time we could not look back with regret to one unpleasant hour.
Sometimes we had endured some crosses as well, but we brothers bore them,
I believe, without a murmur, and Moncrieff without one complaining word.

'Boys,' he would say, quietly, 'nobody gets it all his own way in this
world. We must just learn to take the thick wi' the thin.'

Moncrieff was somewhat of a proverbial philosopher; but had he been
entrusted with the task of selecting proverbs that should smooth one's
path in life, I feel sure they would have been good ones.

Strath Coila New, as we called the now green valley in which our little
colony had been founded, had improved to a wonderful extent in so brief a
time. The settlers had completed their houses long ago; they, like
ourselves, had laid out their fields and farms and planted their
vineyards; the hedges were green and flowering; the poplar-trees and
willows had sprung skywards as if influenced by magic--the magic of a
virgin soil; the fields were green with waving grain and succulent
lucerne; the vines needed the help of man to aid them in supporting their
wondrous wealth of grapes; fruit grew everywhere; birds sang everywhere,
and to their music were added sounds even sweeter still to our ears--the
lowing of herds of sleek fat cattle, the bleating armies of sheep, the
home-like noise of poultry and satisfied grunting of lazy pigs. The latter
sometimes fed on peaches that would have brought tears of joy to the eyes
of many an English market gardener.

Our villa was complete now; wings and tower, and terraced lawns leading
down to the lake, close beside which Dugald had erected a boat-house that
was in itself like a little fairy palace. Dugald had always a turn for the
romantic, and nothing would suit him by way of a boat except a gondola.
What an amount of time and taste he had bestowed on it too! and how the
Gaucho carpenters had worked and slaved to please him and make it
complete! But there it was at last, a thing of beauty, in all
conscience--prows and bows, cushioned seats, and oars, and awnings, all
complete.

It was his greatest pleasure to take auntie, Aileen, and old Jenny out to
skim the lake in this gondola, and sit for long happy hours reading or
fishing.

Even Bombazo used to form an item in these pleasant little excursions. He
certainly was no use with an oar, but it was the 'bravo' captain's delight
to dress as a troubadour and sit twanging the light guitar under the
awnin