It was a sad heart to us all, to see the lifeless creature in his white nightcap and eyes closed, lying with his yellow hair spread on the pillow; and we went out, that the women-folk might cover up the looking- glass and the face of the clock, ere they proceeded to dress the body in its last clothes--clothes that would never need changing; but, when we were half down the stair, and I felt glad with the thoughts of getting to the fresh air, we were obliged to turn up again for a little, to let the man past that was bringing in the dead deal. But why weave a long story out of the materials of sorrow? or endeavour to paint feelings that have no outward sign, lying shut up within the sanctuary of the heart? The grief of a father and a mother can only be conceived by them who, as fathers and mothers, have suffered the loss of their bairns,--a treasure more precious to nature than silver or gold, home to the land-sick sailor, or daylight to the blind man sitting beaking in the heat of the morning sun. The coffin having been ordered to be got ready with all haste, two men brought it on their shoulders betimes on the following morning; and it was a sight that made my blood run cold to see the dead corpse of poor Mungo, my own prentice, hoisted up from the bed, and laid in his black- handled, narrow housie. All had taken their last looks, the lid was screwed down by means of screw-drivers, and I read the plate, which said, "Mungo Glen, aged 15." Alas! early was he cut off from among the living--a flower snapped in its spring blossom--and an awful warning to us all, sinful and heedless mortals, of the uncertainty of this state of being. In the course of the forenoon, Maister Glen's cart was brought to the door, drawn by two black horses with long tails and hairy feet, a tram one and a leader. Though the job shook my nerves, I could not refuse to give them a hand down the stair with the coffin, which had a fief-like smell of death and sawdust; and we got it fairly landed in the cart, among clean straw. I saw the clodhapper of a ploughman aye dighting his een with the sleeve of his big-coat.