as well. So it may be truthfully said
that we were a happy family. The time sped by, the years flew on without,
apparently, ever a bit of change from one Christmas Day to another. Mr.
Townley, our tutor, seemed to have little ambition to 'better himself,' as
it is termed. When challenged one morning at breakfast with his want of
desire to push,

'Oh,' said Townley, 'I'm only a young man yet, and really I do not wish to
be any happier than I am. It will be a grief to me when the boys grow
older and go out into the world and need me no more.'

Mr. Townley was a strict and careful teacher, but by no means a hard
taskmaster. Indoors during school hours he was the pedagogue all over. He
carried etiquette even to the extent of wearing cap and gown, but these
were thrown off with scholastic duties; he was then--out of doors--as
jolly as a schoolboy going to play at his first cricket-match.

In the field father was our teacher. He taught us, and the 'grieve,' or
bailiff, taught us everything one needs to know about a farm. Not in
headwork alone. No; for, young as we were at this time, my brothers and I
could wield axe, scythe, hoe, and rake.

We were Highland boys all over, in mind and body, blood and bone.
I--Murdoch--was fifteen when the cloud gathered that finally changed our
fortunes. Donald and Dugald were respectively fourteen and thirteen, and
Sister Flora was eleven.

Big for our years we all were, and I do not think there was anything on
dry land, or on the water either, that we feared. Mr. Townley used very
often to accompany us to the hills, to the river and lake, but not
invariably. We dearly loved our tutor. What a wonderful piece of
muscularity and good-nature he was, to be sure, as I remember him! Of both
his muscularity and good-nature I am afraid we often took advantage. Flora
invariably did, for out on the hills she would turn to him with the utmost
_sang-froid_, saying, 'Townley, I'm tired; take me on your back.' And for
miles Townley would trudge along with her, feeling her weight no more than
if she had been a moth that had got on his shoulders by accident. There
was no tiring Townley.

To look at our tutor's fair young face, one would never have given him the
credit of possessing a deal of romance, or believed it possible that he
could have harboured any feeling akin to love. But he did. Now this is a
story of stirring adventure and of struggle, and not a love tale; so the
truth may be as well told i