as the sun in the heavens that the ancient place of the Breadlands
would be destroyed; whereupon he accorded to go with me, and we

walked at a lively course to the spot, and the people from all
quarters were pouring in, and it was an awsome scene. But the

burning of the house, and the droves of the multitude, were nothing
to what we saw when we got forenent the place. There was the

rafters crackling, the flames raging, the servants running, some
with bedding, some with looking-glasses, and others with chamber

utensils as little likely to be fuel to the fire, but all
testifications to the confusion and alarm. Then there was a shout,

"Whar's Miss Girzie? whar's the Major?" The Major, poor man, soon
cast up, lying upon a feather-bed, ill with his complaints, in the

garden; but Lady Skimmilk was nowhere to be found. At last, a
figure was seen in the upper flat, pursued by the flames, and that

was Miss Girzie. Oh! it was a terrible sight to look at her in that
jeopardy at the window, with her gold watch in the one hand and the

silver teapot in the other, skreighing like desperation for a ladder
and help. But, before a ladder or help could be found, the floor

sunk down, and the roof fell in, and poor Miss Girzie, with her
idols, perished in the burning. It was a dreadful business! I

think, to this hour, how I saw her at the window, how the fire came
in behind her, and claught her like a fiery Belzebub, and bore her

into perdition before our eyes. The next morning the atomy of the
body was found among the rubbish, with a piece of metal in what had

been each of its hands, no doubt the gold watch and the silver
teapot. Such was the end of Miss Girzie; and the Breadland, which

the young laird, my pupil that was, by growing a resident at
Edinburgh, never rebuilt. It was burnt to the very ground; nothing

was spared but what the servants in the first flaught gathered up in
a hurry and ran with; but no one could tell how the Major, who was

then, as it was thought by the faculty, past the power of nature to
recover, got out of the house, and was laid on the feather-bed in

the garden. However, he never got the better of that night, and
before Whitsunday he was dead too, and buried beside his sister's

bones at the south side of the kirkyard dyke, where his cousin's
son, that was his heir, erected the handsome monument, with the

three urns and weeping cherubims, bearingwitness to the great
valour of the Major among the Hindoos, as well as other commendable

virtues, for which, as the epitaph says, he was universally esteemed
and beloved, by all who knew him, in his public and private

capacity.
But although the burning of the Breadland-House was justly called

the great calamity, on account of what happened to Miss Girzie with
her gold watch and silver teapot; yet, as Providence never fails to

bring good out of evil, it turned out a catastrophe that proved
advantageous to the parish; for the laird, instead of thinking to

build it up, was advised to let the policy out as a farm, and the
tack was taken by Mr Coulter, than whom there had been no such man

in the agriculturing line among us before, not even excepting Mr
Kibbock of the Gorbyholm, my father-in-law that was. Of the

stabling, Mr Coulter made a comfortable dwelling-house; and having
rugget out the evergreens and other profitable" target="_blank" title="a.没有利润的；无益的">unprofitable plants, saving the

twa ancient yew-trees which the near-begaun Major and his sister had
left to go to ruin about the mansion-house, he turned all to

production, and it was wonderful what an increase he made the land
bring forth. He was from far beyond Edinburgh, and had got his

insight among the Lothian farmers, so that he knew what crop should
follow another, and nothing could surpass the regularity of his rigs

and furrows.--Well do I remember the admiration that I had, when, in
a fine sunny morning of the first spring after he took the

Breadland, I saw his braird on what had been the cows' grass, as
even and pretty as if it had been worked and stripped in the loom

with a shuttle. Truly, when I look back at the example he set, and
when I think on the method and dexterity of his management, I must

say, that his coming to the parish was a great godsend, and tended
to do far more for the benefit of my people, than if the young laird

had rebuilded the Breadland-House in a fashionable style, as was at
one time spoken of.

But the year of the great calamity was memorable for another thing:-
in the December foregoing, the wind blew, as I have recorded in the

chronicle of the last year, and broke down the bough of the tree
whereon the kirk-bell had hung from the time, as was supposed, of

the persecution, before the bringing over of King William. Mr
Kibbock, my father-in-law then that was, being a man of a discerning

spirit, when he heard of the unfortunate fall of the bell, advised
me to get the heritors to big a steeple; but which, when I thought

of the expense, I was afraid to do. He, however, having a great
skill in the heart of man, gave me no rest on the subject; but told

me, that if I allowed the time to go by till the heritors were used
to come to the kirk without a bell, I would get no steeple at all.

I often wondered what made Mr Kibbock so fond of a steeple, which is
a thing that I never could see a good reason for, saving that it is

an ecclesiastical adjunct, like the gown and bands. However, he set
me on to get a steeple proposed, and after no little argol-bargling

with the heritors, it was agreed to. This was chiefly owing to the
instrumentality of Lady Moneyplack, who, in that winter, was much

subjected to the rheumatics, she having, one cold and raw Sunday
morning, there being no bell to announce the time, come half an hour

too soon to the kirk, made her bestir herself to get an interest
awakened among the heritors in behalf of a steeple.

But when the steeple was built, a new contention arose. It was
thought that the bell, which had been used in the ash-tree, would

not do in a stone and lime fabric; so, after great agitation among
the heritors, it was resolved to sell the old bell to a foundery in

Glasgow, and buy a new bell suitable to the steeple, which was a
very comelyfabric. The buying of the new bell led to other

considerations, and the old Lady Breadland, being at the time in a
decaying condition, and making her will, she left a mortification to

the parish, as I have intimated, to get a clock; so that, by the
time the steeple was finished, and the bell put up, the Lady

Breadland's legacy came to be implemented, according to the
ordination of the testatrix.

Of the casualities that happened in this year, I should not forget
to put down, as a thing for remembrance, that an aged woman, one

Nanse Birrel, a distillator of herbs, and well skilled in the
healing of sores, who had a great repute among the quarriers and

colliers--she having gone to the physic well in the sandy hills to
draw water, was found, with her feet uppermost in the well, by some

of the bairns of Mr Lorimore's school; and there was a great debate
whether Nanse had fallen in by accident head foremost, or, in a

temptation, thrown herself in that position, with her feet sticking
up to the evil one; for Nanse was a curious discontented blear-eyed

woman, and it was only with great ado that I could get the people
keepit from calling her a witchwife.

I should likewise place on record, that the first ass that had ever
been seen in this part of the country, came in the course of this

year with a gang of tinklers, that made horn-spoons and mended
bellows. Where they came from never was well made out; but being a

blackaviced crew, they were generally thought to be Egyptians. They
tarried about a week among us, living in tents, with their little

ones squattling among the litter; and one of the older men of them
set and tempered to me two razors, that were as good as nothing, but

which he made better than when they were new.
Shortly after, but I am not quite sure whether it was in the end of

this year, or the beginning of the next, although I have a notion
that it was in this, there came over from Ireland a troop of wild

Irish, seeking for work as they said; but they made free quarters,
for they herrit the roosts of the clachan, and cutted the throat of

a sow of ours, the carcass of which they no doubt intended to steal;
but something came over them, and it was found lying at the back

side of the manse, to the great vexation of Mrs Balwhidder; for she
had set her mind on a clecking of pigs, and only waited for the