e saw was the grandest-looking man he had ever seen.
Indeed, he looked more like a bird than a man--a big bird with a big
black crest. He was very tall. His feet were broad and white, like the
feathered feet of some plumy bird, his legs were bare and brown and
hairy. He was clothed in many colours. He had fur in front, which swung
as he walked, and silver and shining stones about him. He held his head
very high and from it drooped great black plumes. His face looked as if
it had been cut--roughly but artistically--out of a block of old wood,
and his eyes were the colour of a summer sky. And John Broom felt as he
had felt when he first saw Miss Betty's cockatoo.

In repose the Highlander's eye was as clear as a cairngorm and as cold,
but when it fell upon John Broom it took a twinkle not quite unlike the
twinkle in the one eye of the sailor; and then, to his amazement, this
grand creature beckoned to John Broom with a rather dirty hand.

"Yes, sir," said John Broom, staring up at the splendid giant, with eyes
of wonder.

"I'm saying," said the Highlander, confidentially (and it had a pleasant
homely sound to hear him speak like the farm-bailiff)--"I'm saying, I'm
confined to barracks, ye ken; and I'll gi'e ye a hawpenny if ye'll get
the bottle filled wi' whusky. Roun' yon corner ye'll see the 'Britain's
Defenders.'"

But at this moment he erected himself, his turquoise eyes looked
straight before them, and he put his hand to his head and moved it
slowly away again, as a young man with more swinging grandeur of colors
and fur and plumes, and with greater glittering of gems and silver,
passed by, a sword clattering after him.

Meanwhile John Broom had been round the corner and was back again.

"What for are ye stan'in' there, ye fule?" asked his new friend. "What
for didna ye gang for the whusky?"

"It's here, sir."

"My certy, ye dinna let the grass grow under your feet," said the
Highlander; and he added, "If ye want to run errands, laddie, ye can
come back again."

It was the beginning of a fresh life for John Broom. With many other
idle or homeless boys he now haunted the barracks, and ran errands for
the soldiers. His fleetness of foot and ready wit made him the
favourite. Perhaps, too, his youth and his bright face and eyes pleaded
for him, for British soldiers are a tender-hearted race.

He was knocked about, but never cruelly, and he got plenty of coppers
and broken victuals, and now and then an old cap