the author proceeds to tell how a laird near Kinghorn got over head and ears in debt, and was at his wit’s end to find a way out of his troubles. At last one evening, as he was wandering alone in the fields, very much dejected, he was accosted by a fine-looking stranger on a black horse, who sympathised with him in his difficulties, and, seeming to know what they were without being told, offered him £10,000 on his simple note of hand. “Ye’s get it on your single bond, As I frae Scotland maun abscond To France, or in a woody swing For lies a neighbour tald the King— An’ said I meant to tak’ his life, To let a gallant get his wife.” The laird, with little hesitation, accepted the offer, and, according to appointment, the stranger called with the money “on the chap o’ twal” the following night— “As muckle goud, and rather mair, Than wad out-weigh twal pecks o’ bear.” He had not time to wait till it was counted, but, assuring the laird that it was all right, he presented the bond for signature. This, however, read that after fifteen years the laird should be the stranger’s servant. But the laird wouldn’t have this:— “As upright folk abhor mischief— As honest men despise a thief— As dogs detest a grunting sow, So laigh the laird disdained to bow!” And, bursting out with:— “Hence, Satan! to your black abode, In name of my Almighty God!” he sent the “stranger” right out somewhere through the roof, leaving the money on the table. The supernatural powers of Scottish mythology never could stand the name of the Deity. But the laird had not heard the last of his great enemy. He prospered and grew richer and richer until, sixteen years after, when, at a feast, he was called out to speak with a visitor on horseback. A minute after there was a loud report, the “stranger” lay dead on the ground, and at the laird’s feet lay a pistol. The laird was lodged in Edinburgh prison on a charge of murder, but on the doctors examining the body it was found to have been dead ten days before “it” visited the laird, and that there was no mark where a bullet could have entered. This created a great uproar, and the mystery seemed incapable of explanation, until at last some Peebles folk came to the capital, and swore that the body was that of their piper:— “I saw him yerdit, I can swear— Frae his lang hame how came he there?” It was the Peebles piper, better dressed than ever he had been in life, and he had died in his bed at home. They even identified his “sark” and the pistol. The laird was liberated, but he in his heart knew quite well the real explanation of the mystery:—