his whiffletree.

Aleck had had the same difficulty in freeing his chain as Ranald, but
instead of trying to detach it from the stump, he had unhooked the other
end, and then, with a mighty backward jerk, had snatched it from the
stump. But before he could attach it to his place on the whiffletree
again, Ranald stood ready for work.

"A win, lad! A win!" cried old Farquhar, more excited than he had been
for years.

"It is no win," said Aleck, hotly.

"No, no, lads," said Macdonald Bhain, before Farquhar could reply. "It
is as even a match as could well be. It is fine teams you both have got,
and you have handled them well."

But all the same, Ranald's friends were wildly enthusiastic over what
they called his victory, and Don could hardly keep his hands off him,
for very joy.

Aleck, on the other hand, while claiming the victory because his team
was at the pile first, was not so sure of it but that he was ready
to fight with any one venturing to dispute his claim. But the men all
laughed at him and his rage, until he found it wiser to be good-humored
about it.

"Yon lad will be making as good a man as yourself," said Farquhar,
enthusiastically, to Macdonald Bhain, as Ranald drove his team to the
stable.

"Aye, and a better, pray God," said Macdonald Bhain, fervently, looking
after Ranald with loving eyes. There was no child in his home, and his
brother's son was as his own.

Meanwhile Don had hurried on, leaving his team with Murdie that he
might sing Ranald's praises to "the girls," with whom Ranald was highly
popular, although he avoided them, or perhaps because he did so, the
ways of women being past understanding.

To Mrs. Murray and Maimie, who with the minister and Hughie, had come
over to the supper, he went first with his tale. Graphically he depicted
the struggle from its beginning to the last dramatic rush to the pile,
dilating upon Ranald's skill and pluck, and upon the wonderful and
hitherto unknown virtues of Farquhar's shiny blacks.

"You ought to see them!" cried Don. "You bet they never moved in their
lives the way they did today. Tied him!" he continued. "Tied him! Beat
him, I say, but Macdonald Bhain says 'Tied him'--Aleck McRae, who thinks
himself so mighty smart with his team."

Don forgot in his excitement that the McRaes and their friends were
there in numbers.

"So he is," cried Annie Ross, one of Aleck's admirers. "There is not a
man in the Indian Lands that can beat Aleck and