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One evening the same clergyman was dining with a pleasant party at a laird’s house about a mile from the village, when it flashed across his mind that he ought to have been at that moment performing a baptism in the house of one of the villagers. Hastily asking to be excused for a little, as he had forgotten an engagement, and with the assurance that he would soon be back, he started off. It was past nine o’clock before he reached the village and knocked at the door of his parishioner. There was no answer for a time, and after a second and more vigorous knock, the window overhead was opened, and a voice demanded who was there. ‘It’s me, Mrs. Maclellan. I’m very sorry, indeed, to have forgotten about the baptism. But it’s not too late yet’ ‘O minister, we’re in bed, and a’ the fowk are awa’. We canna hae the baptism noo.’ ‘Never mind the folk, Mrs. Maclellan; is the bairn here?’ ‘Ow ay, the bairn’s here, sure eneuch.’ ‘Weel, that will do, and so you maun let me in, and we’ll hae the baptism after all.’ The husband had meanwhile pulled some clothes on, and with his wife came downstairs to let in their minister. The ‘tea-things,’ which the good woman had prepared with great care for her little festival, had been carried back to the kitchen, whither the husband had gone for a lamp. The woman appeared with the child, and begged that they would come into her parlour. But the minister, assuring her that the room made no difference, proceeded with the ceremony in the kitchen. When the moment came for sprinkling the baby, he dipped his hand into the first basin he saw. ‘O stop, stop Mr—— that’s the water I washed up the tea-cups and saucers in.’ ‘It will do as well as any other,’ he said, and continued his prayer to the end of the short service. As soon as it was over, he started back to the laird’s, and rejoined the party after an absence of about an hour.