up on your knee! Lay yoursel' back into your chair, Wullie ma man, and Lappie 'll watch by ye faithfully, till ye return frae the Laun' o' Nod."

Lappie interpreted every word, leaped up on his Master's knee, and coiled himself into a soft ball betwixt the great rough hands outstretched to receive and clap him. In a very few seconds, Drucken Wull was sound asleep, and snoring like a porpoise; -an operation so unwontedly and unnecessarily vigorous, that little Lappie kept one eye wide open, staring at his master, while making believe that he was asleep by shutting fast the other!

Immediately, the door of Clay Biggin' was again filled with Angell Jenn's kindly presence. Looking very winsomely at Betty, she said:

"He's bad, and bad eneuch! But dinna despair. The Almichty has na lost patience yet; why should we? . . . Na, na, Betty, dinna apologeeze tae me. Ye're nane tae blame. If I had had your cross to carry, I micht hae dune waur masel'! . . . Ask the gude Lord tae help ye; an' we'll a' ask, an' we'll a' help. An' oh! mind aye this-He's dear tae YIN wha dee'd for us a'. Think o' that, Betty ma wumman, think o' that!”

The last words were spoken very softly, as if almost too holy for talk; and a beautiful wave of light suffused the face of Angell Jenn, as she turned away from Clay Biggin' and moved towards us. Betty, still holding the half-shut door in her hand, gazed after her as in a trance, and soliloquized:

"Weel may they ca' ye Angell Jenn!... No yae word o' blame for me. Eh, sirs, it's hert-breckin' to be praised and comforted like that! Had she

thrashed me, and banned me, ma hert wad na been haulf sae sair. . . . But it's a new kind o' sairness, this, an' 'll may be bring us healin'. Come what wull come, I vow tae try an' please ye, dear Angell Jenn."

Next minute, when passing through the small company of four or five of us who still lingered at the Lade Brig, a few steps from The Cottage door, Angell Jenn turned towards the Miller with that same homely but pathetic look I had at first observed, and said sweetly:

"Neebours, I hae a wee bit plot for puir Wull, an' I wad like ye a' tae help me. It's no verra muckle. But just this-in the mornin', I'm gaun tae pledge him no tae touch the Drink for yae twal months. Puir fallow, I ken he'll try! But I'm no just sae shure that his Neebours 'll staun' by an' gie him a cheer, an' look prood o' him, as if they were cryin', 'Weel dune! Wullie.' . . Ye see sae mony o' the young fallows, out o' nae great hairm, but thochtlessness, offer him a dram,—and, then, he's a lost man! Oh, it's waefu' tae think o’losin' puir Wullie, a' for a glass o' whuskie!"

There was a very painful pause. No one spoke, but several of them looked towards me. At length, the Miller, addressing her, but glancing at me, said: "This is the Laird o' Tinlie Tour, lately come Hame tae leeve amang us. Aiblins, he wad help." "Ye're welcome tae your Ain, Laird. I've heard gude only o' you an' yours. In thae battles we need to staun' by ilk ither, fondly yet dourly, or there's nae victory!" said the Little Woman, with perfect self-possession and irresistible naturalness.

I assured her, that we would lay our heads together, and unite in one bond to further her plans. She bowed modestly, and passed on into The Cottage, to resume her baking, and her homely duties,

-as if all this evening's work were as natural to her as to breathe. To me, on the contrary, it was the first thoroughly real and living presentation of the CHRIST-SPIRIT in flesh and blood that had ever crossed my path. In Tinlie Tower, I lay wide awake far through the night, wondering whereunto this would grow. I heard the hour of morning strike, and I fell asleep, when the birds began to twitter at my bedroom window. That day, and ever since, new visions filled all my dreams.

The rest needs not to be so fully told. By daybreak, Wull had a very early Visitor. It was Angell Jenn "wi' an oranger frae wee Jimsie. Graun' for slockenin' the drouth, Wullie! A fine thing is an oranger, the day after ye've been at The Toun, Wullie, and taen ower muckle o' their nasty saut broth. It's a verra thirsty thing, that saut broth, ma man Wullie."

"Broth? Ye're pokin' at me noo, Angell Jenn. Whuskie,-Deevil's broth!" said Wull with a terrible emphasis, and hissing the words, as if he tore them. with his teeth. And then, with a tear in his voice he continued-" But, O Angell Jenn, gin ye were at my elbuck, I wad taste it never mair! My brain's been reelin' a' nicht. But I saw yer haun's takin' the blankets aff the bed, an' wrappin' them roon' me in ma chair. And I heard yer voice croonin' tae mak' me sleep; and sayin' bonnie words (whan ye thocht I was sleepin'), bonnie words tae

the Gude Shepherd to tak' tent o' puir Drucken Wull. Noo, dinna be angry, but I wad raither cut ma throat, an' gang straucht tae Hell, than drink again, an' vex ye ony mair!"

Before this outpouring was finished, Betty had quickly slipt out into the Garden; and Angell Jenn, swiftly taking in the whole parable, burst out:

"Gomeril, muckle gomeril, as I maun ca' ye! It was nae me, it was yer ain Betty, that wrappit ye in blankets, an' crooned tae ye, an' prayed for ye, a' through the nicht. And your big stupit and donnert turnip-o'-a-heid canna see't-canna understaun' that ye've an Angel frae God in yer ain Hoose, gif ye had na sae sair clippit her wings till she canna soar. .. Mibbe, ye think it was me, tae, that redd up a' the Hoose, an' spread oot yer breakfast there sae bonnie, ye donnert fule? I'm no shure but this is waur nor Drinkin' yet,— to be blin', aye, stane-blin' against the licht o' God, fa'in' in flichters o' love a' aroon ye!"

But Angell

This tonic may seem rather severe. Jenn knew too well the constitution of her patient, and had the nerve and courage to apply the necessary remedy, however drastic. A Soul had to be wakened, had to be shaken into life and consciousness, after a sleep of forty years, and a drunken doze of fifteen. No gentle and conventional tickling was of any avail, but lash and spur,-provided only they were plied in love.

When Betty returned, a new look in Wull's eyes and hers, as they met, revealed to Angell Jenn that Soul had begun to wrestle for life in dead earnest against the mere Animal, and that the Brute in

both would soon be bridled. Yet all the expression it found at first would have been, to a less practised and intuitive glance than Angell Jenn's, anything but encouraging.

"Ken ye, Betty, what Angell Jenn's been ca'in me-'a turnip-heid' and 'a donnert fule'? She's richt! I've been blin' as a bat, stane-blin'. But, this day, I'm beginnin' tae see. . . . Haud on, Betty, haud a wee; and dinna expec' ower muckle o' me. Ma een'll get used tae the licht by-and

bye."

To this Betty responded-" Fule, donnert fule, hae I been, tae, Wullie ma man! But we'll no brag. We'll just hing on by Angell Jenn; and, if there's a God, He'll pou us through intill the same sweet licht whaurin she walks."

There was little Religiosity in all this. There was no kissing and repenting and raving. But, somehow, Angell Jenn was mightily delighted.

"June the Twalth, Wullie and Betty, June the Twalth that's the date! I just beg yae word frae ye baith-that no yae drap o' Drink shall cross yer craigies for twal months frae this day. Then, we'll meet, compare notes, an' brak the pledge gif it it does na pey! What say ye twa?"

For the first time, Wull's emotions stirred the Soul that was rising into life within him. He stood up, and grasped Bett's hand across the Breakfast Table, while Angell Jenn laid hers softly on the two clasped together, and tenderly said

"Faither in Heeven, hear the pledge thus taken. Loving Maister o' us a', mak' Wullie strong and brave, and Betty kind an' patient. Holy Teacher

B