ure. About half a mile up the water was a camp of red-coats; a
big fire blazed in their midst, at which some were cooking; and near by,
on the top of a rock about as high as ours, there stood a sentry, with
the sun sparkling on his arms. All the way down along the river-side
were posted other sentries; here near together, there widelier
scattered; some planted like the first, on places of command, some on
the ground level, and marching and counter-marching, so as to meet
half-way. Higher up the glen, where the ground was more open, the chain
of posts was continued by horse-soldiers, whom we could see in the
distance riding to and fro. Lower down, the infantry continued; but as
the stream was suddenly swelled by the confluence of a considerable
burn, they were more widely set, and only watched the fords and
stepping-stones.

I took but one look at them, and ducked again into my place. It was
strange indeed to see this valley, which had lain so solitary in the
hour of dawn, bristling with arms and dotted with the red coats and
breeches.

"Ye see," said Alan, "this was what I was afraid of, Davie: that they
would watch the burn-side. They began to come in about two hours ago,
and, man! but ye're a grand hand at the sleeping! We're in a narrow
place. If they get up the sides of the hill, they could easy spy us with
a glass; but if they'll only keep in the foot of the valley we'll do
yet. The posts are thinner down the water; and, come night, we'll try
our hand at getting by them."

"And what are we to do till night?" I asked.

"Lie here," says he, "and birstle."

That one good Scots word, "birstle," was indeed the most of the story of
the day that we had now to pass. You are to remember that we lay on the
bare top of a rock, like scones upon a girdle; the sun beat upon us
cruelly; the rock grew so heated, a man could scarce endure the touch of
it; and the little patch of earth and fern, which kept cooler, was only
large enough for one at a time. We took turn about to lie on the naked
rock, which was indeed like the position of that saint that was martyred
on a gridiron; and it ran in my mind how strange it was, that in the
same climate, and at only a few days' distance, I should have suffered
so cruelly, first from cold upon my island and now from heat upon this
rock.

All the while we had no water, only raw brandy for a drink, which was
worse than nothing; but we kept the bottle as cool as we could, burying
it in t