“’But let us send a civil message to the gossips, Sandy; and hadna ye better say I am sair laid with a sudden sickness? though it’s sinful-like to send the poor messenger a mile agate with a lie in his mouth without a glass of brandy.’

“‘To such a messenger, and to those who sent him, no apology is needed,’ said the austere laird; ‘so let him depart.’  And the clatter of a horse’s hoofs was heard, and the muttered imprecations of its rider on the churlish treatment he had experienced.

“‘Now, Sandie, my lad,’ said his wife, laying an arm particularly white and round about his neck as she spoke, ’are you not a queer man and a stern?  I have been your wedded wife now these three years; and, beside my dower, have brought you three as bonnie bairns as ever smiled aneath a summer sun.  O man, you a douce man, and fitter to be an elder than even Willie Greer himself, I have the minister’s ain word for ’t, to put on these hard-hearted looks, and gang waving your arms that way, as if ye said, “I winna take the counsel of sic a hempie as you;” I’m your ain leal wife, and will and maun have an explanation.’

“To all this Sandie Macharg replied, ’It is written, “Wives, obey your husbands”; but we have been stayed in our devotion, so let us pray;’ and down he knelt:  his wife knelt also, for she was as devout as bonnie; and beside them knelt their household, and all lights were extinguished.

“‘Now this beats a’,’ muttered his wife to herself; ’however, I shall be obedient for a time; but if I dinna ken what all this is for before the morn by sunket-time, my tongue is nae langer a tongue, nor my hands worth wearing.’

“The voice of her husband in prayer interrupted this mental soliloquy; and ardently did he beseech to be preserved from the wiles of the fiends and the snares of Satan; from witches, ghosts, goblins, elves, fairies, spunkies, and water-kelpies; from the spectre shallop of Solway; from spirits visible and invisible; from the Haunted Ships and their unearthly tenants; from maritime spirits that plotted against godly men, and fell in love with their wives—­’

“‘Nay, but His presence be near us!’ said his wife, in a low tone of dismay.  ’God guide my gudeman’s wits:  I never heard such a prayer from human lips before.  But, Sandie, my man, Lord’s sake, rise.  What fearful light is this?  Barn and byre and stable maun be in a blaze; and Hawkie, and Hurley, Doddie, and Cherrie, and Damsonplum will be smoored with reek, and scorched with flame.’

“And a flood of light, but not so gross as a common fire, which ascended to heaven and filled all the court before the house, amply justified the good-wife’s suspicions.  But to the terrors of fire Sandie was as immovable as he was to the imaginary groans of the barren wife of Laird Laurie; and he held his wife, and threatened the weight of his right hand—­and it was a heavy one—­to all who ventured abroad, or even unbolted the door.  The neighing and