“Dugald,” said the dominie to the shepherd, “go your ways to your sheep.  I’ll hae nae fighting in my parish.

“Jim Armstrong, you thrawart bully you, dinna think you are the only man that kens Cumberland cantrips.  I could fling you mysel’ before you could tell your own name;” and as if to prove his words, he raised an immense stone, that few men could have lifted, and with apparent ease flung it over his right shoulder.  A shout of astonishment greeted the exploit, and Tony Musgrave—­whose keen, satirical ill-will had hitherto been Tallisker’s greatest annoyance—­came frankly forward and said, “Dominie, you are a guid fellow!  Will you tak some beer wi’ me?”

Tallisker did not hesitate a moment.

“Thank you, Tony.  If it be a drink o’ good-will, I’ll tak it gladly.”

But he was not inclined to prolong the scene; the interference had been forced upon him.  It had been the only way to stop a quarrel which there would have been no healing if blood had once been shed.  Yet he was keenly alive to the dignity of his office, and resumed it in the next moment.  Indeed, the drinking of the glass of good-will together was rather a ceremonial than a convivial affair.  Perhaps that also was the best.  The men were silent and respectful, and for the first time lifted their caps with a hearty courtesy to Tallisker when he left them.

“Weel!  Wonders never cease!” said Jim Armstrong scornfully.  “To see Tony Musgrave hobnobbing wi’ a black-coat!  The deil must ‘a’ had a spasm o’ laughing.”

“Let the deil laugh,” said Tony, with a snap of his grimy fingers.  Then, after a moment’s pause, he added, “Lads, I heard this morning that the dominie’s wheat was spoiling, because he couldna get help to cut it.  I laughed when I heard it; I didna ken the man then.  I’m going to-morrow to cut the dominie’s wheat; which o’ you will go wi’ me?”

“I!” and “I!” and “I!” was the hearty response; and so next day Traquare saw a strange sight—­a dozen colliers in a field of wheat, making a real holiday of cutting the grain and binding the sheaves, so that before the next Sabbath it had all been brought safely home.

CHAPTER V.

But during these very days, when the dominie and his parishioners were drawing a step closer to each other, the laird and his son were drifting farther apart.  Crawford felt keenly that Colin took no interest in the great enterprises which filled his own life.  The fact was, Colin inherited his mother’s, and not his father’s temperament.  The late Lady Crawford had been the daughter of a Zetland Udaller, a pure Scandinavian, a descendant of the old Vikings, and she inherited from them a poetic imagination and a nature dreamy and inert, though capable of rousing itself into fits of courage that could dare the impossible.  Colin would have led a forlorn hope or stormed a battery; but the bare ugliness and monotony of his life at the works fretted and worried him.