The house was two stories high, with two large rooms on each.
It opened not directly on the garden, but on a causewayed path, or passage, giving on the road on the one hand, and closed on the other by the tall willows and elders that bordered on the stream.

And it was this strip of causeway that enjoyed among the young parishioners of Balweary so infamous a reputation.

The minister walked there often after dark, sometimes groaning aloud in the instancy of his unspoken prayers; and when he was from home, and the manse door was locked, the more daring schoolboys ventured, with beating hearts, to 'follow my leader' across that legendary spot.
This atmosphere of terror, surrounding, as it did, a man of God of spotless character and orthodoxy, was a common cause of wonder and subject of inquiry among the few strangers who were led by chance or business into that unknown, outlying country.

But many even of the people of the parish were ignorant of the strange events which had marked the first year of Mr.Soulis's ministrations; and among those who were better informed, some were naturally reticent, and others shy of that particular topic.

Now and again, only, one of the older folk would warm into courage over his third tumbler, and recount the cause of the minister's strange looks and solitary life.
* * * * * Fifty years syne, when Mr.Soulis cam first into Ba'weary, he was still a young man--a callant, the folk said--fu' o' book learnin' and grand at the exposition, but, as was natural in sae young a man, wi' nae leevin' experience in religion.