d fire-place, where huge resinous pine
logs sent up an odor most grateful to the senses and emitted a pleasant,
fitful blaze, lighting up, ever and anon, the faces of The McAllister and
his second son Ivan.

On the walls hung huge antlers and heads of deer, the trophies of many a
hard day's sport, for they had been a race of sportsmen for generations,
these McAllisters, a hardy, strong, self-reliant people, like their own
harsh mountain breezes.

The two representatives of the race now quarrelling in the hall were both
fine looking men, though of somewhat different types. The McAllister was
a tall old man over six feet in height, well and strongly built. His hair
was iron-grey, his eyes blue and piercing, his nose rather inclined to
the Roman type, his mouth large and determined, and his chin firm, square
and somewhat obstinate. His eyebrows were very thick and bushy, thus
lending to his face a sinister and rather forbidding expression. He wore
a rough home-spun shooting suit, and had folded round his shoulders a
tartan of the McAllister plaid, which from time to time he pushed from
him with a hasty impatient gesture, as he addressed his son in angry,
menacing tones,--

"An' I tell ye, Ivan, though ye be my son, never mair shall I call ye so,
if ye join the rabble that young scamp has got together, and never mair
shall ye darken the doors of Dunmorton if ye gae wi' him. Noo choose
between that young pretender and your ain people."

"Father," said Ivan, "he is not a pretender, of that I am convinced, and
you will be soon. He is the descendant of our own King James VI. (whose
mother was bonnie Queen Mary), and you paid fealty at Holyrood many years
ago to King James. My bonnie Prince Chairlie should by rights be sitting
on the throne of Scotland, aye, and of England too, and, by the help of
Heaven and our guid Scotch laddies, he will be there ere long."

"Never," sneered The McAllister, scornfully. "I am not afraid of that."

"Well, that is comforting to you at any rate, sir; then why care about
my going to join his army, for I am going, nothing can stop me now." And
Ivan McAllister's bonnie face glowed with an enthusiasm almost pathetic
as he thought of his beloved leader, for whom he would stake all his
worldly prospects, aye, and if need be his very life.

"Ivan McAllister," said his father, "I thought ye had mair common sense,
though it is rare in lads o' your age. Ye can never imagine that a pack
o' young idio