THE UNLUCKY PRESENT: A TALE.


A Lanarkshire minister (who died within the present century) was one of
those unhappy persons, who, to use the words of a well known Scottish
adage, "can never see green cheese but their een reels." He was
_extremely covetous_ and that not only of nice articles of food, but of
many other things which do not generally excite the cupidity of the
human heart. The following story is in corroboration of this
assertion:--Being on a visit one day at the house of one of his
parishioners, a poor lonely widow, living in a moorland part of the
parish, he became fascinated by the charms of a little cast-iron pot,
which happened at the time to be lying on the hearth, full of potatoes
for the poor woman's dinner, and that of her children. He had never in
his life seen such a nice little pot--it was a perfect conceit of a
thing--it was a gem--no pot on earth could match it in symmetry--it was
an object altogether perfectly lovely. "Dear sake! minister," said the
widow, quite overpowered by the reverend man's commendations of her pot;
"if ye like the pot sae weel as a' that, I beg ye'll let me send it to
the manse. It's a kind o' orra (_superfluous_) pot wi' us; for we've a
bigger ane, that we use for ordinar, and that's mair convenient every
way for us. Sae ye'll just tak a present o't. I'll send it ower the morn
wi' Jamie, when he gangs to the schule." "Oh!" said the minister, "I can
by no means permit you to be at so much trouble. Since you are so good
as to give me the pot, I'll just carry it home with me in my hand. I'm
so much taken with it, indeed, that I would really prefer carrying it
myself." After much altercation between the minister and the widow, on
this delicate point of politeness, it was agreed that he should carry
home the pot himself.