the cause of my deserting to the hills,
being starved for a day and a night, and taken prisoner now as a spy."

"Sir," said Andrew, hastily untying the kerchief that bound them
together, "I humbly ask your pardon. Moreover, it's my opeenion that if
ye hadna been starvin' ye wadna have been here 'e noo, for ye're
uncommon teuch. Rin, lassie, an' fetch some breed an' cheese. Whar's
Marion an' Is'b'l?"

"They went out to seek for Peter," said Jean, as she hastened to obey
her uncle's mandate.

At that moment a loud knocking was heard at the door, and the voice of
Marion, one of the maid-servants, was heard outside. On the door being
opened, she and her companion Isabel burst in with excited looks and the
information, pantingly given, that the "sodgers were comin'."

"Haud yer noise, lassie, an' licht the fire--pit on the parritch pat.
Come, Peter, let's hear a' aboot it."

Ramblin' Peter, who had been thus named because of his inveterate
tendency to range over the neighbouring hills, was a quiet, undersized,
said-to-be weak-minded boy of sixteen years, though he looked little
more than fourteen. No excitement whatever ruffled his placid
countenance as he gave his report--to the effect that a party of
dragoons had been seen by him not half an hour before, searching
evidently for his master's cottage.

"They'll soon find it," said the farmer, turning quickly to his
domestics--"Away wi' ye, lassies, and hide."

The two servant-girls, with Jean and her cousin Aggie Wilson, ran at
once into an inner room and shut the door. Ramblin' Peter sat stolidly
down beside the fire and calmly stirred the porridge-pot, which was
nearly full of the substantial Scottish fare.

"Noo, sir," said Black, turning to Will Wallace, who had stood quietly
watching the various actors in the scene just described, "yer
comrades'll be here in a wee while. May I ask what ye expect?"

"I expect to be imprisoned at the least, more probably shot."

"Hm! pleasant expectations for a young man, nae doot. I'm sorry that
it's oot o' my power to stop an' see the fun, for the sodgers have
strange suspicions aboot me, so I'm forced to mak' mysel' scarce an'
leave Ramblin' Peter to do the hospitalities o' the hoose. But before I
gang awa' I wad fain repay ye for the guid turn ye did to my bairns. If
ye are willin' to shut yer eyes an' do what I tell ye, I'll put you in a
place o' safety."

"Thank you, Mr. Black," returned Wallace; "of course I