was increased by his successful struggles against
the Clan Chattan, in which he restored the equality betwixt the two
contending confederacies, which had existed before the calamitous defeat
of which I told your honour. Feeling himself thus firmly seated, he
naturally became desirous to bring home his only son to his bosom and
family; and for that purpose caused me to send the young Conachar, as
he was called, more than once to the Highlands. He was a youth expressly
made, by his form and gallantry of bearing, to gain a father's heart.
At length, I suppose the lad either guessed the secret of his birth
or something of it was communicated to him; and the disgust which the
paughty Hieland varlet had always shown for my honest trade became more
manifest; so that I dared not so much as lay my staff over his costard,
for fear of receiving a stab with a dirk, as an answer in Gaelic to
a Saxon remark. It was then that I wished to be well rid of him, the
rather that he showed so much devotion to Catharine, who, forsooth, set
herself up to wash the Ethiopian, and teach a wild Hielandmnan mercy and
morals. She knows herself how it ended."

"Nay, my father," said Catharine, "it was surely but a point of charity
to snatch the brand from the burning."

"But a small point of wisdom," said her father, "to risk the burning of
your own fingers for such an end. What says my lord to the matter?"

"My lord would not offend the Fair Maid of Perth," said Sir Patrick;
"and he knows well the purity and truth of her mind. And yet I must
needs say that, had this nursling of the doe been shrivelled, haggard,
cross made, and red haired, like some Highlanders I have known, I
question if the Fair Maiden of Perth would have bestowed so much zeal
upon his conversion; and if Catharine had been as aged, wrinkled, and
bent by years as the old woman that opened the door for me this morning,
I would wager my gold spurs against a pair of Highland brogues that this
wild roebuck would never have listened to a second lecture. You laugh,
glover, and Catharine blushes a blush of anger. Let it pass, it is the
way of the world."

"The way in which the men of the world esteem their neighbours, my
lord," answered Catharine, with some spirit.

"Nay, fair saint, forgive a jest," said the knight; "and thou, Simon,
tell us how this tale ended--with Conachar's escape to the Highlands, I
suppose?"

"With his return thither," said the glover. "There was, for some two