I stood staring with my mouth open.

“And the old Grenadiers, too, who were not so active as they used to be, they could not keep up; and yet if they lingered the peasants would catch them and crucify them to the barn doors with their feet up and a fire under their heads, which was a pity for these fine old soldiers.  So when they could go no further, it was interesting to see what they would do; for they would sit down and say their prayers, sitting on an old saddle, or their knapsacks, maybe, and then take off their boots and their stockings, and lean their chin on the barrel of their musket.  Then they would put their toe on the trigger, and pouf! it was all over, and there was no more marching for those fine old Grenadiers.  Oh, it was very rough work up there on these Guadarama mountains!”

“And what army was this?” I asked.

“Oh, I have served in so many armies that I mix them up sometimes.  Yes, I have seen much of war.  Apropos I have seen your Scotchmen fight, and very stout fantassins they make, but I thought from them, that the folk over here all wore—­how do you say it?—­petticoats.”

“Those are the kilts, and they wear them only in the Highlands.”

“Ah! on the mountains.  But there is a man out yonder.  Maybe he is the one who your father said would carry my letters to the post.”

“Yes, he is Farmer Whitehead’s man.  Shall I give them to him?”

“Well, he would be more careful of them if he had them from your hand.”

He took them from his pocket and gave them over to me.  I hurried out with them, and as I did so my eyes fell upon the address of the topmost one.  It was written very large and clear: 

   A son MAJESTE,

    Le roi de Suede,

      Stockholm.

I did not know very much French, but I had enough to make that out.  What sort of eagle was this which had flown into our humble little nest?

CHAPTER VII.

THE CORRIEMUIR PEEL TOWER.

Well, it would weary me, and I am very sure that it would weary you also, if I were to attempt to tell you how life went with us after this man came under our roof, or the way in which he gradually came to win the affections of every one of us.  With the women it was quick work enough; but soon he had thawed my father too, which was no such easy matter, and had gained Jim Horscroft’s goodwill as well as my own.  Indeed, we were but two great boys beside him, for he had been everywhere and seen everything; and of an evening he would chatter away in his limping English until he took us clean from the plain kitchen and the little farm steading, to plunge us into courts and camps and battlefields and all the wonders of the world.  Horscroft had been sulky enough with him at first; but de Lapp, with his tact and his easy ways, soon drew him round, until he had quite won his heart, and Jim would sit with Cousin Edie’s hand in his, and the two be quite lost in listening to all that he had to tell us.  I will not tell you all this; but even now, after so long an interval, I can trace how, week by week and month by month, by this word and that deed, he moulded us all as he wished.