'I dinna richtly ken what ye mean by that; but I'm thinkin' it was muckle the same kin' o' faith 'at the prodigal had; for they baith rase an' gaed hame.' ''Deed, maybe ye're richt, laddie,' returned Mrs. Falconer, after a moment's thought. 'We'll houp the best.' All the remainder of the evening she sat motionless, with her eyes fixed on the rug before her, thinking, no doubt, of the repentance and salvation of the fiddler, and what hope there might yet be for her own lost son. The next day being Saturday, Robert set out for Bodyfauld, taking the violin with him. He went alone, for he was in no mood for Shargar's company. It was a fine spring day, the woods were budding, and the fragrance of the larches floated across his way. There was a lovely sadness in the sky, and in the motions of the air, and in the scent of the earth--as if they all knew that fine things were at hand which never could be so beautiful as those that had gone away. And Robert wondered how it was that everything should look so different. Even Bodyfauld seemed to have lost its enchantment, though his friends were as kind as ever. Mr. Lammie went into a rage at the story of the lost violin, and Miss Lammie cried from sympathy with Robert's distress at the fate of his bonny leddy. Then he came to the occasion of his visit, which was to beg Mr. Lammie, when next he went to Aberdeen, to take the soutar's fiddle, and get what he could for it, to help his widow. 'Poor Sanny!' said Robert, 'it never cam' intil 's heid to sell her, nae mair nor gin she had been the auld wife 'at he ca'd her.' Mr. Lammie undertook the commission; and the next time he saw Robert, handed him ten pounds as the result of the negotiation. It was all Robert could do, however, to get the poor woman to take the money. She looked at it with repugnance, almost as if it had been the price of blood. But Robert having succeeded in overcoming her scruples, she did take it, and therewith provide a store of sweeties, and reels of cotton, and tobacco, for sale in Sanny's workshop. She certainly did not make money by her merchandise, for her anxiety to be honest rose to the absurd; but she contrived to live without being reduced to prey upon her own gingerbread and rock. CHAPTER IV. THE ABERDEEN GARRET.