re,
and it has got all curly. I will ask Maggie to cut off a bit for you
to see.

Maggie has got such a nice brother. He says he remembers you when you
were a little girl, and my eyes are like yours. He is the head-keeper
now, and lets me go out fishing with him. He has got straight red
hair, and oh, such a red beard! and he talks in such a queer way--they
all do here; but I am beginning to understand. Maggie is going to live
at Sandy's cottage soon. He had a wife, but she is dead, and there is
no one to work and cook for him. But I shall see Maggie nearly every
day, and Nan--that is Jessie's nurse--will mend my clothes.

The primroses have been quite lovely. It will be all withered when it
has been through the Red Sea, and will have no smell, but I send you
one all the same. Mother, you forgot to tell me what English flowers
were like--they are beautiful.

I hope the major is quite well, and I do hope he doesn't get any
fatter, because of his poor little horse. I wish he could see how thin
Uncle Hugh is--sometimes I wonder I can't see through him. He walks up
the steepest hills and over the heather without ever stopping.

Tell father I can ride quite as well as Brian, and Uncle Hugh says I
have a good seat. It must be true, because he never praises anybody.

Oh, dear darling mother, my hand is quite tired, and I have taken two
afternoons to write this letter. I wish I could see you and feel you,
though I _don't in the least_ forget what you are like. I can't bear
to look at your picture often, because it makes the tears come in my
eyes, and you might not like me to cry. At night when I go to bed I
shut my eyes very quick and very tight, and try not to remember
anything in India. I generally go to sleep very quick. The next time
I write perhaps I shall be nearly a hero. I am a long way off it yet.
It would be dreadful if I was not one before you come. A thousand
kisses to you and father from your own loving little boy,

JEFF.

The letter did not stand so irreproachably spelt, but that is what it
said and meant.

CHAPTER IV.

My poor little boy sadly missed many things that were joys or daily
events at home in India. Yet he did not magnify their importance
unduly, and remembered that he must not grieve the loving heart which
probably ached with just as keen a longing as his own. This was
heroism of a negative kind, I fancy.

At Loch Lossie they were not at all demonstrative peopl