duties."

"But I'm no. I'm doing harm. There's Charles Dickson says that the
very sicht o' my uniform rouses his dander so muckle that it makes
him break windows, though a peaceably-disposed man till I was
appointed. And what's the use o' their haeing a policeman when
they winna come to the lock-up after I lay hands on them?"

"Do they say they won't come?"

"Say? Catch them saying onything! They just gie me a wap into the
gutters. If they would speak I wouldna complain, for I'm nat'rally
the sociablest man in Thrums."

"Rob, however, had spoken to you."

"Because he had need o' me. That was ay Rob's way, converted or no
converted. When he was blind drunk he would order me to see him
safe hame, but would he crack wi' me? Na, na."

Wearyworld, who was so called because of his forlorn way of
muttering, "It's a weary warld, and nobody bides in't," as he went
his melancholy rounds, sighed like one about to cry, and Gavin
changed the subject.

"Is the watch for the soldiers still kept up?" he asked.

"It is, but the watchers winna let me in aside them. I'll let you
see that for yoursel' at me head o' the Roods, for they watch
there in the auld windmill."