Urquhart, whose obstinacy, sufficiently marked at any time, had been roused by the struggle into one of its most determined attitudes, resisted the claims of the people until the last; and, when he could no longer dictate to them as a patron, he set himself to try whether he could not influence them as a landlord. A day was fixed for the parishioners to meet in the church, that they might avail themselves of the gift of the Crown by making choice of a minister; and, before it arrived, the Captain made the round of his estate, visiting his tenants and dependants, and every one whom he had either obliged, or had the power of obliging, with the intention of forming a party to vote for Mr. Simpson. All his influence, however, proved insufficient to accomplish his object. His tenants preserved either a moody silence when he urged them to come into his plans, or replied to his arguments, which savoured sadly of temporal interests, in rude homilies about liberty of conscience and the rights of the people. Urquhart was not naturally a very patient man; he had been trained, too, in a rough school; and, long before he had accomplished the purposed round, he had got into one of his worst moods. His arguments had been converted into threats, and his threats met by sturdy defiances. In the evening of this vexatious day he stood in front of the steadings of Roderick Ross of the Hill, a plain decent farmer, much beloved by the poor for the readiness with which he imparted to them of his substance, and not a little respected by Urquhart himself for his rough strong sense and sterling honesty. A grey, weather-wasted headstone still marks out his grave; but of the cottage which he inhabited, of his garden fence, and the large gnarled elms which sprung out of it, of his barns, his cow-houses, and his sheep-folds, there is not a single vestige. They occupied, eighty years ago, the middle of one of the parks which are laid out on the hill of Cromarty where it overlooks the town--the third park in the upper range from the eastern corner. In rainy seasons, the spring which supplied his well comes bursting out from among the furrows. Roderick came from the barn to meet the laird; and, after the customary greeting, was informed of the cause of his visit. The merits of the case he had discussed at mill and smithy with every farmer on the estate; and, with his usual bluntness, he now inquired at the laird what interest he, a Papist, could have in the concerns of a Protestant church. “For observe, Captain,” said he, “if ye ettle at serving us wi’ a minister, sound after your way o’ belief, I maun in conscience gie you a’ the hinderance I can, as the man must be an unsound Papisher to me; an’ if, what’s mair likely, ye only wuss to oblige the callant Simpson wi’ a glebe, stipend, an’ manse, without meddling wi’ ony religion, it’s surely my part to oppose ye baith;--you, for making God’s kirk meat an’ drink to a hireling; him, for taking it on sic