p by which the Indians are
said to be overcome during the interval of their torments. His mother
was scarcely sure that she actually discerned his form on the bed,
scarce certain that her ear caught the sound of his breathing. With a
throbbing heart, Elspat went to the fireplace in the centre of the hut,
where slumbered, covered with a piece of turf, the glimmering embers of
the fire, never extinguished on a Scottish hearth until the indwellers
leave the mansion for ever.

"Feeble greishogh," [Greishogh, a glowing ember.] she said, as she
lighted, by the help of a match, a splinter of bog pine which was to
serve the place of a candle--"weak greishogh, soon shalt thou be put out
for ever, and may Heaven grant that the life of Elspat MacTavish have no
longer duration than thine!"

While she spoke she raised the blazing light towards the bed, on which
still lay the prostrate limbs of her son, in a posture that left it
doubtful whether he slept or swooned. As she advanced towards him, the
light flashed upon his eyes--he started up in an instant, made a stride
forward with his naked dirk in his hand, like a man armed to meet a
mortal enemy, and exclaimed, "Stand off!--on thy life, stand off!"

"It is the word and the action of my husband," answered Elspat; "and I
know by his speech and his step the son of MacTavish Mhor."

"Mother," said Hamish, relapsing from his tone of desperate firmness
into one of melancholy expostulation--"oh, dearest mother, wherefore
have you returned hither?"

"Ask why the hind comes back to the fawn," said Elspat, "why the cat of
the mountain returns to her lodge and her young. Know you, Hamish, that
the heart of the mother only lives in the bosom of the child."

"Then will it soon cease to throb," said Hamish, "unless it can beat
within a bosom that lies beneath the turf. Mother, do not blame me. If
I weep, it is not for myself but for you; for my sufferings will soon be
over, but yours--oh, who but Heaven shall set a boundary to them?"

Elspat shuddered and stepped backward, but almost instantly resumed her
firm and upright position and her dauntless bearing.

"I thought thou wert a man but even now," she said, "and thou art again
a child. Hearken to me yet, and let us leave this place together. Have I
done thee wrong or injury? if so, yet do not avenge it so cruelly.
See, Elspat MacTavish, who never kneeled before even to a priest, falls
prostrate before her own son, and craves his forgi