ble, that is where we wish to settle," I whispered
to Salemina; "though, so far as I can see, the Strathdee crops are up
to their knees in mud. Here is another wee village. What is this
place, driver?"

"Pettybaw, mam; a fine toun!"

"Will there be apartments to let there?"

"I couldna say, mam."

"Susanna Crum's father! How curious that he should live here!" I
murmured; and at this moment the sun came out, and shone full, or at
least almost full, on our future home.

"Pettybaw! _Petit bois_, I suppose," said Salemina; "and there, to be
sure, it is,--the 'little wood' yonder."

We drove to the Pettybaw Inn and Posting Establishment, and,
alighting, dismissed the driver. We had still three good hours of
daylight, although it was five o'clock, and we refreshed ourselves
with a delicious cup of tea before looking for lodgings. We consulted
the greengrocer, the baker, and the flesher, about furnished
apartments, and started on our quest, not regarding the little posting
establishment as a possibility. Apartments we found to be very scarce,
and in one or two places that were quite suitable the landlady refused
to do any cooking. We wandered from house to house, the sun shining
brighter and brighter, and Pettybaw looking lovelier and lovelier; and
as we were refused shelter again and again, we grew more and more
enamored, as is the manner of human kind. The blue sea sparkled, and
Pettybaw Sands gleamed white a mile or two in the distance, the pretty
stone church raised its carved spire from the green trees, the manse
next door was hidden in vines, the sheep lay close to the gray stone
walls and the young lambs nestled close beside them, while the song of
the burn, tinkling merrily down the glade on the edge of which we
stood, and the cawing of the rooks in the little wood, were the only
sounds to be heard.

Salemina, under the influence of this sylvan solitude, nobly declared
that she could and would do without a set bath-tub, and proposed
building a cabin and living near to nature's heart.

"I think, on the whole, we should be more comfortable living near to
the inn-keeper's heart," I answered. "Let us go back there and pass
the night, trying thus the bed and breakfast, with a view to seeing
what they are like,--though they did say in Edinburgh that nobody
thinks of living in these wayside hostelries."

Back we went, accordingly, and after ordering dinner came out and
strolled idly up the main street. A small sig