about 3 A.M.
Every night , if he chose , he might go down to the manse and share a `` brewst '' of toddy with the minister -- a hare-brained ancient gentleman , long and light and still active , though his knees were loosened with age , and his voice broke continually in childish trebles -- and his lady wife , a heavy , comely dame , without a word to say for herself beyond good-even and good-day . Harum-scarum , clodpole young lairds of the neighbourhood paid him the compliment of a visit . Young Hay of Romanes rode down to call , on his crop-eared pony ; young Pringle of Drumanno came up on his bony grey . Hay remained on the hospitable field , and must be carried to bed ; Pringle got somehow to his saddle about 3 A.M. , and -LRB- as Archie stood with the lamp on the upper doorstep -RRB- lurched , uttered a senseless view-holloa , and vanished out of the small circle of illumination like a wraith . Yet a minute or two longer the clatter of his break-neck flight was audible , then it was cut off by the intervening steepness of the hill ; and again , a great while after , the renewed beating of phantom horsehoofs , far in the valley of the Hermiston , showed that the horse at least , if not his rider , was still on the homeward way . There was a Tuesday club at the `` Crosskeys '' in Crossmichael , where the young bloods of the countryside congregated and drank deep on a percentage of the expense , so that he was left gainer who should have drunk the most . Archie had no great mind to this diversion , but he took it like a duty laid upon him , went with a decent regularity , did his manfullest with the liquor , held up his head in the local jests , and got home again and was able to put up his horse , to the admiration of Kirstie and the lass that helped her .