CHAP. xvn. HIS COUNTRY WALKS. 267 



pain. He says to his friend Peach that he is " suffering 

 the punishment of over-fatigue and confinement to the 

 house." He had no assistant in his daily labour no 

 journeyman, no apprentice. All his work was done by 

 himself. And yet he continued his walks. " Like all 

 confined animals," he said, "when snuffing the caller 

 air, I become quite uproarious. A walk of twenty-six 

 miles is such a very fine thing." 



But it is an awful thing in the North to take a walk 

 on a Sunday. The Thurso folks saw him going out and 

 coming in on that day, and they were very much shocked. 

 What could come of such a person? They began to 

 belabour him with tracts. These accumulated on his 

 hands so much, that he went to the oven one day, drew 

 the fire to the front of the grate, put in the bundle of 

 tracts, and pushed the burning coals back, thus con- 

 suming them to ashes. 



A few years later, when Dr. Macleod raised such a 

 stir in the North by his observations as to the Judaical 

 observance of the Sabbath by his countrymen, Robert 

 Dick observed to his brother-in-law : " I have got the 

 newspaper containing the uproar about Dr. Macleod, 

 and am much amused at what their reverences said. 

 They would, if they could, shut out the light. ' Donald, 

 man, Donald ! what is it that ye'll aye be shutting out 

 ta light ?' ' If ta tail pe brak, ye'll find that ! Very 

 good ; and all the noise, I fancy, is for fear that 'the tail 

 pe brak.'"* 



* The allusion is to an anecdote of two expatriated Highlaudmen in 

 Canada, who went out to hunt for wild pigs. They found a litter in 



