within two gunshots of the
house of Glashruach, yet to get to it they had to walk miles up and
down Glashgar. A mountain in storm is as hard to cross as a sea.
Arrived, they did not therefore feel safe. The tendency of the
Glashburn was indeed away from the cottage, as the grounds of
Glashruach sadly witnessed; but a torrent is double-edged, and who
could tell? The yielding of one stone in its channel might send it
to them. All night Angus watched, peering out ever again into the
darkness, but seeing nothing save three lights that burned above the
water--one of them, he thought, at the Mains. The other two went
out in the darkness, but that only in the dawn. When the morning
came, there was the Glashburn meeting the Lorrie in his garden. But
the cottage was well built, and fit to stand a good siege, while any
moment the waters might have reached their height. By breakfast
time, however, they were round it from behind. There is nothing
like a flood for revealing the variations of surface, the dips and
swells of a country. In a few minutes they were isolated, with the
current of the Glashburn on one side, and that of the Lorrie in
front. When he saw the water come in at front and back doors at
once, Angus ordered his family up the stair: the cottage had a large
attic, with dormer windows, where they slept. He himself remained
below for some time longer, in that end of the house where he kept
his guns and fishing-tackle; there he sat on a table, preparing nets
for the fish that would be left in the pools; and not until he found
himself afloat did he take his work to the attic.

There the room was hot, and they had the window open. Mistress Mac
Pholp stood at it, looking out on the awful prospect, with her
youngest child, a sickly boy, in her arms. He had in his a little
terrier-pup, greatly valued of the gamekeeper. In a sudden outbreak
of peevish wilfulness, he threw the creature out of the window. It
fell on the slooping roof, and before it could recover itself, being
too young to have the full command of four legs, rolled off.

"Eh! the doggie's i' the watter!" cried Mistress Mac Pholp in
dismay.

Angus threw down everything with an ugly oath, for he had given
strict orders not one of the children should handle the whelp,
jumped up, and got out on the roof. From there he might have
managed to reach it, so high now was the water, had the little thing
remained where it fell, but already it had swam