es, without which nothing would have
been counted a sermon in Drumtochty Kirk, and then, adjusting them with
care, the Doctor made a deliberate survey of the congregation,
beginning at his right hand and finishing at his left. Below him sat
the elders in their blacks, wearing white stocks that had cost them no
little vexation that morning, and the precentor, who was determined no
man, neither Saunders Baxter nor another, should outsing him that day
in Coleshill. Down the centre of the kirk ran a long table, covered
with pure white linen, bleached in the June showers and wonderfully
ironed, whereon a stain must not be found, for along that table would
pass the holy bread and wine. Across the aisle on either side, the
pews were filled with stalwart men, solemn beyond their wonted gravity,
and kindly women in simple finery, and rosy-cheeked bairns. The women
had their tokens wrapped in snowy handkerchiefs, and in their Bibles
they had sprigs of apple-ringy and mint, and other sweet-scented
plants. By-and-by there would be a faint fragrance of peppermint in
the kirk--the only religious and edifying sweet, which flourishes
wherever sound doctrine is preached and disappears before new views,
and is therefore now confined to the Highlands of Wales and Scotland,
the last home of our fathers' creed. The two back seats were of black
oak, richly carved. In the one sat the General and Kate, and across
the passage Viscount Hay, Lord Kilspindie's eldest son, a young man of
noble build and carriage, handsome and debonair, who never moved during
the sermon save twice, and then he looked at the Carnegies' pew.

When the Doctor had satisfied himself that none were missing of the
people, he dropped his eye-glass--each act was so closely followed that
Drumsheugh below could tell where the Doctor was--and took snuff after
the good old fashion, tapping the box twice, selecting a pinch,
distributing it evenly, and using first a large red bandana and then a
delicate white cambric handkerchief. When the cambric disappeared,
each person seized his Bible, for the Doctor would say immediately with
a loud, clear voice, preceded by a gentlemanly clearance of the throat,
"Let us compose our minds for the worship of Almighty God by singing to
His praise the first Psalm.

"'That man hath perfect blessedness
Who walketh not astray--'"

Then Peter Rattray, of the high Glen, would come in late, and the
Doctor would follow him with his eye t