bundle--for she reckoned on being of some use to Eppie during her visit
When they had eaten their humble dinner, Andrew brought the cart to the
door, and Maggie scrambled into it.

"Tak a piece wi' ye," said her father, following her to the cart: "ye hadna
muckle to yer denner, and ye may be hungry again or ye hae the lang road
ahint ye!"

He put several pieces of oatcake in her hand, which she received with a
loving smile; and they set out at a walking pace, which Andrew made no
attempt to quicken.

It was far from a comfortable carriage, neither was her wisp of straw in
the bottom of it altogether comfortable to sit upon; but the change from
her stool and the close attention her work required, to the open air and
the free rush of the thoughts that came crowding to her out of the
wilderness, put her at once in a blissful mood. Even the few dull remarks
that the slow-thinking Andrew made at intervals from his perch on the
front of the cart, seemed to come to her from the realm of Faerie, the
mysterious world that lay in the folds of the huddled hills. Everything
Maggie saw or heard that afternoon seemed to wear the glamour of God's
imagination, which is at once the birth and the very truth of everything.
Selfishness alone can rub away that divine gilding, without which gold
itself is poor indeed.

Suddenly the little horse stood still. Andrew, waking up from a snooze,
jumped to the ground, and began, still half asleep, to search into the
cause of the arrest; for Jess, although she could not make haste, never of
her own accord stood still while able to keep on walking. Maggie, on her
part, had for some time noted that they were making very slow progress.