“‘I was a cousin of Willie’s,” continued James, ‘by the mither’s side, and he persuaded me to accompany him to Canada. We set sail the first day of May, and were here in time to chop a small fallow for a fall crop. While Robertson had more of this world’s gear than I, for his father had provided him with sufficient funds to purchase a good lot of wild land, which he did in the township of M——, and I was to work with him, on shares. We were one of the first settlers in that place, and we found the work before us rough and hard to our heart’s content. But Willie had a strong motive for exertion—and never did man work harder than he did that first year on his bush-farm, for the love of Jeanie Burns.’ “We built a comfortable log-house, in which we were assisted by the few neighbors we had, who likewise lent a hand in clearing ten acres we had chopped for fall crop. “All this time Willie kept up a constant correspondence with Jeanie Burns; and he used to talk to me of her coming out, and his future plans, every night when our work was done. If I had not loved and respected the girl mysel’ I should have got unco tired o’ the subject. “We had just put in our first crop of wheat, when a letter came from Jeanie bringing us the news of her grandfather’s death. Weel I ken the word that Willie spak’ to me when he closed that letter. ‘Jamie, the auld man is gane at last—an’, God forgi’e me, I feel too gladsome to greet. Jeanie is willin’ to come whenever I ha’e the means to bring her out, an’, hoot man, I’m jist thinkin’ that she winna’ ha’e to wait lang.’ “Good workmen were getting very high wages just then, and Willie left the care of the place to me, and hired for three months with auld Squire Jones. He was an excellent teamster, and could put his hand to any sort of work. When his term of service expired he sent Jeanie forty dollars, to pay her passage out, which he hoped she would not delay longer than the spring. “He got an answer from Jeanie full of love and gratitude, but she thought that her voyage might be delayed until the fall. The good woman, with whom she had lodged since her parent’s died, had just lost her husband, and was in a bad state of health, and she begged Jeanie to stay with her until her daughter could leave her service in Edinburgh and come to take charge of the house. This person had been a kind and steadfast friend to Jeanie in all her troubles, and had helped her nurse the old man in his dying illness. I am sure it was just like Jeanie to act as she did. She had all her life looked more to the comforts of others than to her ain. But Robertson was an angry man when he got that letter, and he said, ‘If that was a’ the lo’e that Jeanie Burns had for him, to prefer an auld woman’s comfort, who was naething to her, to her betrothed husband, she might bide awa’ as lang as she pleased, he would never trouble himsel’ to write to her again.’