‘To think,’ he went on, ‘o’ a haill kirk o’ cats aneath the yird--a’ sittin kaimin themsels wi’ kaims!--Kirsty, ye _winna_ think it a place for _me_? Ye see I’m no like ither fowk, and sic a thing micht ca (_drive_) me oot o’ a’ the sma’ wits ever I hed!’ ‘Hoots!’ rejoined Kirsty, with a smile, ‘the catacombs has naething to du wi’ cats or kaims!’ ‘Tell me what are they, than.’ ‘The catacombs,’ answered Kirsty, ‘was what in auld times, and no i’ this cuintry ava, they ca’d the places whaur they laid their deid.’ ‘Eh, Kirsty, but that’s waur!’ returned Steenie. ‘I wudna gang intil sic a place wi’ feet siclike’s my ain--na, no for what the warl cud gie me!--no for lang Lowrie’s fiddle and a’ the tunes intil’t! I wud never get my feet oot o’ ’t! They’d haud me there!’ Then Kirsty began to tell him, as she would have taught a child, something of the history of the catacombs, knowing how it must interest him. ‘I’ the days langsyne,’ she said, ‘there was fowk, like you and me, unco fain o’ the bonny man. The verra soun o’ the name o’ ’im was eneuch to gar their herts loup wi’ doonricht glaidness. And they gaed here and there and a’ gait, and tellt ilka body aboot him; and fowk ’at didna ken him, and didna want to ken him, cudna bide to hear tell o’ him, and they said, “Lat’s hae nae mair o’ this! Hae dune wi’ yer bonny man! Haud yer tongues,” they cryit. But the ithers, they wadna hear o’ haudin their tongues. A’body maun ken aboot him! “Sae lang’s we _hae_ tongues, and can wag them to the name o’ him,” they said, “we’ll no haud them!” And at that they fell upo’ them, and ill-used them sair; some o’ them they tuik and brunt alive--that is, brunt them deid; and some o’ them they flang to the wild beasts, and they bitit them and tore them to bits. And----’ ‘Was the bitin o’ the beasts terrible sair?’ interrupted Steenie. ‘Ay, I reckon it was some sair; but the puir fowk aye said the bonny man was wi’ them; and lat them bite!--they didna care!’ ‘Ay, of coorse, gien he was wi’ them, they wadna min’ ’t a hair, or at least, no twa hairs! Wha wud! Gien he be in yon hole, Kirsty, I’ll gang back and intil’t my lee lane. I wull noo!’ Steenie turned and had run some distance before Kirsty succeeded in stopping him. She did not run after him. ‘Steenie! Steenie!’ she cried, ‘I dinna doobt he’s there, for he’s a’gait; but ye ken yersel ye canna aye see him, and maybe ye wudna see him there the noo, and micht think he wasna there, and turn fleyt. Bide till we hae a licht, and I gang doon first.’ Steenie was persuaded, and turned and came back to her. To father, mother, and sister he was always obedient, even on the rare occasions when it cost him much to be so. ‘Ye see, Steenie,’ she continued, ‘yon’s no the place! I dinna ken yet what place yon is. I was only gaein to tell ye aboot the places it min’t me o’! Wud ye like to hear aboot them?’ ‘I wad that, richt weel! Say awa, Kirsty.’