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186 ill o' the spavin—I hae seen the beast baith before and since."

"Aweel, aweel, Jock," answered Mr Skreigh, with a tone of mild solemnity, "our accounts differ in no material particulars; but I had no knowledge that ye had seen the man—So ye see, my friends, that this sooth-sayer having prognosticated evil to the boy, his father engaged a godly minister to be with him morn and night."

"Aye, that was him they ca'd Dominie Sampson," said the postillion.

"He's but a dumb dog, that," observed the Deacon; "I have heard that he never could preach five words of a sermon endlang, for as lang as he has been licensed."

"Weel, but," said the Precentor, waving his hand, as if eager to retrieve the command of the discourse, "he waited on the young Laird by night and day. Now, it chanced, when the bairn was near five years auld, that the Laird had a sight of his errors, and determined to put these Egyptians aff his ground; and he caused them