The city, large as it was, was yet not large enough to prevent a
portion of the private affairs of individuals from coming to be
treated as public property, and Mrs. Bonniman was a handsome and
rich young widow, the rumour of whose acceptableness to Mr. Sclater
had reached Mistress Croale's ear before ever she had seen the
minister himself. An unmistakable shadow of confusion crossed his
countenance; whereupon with consideration both for herself and him,
the woman made haste to go on, as if she had but chosen her instance
at merest random.

"Na, na, sir! what my sowl may be in the eyes o' my Maker, I hae ill
tellin'," she said, "but dinna ye threip upo' me 'at it's o' the
same vailue i' your eyes as the sowl o' sic a fine bonny, winsome
leddy as yon. In trouth," she added, and shook her head mournfully,
"I haena had sae mony preevileeges; an' maybe it'll be seen till,
an' me passed ower a wheen easier nor some fowk."

"I wouldn't have you build too much upon that, Mistress Croale,"
said Mr. Sclater, glad to follow the talk down another turning, but
considerably more afraid of rousing the woman than he had been
before.

The remark drove her behind the categorical stockade of her
religious merits.

"I pey my w'y," she said, with modest firmness. "I put my penny, and
whiles my saxpence, intil the plate at the door when I gang to the
kirk -- an' I was jist thinkin' I wad win there the morn's nicht at
farest, whan I turnt an' saw ye stan'in there, sir; an' little I
thoucht -- but that's neither here nor there, I'm thinkin'. I tell as