ous offense who could have ventured
to express before Simon Ford any doubt that old Aberfoyle would one day
revive! He had never given up the hope of discovering some new bed which
would restore the mine to its past splendor. Yes, he would willingly,
had it been necessary, have resumed the miner's pick, and with his
still stout arms vigorously attacked the rock. He went through the dark
galleries, sometimes alone, sometimes with his son, examining, searching
for signs of coal, only to return each day, wearied, but not in despair,
to the cottage.

Madge, Simon's faithful companion, his "gude-wife," to use the Scotch
term, was a tall, strong, comely woman. Madge had no wish to leave the
Dochart pit any more than had her husband. She shared all his hopes and
regrets. She encouraged him, she urged him on, and talked to him in
a way which cheered the heart of the old overman. "Aberfoyle is only
asleep," she would say. "You are right about that, Simon. This is but a
rest, it is not death!"

Madge, as well as the others, was perfectly satisfied to live
independent of the outer world, and was the center of the happiness
enjoyed by the little family in their dark cottage.

The engineer was eagerly expected. Simon Ford was standing at his door,
and as soon as Harry's lamp announced the arrival of his former viewer
he advanced to meet him.

"Welcome, Mr. Starr!" he exclaimed, his voice echoing under the roof
of schist. "Welcome to the old overman's cottage! Though it is buried
fifteen hundred feet under the earth, our house is not the less
hospitable."

"And how are you, good Simon?" asked James Starr, grasping the hand
which his host held out to him.

"Very well, Mr. Starr. How could I be otherwise here, sheltered from
the inclemencies of the weather? Your ladies who go to Newhaven or
Portobello in the summer time would do much better to pass a few months
in the coal mine of Aberfoyle! They would run no risk here of catching a
heavy cold, as they do in the damp streets of the old capital."

"I'm not the man to contradict you, Simon," answered James Starr, glad
to find the old man just as he used to be. "Indeed, I wonder why I do
not change my home in the Canongate for a cottage near you."

"And why not, Mr. Starr? I know one of your old miners who would be
truly pleased to have only a partition wall between you and him."

"And how is Madge?" asked the engineer.

"The goodwife is in better health than I am, if that