'we'll wrestle wi' the devil till we throttle him,' and down him
and my father gaed on their knees.

"The minister prayed a lang time till my father said his hunger
for the drink was gone, 'but', he says, 'it swells up in me o' a
sudden aye, and it may be back afore you're hame.' 'Then come to
me at once,' says Mr. Dishart; but my father says, 'Na, for it
would haul me into the public-house as if it had me at the end o'
a rope, but I'll send the laddie."

"You saw my father crying the minister back? It was to gie him twa
pound, and, says my father, 'God helping me,' he says, 'I'll droon
mysel in the dam rather than let the drink master me, but in case
it should get haud o' me and I should die drunk, it would be a
michty gratification to me to ken that you had the siller to bury
me respectable without ony help frae the poor's rates.' The
minister wasna for taking it at first, but he took it when he saw
how earnest my father was. Ay, he's a noble man. After he gaed awa
my father made me learn the names o' the apostles frae Luke sixth,
and he says to me, 'Miss out Bartholomew,' he says, 'for he did
little, and put Gavin Dishart in his place.'"

Feeling as old as he sometimes tried to look, Gavin turned
homeward. Margaret was already listening for him. You may be sure
she knew his step. I think our steps vary as much as the human
face. My book-shelves were made by a blind man who could identify
by their steps nearly all who passed his window. Yet he has
admitted to me that he could not tell wherein my steps differed
from others; and this I believe, though rejecting his boast that
he could distinguish a minister's step from a doctor's, and even