ttle ravine made by a small burn fighting
and wearing its way for ages to the Tochty, and stood on a bridge of
two planks and a handrail thrown over a tiny pool, where the water was
resting on a bed of small pebbles. The oak copse covered the sides of
the tiny glen and met across the streamlet, and one below could see
nothing but greenery and the glint of the waterfall where the burn
broke into the bosky den from the bare heights above. Other times the
path, that allowed two to walk abreast if they wished very much and
kept close together, would skirt the face of the high river bank, and
if you peeped down through the foliage of the clinging trees you could
see the Tochty running swiftly, and the overhanging branches dipping in
their leaves. Then the river would make a sweep and forsake its bank,
leaving a peninsula of alluvial land between, where the geranium and
the hyacinth and the iris grew in deep, moist soil. One of these was
almost clear of wood and carpeted with thick, soft turf, and the river
beside it was broad and shining.

"We shall go down here," said the General, "and I will show you
something that I count the finest monument in Perthshire, or maybe in
broad Scotland."

In the centre of the sward, with trees just touching it with the tips
of their branches, was a little square, with a simple weather-beaten
railing. And the General led Kate to the spot, and stood for a while
in silence.

"Two young Scottish lassies, Kate, who died two hundred years ago, and
were buried here, and this is the ballad--

"'Bessie Bell and Mary Grey
They were twa bonnie lassies,
They biggit a hoose on yonder brae
And theikit it ower wi' rashes.'"

Then the General and Kate sat down by the river edge, and he told her
the deathless story,--how in the plague of 1666 they fled to this
district to escape infection; how a lover came to visit one of them and
brought death in his kiss; how they sickened and died; how they were
laid to rest beside the Tochty water; and generations have made their
pilgrimage to the place, so wonderful and beautiful is love. They
loved, and their memory is immortal.

Kate rested her chin on her hand and gazed at the running water, which
continued while men and women live and love and die.

"He ought not to have come; it was a cowardly, selfish act, but I
suppose," added the General, "he could not keep away."

"Be sure she thought none the less of him for his coming, and I think a