“Missie, I’m auld--I whiles forget things I ken weel, and speak as if I was a bairn mysel; but ae life canna redeem anither, little bairn. Na, na, I wad gang wi’ ye blythe, puir wee innocent heart, to take care of ye--if God didna send an angel to take care of us baith--” said the old man, with a momentary wandering, “but there never was but Ane, that could redeem lives out of God’s hand with His ain. We’re a’ forfeit ourselves, bairnie; if my life was mine, and your’s your ain, we might offer them for Mr. Hairy; but God has your bit heartie in His hand, as well as mine, and will lay them quiet when it is His pleasure, and no a day before. There _was_ Ane that had His life free to lay down, and free to take up--and there was but Ane. I’ve had glimmerings o’ Him mysel,” continued Dragon, fixing his unsteady eyes on the roof, and wandering from the first subject into the more immediate personal interest which his own words recalled to him, “glimmerings like blinks of the sun out of clouds; but if I whiles lose mind of the Lord--for I’m auld and feeble, and sae lang in this world, that it’s ill to believe I have to gang away--if _I_ whiles lose mind, that am but a puir useless creature, is that to say that He loses mind o’ me?--as if _He_ didna ken what was the guid reason, wherefore, I wasna taken hence in my strength, but left to wear out my days like a sleep, and to forget! Ane might think the like o’ me, sae aged and frail, had been forgotten out of the course of nature, and left because He didna mind--but never you trow that, bairnie--I ken He minds, and when it’s my time, He’ll send for me, as thoughtful as if I was the grandest man on this earth. What’s about _my_ memory, though it whiles can carry naething but bairnly things? Is that to rule His, think ye, that grows not auld for ever? And I ken He never forgets.” Absorbed and full of awe, Violet followed unconsciously the half-palsied wave of the old man’s head and figure as he spoke, and watched the unusual gleam which shot from the eyes, which he in vain tried to fix on the rafter. Poor, dim unsteady eyes! they glanced about in every direction, as if they possessed some distinct energy and will of their own. But when Adam sank back on his pillow, Lettie shivered and thought she had forgotten Harry--poor Harry! She could still hear his moan in her ears. “Oh, my Harry, my Harry! Dragon, do ye think God will take him up--up--yonder beside Him?” and Lettie turned her eyes full of dark wistful reverence and fear upon the old man’s face.