so that the joints ache and the
wrists faint under your weight.

Now and then, indeed, where was a big bush of heather, we lay awhile and
panted, and, putting aside the leaves, looked back at the dragoons. They
had not spied us, for they held straight on; a half-troop, I think,
covering about two miles of ground, and beating it mighty thoroughly as
they went. I had awakened just in time; a little later, and we must have
fled in front of them, instead of escaping on one side. Even as it was,
the least misfortune might betray us; and now and again, when a grouse
rose out of the heather with a clap of wings, we lay as still as the
dead, and were afraid to breathe.

The aching and faintness of my body, the labouring of my heart, the
soreness of my hands, and the smarting of my throat and eyes in the
continual smoke of dust and ashes, had soon grown to be so unbearable
that I would gladly have given up. Nothing but the fear of Alan lent me
enough of a false kind of courage to continue. As for himself (and you
are to bear in mind that he was cumbered with a great-coat) he had first
turned crimson, but as time went on the redness began to be mingled with
patches of white; his breath cried and whistled as it came; and his
voice, when he whispered his observations in my ear during our halts,
sounded like nothing human. Yet he seemed in no way dashed in spirits,
nor did he at all abate in his activity; so that I was driven to marvel
at the man's endurance.

At length, in the first gloaming of the night, we heard a trumpet sound,
and, looking back from among the heather, saw the troop beginning to
collect. A little after, they had built a fire and camped for the night,
about the middle of the waste.

At this I begged and besought that we might lie down and sleep.

"There shall be no sleep the night!" said Alan. "From now on, these
weary dragoons of yours will keep the crown of the muirland, and none
will get out of Appin but winged fowls. We got through in the nick of
time, and shall we jeopard what we've gained? Na, na, when the day
comes, it shall find you and me in a fast place on Ben Alder."

"Alan," I said, "it's not the want of will: it's the strength that I
want. If I could, I would; but as sure as I'm alive, I cannot."

"Very well, then," said Alan, "I'll carry ye."

I looked to see if he were jesting; but no, the little man was in dead
earnest; and the sight of so much resolution shamed me.

"Lead away!" said I