The big ha’ Bible was accordingly removed by Mrs. Walkinshaw from the shelf where it commonly lay undisturbed from the one sacramental occasion to the other, and the dust being blown off, as on the Saturday night prior to the action sermon, she carried it to the kitchen to be more thoroughly wiped, and soon after returned with it followed by the servants. Claud, in the meantime, having drawn his elbow-chair close to the table, and placed his spectacles on his nose, was sitting, when the mistress laid the volume before him, ready to begin. As some little stir was produced by the servants taking their places, he accidentally turned up the cover, and looked at the page in which he had inserted the dates of his own marriage and the births of his children. Mrs. Walkinshaw observing him looking at the record, said,-- ‘Atweel, Charlie need na been in sic a haste, he’s no auld enough yet to be the head o’ a family. How auld were ye, gudeman, when we were marriet? But he’s no blest wi’ the forethought o’ you.’ ‘Will that tongue o’ thine, Girzy, ne’er be quiet? In the presence o’ thy Maker, wheest, and pay attention, while I read a chapter of His holy word.’ The accent in which this was uttered imposed at once silence and awe, and when he added, ‘Let us worship God, by reading a portion of the Scriptures of truth,’ the servants often afterwards said, ‘he spoke like a dreadfu’ divine.’ Not being, as we have intimated, much in the practice of domestic worship, Claud had avoided singing a Psalm, nor was he so well acquainted with the Bible, as to be able to fix on any particular chapter or appropriate passage from recollection. In this respect he was, indeed, much inferior to the generality of the Glasgow merchants of that age, for, although they were considerably changed from the austerity by which their fathers had incurred the vengeance of Charles the Second’s government, they were still regular in the performance of their religious domestic duties. Some excuse, however, might be made for Claud, on account of his having spent so many years on the English Borders, a region in no age or period greatly renowned for piety, though plentifully endowed, from a very ancient date, with ecclesiastical mansions for the benefit of the outlaws of the two nations. Not, however, to insist on this topic, instead of reverently waling a portion with judicious care, he opened the book with a degree of superstitious trepidation, and the first passage which caught his eye was the thirty-second verse of the twenty-seventh chapter of Genesis. He paused for a moment; and the servants and the family having also opened their Bibles, looked towards him in expectation that he would name the chapter he intended to read. But he closed the volume over upon his hand, which he had inadvertently placed on the text, and lay back on his chair, unconscious of what he had done, leaving his hand still within the book. ‘We’re a’ ready,’ said Mrs. Walkinshaw; ‘whare’s the place?’