to say gently, 'This is a part of
the world where our master lives, because it is lovely and he loves
it. He makes you welcome to come and go as you will, whoever you
are, as if it were your own.' Don't you think that is a charming
impression? And afterward we found out that the doors of this
Chieftain's house are never locked. Mostly in the summer they stand
wide open all night, although he has beautiful old silver, and
quantities of valuable pictures and things which have been in his
family more or less ever since there was a Scotland. It is a dear
old sixteenth-century house, with networks of black oak beams, and
lots of quaint bow-windows that look out on lovely lawns and
flower-gardens, and box or holly hedges, and yew trees cut in
fantastic shapes.

We stayed one whole day and two nights. Wasn't it good of him to
have us? In all the corridors there are carpets and curtains of the
Chieftain's hunting tartan. I loved it. I do hope you have dogs'
heads and antlers, and tartan curtains and carpets and things at
your castle at Dhrum? It is yours, you know! I wonder if I shall
ever see it?

I can't tell you how excited I was when the Chieftain and several
other Highland men he had staying in his house-party wore the kilt
to dinner. All their knees were baked to exactly the right brown;
but he was the smartest of the men (though some were very young and
handsome), because he, being the head of the Clan, had a green
velvet coat. Poor Basil and Mr. Vanneck in their ordinary evening
things looked like _nothing at all_. I was quite sorry for them,
but so glad I hadn't to sit by one at the table, as I wanted only
to talk to the kilted men. I wore that white frock you chose for
me--do you remember?--and a sash of the MacDonald of Dhrum dress
tartan, which I found in Aberdeen. All during dinner the pipers
piped, and I was so thrilled I could scarcely eat. Afterward there
was an impromptu dance in a bare, tartan-draped room, where it
seemed that Macbeth could quite well have been entertained. I
thought I should have to look on, of course, as I've never learned
to dance; but that dear Chieftain taught me the 'Petronella,' which
is very pretty and easy to pick up. It seems as if one could not
help dancing to the music of the pipes; don't you find it so?