ds; and sometimes I
feel so sick at heart that I doubt whether I shall ever again get
back to Dare. There are some flowers, too; but I would ask to be
allowed to keep them, if you have no objection; and the sketch of
Ulva, that you made on the deck of the _Umpire_, when we were
coming back from Iona, I would like to keep that, if you have no
objection. And I remain your faithful friend,

"KEITH MACLEOD."

Now, at the moment he was writing this letter, Lady Macleod and her
niece were together; the old lady at her spinning-wheel, the younger one
sewing; and Janet Macleod was saying,--

"Oh, auntie, I am so glad Keith is going away now in the yacht! and you
must not be vexed at all or troubled if he stays a long time; for what
else can make him well again? Why, you know that he has not been Keith
at all of late,--he is quite another man--I do not think any one would
recognize him. And surely there can be no better cure for sleeplessness
than the rough work of the yachting; and you know Keith will take his
share, in despite of Hamish; and if he goes away to the South, they will
have watches, and he will take his watch with the others, and his turn
at the helm. Oh, you will see the change when he comes back to us!"

The old lady's eyes had slowly filled with tears.

"And do you think it is sleeplessness, Janet," said she, "that is the
matter with our Keith? Ah, but you know better than that, Janet."

Janet Macleod's face grew suddenly red; but she said, hastily,--

"Why, auntie, have I not heard him walking up and down all the night,
whether it was in his own room or in the library? And then he is out
before any one is up: oh yes, I know that when you cannot sleep the face
grows white and the eyes grow tired. And he has not been himself at
all--going away like that from every one, and having nothing to say, and
going away by himself over the moors. And it was the night before last
he came back from Kinloch, and he was wet through, and he only lay
down on the bed, as Hamish told me, and would have slept there all the
night, but for Hamish. And do you not think that was to get sleep at
last that he had been walking so far, and coming through the shallows of
Loch Scridain, too? Ah, but you will see the difference, auntie, when he
comes back on board the _Umpire_, and we will go down to the shore, and
we will be glad to see him that day."

"Oh yes, Jane