o redeek'lus sudden?" he was asked.

"I dinna ken," he answered tropically, "and I dinna care. If he bided
three weeks, he bided ower lang. I kent that fine when ance I saw her.
Noo, I pit it till ye, gin ye were crossin' a desert place, an' ye saw
the Rose o' Sharon afore ye, wad ye no' pluck it gin ye micht, and pluck
it quick? I pit it till ye." And they answered him not a word, for there
is no debater like the heart.

I was told in after days that my historic friend the beadle canvassed
for me night and day, laying mighty stress upon the fact that he knew me
well, since he had travelled with me, assuring every ear that I was
"uncommon ceevil," and proudly laying bare the independent scorn with
which I had met his proposition to inspect the manse.

"But we micht get him yet," he concluded, "gin we gang richt aboot it."

These testimonials, together with his plaintive appeal to be relieved of
the responsibility which the absence of a fixed minister threw upon
himself, went far to confirm the wavering.

Nor shall I linger to trace the workings of that ponderous machinery
whereby I was at last installed as the minister of St. Cuthbert's
Church. Even the great assemblage which gathered to welcome us, with its
infinite introductions, its features social, devotional, and
deputational, its addresses civic and ecclesiastical, must be dismissed
with a word.

It reminded me of nothing so much as of the launching of a ship, and
beneath all its tumult of artillery there thrummed the deep undertone of
joy. For St. Cuthbert's, contrary to its historic way, had parted with
its last minister, a man of great ability, amid the smoke of battle, and
he had gone forth as Napoleon went, with a martial record which the
corroding years even yet have scarcely tarnished. Fierce had been the
fight, the factions grimly equal, and beclouded with a sublime confusion
as to which side had been led by heaven and which by Belial. On this
point, even now, they do not exactly see eye to eye.

And this deep joy, whose untiring hum (joy's native voice) had entwined
itself with every exercise of our exultant gathering was born of the
assurance of returning harmony and the welcome calm which follows the
departing storm. The gentle vines of peace were beginning to clothe
their scarred and disfigured Zion.

St. Cuthbert's hailed that night as the hour of its convalescence. In
consequence, every speech, even those from dry and desiccated lips, was
co