There was a wilderness of trees all about, bird-haunted trees. Surely not a feathered songster that ever trilled a note in the far North that did not sing in those copses and groves, while high aloft, in the swaying pine-trees, lived hawk and crow and magpie.
All the place, in the sweet summer-time, was a poem, a romance, a dream.
Of course Kilbuie Cottage was now given up, and Sandie’s mother and Elsie came to reside at the manse, and sit Sunday after Sunday in the manse pew, near to the pulpit.
Sandie’s living was a good one, and there was, in addition to the stipend, a large and rich farm of glebeland, which soon became the young minister’s chief delight.
. . . . . .
I must tell you something else, as long as I think of it. Jamie Duncan had a rich uncle, who was good enough to shuffle off this mortal coil for the benefit of Jamie. He left him quite a haul of money.
Then Jamie took Kilbuie farm and stocked it, and elevated Geordie Black—the quondam orra man—to the proud position of first horseman, and lived happy ever afterwards, so far as I know.
I did hear lately that Geordie Black had married Tibbie, but it may be mere rumour.
. . . . . .
One beautiful summer’s day Willie called at the manse. He had come to stay for a whole fortnight.