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"Nay, nay, friend; I come frae the Hielands, and have not so far forgotten the customs of the old country as to receive payment for entertaining a guest, and as such your son is welcome. However, come in, and get rid of your packs; and to-morrow, when you have rested, we will examine their contents and calculate their value."
I ejaculated fervently, not knowing what I said. But Donald misunderstood me and I had nothing to fear. "Ye're richt there," he cried exultantly; "it's what I ca' a sacred preevilege to hear the like o' that, maist as sacred as a psalm. Ma faither used to play that verra tune at funerals i' the hielands, and the words they aye sang till't was these:
"Oh, the bonnie, bonnie Hielands!" cried David with a passionate affection; "it is always Sabbath up i' the mountains, Christine. I maun see them once again ere I lay by my pilgrim-staff and shoon for ever." "Then you are not Glasgow born, Mr. Cameron," said James, with the air of one who finds out something to another's disadvantage. "Me! Glasgo' born! Na, na, man!
"Ye are a young gentleman," he replied, "and an Englishman, and a' this may be very fine to you; but for me, wha am a plain man, and ken something o' the different values of land, I wadna gie the finest sight we hae seen in the Hielands, for the first keek o' the Gorbals o' Glasgow; and if I were ance there, it suldna be every fule's errand, begging your pardon, Mr.
'I wot weel, Mr. Wauverley, and that was she e'en; but sair, sair angry and affronted wad she hae been, puir thing, if she had thought ye had been ever to ken a word about the matter; for she gar'd me speak aye Gaelic when ye was in hearing, to mak ye trow we were in the Hielands. I can speak it weil eneugh, for my mother was a Hieland woman.
For a week James remained in his own room. Then Christine was laid beside her father, and the shop was reopened, and the household returned to its ways. But James was not seen in house or shop, and the neighbors said, "Kirsty Cameron has had a wearisome sickness, and nae doobt her gudeman was needing a rest. Dootless he has gane to the Hielands a bit." But it was not northward James Blackie went.
This was it," said he, and whistled me the air. "And then, besides," he continued, "it's no' sae bad now as it was in forty-six. The Hielands are what they call pacified. Small wonder, with never a gun or a sword left from Cantyre to Cape Wrath, but what tenty folk have hidden in their thatch! But what I would like to ken, David, is just how long?
"Ah, but ye judge Rob hardly," said the Bailie, "ye judge him hardly, puir chield; and the truth is, that ye ken naething about our hill country, or Hielands, as we ca' them.
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