ters and among the fells, where there's only
cothouse clachans and lonely farm-towns. Ye'll see there why the old
Scottish stock grows firm and strong and the bit, bleak country breeds
men who make it respected across the world. Man, if I had not
rheumatism and some fashious business I cannot neglect, we would take
the moors together!"

"You don't seem to like the smart hotels," Foster remarked, half amused.

"I do not like the folk they harbor. The dusty trippers in leather
coats and goggles ye meet at Melrose and Jedburgh are an affront to an
old Scottish town. But a man on foot, in clothes that match the ling
and the gray bents, gives a human touch to the scene, whether ye meet
him by a wind-ruffled lochan or on the broad moor. Ye ken he has come
slowly through the quiet hills, for the love o' what he sees. But ye
will not understand an old man's havering!"

"I think I do," said Foster. "One learns the charm of the lone trail
in the Canadian bush. But I have a map, and don't care much where I
go, so long as it's somewhere south. Suppose you mark me out a route
towards Liddesdale."

The man did so, and jotted down a few marginal notes.

"I'm sending ye by the old drove roads," he explained. "Sometimes
ye'll find them plain enough, but often they're rough green tracks, and
nobody can tell ye when they were made. The moss-troopers wore them
deeper when they rode with the spear and steel-cap to Solway sands.
Afterwards came the drovers with their flocks and herds, the smugglers'
pack-horse trains, and messengers to Prince Charlie's friends from
Louis of France. That's why the old road runs across the fell, while
the turnpike keeps the valley. If ye follow my directions, ye'll maybe
find the link between industrial Scotland and the stormy past; it's in
the cothouse and clachan the race is bred that made and keeps alive
Glasgow and Dundee."

Foster thanked him and examined the map. It was clearly drawn and
showed the height and natural features of the country, which was
obviously rough. The path marked out led over the Border hills, dipped
into winding valleys, and skirted moorland lakes. It seemed to draw
him as he studied it, for the wilderness has charm, and the drove road
ran through heathy wastes far from the smoke of factories and mining
towns. Well, he was ready to cross the bleak uplands, without
troubling much about the mist and rain, for he had faced worse winters
than any Scotland knew, b