daft about Dalrymple; and some of the auld anes, that should ken better. But no me! he never lets on when he sees me-he's oure prood and taen up wi' himsel for that. Him like Dr. Yule! Gae awa, gae awa, dinna tell me. I ken better."

Cairney has weathered these ten years manfully, like a brig lying to. As he stood with his blue coat and gilt buttons beneath the portico of the Greenock Custom-House, watching one of his heavy laden vessels, with loosened sails, returning from her voyage, and about to cast anchor, he seemed a statue erected there to an old generation of honourable, wealthy, though somewhat rough guild of shipowners, who were passing rapidly

away.

No one ever fancied ten years could materially alter his wife. One word about her in passing. Mrs. Campbell was recognised by the wise and prudent as a sort of model wife, and as the very genius of order and exact propriety. She prided herself on never giving way to her feelings, and abhorred everything like sentiment or emotion. She was incapable of hate and revenge, as these passions are ordinarily expressed, and equally incapable of self-sacrificing love, or generous enthusiasm. Her hooked nose, thin lips, sharp chin, and grey eyes became her-that is, they seemed perfectly adapted to her spirit. Her gown, which flowed to the ground in straight lines from her thin waist, and descended from her thin neck to her waist, at an acute angle, with white muslin within, the whole connected by a large pin, of Achnabeg hair, was such a dress as she might have been born in-like prophetic swaddling clothes. A fruit-tree, perfectly pruned and nailed down to the wall, was her ideal of the form to which the human mind, domestic arrangements, and society in general ought to be trained. A branch growing free was a painful defect in her eyes. Accordingly, her daughter Kate was often a source of anxiety to her; for she never could, with all her consummate art, sharp pruning, or careful hammering, adjust her branches to her ideal type of beauty. She attributed these defects to her husband's influence, who, she alleged, was too old when he came under his wife's training to be touched or cultivated with any hope of improving his own twisted and gnarled condition. Cairney was, in her estimation, an old tree of good and evil, which flung out its branches at the promptings of rude nature, and could neither be cut down nor transplanted, lest its fruit, on which Mrs. Campbell's subsistence depended, should be entirely lost, and leaves only appear, or the whole plant die down to its stump.

Duncan Ardmore has long ago obtained a commission in the army-served abroad, and is daily expecting his company. Old Martin Shillabeer has been dead several years; but his niece Floxy was educated by Miss Duncombe, and also trained as a waiting-maid, and is acting in that capacity with Mrs. and Miss Macdougall at Ardmore. Finally, little Curly has become Dr. Morris, and occupies the second flat of a house in the main street of the old borough, the lower flat of which is distinguished by a large window that gleams with two huge bottles of green and pink water.

But it is necessary to enter a little more into detail regarding two at least of those persons, whom the

busy hands of ten years had been moulding without and within, until they had well-nigh assumed the form which they would probably maintain for life.

Ned has made several voyages to different parts of the world since we last parted with him; and has been for some time in command of a fine new ship of Cairney's, called the "William Pitt," in honour of the great pilot who had weathered the storm.

Never did a truer man pace the deck, although that field of his fame belonged to a merchantship only; yet it is the hero that makes the field illustrious, and not the field the hero. In his outward appearance he was what the old writers would have described as "a pretty man," which expressed whatever was comely as well as manly. "Jack" never attempted to picture him in words, but every man on board of the "William Pitt" was proud of the skipper. He had little of the sailor in his dress, or in his appearance, beyond the sunburnt face and hands, and even less in his manners. These were well bred, because springing from a benevolent heart and good sense. He was modest and unassuming, mindful of the wants and feelings of others, without being in the least degree obtrusive. Those habits of study, and literary tastes which he had acquired in the old Grammar School, were of immense importance to him, even in his rough sea-life. He devoted every spare hour to reading, and his constant ambition was to become thoroughly accomplished in his profession, as a scientific seaman. merchant-navy, thanks to improved legislation, as well as to improved civilisation, has now very many officers of the same stamp. At that time they were more rare. His only amusement was the keybugle, which he was taught by his black cook, who had been once in a regimental band, but from dissipated habits was forced to adopt an artistic profession of another kind in the caboose of the "William Pitt."

The

The manner in which Ned discharged his duties as the captain of the "William Pitt" was, unknown to him, described to old Cairney by Jack Musters, his boatswain, another Englishman whom he had picked up and appointed to this post of honour. Cairney was what is called "a knowing old hand," and, afraid of being deceived by those whom he employed, was in the habit of questioning the sailors, when he had a quiet opportunity of doing so, about their officers. This he did in an apparently easy off-hand, "by-the-way" style, as if he had no interest whatever in any information he might elicit, but was talking merely for talking's sake. Yet all the while he would greedily drink in every word; and no witness on a trial for murder was listened to by a jury with more eager attention than were those sailors by Cairney when anxious to learn what sort of men had charge of his ships. Accordingly, when Musters came one day to his office, on some business or other, Cairney, with an artless, careless air, and while filling up some printed form on his desk, asked— Well, how do you like the Captain ?" "First-rate," said Jack; "true blue !"

"

"Good seaman ?" continued Cairney, looking at Musters, who leant upon the sort of counter in

the office, which fenced off from the passage the inner sanctum that contained the Owner's desk

and stool.

'Seaman?" replied Jack, "I should like to know! It would do your heart good, sir, just to come a voyage to see how he handles his ship. He's a navigator, no mistake. Fair or foul, he works with them instruments of his amazing, taking lunars, or taking stars; for your moon or stars are all the same to him; and he'll tell you to the length of a marling-spike where the ship is any hour, day or night, or at what bells he'll make the lights or the land. He's wonderful, I do assure you-he really is wonderful!"

no small trial of his faith. To yield meekly to God's will as our Almighty provider; to hold fast our confidence in Him as a Father who knows the things we stand in need of, and remembers every fibre of our frame which He has made, and who in His Son has witnessed for His oneness with us as human beings, and believing this, to tell God our every care, and then to wait on Him in peace; this, I say, is not easy for any one, especially for one with a naturally vehement passionate nature keenly appreciating the enjoyments of social life. "Why was I made for love, and love denied to me?" is a question which many have answered for themselves in the flush and strength

"Keep you in good order-eh ?"

"We don't need it," said Musters, with a smile; we likes to please him, and mind you," remarked the boatswain, leaning forward and talking in a confidential tone of voice, "he never speaks an oath nor abuses one-ain't it queer? Aye, and he gives the men liberty to read, and has books for them too, and talks to them friendly like; and every Sunday, I do assure your honour, he is like a parson, - he is indeed—a reading the Scriptures and explaining them-the men tell me, and I am of the same mind myself, that they would rather hear the Captain than most of them parsons. Any how, we all likes him, for no mistake he likes us, and it's a pleasure to sail with him; and the ship is like what a ship should be, and not, as I have seen it, begging your honour's pardon, like a hell upon earth."

"I am afraid, Boatswain, he is a soft-hearted, easy, lubberly chap, who will give you all your own way," said Cairney.

"That's a good one! Excuse me, sir, but I wish you only saw our skipper in a gale of wind I wish you saw him in the great gale you knows about, of last October, when we nearly foundered! Lubberly!" Musters chewed his tobacco with great vehemence, looking up to the roof. "And as for soft," he continued, again directing his conversation to Cairney, "I'd like to see the man who would dare come to close quarters with Captain Fleming! Let them but see his eye,-it shines; I will maintain it does,—it shines at night, your honour; I've seen it; and as for his hand, why, it's iron! I think he would shake the life out of every man on board, except, mayhap, big | Ben. Lubberly! soft! No, no, Captain Cairney. He is like his ship, well built with heart of oak; well found from junk to biscuit; well rigged and all taught from keel to truck; beautiful and quiet in harbour, but strong and glorious in a gale of wind ;-a craft fit for all seas and all weather! Cairney opened his eyes and ears, and only said, "All right! Here's half a crown to drink success."

As in the case of many others whose position in the arbitrary social scale was not high, because not elevated by riches or rank, Ned's cultivation of mind, refined tastes, and inward appreciation of all that was beautiful and good in man and woman, made him feel more solitary and utterly hopeless of ever finding one who would satisfy the secret longings of his heart. This was to him

of their goods, Then comes the feeds on husks,

ing from Him with the portion to waste them in riotous living. great famine of the soul, when it and feeds with swine! Why that springtime "when a young man's fancy lightly falls on thoughts of love," should be the subject of so much comedy, I know not; for to all it is a solemn crisis, and to many it is a tragedy, acted within the soul on a midnight stage, with no lights and no spectators, but where wounds are nevertheless given which, if they do not kill the heart, may yet leave scars there for life. In no moment in our history is the reality of faith in a loving God and Father more demanded than when the heart is yearning for a creature affection to fill up its void, or when the bright hope dawns that the lamb is found which God has provided for the great and blessed sacrifice of devoted love!

But how shall I describe Kate Cairney?—I frankly confess my inability to hold out from me, to look at, and to criticise those whom I admire, so as to perceive their faults. I suppose Kate had her faults. Outwardly she had none; that I will boldly maintain, should any conceited critic or envious rival dare to suggest their existence. Look at her graceful figure, with its graceful movements; glance at the waving gleams in her hair; study the head that wears it, and see how it is poised on her lovely neck; gaze on that face, at morn or even, in laughter or in tearful sadness; and, after having been attracted by each beautiful feature, when you can at last see nothing but those eyes that pierce you through and through, as sunlight pierces through the clouds,-do you not feel that they are the out-looks from an inner being of depth, purity, and beauty, greater even than all the beauty you behold? Do you not feel assured that truth and goodness are within, and look through them from a most genuine soul;-and not the less genuine but the more, because of its keen sense of the ludicrous, which can make her laugh with such thorough enjoyment, or its keener sense of wrong, which often casts a shadow on her brow? Could we see her inner life as she herself, no doubt, perceives it, many a spot would be discovered on the bright disk of her sun. A large spot of pride; another of self-will; another of impatience when crossed, and of fretfulness at evil-doers; another dark spot of strange fears and despondency; but in spite of all, a light shines there "that never was on sea or land." If Kate had no faults she could not have been a daughter of her motherI don't mean Eve, but Mrs. Campbell.

ahead as if guiding him, and lighting up his path across the waste of waters, and that her voice, her form, her words, all exercised a marvellous undying power over him ;—but what of all that? It was a mere exercise of cool justice. She deserved this. Ned had heard, besides, that a certain M'Dougal of Ardmore was her destined bridegroom-a cousin too by another family branch-(why did not some winter gale break such a branch!)-Little fussy Miss M'Grigor had expressed her surprise to him at a tea-party in Greenock that he had never heard of this "match.' Often did Ned conjecture what sort of fellow M'Dougal was, and many imaginary scenes were acted by him, in which he repeated all Kate and M'Dougal would say to him in certain given circumstances, with all he would say, or endeavour to say to them, until a crisis came in the performance of this drama, when, his face getting red, he would stamp with his foot, and declare himself a jack-ass. Such dreams, half tragic half comic, were generally ended by a rush from the cabin to the deck, with the snatch of a song or effort at whistling; and, as he then paced about, he sometimes thought that the stars twinkled sadly, and that there was in the heaving sea a dread irresistible power, like an unfathomed destiny, that bore him on, with its wild waves and surging tides. But brain and heart became more calm, and settled into their usual state of rest, as he seized his key-bugle, and after lingering softly for a moment on "the banks and braes o' Bonnie Doon," burst forth in triumph with the immortal strain of "A man's a man for a' that." But, again I ask, what did all this prove? Nothing. And yet it proved more than Ned would dare to confess even to himself. For next to the highest of all influences, the presence in the thoughts of a pure and loving woman is the most refining and elevating which visits the heart of man.

CHAPTER XVII.-ARDMORE.

Ardmore House had originally been constructed after a type of architecture which required little genius for its production unless the genius of ugliness-and why should not perfect ugliness require genius as well as perfect beauty? The said habitation was neither the legitimate successor of the old Highland home of " gentleman tenants," men who were often nearly related by blood to the Laird, and to the best in the land by education and manners. That Highland house of the olden time, with its roofing of straw or heather, fitted into the landscape like a grey boulder crowned with tufted heath or waving bracken, and this the house of Ardmore never did. Nor was it the ancestor of the railway station-house style of architecture, which, in every variety of peaked gable ends and bow-windows, obtrudes itself on the margin of our western lochs. The dwellingplace of the M'Dougals was a house of two storeys, with slated roof, and a chimney at each end, three small windows above, and one on each side of a square porch, which, like a large nose, protruded from between those small, square eyes. The building sprung out of the green grass, alone and solitary, like a mushroom, and without ornament of any kind from shrub or flower.

Its

only accompaniments were a black peat-stack, which supplied the fuel; and at a little distance "the square" of houses required for horses and cattle, pigs and poultry, which reposed there at | night, though, during the day, they were free to gather their food up to the walls of the mansionhouse. The only object of interest in its immediate neighbourhood was the beautiful sea-beach of Ardmore Bay, flanked on each side by wooded promontories, interspersed with grey rock and natural copse. On one of those low headlands was the remains of an old feudal keep, that towered above a row of scattered cottages, with patches of green fields between them and the sea. In the distance, behind Ardmore, rose a range of hills, whose dark moorlands mingled at their base with green pasture lands, and fed a full-winding stream which flowed past the house to join the sea.

This was the Ardmore of John M'Dougal, the father of the late laird. The said John was an active, industrious man, who, from the manufacture of kelp and the successful breeding of Highland cattle, guided by enormous greed, and an easy conscience in buying and selling, was enabled to add considerably to the original property by purchasing several farms, with such euphonious names as Drumancladich and Copriemehanach.

She

John's son, Duncan, who inherited his father's character as well as property, with the addition of a love for ardent spirits, especially when smuggled, married the daughter of a neighbouring proprietor, and by her received two or three thousand pounds, which was considered rather a handsome "tocher" in the district. Mrs. M'Dougal had been induced to read Waverley when published, and this gave her an impression, which afterwards became to her a settled truth, that a Highland proprietor was the true type of medieval chivalry, and his house, with bagpipe, kilts, and barges, the abode of the arts and of romance. It was she, accordingly, who resolved that Ardmore should be changed into an abode worthy of an old family; although a very small rill from the fountain of chieftainship flowed in Duncan's veins. accordingly began to dress up the old prosaic dwelling-place into one more consistent with picturesque antiquity and modern pretensions. It was quite marvellous how the original walls were concealed or ennobled by alliances with high gables, pepper-box turrets, clusters of chimneys, and other additions, until it looked quite baronial—in a small way. She also carved out a winding avenue, ending with a porter's lodge, which served to accommodate the gardener, and another family, paying rent, in the rear. A new garden was laid out, and beneath the drawing-room window appeared a flowergarden, out of which, by the way, she never managed to banish the hens and turkeys, who burrowed under the rose-trees, and left their feathers on the fuchsias. New larch plantations also grew up, like green beards bristling on every round chin of waste land near the house. Then came a gig instead of the old cart, a new "barge" instead of the old boat; above all, a tawdry awkward lad, called the footman, in place of the sonsie lass who was wont to open the door; until at last Mrs. M'Dougal felt herself in circumstances which entitled her to change the house of Ardmore into the more dignified title of

"Ardmore House," and to engrave the M'Dougal arms on some new silver-plate, as well as to have them painted on the backs of two stiff chairs which stood in the lobby, beneath two deers' heads with branching antlers, flanked by some swords and guns brought by her brother from India, and an old Highland shield, bought in the Saltmarket of Glasgow. When at last she entered her new drawing-room, innocent as yet of peat-reek, gazed on her gilt-paper and handsome windowcurtains, arranged the newly bound books on the centre table, with some bits of china on each side of the new clock upon the table in the recess, and when she finally sat down upon the sofa, contemplating all through her spectacles, she seemed a little, dumpy, self-satisfied, asthmatic female Belshazzar, who said, "Is not this great Babylon that I have built for the throne of my glory?" Her husband died leaving her with a son and daughter-Duncan and Jane. The widow did all justice to the memory of the dear deceased; for, as a Highlander once remarked of his wife's death, "It was a great loss, nae doot, and also a heap o' expenses." The funeral left an inheritance of cold meat, which it required immense perseverance and self-sacrifice for several days on the part of the mourning domestics, and numerous adherents of the family to consume. The whisky gurgled from casks and jars during all hours to supply commemorative services. Mrs. M'Dougal spared no expense in sorrowful garments; her handsome jointure demanding this handsome funeral pile. Then came the condolences from all her neighbours, and their most liberal contributions of tears for the dead Duncan, the more remarkable considering their sentiments about him while alive. The most acute sufferer, perhaps, was old M'Donald, the minister, who felt bound to write a new sermon, or a new tail to an old head, so as to make the character of Duncan harmonize with his text on the blessedness of the righteous dead. But the tragedy soon passed away-the curtain fell-the lights were extinguished, and soon it rose again with the same actors in a comedy of marriage, of which more anon.

Mrs. M'Dougal was what is called an active managing woman, who superintended her farm, while professing, for "gentility's" sake, to leave it to an old confidential servant of the family, who occupied the situation of " ground officer," as an inferior kind of land-steward is called in the Highlands. Her talent consisted chiefly in a sort of cunning prudence, by which she never lost sight of, but stedfastly pursued her own interests, though with great blandness of manner, and the exercise of a liberal hospitality. Her daughter Jane, our old acquaintance, was a comely girl, now quite restored to robust health. She was full of animal spirits, had beautiful white teeth and skin, and a frank | manner without any reserve. But she had no force or depth of character; had always one flirtation at least on hand, and was a constant attender at all regatta and county balls. Her marriage with some one or other was assumed to be a question of time, much more than of affection. Not that Jane would ever marry a man whom she did not profess to love; but if he was "a suitable match" in other respects, she could very easily get up that amount of liking which was proper and becoming, and

which she herself, perhaps, would, for decency's sake, call love; and when on her marriage tour, she would be sure to write her mother, telling her how happy she was in having "such a considerate, attentive husband, who spared no expense," etc., and "how unworthy she was," etc. Nor was she one who was likely to break her heart in any case. Give her only a respectable marriage, and her old flirtations and gleams of more tender attachments would all be absorbed, like meteors in the sun of an "excellent connexion."

Duncan, the laird, with whom we have most to do, had, in his youth, all the disadvantages arising from a mother's teaching, who gave him his own way, and of a tutor's, afterwards his minister, Mr. M'Donald, who dozed over a few lessons with him, but taught him as one who, being a laird, had his fortune of £700 a year already made, and, conse quently, did not require much education. So Duncan, in his youth, galloped about on a red pony with large white eyes and shaggy mane; and educated half a dozen terriers with such care, as, if expended on him. self, would have made him equally obedient, brave, and interesting. He fished, of course, and that to perfection, and never knew, as a boy, what a headache was, except when extra company in the house secured to him extra sweets. He was bold, imperious, and selfish. In due time a commission was obtained for him in the army. His mother recognised this as the gentlemanly thing for him; and Duncan himself, as he grew up and mingled with other young men, longed for so good an opportunity of enjoying independence, and getting quit of his mother's leading strings, as he expressed it. Duncan, as I have said in a previous chapter, after having received his commission, had served with his regiment abroad. He was known in it as being the "fastest" of those who boasted of running along the broad road. Some laughed at his vanity; others pitied his folly; while the more thoughtful and higher bred officers avoided him as much as possible as "a bad style of man," or "a vulgar snob." But Duncan was saved from many a scrape by that prudent cunning which he had inherited from his mother, so that he never quite lost such an amount of reflection as checked him ere he reached the brink of any precipice. When, after some years of experience, he returned home, he had acquired a certain manner which was considered very "gentlemanly" by the circle in which he moved. He dressed well, spoke a strange mixture of Highland Scotch and high English, assumed the airs of a man of the world, and kept his old companions in roars of laughter at the recital of his peculiar adventures.'

One of his boon companions was Peter M'Donald. Peter, or Red Peter as he was called, was short, round, strong, like a Highland bull. Yellow hair crisped in short bleached curls under his Glengarry bonnet, spread as down over his freckled face, and covered the portion of his enormous limbs displayed beneath his red kilt. A row of short white teeth, with small piercing eyes, and broad nose with expanded nostrils, completed his face. I hardly know what was Peter's trade or profession. He had been farmer, distiller, land-agent, and whisky agent. But how he lived now no one could very well tell. Yet Peter never seemed to