"Ay, and who dares say I'm not Archie Fearn?" replied the man. "Was I no born in Scotland? And do I not speak like a Scotsman?"
"You did not call yourself Archie Fearn the last time I saw you," said the judge.
"And when might ye have seen me?"
"I saw you in Liverpool two years ago. You called yourself John McPhail then, and it was my duty to give you six months with hard labour."
The man looked at the judge coolly. "Ay, very likely," he replied. "Ay, I remember noo, I remember noo," and he laughed significantly.
"Why do you laugh?" asked the judge.
"I was thinking," was the reply. "I think of mony things. The Scotch are a canny people. You'll be knowing that yourself, my lord."
"And you say you're Willie Fearn's brother?" said the judge.
"Ay, I am and all. It's perfectly true that Willie is an elder in the kirk, while I am—weel, what you see me; but, for all that, I know more about the fundamentals of doctrine than he does. I know the second catechism by heart, and I could put any meenister in this toon to shame. Ay, man, but if you want to hear preaching you must go to Scotland. It's there that the meenisters are groonded in the faith. In these English kirks they are very lax in the faith." And again the man laughed as though something amused him.
"You seem to boast a good deal of your knowledge," said the judge, trying to estimate the man.