stumbled and fell, to the damage of his own knees and his
rider's head. On this the angry purchaser remonstrated with the laird,
whose reply was, "Well, sir, I told ye he was an honest beast; many a
time has he threatened to come down with me, and I kenned he would keep
his word some day."

At the time of the threatened invasion, the laird had been taunted at a
meeting at Ayr with want of loyal spirit at Cumnock, as at that place no
volunteer corps had been raised to meet the coming danger; Cumnock, it
should be recollected, being on a high situation, and ten or twelve
miles from the coast. "What sort of people are you up at Cumnock?" said
an Ayr gentleman; "you have not a single volunteer!" "Never you heed,"
says Logan, very quietly; "if the French land at Ayr, there will soon be
plenty of volunteers up at Cumnock."

A pendant to the story of candid admission on the part of the minister,
that the people might be _weary_ after his sermon, has been given on the
authority of the narrator, a Fife gentleman, ninety years of age when he
told it. He had been to church at Elie, and listening to a young and
perhaps bombastic preacher, who happened to be officiating for the Rev.
Dr. Milligan, who was in church. After service, meeting the Doctor in
the passage, he introduced the young clergyman, who, on being asked by
the old man how he did, elevated his shirt collar, and complained of
fatigue, and being very much "_tired_." "Tired, did ye say, my man?"
said the old satirist, who was slightly deaf; "Lord, man! if you're
_half_ as tired as I am, I pity ye!"

I have been much pleased with an offering from Carluke, containing two
very pithy anecdotes. Mr. Rankin very kindly writes:--"Your
'Reminiscences' are most refreshing. I am very little of a
story-collector, but I have recorded some of an old schoolmaster, who
was a story-teller. As a sort of payment for the amusement I have
derived from your book, I shall give one or two."

He sends the two following:--

"Shortly after Mr. Kay had been inducted schoolmaster of Carluke (1790),
the bederal called at the school, verbally announcing,
proclamation-ways, that Mrs. So-and-So's funeral would be on Fuirsday.
'At what hour?' asked the dominie. 'Ou, ony time atween ten and twa.' At
two o'clock of the day fixed, Mr. Kay--quite a stranger to the customs
of the district--arrived at the place, and was astonished to find a
crowd of men and lads, standing here and there, some smoking, and