question."

"Probably one hundred a-year, one year with another, besides my glebe and
pasture-ground."

"And you scruple to exchange that for twelve hundred a-year, without
alleging any damning difference of doctrine betwixt the two churches of
England and Scotland?"

"On that, sir, I have reserved my judgment; there may be much good, and
there are certainly saving means in both; but every man must act
according to his own lights. I hope I have done, and am in the course of
doing, my Master's work in this Highland parish; and it would ill become
me, for the sake of lucre, to leave my sheep in the wilderness. But, even
in the temporal view which you have taken of the matter, Sir George, this
hundred pounds a-year of stipend hath fed and clothed us, and left us
nothing to wish for; my father-in-law's succession, and other
circumstances, have added a small estate of about twice as much more, and
how we are to dispose of it I do not know--So I leave it to you, sir, to
think if I were wise, not having the wish or opportunity of spending
three hundred a-year, to covet the possession of four times that sum."

"This is philosophy," said Sir George; "I have heard of it, but I never
saw it before."

"It is common sense," replied Butler, "which accords with philosophy and
religion more frequently than pedants or zealots are apt to admit."

Sir George turned the subject, and did not again resume it. Although they
travelled in Sir George's chariot, he seemed so much fatigued with the
motion, that it was necessary for him to remain for a day at a small town
called Mid-Calder, which was their first stage from Edinburgh. Glasgow
occupied another day, so slow were their motions.

They travelled on to Dumbarton, where they had resolved to leave the
equipage and to hire a boat to take them to the shores near the manse, as
the Gare-Loch lay betwixt them and that point, besides the impossibility
of travelling in that district with wheel-carriages. Sir George's valet,
a man of trust, accompanied them, as also a footman; the grooms were left
with the carriage. Just as this arrangement was completed, which was
about four o'clock in the afternoon, an express arrived from Sir George's
agent in Edinburgh, with a packet, which he opened and read with great
attention, appearing much interested and agitated by the contents. The
packet had been despatched very soon after their leaving Edinburgh, but
the messenger had missed the travellers by