“Mr. Higginbotham, you are still making me the scapegoat for other men's acts. I was only the historian. It was Jamie Soutar and Carmichael, the Free Kirk minister, who held a council on the road one day, and decided that it must be well with Posty because he died to save a little child. Jamie has always been a trial to me, and a ground of criticism, especially because he used to cloak his good deeds with falsehood to escape praise instead of proclaiming them at the corners of the streets as the good people used to do. So little sympathy have I with Jamie, that before the proof sheets of the book left this room I sent for Jamie (in a literary sense), and he came (in the same sense), and I placed him just where you are sitting and spoke to him (always in the same sense) very seriously. May I tell you--as it will further vindicate me--what I said? “Thank you, sir, for your patience. 'James,' I said--for if any one is usually called Jamie and on some occasion you say James, it is very impressive--'if these sheets are printed as they stand, I'm afraid both you and I will suffer at the hands of the good people, and, with your permission, there is one passage at least I would like to amend.' “'What is it?* said Jamie quickly, but, I felt, unresponsively. “'It's where you go up to London solely to visit the poor servant lass, and then say you are in charge of Drumsheugh's cattle; where you assure Lily that her mistress had been enquiring for her, when you had just rated her mistress for cruel carelessness; where you give Lily twenty pounds as from her mistress, while it is your own money: all to cheer a poor dying lassie, James, I admit, but not true, not true.' “'What wud ye hev me to say?' enquired Jamie, but very drily indeed. “'Well, I have written a sentence or two, James, which I hope you will allow me to insert, and I am sure our critics will be quite satisfied; it's what they would say themselves.' “'Read on,' said Jamie, looking very hard. “'Here I am, Lily, a' the way frae Drumtochty, ane's errand to see ye--a matter o' five pounds outlay, I reckon, but what's that 'atween friends? And here's twenty punds o' ma hard-earned savin's a've brocht ye; ye'll pay me back gin ye be spared; an' gin things come to the worst, yir grandmother's honest; interest needna be mentioned unless ye insist, and ye maunna tell onybody what a've done for ye, except a friend or two in the Glen.' “'Are ye prood o' that passage?' enquired Jamie, and his tone was distinctly disagreeable; 'd'ye think it a credit to you or me?' “'It's safe, James, and will be acceptable.'