waving his hand, in a sudden heat of excitement, right and left; and
looking swiftly all about him on the platform, he said: "It's not
sittin' we'es take such welcome as this, my neebors!" Each man and woman
there, catching the quick contagion, rose; and it was a tumultuous crowd
of glowing faces that pressed forward around the piano as the singing
went on,--fathers, mothers, rustics, all; and the children, pleased and
astonished, sang better than ever, and when the chorus was ended it was
some minutes before all was quiet.

Many things had been settled in that few minutes. John McDonald's heart
was at rest. "The music'll carry a' before it, no matter if they do make
a failure here 'n' there," he thought. "The bairn is a' right." The
mother's heart was at rest also.

"She's done wonders wi' 'em,--wonders! I doubt not but it'll go through
as it's begun. Her face's a picture to look on. Bless her!" Isabella was
saying behind her placid smile.

"Eh, but she's won her guineas out o' us," thought old Dalgetty,
ungrudgingly, "and won 'em well."

"I don't see why everybody is so afraid of Sandy Bruce," thought Little
Bel. "He looks as kind and as pleased as my own father. I don't believe
he'll ask any o' his botherin' questions."

What Sandy Bruce thought it would be hard to tell; nearer the truth,
probably, to say that his head was in too much of a whirl to think
anything. Certain it is that he did not ask any botherin' questions, but
sat, leaning forward on his stout oaken staff, held firmly between his
knees, and did not move for the next hour, his eyes resting alternately