own to
a solitary woman whose ideas still dwelt upon her own early times.
She imagined that her son had only to proclaim himself his father's
successor in adventure and enterprise, and that a force of men, as
gallant as those who had followed his father's banner, would crowd
around to support it when again displayed. To her Hamish was the eagle
who had only to soar aloft and resume his native place in the skies,
without her being able to comprehend how many additional eyes would have
watched his flight--how many additional bullets would have been directed
at his bosom. To be brief, Elspat was one who viewed the present state
of society with the same feelings with which she regarded the times that
had passed away. She had been indigent, neglected, oppressed since the
days that her husband had no longer been feared and powerful, and she
thought that the term of her ascendence would return when her son had
determined to play the part of his father. If she permitted her eye to
glance farther into futurity, it was but to anticipate that she must be
for many a day cold in the grave, with the coronach of her tribe cried
duly over her, before her fair-haired Hamish could, according to her
calculation, die with his hand on the basket-hilt of the red claymore.
His father's hair was grey, ere, after a hundred dangers, he had fallen
with his arms in his hands. That she should have seen and survived the
sight was a natural consequence of the manners of that age. And better
it was--such was her proud thought--that she had seen him so die, than
to have witnessed his departure from life in a smoky hovel on a bed
of rotten straw like an over-worn hound, or a bullock which died of
disease. But the hour of her young, her brave Hamish, was yet far
distant. He must succeed--he must conquer--like his father. And when he
fell at length--for she anticipated for him no bloodless death--Elspat
would ere then have lain long in the grave, and could neither see his
death-struggle nor mourn over his grave-sod.

With such wild notions working in her brain, the spirit of Elspat rose
to its usual pitch, or, rather, to one which seemed higher. In the
emphatic language of Scripture, which in that idiom does not greatly
differ from her own, she arose, she washed and changed her apparel, and
ate bread, and was refreshed.

She longed eagerly for the return of her son, but she now longed not
with the bitter anxiety of doubt and apprehension. She said to her