exclaimed David, who, in an opportunity of
giving his testimony on the offences and backslidings of the land, forgot
for a moment his own domestic calamity--"out upon your General Assembly,
and the back of my hand to your Court o' Session!--What is the tane but a
waefu' bunch o' cauldrife professors and ministers, that sate bien and
warm when the persecuted remnant were warstling wi' hunger, and cauld,
and fear of death, and danger of fire and sword upon wet brae-sides,
peat-haggs, and flow-mosses, and that now creep out of their holes, like
bluebottle flees in a blink of sunshine, to take the pu'pits and places
of better folk--of them that witnessed, and testified, and fought, and
endured pit, prison-house, and transportation beyond seas?--A bonny bike
there's o' them!--And for your Court o' Session--"

"Ye may say what ye will o' the General Assembly," said Saddletree,
interrupting him, "and let them clear them that kens them; but as for the
Lords o' Session, forby that they are my next-door neighbours, I would
have ye ken, for your ain regulation, that to raise scandal anent them,
whilk is termed to _murmur_ again them, is a crime _sui generis,_--_sui
generis,_ Mr. Deans--ken ye what that amounts to?"

"I ken little o' the language of Antichrist," said Deans; "and I care
less than little what carnal courts may call the speeches of honest men.
And as to murmur again them, it's what a' the folk that loses their
pleas, and nine-tenths o' them that win them, will be gey sure to be
guilty in. Sae I wad hae ye ken that I hand a' your gleg-tongued
advocates, that sell their knowledge for pieces of silver--and your
worldly-wise judges, that will gie three days of hearing in presence to a
debate about the peeling of an ingan, and no ae half-hour to the gospel
testimony--as legalists and formalists, countenancing by sentences, and
quirks, and cunning terms of law, the late begun courses of national
defections--union, toleration, patronages, and Yerastian prelatic oaths.
As for the soul and body-killing Court o' Justiciary--"

The habit of considering his life as dedicated to bear testimony in
behalf of what he deemed the suffering and deserted cause of true
religion, had swept honest David along with it thus far; but with the
mention of the criminal court, the recollection of the disastrous
condition of his daughter rushed at once on his mind; he stopped short in
the midst of his triumphant declamation, pressed his hands agai