e sororum.

What, then, the Southron used to ask, _is_ the difference between the
Free Church, the Established Church, and the United Presbyterian
Church? If the Southron put the question to a Scottish friend, the
odds were that the Scottish friend could not answer. He might be a
member of the Scottish 'Episcopal' community, and as ignorant as any
Anglican. Or he might not have made these profound studies in Scottish
history, which throw glimmerings of light on this obscure subject.

Indeed, the whole aspect of the mystery has shifted, of late, like the
colours in a kaleidoscope. The more conspicuous hues are no longer
'Auld Kirk,' 'Free Kirk,' and 'U.P.'s,' but 'Auld Kirk,' 'Free Kirk,'
and 'United Free Kirk.' The United Free Kirk was composed in 1900 of
the old 'United Presbyterians' (as old as 1847), with the overwhelming
majority of the old Free Kirk, while the Free Kirk, of the present
moment, consists of a tiny minority of the old Free Kirk, which
declined to join the recent union. By a judgment (one may well call it
a 'judgment') of the House of Lords (August 1, 1904), the Free Kirk,
commonly called 'The Wee Frees,' now possesses the wealth that was the
old Free Kirk's before, in 1900, it united with the United
Presbyterians, and became the United Free Church. It is to be hoped
that common sense will discover some 'outgait,' or issue, from this
distressing imbroglio. In the words which Mr. R.L. Stevenson, then a
sage of twenty-four, penned in 1874, we may say 'Those who are at all
open to a feeling of national disgrace look forward eagerly to such a
possibility; they have been witnesses already too long to the strife
that has divided this small corner of Christendom.' The eternal
schisms of the Kirk, said R.L.S., exhibit 'something pitiful for the
pitiful man, but bitterly humorous for others.'

The humour of the present situation is only too manifest. Two
generations ago about half of the ministers of the Kirk of Scotland
left their manses and pleasant glebes for the sake of certain ideas.
Of these ideas they abandoned some, or left them in suspense, a few
years since, and, as a result, they have lost, if only for the moment,
their manses, stipends, colleges, and pleasant glebes.

Why should all these things be so? The answer can only be found in the
history--and a history both sad and bitterly humorous it is--of the
Reformation in Scotland. When John Knox died, on November 24, 1572, a
decent burgess of Edin