"Bless you, sir!" cried the devout spinster; while Mrs Bairnsfather kept staring at her husband and guests, unable to solve the strange mystery, "you do not know a tithe of the good that this little book has achieved. It has been in half the houses in the Cowgate and Canongate. It is relished by the poor, and sought after by the rich; it mends the heart, improves the understanding, and binds up the wounds of those that are struck by the hands of the archers. Oh! I agitate in the good work mightily with it, and others of the same class; and may all success attend your efforts, also, in so excellent a cause. Call meetings by all means, read, expound, examine, exhort, entreat, and, hark ye, take Mr Samuel Thriven with you, for his heart is in the cause of the improvement of his fellow-creatures, and he knows the value of the allegory of the devout tinker of Elstow. "We cannot do without Mr Thriven," replied Mr Bairnsfather, with a smile; and while Mrs Bairnsfather was calling out to them to take another cup, and explain to her the meaning of their conduct, the creditors rose all together, and, taking their hats and Bunyan, were on the point of leaving the room, in great haste and manifest excitement, when the door opened, and the soft voice of Widow Mercer saluted them. "Have you heard the news?" said she. "Does it concern Mr Thriven?" replied more than one. "Yes, to be sure it does," rejoined she. "We will all now get full payment of our debts; what think ye of that, sirs?" "Hush, hush," said Mr Bairnsfather, in the ear of the widow. "Say nothing of the 'Pilgrim's Progress.' You know Miss M'Falzen is a friend of Mr Thriven's." "The 'Pilgrim's Progress!'" ejaculated the widow. "Alas! he is, of a verity, mad," rejoined Mrs Bairnsfather. "The 'Pilgrim's Progress,'" again cried Mrs Mercer. "Tush, we knew all about it," whispered Mr Wrench. "You also have seen the book?" "Yes," replied the widow, "I have, as who hasn't? but Lord bless me!"--and she whispered in his ear--"what, in the name of wonder, has the 'Pilgrim's Progress' to do with Mr Thriven having got ten thousand pounds left him by Mrs Grizel M'Whirter." The whisper was communicated to the two other creditors by Mr Wrench. The three merchants, stimulated at the same moment by the same impulse of joy, laid hold of the good widow, and whirled her like a top round the room, snapping their fingers the while, and exhibiting other perfectly innocent demonstrations of gladness. "The most extraordinary method of proselytising," said the spinster, "that I, who have carried on the trade of mending the species for many years, have ever yet seen." "It is all beyond my poor wits together," added the wife.