y day as it was, but it was over at last, and after they had
eaten their supper, where Kirsty served it to them in their playhouse,
Scotty went to the house to bid the old woman good-bye, and started for
home.

The little girl followed him sadly and slowly to the edge of the
clearing.

"When'll you come back again?" she asked pleadingly.

"I'll not know," said Scotty patronisingly, "I don't often play with
girls."

The blue sunbonnet drooped; its owner's assurance and independence had
all vanished. "You might come next Saturday," she suggested humbly.

"Well," said Scotty handsomely, "mebby I'll be coming."

"I'm going to ask Kirsty if I can't go to school with you some day!"
she cried audaciously.

Scotty looked alarmed. In reality he was most eager to return and
resume housekeeping in the fence-corner, but to have this stranger go
to school with him would never do. The boys would laugh at him, and
already he had sufficient trials with Betty Lauchie since Peter stopped
going to school.

"Oh, it's too far!" he cried hastily, "an' there will be an awful cross
master there!"

"I don't care, you wouldn't let him touch me, would you?"

"If you don't ask Kirsty, I'll come over all next Saturday, an' mebby
she'll be letting you come to my place; it's nicer than school."

So thus comforted, Isabel climbed the stump and swung her sunbonnet as
long as the slanting sunlight showed the little figure running down the
fast darkening forest-pathway; and just before the shadows swallowed
him up, he turned and waved his cap in farewell.

VII

THE AVENGING OF GLENCOE

Now the dewy sounds begin to dwindle,
Dimmer grow the burnished rills,
Breezes creep and halt,
Soon the guardian night shall kindle
In the violet vault,
All the twinkling tapers
Touched with steady gold
Burning through the lawny vapours
Where they float and fold.
--DUNCAN CAMPBELL SCOTT.

The sound of a tinkling bell, crossing the pasture in tuneful harmony
with the music of the summer evening, had come to a pause in the
barnyard, and the boys had gone out with their pails to the milking.

Scotty came capering up the path from the barn, making mischievous
snatches at Granny's rosebushes, which surrounded the house all abloom
in their June dresses. He seldom returned from his evening task of
bringing home the cows in such good time. Generally he lingered in the
woods until he had almost worn out even Granny'