"'John Gib,' cried Anton Lennox, 'stand up before the Lord, and answer—who has done this?'
"'I, that am the head of the Sweet Singers, and the Lord's anointed!' said he. 'I have done it!'
"'Then, by the Lord's great name, I will make you sing right sweetly for this!' cried Anton, taking a vow.
"Then one of the women took up the parable.
"'We heard a voice in the Frost Moss,' she said, 'and a light shone about us there; and John Gib bade us burn our Bibles, for that the Psalms in Metre, the chapter headings, and the Table of Contents were but human inventions.'
"'And I did it out of despite against God!' cried John Gib.
"Then Anton Lennox said not a word more, but cast away his plaid, spat upon his cudgel-palm, and called over his shoulder to me:
"'Come, Sandy, and help me to wrestle in the Spirit with these Sweet Singers.'
"As he ran down the brae, David Jamie, the student youth, came at him with a little spit-stick of a sword, and cried that if he came nearer he would run him through.
"'The Lord forgie ye for leein', callant,' cried Anton, catching the poor thin blade on his great oak cudgel, for Anton was a great player with the single-sticks, and as a lad had been the cock of the country-side. The steel, being spindle-thin, shivered into twenty pieces, and the poor lad stood gaping at the sword-hilt left in his hand, which had grown suddenly light.