history.

"This wass my great-grandfather's, and these two nicks in the blade
were made on the dragoons at Prestonpans; and this wass my husband's
sword, for he wass sergeant-major before he died, a fery brave man,
good at the fighting and the praying too.

"Maybe I am wrong, and I do not know what you may be thinking, but
things come into my mind when I am reading the Bible, and I will be
considering that it wass maybe not so good that the Apostles were
fishing people."

"What ails you at fishermen, Janet?"

"Nothing at all but one thing; they are clever at their nets and at
religion, but I am not hearing that they can play with the sword or the
dirk.

"It wass a fery good intention that Peter had that night, no doubt, and
I will be liking him for it when he took his sword to the policeman,
but it wass a mighty poor blow. If Ian or his father had got as near
as that, it would not have been an ear that would have been missing."

"Perhaps his head," suggested Carmichael.

"He would not have been putting his nose into honest people's business
again, at any rate," and Janet nodded her head as one who could see a
downright blow that left no regrets; "it hass always made me ashamed to
read about that ear.

"It wass not possible, and it iss maybe no good speaking about it
now"--Janet felt she had a minister now she could open her mind
to--"but it would hef been better if our Lord could hef had twelve
Macphersons for His Apostles."

"You mean they would have been more brave and faithful?"

"There 'wass a price of six thousand pounds, or it might be four, put
on Cluny's head after Culloden, and the English soldiers were all up
and down the country, but I am not hearing that any clansman betrayed
his chief.

"Thirty pieces of silver wass a fery small reward for such a dirty
deed, and him one of the Chief's tail too; it wass a