. Peter
Lauchie jist came to his clearin', and I would be coming to the line
all alone, and then I met Grandaddy an' the boys there."

"Eh, indeed, it is the great man you will be, whatever," she said,
regarding him wistfully. This child, her last baby, and the
best-beloved, was growing up swiftly to manhood, and like all the
others would soon have interests beyond her. "An' would Granny's boy
not be fearing to cross the swamp alone?" Her voice was almost
pleading. She bent down, and her thin, hard hand rested caressingly on
his dark, tumbled curls. She yearned to hear him confess himself her
baby still. He threw back his head and looked up into her tender,
wrinkled face; and one little hand went up suddenly to caress its rough
surface. For Scotty had a heart quite out of proportion to the size of
his body, and a look of grief on Granny's face could move him quicker
than the sternest command of his grandfather.

"Yes," he confessed in a whisper, "I would be fearing jist once, and
then I spoke the piece about 'the Lord is my Shepherd' and then I
wouldn't be minding much. Sing it, Granny."

So Granny sang the Shepherd's psalm in Gaelic, as she went slowly about
her household tasks; sang it in a thin, quavering voice to a weird old
Scottish melody that had in it the wail of winds over lone heather
moors, and the sob of waves on a wild, rock-bound coast. She came and
went, in and out of the dancing ring of fire-light, a tall, thin
figure, stooped and aged-looking, apparently more from hard work than
from advanced years. But her toil-bent frame, her rough hands and
coarse grey homespun dress could not quite hide the air of gentle
dignity that clothed her. There was a certain lofty refinement in her
movements; and on her wrinkled face and in her beautiful grey eyes the
imprint of a soul that toil and pain had only strengthened and
sweetened. Hers was the face of a woman who had suffered much, but had
conquered, and always would conquer through faith and love.

To the little boy on the hearthstone, at least, the thin, stooped
figure and worn face made up the most beautiful personality the world
could produce. But he turned to the fire, and his dreams floated far
away beyond the ring of fire-light, and beyond Granny's gentle voice.
For he had entered a new world that day, the great new world of school,
and his imagination had a wider field in which to run riot.

He was still dreaming, and Granny was half-way