Warlock o' Glenwarlock: A Homely Romance

ze bag, hung by the strings over his shoulder, came out from among the hills upon a comparative plain. But there were hills on all sides round him yet-not very high-few of them more than

e incapable of yielding crops and money! In truth many a man who now admires, would be unable to do so, if, like those farmers, he had to struggle with nature for l

very soul. These were covered with grass for the vagrant cow, sprinkled with loveliest little wild flowers for the poet-peasant, burrowed in by wild bees for the adventurous delight of the honey-drawn school-boy. Glad I am they had not quite vanished from Scotland before I was sent thither, but remained to help me get ready for the kingdom of heaven: those dyk

as he went along-none the less that some of them, hearing from their children that he had not been to school the day before, had remarked that his birthday hardly brought him enough to keep it with. The vulgarity belonging to the worship of Mammon, is by no means confined to the rich; many of these, having next to nothing, yet thought profession the one thing, money, houses, lands the only inheritances. It is a marvel that even world-loving people should never see with what a load they oppress the lives of the children to whom, instead of bringing them up to earn their own living, and thus enjoy at least THE GAME of life, they leave a fortune enough to sink a devil yet deeper in hell. Was it nothing to Cosmo to inherit a long line of ancestors whose story he knew-their virtues, their faults, their wickedness, their humiliation?-to inherit the nobility of a father such as his? the graciousness of a mother such as that father caused him to remember her? Was there no occasion for the laird to rejoice in the birth of a boy whom he believed to have inherited all the virtues of his race, and left all their vices behind? But none of the villagers forgot, however they might regard the holiday, that Cosmo was the "yoong laird" notwithstanding the poverty of his house; and they all knew that in old time the birthday of the heir had been a holiday to the school as well as to himself, and remembered the intro

ere less than friendly with him. One point in his conduct was in particular distasteful to them: he seemed to scorn even an honest advantage. For in truth he never could bring himself, in the small matters of dealing that pass between boys at school, to make the least profit. He had a passion for fair play, which, combined with love to his neighbour, made of an advantage, though perfectly understood and recognized, almost a physi

g from each a kindly response, the boy walked steadily on till he came to the school. There, on the heels of the master, the boys and girls were already crowding in, and he entered along with them. The religious preliminaries over, consisting in a dry and apparently grudging rec

up for lost time to

ever slight, or however merely implied, of disapproval of anything his fath

wasn't l

er in his turn angry, bu

expect to find you prepared

," Cosmo answered; "but my father s

not master of

sing into the mother-tongue, which, except it

's devotion to his father

you are the best scholar in it, is no reason why you should be allowed to idle away hours in which you might have been laying up store for the time

haena speirt," answered Cos

ill-temper of the master now overcame him, and

n' ye'll be as great a fule a

e. Most boys would then have made for the door, but that was not Cosmo's idea of bearing witness. The moment the book left his hand, he d

for a moment seemed lost in suffering. The next, he clenched for the boy a man's fist, and knocked him down

came rushing up. She was the grand-daught

, with his handkerchief to one eye, looking down on the boy. So little di

ed Agnes, as she stooped to

and seizing her, pulled her away, and f

ny grief that might befall either Cosmo or the lass Gracie. Therefore, although he would have been ready to sink had the door then opened and the laird entered, he did not much fear any consequences to be counted serious from the unexpected failure of his self-command. He dragged the boy up by the arm, and set him on his seat, before Agnes could return; but his face was as that of one dead, and he fell forward on t