Mr. James, I should have behaved precisely as you have done, and had
you been at the Slugs you would have jumped in as I did. Mr. Cathro,
you pain me by holding back; I assure you I esteem my old Dominie more
than ever for the way in which you stuck up for Captain Ure, though
you must see why I could not drink that gentleman's health."

And Mr. Cathro made the best of it, wringing Tommy's hand effusively,
while muttering, "Fool, donnard stirk, gowk!" He was addressing
himself and any other person who might be so presumptuous as to try to
get the better of Thomas Sandys. Cathro never tried it again. Had
Tommy died that week his old Dominie would have been very chary of
what he said at the funeral.

They were in the garden now, the gentlemen without their hats. "Have
you made your peace with him?" Cathro asked Grizel, in a cautious
voice. "He is a devil's buckie, and I advise you to follow my example,
Miss McQueen, and capitulate. I have always found him reasonable so
long as you bend the knee to him."

"I am not his enemy," replied Grizel, loftily, "and if he has done a
noble thing I am proud of him and will tell him so."

"I would tell him so," said the Dominie, "whether he had done it or
not."

"Do you mean," she asked indignantly, "that you think he did not do
it?"

"No, no, no," he answered hurriedly; "or mercy's sake, don't tell him
I think that." And then, as Tommy was out of ear-shot: "But I see