lesson!' Some o' your book-learned folk wad ca' this conduct philosophy
in Jeannie; but I, wha kenned every thought in her heart, was aware that
it proceeded from her resignation as a true Christian, and her affection
as a dutiful wife. Weel, the upshot was, I had robbed mysel' out o' a
thousand pounds as simply as ye wad snuff out a candle. You have heard
the saying, that sorrow ne'er comes singly; and I am sure, in a' my
experience, I have found its truth. At that period I had two thousand
pounds, bearing six per cent., lying in the hands o' a gentleman o'
immense property. Everybody believed him to be as sure as the bank.
Scores o' folk had money in his hands. The interest was paid punctually,
and I hadna the least suspicion. Weel, I was looking ower the papers one
morning at breakfast, and I happened to glance at the list o' bankrupts
(a thing I'm no in the habit o' doing), when, mercy me! whose name
should I see but the very gentleman's that had my twa thousand pounds! I
had the paper in one hand and a saucer in the other. The saucer and the
coffee gaed smash upon the hearth! I trembled frae head to foot. 'Oh
David! what's the matter?' cried Jeannie. 'Matter!' cried I; 'matter!
I'm ruined!--we're a' ruined!' But it's o' nae use dwelling on this. The
fallow didna pay eighteenpence to the pound; and there was three
thousand gaen out o' my five! It was nae use, wi' a young family, to
talk o' living on the interest o' our money now. 'We maun tak' a farm,'
says I; and baith Jeannie and her mother saw there was naething else for
it. So I took a farm which lay partly in the Lammermoors and partly in
the Merse. It took the thick end o' eight hundred pounds to stock it.
However, we were very comfortable in it; I found mysel' far mair at hame
than I had been in Edinburgh; for I had employment for baith mind and
hands, and Jeannie very soon made an excellent farmer's wife. Auld
grannie, too, said she never had been sae happy; and the bairns were as
healthy as the day was lang. We couldna exactly say that we were making
what ye may ca' siller, yet we were losing nothing, and every year