ong all the Highland youth that went
abroad to the bloody wars from the base of Benevis, to compare with
Ranald of the Red-Cliff, whose sires had been soldiers for centuries, in
the days of the dagger and Lochaber axe--stately in his strength amid
the battle as the oak in a storm, but gentle in peace as the birch-tree,
that whispers with all its leaves to the slightest summer-breath? If
their love was great when often fed at the light of each other's eyes,
what was it when Ranald was far off among the sands of Egypt, and Flora
left an orphan to pine away in her native glen? Beneath the shadow of
the Pyramids he dreamt of Dalness and the deer forest, that was the
dwelling of his love--and she, as she stood by the murmurs of that
sea-loch, longed for the wings of the osprey, that she might flee away
to the war-tents beyond the ocean, and be at rest!

But years--a few years--long and lingering as they might seem to loving
hearts separated by the roar of seas--yet all too too short when 'tis
thought how small a number lead from the cradle to the grave--brought
Ranald and Flora once more into each other's arms. Alas! for the poor
soldier! for never more was he to behold that face from which he kissed
the trickling tears. Like many another gallant youth, he had lost his
eyesight from the sharp burning sand--and was led to the shieling of his
love like a wandering mendicant who obeys the hand of a child. Nor did
his face bear that smile of resignation usually so affecting on the calm
countenances of the blind. Seldom did he speak--and his sighs were
deeper, longer, and more disturbed than those which almost any sorrow
ever wrings from the young. Could it be that he groaned in remorse over
some secret crime?

Happy--completely happy, would Flora have been to have tended him like a
sister all his dark life long, or, like a daughter, to have sat beside
the bed of one whose hair was getting fast grey, long before its time.
Almost all her relations were dead, and almost all her friends away to
other glens. But he had returned, and blindness, for which there was no
hope, must bind his steps for ever within little room. But they had been
betrothed almost from their childhood, and would she--if he desired
it--fear to become his wife now, shrouded as he was, now and for ever,
in the helpless dark? From his lips, however, her maidenly modesty
required that the words should come; nor could she sometimes help
wondering, in half-upbraidin