"Wife an' bairns, indeed!" said Janet; "vera uncertain comforts, ma'am, an' vera certain cares. Our Master Davie likes aye to be sure o' his bargains."
"Weel, Janet, it's a great cross to me--an' him sae honored, an' guid an' rich, wi' no a shilling ill-saved to shame him."
"Tut, tut, ma'am! The river doesna' swell wi' clean water. Naebody's charged him wi' wrangdoing--that's enough. There's nae need to set him up for a saint."
"An' you wanted him to be a minister, Janet."
"Wi' _excepts_, ma'am; but they'll ne'er be found amang mithers."
This conversation took place one lovely Sabbath evening, and just at the same time David was standing thoughtfully on Princes street, Edinburgh, wondering to which church he had better turn his steps. For a sudden crisis in the affairs of a bank in that city had brought him hurriedly to Scotland, and he was not only a prudent man who considered public opinion, but was also in a mood to conciliate that opinion so long as the outward conditions were favorable. Whatever he might do in London, in Scotland he always went to morning and evening service.
He was also one of those self-dependent men who dislike to ask questions or advice from anyone. Though a comparative stranger he would not have allowed himself to think that anyone could direct him better than he could choose for himself. He looked up and down the street, and finally followed a company which increased continually until they entered an old church in the Canongate.
Its plain wooden pews and old-fashioned elevated pulpit rather pleased than offended David, and the air of antiquity about the place consecrated it in his eyes. Men like whatever reminds them of their purest and best days, and David had been once in the old Relief Church on the Doo Hill in Glasgow--just such a large, bare, solemn-looking house of worship. The still, earnest men and women, the droning of the precentor, the antiquated singing pleased and soothed him. He did not notice much the thin little fair man who conducted the services; for he was holding a session with his own soul.
A peculiar movement among the congregation announced that the sermon was beginning, and David, looking up, saw that the officiating minister had been changed. This man was swarthy and tall, and looked like some old Jewish prophet, as he lifted his rapt face and cried, like one crying in the wilderness, "Friends! I have a question to ask you to-night: '_What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul_?'"