ld all liquid and flowing over the cup's rim. And hence they call the
glen "The Cuagh Oir," The Glen of the Cup of Gold.

At the bottom of the Cuagh, far down, a little loch gleams, an oval of
emerald or of sapphire, according to the sky above that smiles into
its depths. On dark days the loch can gloom, and in storm it can rage,
white-lipped, just like the people of the Glen.

Around the emerald or sapphire loch farmlands lie sunny and warm, set
about their steadings, and are on this spring day vivid with green,
or rich in their red-browns where the soil lies waiting for the seed.
Beyond the sunny fields the muirs of brown heather and bracken climb
abruptly up to the dark-massed firs, and they to the Cuagh's rim. But
from loch to rim, over field and muir and forest, the golden, liquid
light ever flows on a sunny day and fills the Cuagh Oir till it runs
over.

On the east side of the loch, among some ragged firs, a rambling Manor
House, ivy-covered and ancient, stood; and behind it, some distance
away, the red tiling of a farm-cottage, with its steading clustering
near, could be seen. About the old Manor House the lawn and garden
told of neglect and decay, but at the farmhouse order reigned. The trim
little garden plot, the trim lawn, the trim walks and hedges, the trim
thatch of the roof, the trim do'-cote above it, the trim stables, byres,
barns and yard of the steading, proclaimed the prudent, thrifty care of
a prudent, thrifty soul.

And there in the steading quadrangle, amidst the feathered creatures,
hens, cocks and chicks, ducks, geese, turkeys and bubbly-jocks, stood
the mistress of the Manor and prudent, thrifty manager of the farm,--a
girl of nineteen, small, well-made, and trim as the farmhouse and its
surroundings, with sunny locks and sunny face and sunny brown eyes. Her
shapely hands were tanned and coarsened by the weather; her little feet
were laced in stout country-made brogues; her dress was a plain brown
winsey, kilted and belted open at the full round neck; the kerchief that
had fallen from her sunny, tangled hair was of simple lawn, spotless
and fresh; among her fowls she stood, a country lass in habit and
occupation, but in face and form, in look and poise, a lady every inch
of her. Dainty and daunty, sweet and strong, she stood, "the bonny like
o' her bonny mither," as said the South Country nurse, Nannie, who had
always lived at the Glen Cuagh House from the time that that mother was
a baby;