66 The Naturalist of Cumbrae. 



Robertson, preferring farce to melodrama for home 

 consumption, at last grew tired of all this, and took 

 'an opportunity, when the man was in the tragedy 

 vein, of offering him a knife, saying, " Don't be always 

 talking of it, just do it, and have done with it." "Ah," 

 said the fellow, "you would like it, wouldn't you?" 

 But he did not accept his companion's kind offer, nor 

 did he ever again propose to do himself an injury 

 when David was present 



In his new employment it was agreed that David 

 should be allowed to go on winter nights at eight 

 o'clock, after he had suppered the horses, to a night 

 school at a place called Millwell, perhaps about three 

 miles or so distant, to take lessons in arithmetic. 

 The book used in the schools of the district was 

 " Gray's Arithmetic," in which he had already made 

 some progress, so that he did not need to go every 

 night, but only when his calculations had been 

 brought to a standstill by some stumbling-block. 

 When he went, it was not to take a seat in the 

 school, but just to have his difficulty explained, so as 

 to see how the answer to the riddle came out. This 

 seldom took more than a few minutes, nor did he 

 often need to consult the oracle again sooner than in 

 two or three days, by which time he might have met 

 with some fresh difficulty which he could not master. 

 On the road to school there was a burn to be crossed 

 by stepping stones. In the dark the stones could 

 not be safely used, and often the burn was swollen 

 above them, so that on almost all occasions he had 

 to strip off his shoes and stockings and wade across. 

 As this was many a time when the snow was on the 



