without prejudice to her modest, maidenly emotions, a spur
was given to her wishes by the hope of meeting John Ramsay.

For an hour after supper she paced the porch, and still looked out upon
the stars, to mark the slow waxing of the night; and, now and then she
walked forth as far as the mill, and lingered by the bank of the river,
and again returned to ask the sentinel the hour.

"You seem disturbed, Mary," said Macdonald, playfully. "Now, I'll
venture to say I can guess your thoughts: this star-gazing is a great
tell-tale. You were just now thinking that, as the tug of the war is
over, some lad who has borne a musket lately, will be very naturally
tripping this way to-night, instead of going home to see his mother.
Come--isn't that a good guess?"

"Do you know him, sir?" asked Mary, with composure.

"Aye, to be sure I do: a good, brave fellow, who eats well, drinks well,
and fights well."

"All men do that now," replied the maiden, "but I am sure you are wrong,
sir, if you think any such considers it worth his while to come here."

"He must come quickly, or we cannot let him in without a countersign,"
said the officer: "sergeant, order the tattoo to beat, it is nine
o'clock. Mary, stay, I must cross-question you a little about this same
gallant."

"Indeed, sir, I did but jest, and so I thought you did. My father says
it is not proper I should loiter to talk with the men; good night, sir:
it is our time for prayers." And with these words the young girl
withdrew into the house.

In some half hour afterwards Mary escaped by another door and, taking a
circuitous path through the garden, she passed behind the sentinel and
sped towards the mill, intent upon keeping her appointment with the
friends of Butler. As soon as she reached the river bank, she quickened
her pace, and hurried with a nimble step towards the distant thicket.

"What ho! who goes there?" shouted the voice of a man from the
neighborhood of the mill: "who flies so fast?"

"Faith, Tom, it must be a ghost," said a second voice, loud enough to be
heard by the damsel, who now increased the speed with which she fled
towards the cover.

In an instant two of the soldiers of the guard rushed upon the track of
the frightened girl.

"Spare me, good sir--for pity's sake, spare me!" exclaimed the maiden,
suddenly turning round upon her pursuers.

"Where away so fast?" said one of the men. "This is a strange time of
night for girls to be flying into the