“That’s repeatin’ what Rabbie Burns wrote, the rank is but the guinea stamp.” “I have proved it true: for the first time in my life I have become intimate with those whose living depends upon the labor of their hands, and my Old World notions have melted away, when I found them better than those whose boast it is they never soiled their fingers with manual toil.” “Aye, aye; nae guid comes o’ tryin’ to escape the first command to fallen man, ‘in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread.’” “What say you?” asked Morton. “To your asking Maggie? Oh, dinna speak o’t. She’s my ae ewe lamb and I canna pairt wi’ her.” “I do not mean you should; we would go to Upper Canada together.” The old man paused and leant upon his hoe and Morton stood respectfully behind him. After long silence he raised his head. “I canna answer you. It’s no for me to put my ain selfish will against her good; gang and let her choose for hersel’.” “Thank you,” said Morton with emotion. “We have had a backward spring; frost every week a maist to the middle o’ June, an’ sic cauld winds since syne that naething grows. We hae sown in hope, but I’m fearfu’ there will be little to reap. Sic a spring the auldest settler canna mind o’. Look at thae tatties! What poor spindly things they are, an’ this the first week o’ July.” “It has not been so bad in the west.” “I’m glad to hear it. Weel, this being the first real warm day we’ve had, I tell’t Maggie to busk hersel’ and gang and veesit the neebors, for she’s been in a sad and sorrowfu’ way since her mither deed. She said she had nae heart to veesit, but wad tak a walk alang the river and be back to mak my denner. Her brithers we expect hame every day from takin’ rafts to Montreal.” “I’ll go and seek her,” remarked Morton, as he turned, and the old man went on hoeing. Morton had gone about a mile, when his eye caught the flutter of the linen kerchief Maggie had pinned round her neck. She did not see him and as she sauntered before him, he marked her graceful carriage, and muttered to himself, “A woman worthy to woo and win.” Unwilling to startle her by going too near, he cried “Miss Forsyth.” She paused, turned in astonishment, and as her color came and went said, “Is it you?” “Yes, and surely you will not shrink from me as you did when last we met.” She held out her hand and as he pressed it, simply said, “I’m glad you’re safe and well.” “Have you no warmer greeting for me?” “What warmer do you deserve?” “My deservings are nothing, but your own kind heart might plead for me.” “Oh, dear: the conceit of some men, who think they can pick up hearts on the banks of the Chateaugay as they would acorns.” “And what of women who pitch back rings as if they stung them?” Maggie laughed and replied, “The gift is measured with the giver.” “When a gift is a token of the hour of peril, what then, my lady? Is it a thing to be scorned?”