great wool-spinning we then had, both little wheel and meikle wheel,
for stockings and blankets--sitting, as I was saying, in the study,
with the fire well gathered up, for a night's reflection, a
prodigious knocking came to the door, by which the book was almost
startled out of my hand, and all the wheels in the house were
silenced at once. This was her ladyship's flunkey, to beg me to go
to her, whom he described as in a state of desperation.
Christianity required that I should obey the summons; so, with what
haste I could, thinking that perhaps, as she had been low-spirited
for some time about the young laird's going to the Indies, she might
have got a cast of grace, and been wakened in despair to the state
of darkness in which she had so long lived, I made as few steps of
the road between the manse and her house as it was in my ability to
do.

On reaching the door, I found a great light in the house--candles
burning up stairs and down stairs, and a sough of something
extraordinar going on. I went into the dining-room, where her
ladyship was wont to sit; but she was not there--only Kate Malcolm
all alone, busily picking bits of paper from the carpet. When she
looked up, I saw that her eyes were red with weeping, and I was
alarmed, and said, "Katy, my dear, I hope there is no danger?" Upon
which the poor lassie rose, and, flinging herself in a chair,
covered her face with her hands, and wept bitterly.

"What is the old fool doing with the wench?" cried a sharp angry
voice from the drawing-room--"why does not he come to me?" It was
the voice of Lady Macadam herself, and she meant me. So I went to
her; but, oh! she was in a far different state from what I had
hoped. The pride of this world had got the upper hand of her, and