, and ill luck to the lad who wore the same anywhere outside the
Crooked Dyke that marks the town and policies of his lordship! If he
fared no worse, he came home with his coat-skirts scantily filling an
office unusual. Many a time "Slochd!" rang through the night on the
Athole winter when I dosed far off on the fields of Low Germanie,
or sweated in sallies from leaguered towns. And experience made the
burghers mighty tactical on such occasions. Old Leslie or 'Pallas
Armata' itself conferred no better notion of strategic sally than the
simple one they used when the MacNicolls came down the stair with their
prisoner; for they had dispersed themselves in little companies up the
closes on either side the street, and past the close the invaders bound
to go.

They might have known, the MacNicolls, that mischief was forward in that
black silence, but they were, like all Glen men, unacquaint with the
quirks of urban war. For them the fight in earnest was only fair that
was fought on the heather and the brae; and that was always my shame
of my countrymen, that a half company of hagbutiers, with wall cover
to depend on, could worst the most chivalrous clan that ever carried
triumph at a rush.

For the middle of the street the invaders made at once, half ready for
attack from before or behind, but ill prepared to meet it from all airts
as attack came. They were not ten yards on their way when Splendid and
I, emerging behind them, found them pricked in the rear by one company,
brought up short by another in front at Stonefield's land, and harassed
on the flanks by the lads from the closes. They were caught in a ring.

Lowland and Highland, they roared lustily as they came to blows, and the
street boiled like a pot of herring: in the heart of the commotion young
MacLachlan tossed hither and yond--a stick in a linn. A half-score
more of MacNicolls might have made all the difference in the end of
the story, for they struck desperately, better men by far as weight
and agility went than the burgh half-breds, but (to their credit) so
unwilling to shed blood, that they used the flat of the claymore instead
of the edge and fired their pistols in the air.

The long-legged lad flung up a window and lit the street with the flare
of the flambeau he had been teasing out so earnestly, and dunt, dunt
went the oaken rungs on the bonnets of Glen Shira, till Glen Shira smelt
defeat and fell slowly back.

In all this horoyally I took but an onl