upon the poor gentleman on whom they had so often fawned. Corryarrick, with his thick bull's neck, cried, "Tut, tut, Aldour, you know there is no such thing as blood money now ;" and Pitfadden, with his high narrow head, his miserable patrician face, asked how long Aldour had been aware that Simon Balinacluan lived.'

'Unjust, ungenerous!' groaned Mary, standing up. 'Like the starling and the puppy,' muttered Ussie. Mary heard her, and the comparison did her good. She gulped down her grief and pain. They spoke but after their impulses; they are haughty and narrow-minded, or coarse-tempered and vindictive men. Aldour was so much nobler, so much truer and kinder, that they cannot brook the recollection; but Corryarrick is one of ourselves. Well, well! "Go not into a brother's house in the day of your adversity," said the wise man. We have lived to understand his wisdom.' 'Aldour rose up again, all trembling with passion; how could it be otherwise? "Gentlemen, it is true that I have been a wrong-doer; but if you can credit that I wittingly defrauded banished men and orphan children, then strike me down where I stand."

'Then, sure enough, there was a murmur of "Shame! shame! Hold your tongue, Pitfadden. There is no doubt whatever. Young Balinacluan's whereabouts and his very existence were lost. Aldour has been reckless and much to blame; but he was as incapable as any man here of such baseness."

"You must ask that question of me, gentlemen,"

I said. "Some time ago I became accidentally sensible of Aldour's misappropriation," I said it plainly this time, Mary Aldour; "and if you accuse him of deliberate fraud, of course you render me art and part in the crime." "Why did you not come forward with your knowledge ?" demanded Pitfadden. "Why, I for one, gentlemen, did not care to rend a friend's garment; that was one reason. Another and a more powerful one was, that I was perfectly convinced that Aldour would put back the money. Probably you have already freely slandered both of us. But, gentlemen, though you are not without some warrant in my case-I mean the Country has given me and mine a bad name, and hanged us without hesitation for a long time now-still you will not get off so simply with me as with Aldour. You shall not strike me, and I shall not strike you, though my hand is as strong as yours, and I have sword, dirk, and pistols out at Finralia; but I will summon you into a public court, and cause you-yes, you, my patron, as you consider yourself, Pitfadden-to eat your words, and to confess to the world that you have defamed a couple of gentlemen, your neighbours and equals, and one of them your friend, and your acknowledged head in the Country, because of a transgression frankly owned, and amply atoned for."

'That was bravely said,' cried Ussie, clapping her hands; 'and I trust you have broken with Pitfadden. I have long wished it. You must rise, Rory, but not by serving that man.'

But Mary walked up to him, and took his hand ; and Mary had no more notion than Charlotte, when she approached Werter, how she thrilled every nerve in that man by so slight an action. Mary had heard of Finralia's devotion from her father; she had been forced to see it with her own eyes; unconsciously she had now a vivid perception of her power, but she forgot it at this moment, when her heart was only full of pity, and sorrow, and gratitude. We will never forget it, Finralia,-never, that you stood by us in our humiliation-and not the less that you did not spare yourself-henceforth Aldour and Finralia are friends.'

CHAPTER XIX.

THE ROUTE IS COME.'

T was all true, then-all confirmedAldour was to be sold-the Macdonnels were to depart from the glen-for the moment they did not greatly care

whither. It had been easy to speak of

it, but the tug of war, in homely Scotch phrase 'the proof of the pudding,' was yet to come in the fact fulfilled. And the news thus far was on every wind. Aldour had been extravagant and unscrupulous, and he must defray his weakness and his sin with his family rights. The glen had heard it, and there was a wail throughout its length and breadth. The ties of chieftainship were still strong, and the not lessened them. To want Aldour was to want the kindly, protecting, though imperious father, the cordial, generous, though autocratic elder brother. Peasant and tacksman alike cried out, 'Had not every house in the glen been free to Aldour? Would they not have opened their very purses at his call? Had they not done as much for the exiled Lairds ?-convened

Aldour race had

to pay the rents twice over-raised stock in thousands, not by lifting, but by honest, loving contribution, and driven it to the estate bought back for a Lochiel or a Glengarry? Now, was Aldour to consent to sell his and their land, and to transfer their allegiance? Incredible-impossible.

In some the compulsory belief took the form of paroxysms of grief, and old men and women came sobbing to the Great House, and little children were sent to clutch Aldour's plaid as he walked abroad. In others, rage, fanned into frenzy, mingled with and absorbed the regret. They were shamed by their chief's desertion. Better he had died than forsaken them. Their old memories were despised, their old services forgotten. Wild men of the clan came striding down from the lone tributary glens, where their imaginations had been nursed by brooding on their warlike traditions in utter solitude, and cursed Aldour to his face as a degenerate Macdonnel, a renegade chief, whom evil would track and good never meet.

Mary suffered as much as many a quiescent maiden for her lover, or mother for her first-born. There was the people—her people. Mackie, who was always submissive, and always with her cheeks wet with tears, contradicting the smile she got up to humour Mary's jokes-for Mary joked horribly dry jokes-and who would receive them all into the sanctuary of the Schoolhouse, not quite so substantial as the change-house at the Ford of Auchnaglas,