Betty Grier

at I associate with the days o' Auld Langsyne, I am conscious of a feeling of homeliness, a sense of chumship with my surroundings,

et which that king of fishers, Clogger Eskdale, gifted to me when the 'rheumatics' prevented his ever again participating in his favourite sport. My worn leather school-bag, filled with the last batch of books I used, is still suspended from a four-inch nail driven into a 'dook' at the cheek of the mantelp

purpose it was to serve. The deacon could not understand the sentiment which prompted her to assign the bag a place upon the wall; and when, after the nail was s

d nurse, Betty Grier, straightened it and wiped it with her duster; and the deacon took a pinch of snuff, bl

hich for sixteen years held the whole outfit of my boyhood's days; while the mahogany looking-glass, with the groo

the words of Our Lord's Prayer. And there, between the fireplace and the window, is my book-rack, and from its shelves old friends look down upon me. The gilt titles are tarnished and worn, but I know each book by the pl

ence the dear old soul has fingered every ornament. I am conscious of the loving care she has exercised on all my old belongings, and somehow I feel consoled and comforte

or when we were driving down the Dalveen Pass she told me that never before had she seen a Caledonian train, and that her last memory of Traloss dated back to a Sabbath-school trip about the year 1868. Such a long ride in a well-sprung, well-upholstered carriage was also a novelty to her, a new experience whic

t express in words possesses me, my physical and my mental organisation seem to have undergone a change, my experience of city life is blotted out and forgotten, and, strangely enough, I feel myself, as of old, a unit of the village community. Queerer still, this placid acceptance of altered circumstances, thi

has impaired my appetite for social joys; so much so, indeed, that when my doctors-rather apologetically, I thought-informed me that if ever I wished to be well again I must give up my profession and town reside

hed pantry, his head 'screeving' the ceiling, and his broad shoulders almost excluding the waning western light that glimmered through the small four-paned window. Betty, white-capped and white-aproned, is there also, with a large ashet in her hands, on which lies a long, thick silver fish-a salmon, as I afterwards learned-one of the many he lured from

s to his dictation on a small bureau, which has been placed near his chair. I am playing with a Noah's Ark, marshalling the animals in pairs on the rug; and when my mother goes out of the room to the little office adjoining, I leave my toys and stand at his knee, look

a tight embrace, and a wet, wet cheek was laid against mine. Oh, how she trembled and sobbed! I felt bewildered and unhappy, and I remember putting my wee, helpless arms round her neck and asking her why she was crying. She told me that daddy had gone away-away to heaven; and when I asked if he wouldn't come back to us again, she said, 'No, no,' and her embrace tightened, and she wept

me of outstanding moment, and even yet in my retrospect of life it looms large and prominent; but, though I have often endeavoured to recall Betty's ministrations on this occasion, all I can remember is that when she came to the verse, 'I will not leave you comfortless: I w

orter.' It was when my saintly mother was passing into the spiritland, and, without fear or trepidatio

ying that self-same Bible in her hand. She stood on the threshold for a minute, wiping its covers wi

lum,' she be

ase, without the "Mist

that maybe ye micht want to read a verse or twae. I'll lay it doon here;' an

to speak to me when ye got settled doo

long journey, not too tired to have a quiet chat with you. So sit down, plea

re's a hunner an' ten things starin' me in the face to be dune. But what want ye to speak aboot? I daur say the soo, puir thing, will ha'e to wait, noo that you'r

, and we've taken a peep into the future as well; but there's one subject We haven't touched upon, and be

d. 'Board an'--What d'ye mean, Mai

ean the price of my food and the rent o

a' fouk-o' board an' lodgings! A bonny-like subject that to discuss atween us! Dod, man, yin wad think that ye were a Moniaive mason workin' journeyman in Th

you know it. Did you and I not settle that matter long, lo

dressed ye. In thae early days the greatest pleasure to me on earth was to cuddle an' care for ye. But I needna tell ye o' that, ye ken yoursel'. Ye mind hoo much my presence meant to you; that I'm sure o'. As for your mother-weel, I never had ony ither mistress. She took me, a young lass, oot o' a most unhappy hame. It was a pleasure-ay, a privilege-to serve her. Weel, on that day that she was ta'en frae you an' me, she said in your hearin' an' mine, "Betty, this has been the only home you ever knew-never leave it. Pro

well round my sides. 'There noo,' she said at length, 'you're weel happit an' comfortable-lookin', an' sairly, I'm thinkin', in need o' the sleep an' rest which I trust

e me, like the good soul you are, and listen to me.-Yes, you may rais

seated herself, a

hen I was told that it was absolutely necessary I should take up my abode in the country-it was to you and to this room that my thoughts were at once directed. I wrote you I was coming-didn't even say by your leave-

he quickly said, and she loo

give me reason to assume that you consider you are in your own way working off an

um, you forget that I'm

go again. Was not tha

es

posed no obli

N

expenses. Besides, Betty, it is not as if I were a poor man. Thank goodness! I can well afford it; for, between you an

eld up her hands in astonishment. 'Bless my life, i

glibly. 'I assure you, B

dryly. She smiled, and after some

like that.' But Betty heard me not, for she was hol

ou I'm lauchin' at. It's something that happened at the weekly prayer-meetin' i

in the af

sung a psalm and engaged in a word o' prayer, he began to read the last pairt o' the fifth chapter o' Mattha, and when he cam' to the fortieth verse: "And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also," Dauvid hovered a blink. Then he re-read it very slowly, and says he, "Freens, I've aye prided mysel' in my knowledge o'

f our conversation and the purpose I had in view? Somehow I think, as an inspiration, the means to

ed is Betty's concern and mine only. All I may say here is that the weekly amount has to be paid to Nathan, of w

after she left me, from which I argued that the inner wants of the occupant had been attended to. The chop-chopping of vegetables on the ki

n the ryegrass field at the top of the Gallowsflat a wandering landrail, elusive and challenging, craiks his homeward way; while from Cample Strath or Closeburn Heights is fitfully wafted to me the warning bark of a farmer's dog. The clamp-clamp of a cadger's tired-out horse and the rattle of an empty cart