Long Lauchie, as usual, was full of vague and ominous prophecies. His remarks were chiefly concerning the wedding feast to which those who were bidden refused to come, with dark reference to the man who had not on the wedding garment; neither of which allusions, surely, pointed to either Weaver Jimmie or his marriage festivities. Near him, in a little circle where English was spoken, Praying Donald and the minister were leading a discussion on the evidences of Christianity. There was only one quarter in which there were signs of anything but perfect amity, and that was where a heated argument had arisen between Old Farquhar and Peter Sandy Johnstone upon the respective merits of Ossian and Burns; a discussion which, in spite of the age of the disputants, would certainly have ended in blows, had it been in the old days when a marriage was scarcely considered binding without a liberal supply of whiskey. But Kirsty's wedding, happily, belonged to the new era, and the minister, glancing round the well conducted assemblage and recalling the days, not so far past, when most of the Highlanders enlivened any and every social function, from a barn-raising to a burial, with spirits, heaved a great sigh of gratitude. And Store Thompson unconsciously voiced his sentiments when he declared, in a neatly turned little speech, that the occasion was "jist an auspicious consummation-like." There were several other speakers besides the minister and Store Thompson, and each made the kindliest allusions to both bride and groom; but, like the true Scots they were, carefully refrained from paying compliments. There were songs and stories, too, stirring Scottish choruses, and tales of the early days and of the great doings in the homeland. Then Big Malcolm's Farquhar, who had long ago come to regard himself in the light of the old itinerant bards, sang, like Chibiabos, to make the wedding guests more contented. He had but a single English song in his repertoire, one which he rendered with much pride, and only on state occasions. This was a flowery love-lyric, entitled "The Grave of Highland Mary," and was Farquhar's one tribute to the despised Burns. It consisted of a half-dozen lengthy stanzas, each followed by a still lengthier refrain, and was sung to an ancient and erratic air that rose and fell like the wail of the winter winds in the bare treetops. The venerable minstrel sang with much fervour, and only in the last stanza did the swelling notes subside in any noticeable degree. This was not because the melancholy words demanded, but because the singer was rather out of breath. So he sang with some breathless hesitation: "Yet the green simmer saw but a few sunny mornings Till she, in the bloom of her beauty and pride, Was laid in her grave like a bonnie young flower In Greenock kirkyard on the banks of the Clyde."