flabbiness of her corporeal conditions.

"What ails ye, Mistress Catanach?" cried a voice from within.

"Sic a couple 's yon twasum wad mak!" she replied, again bursting
into gelatinous laughter.

"Wha, than? I canna lea' my milk parritch to come an' luik."

"Ow! jist Meg Horn, the auld kail runt, an' Sanny Graham, the
stickit minister. I wad like weel to be at the beddin' o' them.
Eh! the twa heids o' them upon ae bowster!"

And chuckling a low chuckle, Mrs Catanach moved for her own door.

As soon as the churchyard was clear of the funeral train, the mad
laird peeped from behind a tall stone, gazed cautiously around him,
and then with slow steps came and stood over the new made grave,
where the sexton was now laying the turf, "to mak a' snod (trim)
for the Sawbath."

"Whaur is she gane till?" he murmured to himself--He could generally
speak better when merely uttering his thoughts without attempt at
communication.--"I dinna ken whaur I cam frae, an' I dinna ken
whaur she's gane till; but whan I gang mysel', maybe I'll ken baith.
--I dinna ken, I dinna ken, I dinna ken whaur I cam frae."

Thus muttering, so lost in the thoughts that originated them
that he spoke the words mechanically, he left the churchyard and
returned to the school, where, under the superintendence of Malcolm,