The two ministers rose simultaneously.  Gilbert Peden stood at the head and Allan Welsh at the foot of the little table.  They were so near that they could have shaken hands across it.  But they had other work to do.

“Allan Welsh,” said the moderator, stretching out his hand, “minister of the gospel in the parish of Dullarg to the faithful contending remnant, I call upon you to show cause why you should not be deposed for the sins of contumacy and contempt, for sins of person and life, confessed and communicate under your hand.”

“Gilbert Peden,” returned the minister of the Dullarg and clerk to the Marrow Synod, looking like a cock-boat athwart the hawse of a leviathan of the deep, “I call upon you to show cause why you should not be deposed for unfaithfulness in the discharge of your duty, in so far as you have concealed known sin, and by complicity and compliance have been sharer in the wrong.”

There was a moment’s silence.  Gilbert Peden knew well that what his opponent said was good Marrow doctrine, for Allan Welsh had confessed to him his willingness to accept deposition twenty years ago.

Then, as with one voice, the two men pronounced against each other the solemn sentence of deposition and deprivation: 

“In the name of God, and by virtue of the law of the Marrow Kirk, I solemnly depose you from the office of the ministry.”

John Bairdieson burst in the door, leaving the lock hanging awry with the despairing force of his charge.

“Be merciful, oh, be merciful!” he cried; “let not the Philistines rejoice, nor the daughter of the uncircumcised triumph.  Let be! let be!  Say that ye dinna mean it!  Oh, say ye dinna mean it!  Tak’ it back—­tak’ it a’ back!”

There was the silence of death between the two men, who stood lowering at each other.

John Bairdieson turned and ran down the stairs.  He met Ralph and Professor Thriepneuk coming up.

“Gang awa’! gang awa’!” he cried.  “There’s nae leecense for ye noo.  There’s nae mair ony Marrow Kirk!  There’s nae mair heaven and earth!  The Kirk o’ the Marrow, precious and witnessing, is nae mair!”

And the tears burst from the old sailor as he ran down the street, not knowing whither he went.

Half-way down the street a seller of sea-coal, great and grimy, barred his way.  He challenged the runner to fight.  The spirit of the Lord came upon John Bairdieson, and, rejoicing that a foe withstood him, he dealt a buffet so sore and mighty that the seller of coal, whose voice could rise like the grunting of a sea beast to the highest windows of the New Exchange Buildings, dropped as an ox drops when it is felled.  And John Bairdieson ran on, crying out:  “There’s nae kirk o’ God in puir Scotland ony mair!”

CHAPTER XLII.

Purging and restoration.