"Amen!" said the Sergeant; "and gang about yer business to auld wives and idewits, that deserve to dee if they trust the like o’ you."
And so the great Dr. Mair departed in wrath--real or pretended--to pursue his calling as a leech, verily sucking the blood of the credulous, of whom there are not a few among rich and poor, who, loving quackery, are quacked.[#]
[#] It may be added as an instructive fact, that such leeches suck at least £300,000 a year out of the people of this country.
Having disposed of the Quack, we now back into the main line, and resume our journey.
Corporal Dick, who lived in the village of Darnic, several hours’ journey by the "Highflyer" coach from Drumsylie, came at this time to pay his annual visit to the Sergeant.
The Corporal, while serving in the same regiment with Adam, had been impressed, as we have already indicated, by the Christian character of his comrade. Those early impressions had been deepened shortly after his return home from service. We need not here record the circumstances in which this decided change in his sentiments and character had taken place. Many of our Scotch readers, at least, have heard of the movement in the beginning of this century by the devoted Haldanes, who, as gentlemen of fortune, and possessing the sincerest and strongest Christian convictions, broke the formality which was freezing Christian life in many a district of Scotland. They did the same kind of work for the Church in the North which Wesley and Whitfield had done for that in the South, though with less permanent results as far as this world is concerned. Dick joined the "Haldanites". Along with all the zeal and strictness characteristic of a small body, he possessed a large share of _bonhomie_, and of the freedom, subdued and regulated, of the old soldier.
At these annual visits the old veterans fought their battles over again, recalling old comrades and repeating old stories; neither, however, being old in their affections or their memories. But never had the Corporal visited his friend with a more eager desire to "hear his news" than on the present occasion. He had often asked people from Drumsylie, whom he happened to meet, what all this disputing and talk about Adam Mercer meant? And every new reply he received to his question, whether favourable or unfavourable to the Sergeant, only puzzled him the more. One thing, however, he never could be persuaded of--that his friend Adam Mercer would do anything unbecoming to his "superior officer", as he called the minister; or "break the Sabbath", an institution which, like every good Scotchman, he held in peculiar veneration; or be art or part in any mutiny against the ordinances or principles of true religion. And yet, how could he account for all that been told him by "decent folk" and well-informed persons? The good he heard of the Sergeant was believed in by the Corporal as a matter of course; but what of the evil, which seemed to rest upon equally reliable authority?