“Not to say dangerous,” he added, with a forced cough.  “I hae my plaid and my bonnet on; but a coat o’ mail couldna stand mists, that are a vera shadow o’ death to an auld man, wi’ a sair shortness o’ the breath.”

“Sit down, Elder, near the fire.  A glass of hot Hollands will take the chill from you.”

“You are mair than kind, gudewife; and I’ll no say but what a sma’ glass is needfu’, what wi’ the late hour, and the thick mist”—­

“Come, come, Elder.  Mists in every country you will find, until you reach the New Jerusalem.”

“Vera true, but there’s a difference in mists.  Noo, a Scotch mist isna at all unhealthy.  When I was a laddie, I hae been out in them for a week thegither, ay, and felt the better o’ them.”  He had taken off his plaid and bonnet as he spoke; and he drew the chair set for him in front of the blazing logs, and stretched out his thin legs to the comforting heat.

In the mean time, the girls had gone upstairs together; and their footsteps and voices, and Katherine’s rippling laugh, could be heard distinctly through the open doors.  Then Madam called, “Joanna!” and the girl came down at once.  She was tying on her white apron as she entered the room; and, at a word from her mother, she began to take from the cupboards various Dutch dainties, and East Indian jars of fruits and sweetmeats, and a case of crystal bottles, and some fine lemons.  She was a fair, rosy girl, with a kind, cheerful face, a pleasant voice, and a smile that was at once innocent and bright.  Her fine light hair was rolled high and backward; and no one could have imagined a dress more suitable to her than the trig dark bodice, the quilted skirt, and the white apron she wore.

[Illustration:  She was tying on her white apron]

Her father and mother watched her with a loving satisfaction; and though Elder Semple was discoursing on that memorable dispute between the Caetus and Conferentie parties, which had resulted in the establishment of a new independent Dutch church in America, he was quite sensible of Joanna’s presence, and of what she was doing.

“I was aye for the ordaining o’ American ministers in America,” he said, as he touched the finger tips of his left hand with those of his right; and then in an aside full of deep personal interest, “Joanna, my dearie, I’ll hae a Holland bloater and nae other thing.  And I was a proud man when I got the invite to be secretary to the first meeting o’ the new Caetus.  Maybe it is praising green barley to say just yet that it was a wise departure; but I think sae, I think sae.”

At this point, Katherine Van Heemskirk came into the room; and the elder slightly moved his chair, and said, “Come awa’, my bonnie lassie, and let us hae a look at you.”  And Katherine laughingly pushed a stool toward the fire, and sat down between the two men on the hearthstone.  She was the daintiest little Dutch maiden that ever latched a shoe,—­very diminutive, with a