er in a claes tub. He
shook and ran himself dry, and he raced the laughing child until they
both dropped panting on the wind-rippled heath. Then he hunted on the
ground under the gorse for those nests that had a dozen or more eggs in
them. He took just one from each in his mouth, as Auld Jock had taught
him to do. On the kitchen hearth he ate the savory meal with much
satisfaction and polite waggings. But when the bugle sounded from below
to form ranks, he pricked his drop ears and started for the door.

Before he knew what had happened he was inside the poultry-house. In
another instant he was digging frantically in the soft earth under the
door. When the lassie lay down across the crack he stopped digging, in
consternation. His sense of smell told him what it was that shut out the
strip of light; and a bairn's soft body is not a proper object of attack
for a little dog, no matter how desperate the emergency. There was no
time to be lost, for the drums began to beat the march. Having to get
out very quickly, Bobby did a forbidden thing: swiftly and noisily he
dashed around the dark place, and there arose such wild squawkings and
rushings of wings as to bring the gude-wife out of the house in alarm.

"Lassie, I canna hae the bittie dog in wi the broodin' chuckies!"

She flung the door wide. Bobby shot through, and into Elsie's
outstretched arms. She held to him desperately, while he twisted and
struggled and strained away; and presently something shining worked into
view, through the disordered thatch about his neck. The mother had come
to the help of the child, and it was she who read the inscription on the
brazen plate aloud.

"Preserve us a'! Lassie, he's been tak'n by the Laird Provost an' gien
the name o' the auld kirkyaird. He's an ower grand doggie. Ma puir
bairnie, dinna greet so sair!" For the little girl suddenly released the
wee Highlander and sobbed on her mother's shoulder.

"He isna ma ain Bobby ony mair!" She "couldna thole" to watch him as he
tumbled down the brae.

On the outward march, among the many dogs and laddies that had
followed the soldiers, Bobby escaped notice. But most of these had gone
adventuring in Swanston Dell, to return to the city by the gorge of
Leith Water. Now, traveling three miles to the soldiers' one, scampering
in wide circles over the fields, swimming burns, scrambling under
hedges, chasing whaups into piping cries, barking and louping in
pure exuberance of spirits, many