“I believe that would be a brother to Balfour of Baith,” said I, for I was ready for the surgeon now.

“The same, sir,” said James More.  “And since I have been fellow-soldier with your kinsman, you must suffer me to grasp your hand.”

He shook hands with me long and tenderly, beaming on me the while as though he had found a brother.

“Ah!” says he, “these are changed days since your cousin and I heard the balls whistle in our lugs.”

“I think he was a very far-away cousin,” said I, drily, “and I ought to tell you that I never clapped eyes upon the man.”

“Well, well,” said he, “it makes no change.  And you—­I do not think you were out yourself, sir—­I have no clear mind of your face, which is one not probable to be forgotten.”

“In the year you refer to, Mr. Macgregor, I was getting skelped in the parish school,” said I.

“So young!” cries he.  “Ah, then you will never be able to think what this meeting is to me.  In the hour of my adversity, and in the house of my enemy, to meet in with the blood of an old brother-in-arms—­it heartens me, Mr. Balfour, like the skirling of the Highland pipes!  Sir, this is a sad look-back that many of us have to make:  some with falling tears.  I have lived in my own country like a king; my sword, my mountains, and the faith of my friends and kinsmen sufficed for me.  Now I lie in a stinking dungeon; and do you know, Mr. Balfour,” he went on, taking my arm and beginning to lead me about, “do you know, sir, that I lack mere necessaries?  The malice of my foes has quite sequestered my resources.  I lie, as you know, sir, on a trumped-up charge, of which I am as innocent as yourself.  They dare not bring me to my trial, and in the meanwhile I am held naked in my prison.  I could have wished it was your cousin I had met, or his brother Baith himself.  Either would, I know, have been rejoiced to help me; while a comparative stranger like yourself—­”

I would be ashamed to set down all he poured out to me in this beggarly vein, or the very short and grudging answers that I made to him.  There were times when I was tempted to stop his mouth with some small change; but whether it was from shame or pride—­whether it was for my own sake or Catriona’s—­whether it was because I thought him no fit father for his daughter, or because I resented that grossness of immediate falsity that clung about the man himself—­the thing was clean beyond me.  And I was still being wheedled and preached to, and still being marched to and fro, three steps and a turn, in that small chamber, and had already, by some very short replies, highly incensed, although not finally discouraged, my beggar, when Prestongrange appeared in the doorway and bade me eagerly into his big chamber.

“I have a moment’s engagement,” said he; “and that you may not sit empty-handed I am going to present you to my three braw daughters, of whom perhaps you may have heard, for I think they are more famous than papa.  This way.”