Alec laughed. ‘A pretty proof,’ he cried. ‘Oh, of course, the state of religion in one corner of the Hielans is only an illustration; but it’s much the same everywhere. I don’t see, to put the thing plainly, that we should be very much worse off without any kirks, and what we want with so many is a mystery to me. What was the use of building a new one in every parish at the Disruption, I should like to know?’ ‘You know as well as I do,’ answered Alec. ‘A great principle was at stake.’ ‘“The sacred right o’ the nowte[3] to chuse their ain herd,” as Burns puts it,’ interposed Cameron. ‘Not only that; the question was whether the Church should submit to interference on the part of the State,’ said Alec. ‘And by way of showing that she never would submit, she rent herself in twa, and one half has spent the best part of her pith ever since in keeping up the fight wi’ the tither half. What sense is there in that, can ye tell me?’ ‘That’s all very well,’ said Alec, ‘but it seems to me that if a man finds a poor religion around him, he ought to stick to it as well as he can till he finds a better one.’ ‘There’s sense in that, Alec,’ said Cameron; ‘and I’ll no just say I’ve no had my endeavours to find a better.’ ‘Where can ye find a better?’ asked Alec, shocked at this latitudinarianism. ‘I didna say I had succeeded, did I? But I’ve tried. I went a good deal among the Methodists in my first year at College. I was wonderfully taken with them at first--thought them just the very salt of the earth. But in six months, I found they groaned and cried “Amen” a little too often--for nothing at all. Then, my next session, I wandered about from one kirk to another, and then I stayed still. Sometimes I’ve even gone to the Catholics.’ ‘The Catholics!’ exclaimed Alec, with horror. If his friend had said that he had occasionally joined in the rites of pagans, and had witnessed human sacrifices, he could hardly have shocked this son of the Covenanters more seriously. ‘Hoots, ay!’ said the Highlander, with a half-affected carelessness. ‘There’s a lot o’ them in Glenstruan.’ ‘At home? In the north?’ asked Alec, in astonishment. ‘Yes; in out-of-the-way corners there are many Catholics. In some parishes there are but few Protestants.’ ‘How did they come there?’ ‘They have always been there.’ It was news to Alec, Scotchman as he was, that there are to this day little communities of Catholics hidden among the mountains of Ross and Inverness, living in glens so secluded that one might almost fancy that the fierce storms of the sixteenth century had never reached them.