But they rendered themselves
still more remarkable by the tenderness of their friendship, made
manifest in a thousand little acts of brotherly love. They stood
together foremost in the fight, and attended each other with
unremitting kindness and assiduity, when wounds and sickness had
alternately stretched them on the couch of suffering. Their affection
for each other soon became, in short, a subject of general remark,
exciting a singular degree of interest, from the romantic character
with which the bravery of the two friends had invested it.

About this time--that is, about the middle of the war--the regiment to
which M'Intyre and M'Leod belonged had the misfortune to lose their
commanding officer, who was killed in action. To the regiment this was
a misfortune, and one of the most serious kind; for the gallant
soldier who had fallen was the friend as well as the commander of his
men. He studied and adapted himself to their peculiarities; knew and
appreciated their character; and was beloved by them in return, for
the kind consideration which he always evinced for their best
interests. He was, moreover, their countryman--a circumstance which
formed an additional tie between him and the brave men whom he
commanded.

But the death of Colonel Campbell was a double mischance to the
regiment; inasmuch as to his loss was added the misfortune of his
place being supplied by a man of totally opposite character. His
successor, stern, and unforgiving, endeavoured to procure that
efficiency in his corps through fear, which his predecessor had
commanded through love. He was an Englishman; and was a perfect
stranger to the feelings and national peculiarities of the men over
whom he was thus so suddenly placed; neither was he at any pains to
acquire so necessary a piece of information, nor in any way to conform
his system of discipline to the peculiar spirit of the mountain band
which was now under his harsh and undiscriminating control.

Unfortunate, however, as was the circumstance of this officer's being
put in command of the --th regiment to every soldier in that gallant
corps generally, there were two individuals to whom it was indeed a
misfortune of the most melancholy and deplorable kind, and these two
the most meritorious and deserving men in the regiment. Need we say
that these were James M'Intyre and Roderick M'Leod? But we must detail
the circumstances as they occurred.

To do this, then, let us mention that, after