ly:

'My dears, don't I provide you all with ample allowances?'

'Yes, father!' they all answered gravely, 'no one could be more
generous!'

'Don't I let you dress as you please?'

'Yes, father!'--this a little sheepishly.

'Then, my dears, don't you think it would be nicer and kinder of you
not to try and make me feel uncomfortable, even if I do assume a dress
which is ridiculous in your eyes, though quite common enough in the
country where we are about to sojourn?' There was no answer except
that which appeared in their hanging heads. He was a good father and
they all knew it. He was quite satisfied and went on:

'There, now, run away and enjoy yourselves! We shan't have another
word about it.' Then he went on deck again and stood bravely the fire
of ridicule which he recognised around him, though nothing more was
said within his hearing.

The astonishment and the amusement which his get-up occasioned on the
_Ban Righ_ was, however, nothing to that which it created in Aberdeen.
The boys and loafers, and women with babies, who waited at the landing
shed, followed _en masse_ as the Markam party took their way to the
railway station; even the porters with their old-fashioned knots and
their new-fashioned barrows, who await the traveller at the foot of
the gang-plank, followed in wondering delight. Fortunately the
Peterhead train was just about to start, so that the martyrdom was not
unnecessarily prolonged. In the carriage the glorious Highland costume
was unseen, and as there were but few persons at the station at
Yellon, all went well there. When, however, the carriage drew near the
Mains of Crooken and the fisher folk had run to their doors to see who
it was that was passing, the excitement exceeded all bounds. The
children with one impulse waved their bonnets and ran shouting behind
the carriage; the men forsook their nets and their baiting and
followed; the women clutched their babies, and followed also. The
horses were tired after their long journey to Yellon and back, and the
hill was steep, so that there was ample time for the crowd to gather
and even to pass on ahead.

Mrs. Markam and the elder girls would have liked to make some protest
or to do something to relieve their feelings of chagrin at the
ridicule which they saw on all faces, but there was a look of fixed
determination on the face of the seeming Highlander which awed them a
little, and they were silent. It might have been that the eagle's
f