He was, however, good-tempered enough to praise the dinner, and to say "Scotch broth and good Scotch collops were pleasant changes from the roast beef of old England, her Yorkshire pudding and cherry pies." Mrs. Campbell smiled graciously at this compliment, and answered: "I consider collops, Robert, as the most nutritive and delicious of all the ways in which beef is cooked. I attribute my good health to eating them so regularly, and though Jepson is constantly complaining of McNab's extravagance and ill-temper, I always say, 'I don't care, Jepson, what faults McNab has, she can cook collops.' Very few can make a good dish of collops, so I think I am right." "Tell Jepson I say he is to let McNab alone. How did you like Dr. Robertson's last _protégé_?" "I did not go to church. I was not well. The girls were there." "What is your opinion, Isabel?" "That he is very like the lave of the doctor's wonderfuls. Mrs. Robertson told us, he had astonished his college by the tenderness of his conscience and his spirituality; and when I asked her the particulars, she said he had utterly refused to study the Latin Grammar because it contained nothing spiritual. Greek and Hebrew, of course, for they were necessary to a right reading of the Scriptures; but the Latin Grammar had no spiritual relations with literature of any kind--far from it. From what he had been told it was both idolatrous and immoral in its outcome. I suppose he is from Argyle, for when there was talk of expelling him for not conforming to rules, he wrote to the Duke, and the great Duke stood by the lad, and complimented him on his tender conscience, and the like, and took him under his own protection--and so on. Mrs. Robertson is of the opinion, he may come to be the Moderator of the Assembly with such backing." "And what do you think?" "I would not wonder if he did. He has the conceit for anything, and he is a black Celt, and very likely has their covetous eye and greedy heart. He will get on, no doubt of it. Why not? The great Duke at his back, and himself always pushing to the front." "I thought he was nice-looking," said Christina timidly. "His fine black eyes were fairly ablaze when he was preaching." "He is a ferocious Calvinist," added Isabel. "Well, he had fine eyes and was good-looking," persisted Christina. "Good looks are nothing, Christina," said Robert severely. "Beauty is not a moral quality." "People who are good-looking get on in this world. I notice that. I wish I was bonnie." "You are well enough, Christina," said Mrs. Campbell. "If you cannot talk more sensibly, keep quiet." Christina with a wronged, grieved look subsided, and Mrs. Robertson's reception for the conscientious youth, under the Argyle protection, furnished the conversation until the cloth was drawn, and the ladies had trifled awhile with their walnuts and raisins. Then Campbell rose, drank the glass of wine that had been standing before him, and said: