bugle and all the torches on the castle itself
disappeared, although the fire on the bailey wall remained intact, and
the reason for this soon became apparent. From machicolated tower,
keep, peel and curtain, the nimble Highlanders, torchless, scrambled
down, cheering as they came. It seemed incredible that they could
have attained such speed, picking their precarious way by grasping
protruding branch or stump or limb, or by thrusting hand between the
interstices of the timber, without slipping, falling and breaking
their necks.

For a moment the castle walls were alive with fluttering tartans,
strongly illuminated by the torches from the outer bailey. Each man
held his breath while this perilous acrobatic performance was being
accomplished, and silence reigned over the royal party until suddenly
broken by the Italian.

"Highlander!" he cried, "your castle is on fire."

"Aye," said the Highlander calmly, raising his bugle again to his
lips.

At the next blast those on the bailey wall thrust their torches, still
burning among the chinks of the logs, and swarmed to the ground as
speedily and as safely as those on the main building had done. Now
the lighted torches that had been thrown on the roof of the castle,
disappearing a moment from sight, gave evidence of their existence.
Here and there a long tongue of flame sprung up and died down again.

"Can nothing be done to save the palace?" shouted the excitable
Frenchman. "The waterfall; the waterfall! Let us go back, or the
castle will be destroyed."

"Stand where you are," said the chief, "and you will see a sight worth
coming north for."

Now almost with the suddenness of an explosion, great sheets of flame
rose towering into a mountain of fire, as if this roaring furnace
would emulate in height the wooded hills behind it. The logs
themselves seemed to redden as the light glowed through every crevice
between them. The bastions, the bailey walls, were great wheels of
flame, encircling a palace that had all the vivid radiance of molten
gold. The valley for miles up and down was lighter than the sun ever
made it.

"Chieftain," said the legate in an awed whisper, "is this
conflagration accident or design?"

"It is our custom," replied MacNab. "A monarch's pathway must be
lighted, and it is not fitting that a residence once honoured by our
king should ever again be occupied by anyone less noble. The pine tree
is the badge of my clan. At my behest the pine tree sh