but, on their
going out to the street, there was she coming with the drove, no one
missing; and, marvellous to relate, she was carrying a young pup in
her mouth! She had been taken in travail on those hills; and how the
poor beast had contrived to manage the drove in her state of
suffering is beyond human calculation, for her road lay through sheep
the whole way. Her master's heart smote him when he saw what she had
suffered and effected: but she was nothing daunted; and having
deposited her young one in a place of safety, she again set out full
speed to the hills, and brought another and another, till she removed
her whole litter one by one; but the last one was dead.

"The stories related of the dogs of sheep-stealers are fairly beyond
all credibility. I cannot attach credit to some of them without
believing the animals to have been devils incarnate, come to the earth
for the destruction both of the souls and bodies of men. I cannot
mention names, for the sake of families that still remain in the
country; but there have been sundry men executed, who belonged to this
district of the kingdom, for that heinous crime, in my own days; and
others have absconded, just in time to save their necks. There was not
one of these to whom I allude who did not acknowledge his dog to be
the greatest aggressor. One young man in particular, who was, I
believe, overtaken by justice for his first offence, stated, that
after he had folded the sheep by moonlight, and selected his number
from the flock of a former master, he took them out, and set away with
them towards Edinburgh. But before he had got them quite off the farm,
his conscience smote him, as he said (but more likely a dread of that
which soon followed), and he quitted the sheep, letting them go again
to the hill. He called his dog off them, and mounting his pony, he
rode away. At that time he said his dog was capering and playing
around him, as if glad of having got free of a troublesome business;
and he regarded him no more, till, after having rode about three
miles, he thought again and again that he heard something coming up
behind him. Halting, at length, to ascertain what it was, in a few
minutes there comes his dog with the stolen animals, driving them at a
furious rate to keep up with his master. The sheep were all smoking,
and hanging out their tongues, and their guide was fully as warm as
they. The young man was now exceedingly troubled, for the sheep having
been brou