minister who preached for it, on the ground that it came expensive to pay a large number of candidates.  The scandal of the thing was hushed up, out of respect for his father, who was a God-fearing man, but Sam’l was known by it in Lang Tammas’s circle.  The coal-carter was called Little Sanders, to distinguish him from his father, who was not much more than half his size.  He had grown up with the name, and its inapplicability now came home to nobody.  Sam’l’s mother had been more far-seeing than Sanders’s.  Her man had been called Sammy all his life, because it was the name he got as a boy, so when their eldest son was born she spoke of him as Sam’l while still in his cradle.  The neighbors imitated her, and thus the young man had a better start in life than had been granted to Sammy, his father.

It was Saturday evening—­the night in the week when Auld Licht young men fell in love.  Sam’l Dickie, wearing a blue Glengarry bonnet with a red ball on the top, came to the door of a one-story house in the Tenements, and stood there wriggling, for he was in a suit of tweeds for the first time that week, and did not feel at one with them.  When his feeling of being a stranger to himself wore off, he looked up and down the road, which straggles between houses and gardens, and then, picking his way over the puddles, crossed to his father’s hen-house and sat down on it.  He was now on his way to the square.

Eppie Fargus was sitting on an adjoining dike, knitting stockings, and Sam’l looked at her for a time.

“Is’t yersel, Eppie?” he said at last.

“It’s a’ that,” said Eppie.

“Hoo’s a’ wi’ ye?” asked Sam’l.

“We’re juist aff an’ on,” replied Eppie, cautiously.

There was not much more to say, but as Sam’l sidled off the hen-house, he murmured politely, “Ay, ay.”  In another minute he would have been fairly started, but Eppie resumed the conversation.

“Sam’l,” she said, with a twinkle in her eye, “ye can tell Lisbeth Fargus I’ll likely be drappin’ in on her aboot Munday or Teisday.”

Lisbeth was sister to Eppie, and wife of Thomas McQuhatty, better known as T’nowhead, which was the name of his farm.  She was thus Bell’s mistress.

Sam’l leaned against the hen-house, as if all his desire to depart had gone.

“Hoo d’ye kin I’ll be at the T’nowhead the nicht?” he asked, grinning in anticipation.

“Ou, I’se warrant ye’ll be after Bell,” said Eppie.

“Am no sae sure o’ that,” said Sam’l, trying to leer.  He was enjoying himself now.

“Am no sure o’ that,” he repeated, for Eppie seemed lost in stitches.

“Sam’l?”

“Ay.”

“Ye’ll be speirin’ her sune noo, I dinna doot?”

This took Sam’l, who had only been courting Bell for a year or two, a little aback.

“Hoo d’ye mean, Eppie?” he asked.

“Maybe ye’ll do’t the nicht.”

“Na, there’s nae hurry,” said Sam’l.