She soon got into bed, and, as a precautionary measure, buried her head under the clothes before she began to say her prayers, which, under the circumstances, she had thought she might be excused for leaving till she had lain down.

But her prayers were suddenly interrupted by a terrible noise of scrambling and scratching and scampering in the very room beside her.
"I tried to cry oot," she said afterwards, "for I kent 'at it was rottans; but my tongue booed i' my mou' for fear, and I cudna speak ae word." The child's fear of rats amounted to a frenzied horror.

She dared not move a finger.

To get out of bed with those creatures running about the room was as impossible as it was to cry out.

But her heart did what her tongue could not do--cried out with a great and bitter cry to one who was more ready to hear than Robert and Nancy Bruce.