“What matter,” she said, presently, as she stroked down her kirtle over her knee modestly, with an air that took me mightily, it was so full of distance and respect. “I come not far, but only from the farm town of Drumglass down there on the meadow’s edge. Ye are welcome to the bit piece; I am as glad to see ye eat it as of a sunny morn in haytime. You have come far, and a brave day’s wark we are expecting from you this Sabbath day.” Then, as was my duty, I rebuked her for looking to man for that which could alone come from the Master and Maker of man. She listened very demurely, with her eyes upon the silver buckles of her shoon, which she had admiringly placed side by side on the grass, when she set herself down on the low boundary wall of the kirkyard. “I ken I am too young and light and foolish to be fit company even for a young minister,” she said, and there was a blush upon her cheek which vexed me, though it was bonny enough to look upon. “Nay,” answered I quickly; “there you mistake me. I meant no such thing, bonnie lass. We are all both fond and foolish, minister and maid.” (Well might I say it, for--God forgive me!--at that very moment my mind ran more on how the lass looked and on the way she had of tapping the grass with her foot than on the solemn work of the day.) “No, no,” she interrupted, hastily; “I am but a silly lass, poor and ignorant, and you do well to fault me.” Now this put me in a painful predicament, for I still held in my hand the solitary scraplet left of the young lass’s “piece,” and I must needs, like a dull, splenetic fool, go on fretting her for a harmless word. She turned away her head a little; nevertheless, I was not so ill-learned in the ways of maids but that I could see she was crying. “What is your name, sweet maid?” I asked, for my heart was wae that I had grieved her. She did not answer me till she had a little recovered herself. “Jean Gemmell,” she said, at last, “and my father is the tenant of Drumglass up by there. He is an elder, and will be here by kirk-time. The session is holding a meeting at the Manse.” I had pulled a Bible from my pocket and was thinking of my sermon by this time. Jean Gemmell rose and stood a moment picking at a flower by the wall. “My father will be on your side,” she said, slowly. “But,” cried I, in some astonishment, “your father has not yet heard me preach.” “No more have I,” she made answer, smiling on me with her eyes, “but, nevertheless, my father will be on your side.” And she moved away, looking still very kindly upon me. I cannot tell whether or no I was helped by this rencounter in my conduct of the worship that day in the parish kirk of Balmaghie. At any rate, I went down and walked in the meadows by the side of Dee Water till the folk gathered and the little cracked bell began to clank and jow from the kirk on the hill. CHAPTER XIII. MY LADY OF PRIDE.