the sail filled, the boat heeled to the gunwale, and we swept immediately beyond sound of the men’s voices.  To what terrors they endured upon the rock, where they were now deserted without the countenance of any civilised person or so much as the protection of a Bible, no limit can be set; nor had they any brandy left to be their consolation, for even in the haste and secrecy of our departure Andie had managed to remove it.

It was our first care to set Anster ashore in a cove by the Glenteithy Rocks, so that the deliverance of our maroons might be duly seen to the next day.  Thence we kept away up Firth.  The breeze, which was then so spirited, swiftly declined, but never wholly failed us.  All day we kept moving, though often not much more; and it was after dark ere we were up with the Queensferry.  To keep the letter of Andie’s engagement (or what was left of it) I must remain on board, but I thought no harm to communicate with the shore in writing.  On Prestongrange’s cover, where the Government seal must have a good deal surprised my correspondent, I writ, by the boat’s lantern, a few necessary words, and Andie carried them to Rankeillor.  In about an hour he came aboard again, with a purse of money and the assurance that a good horse should be standing saddled for me by two to-morrow at Clackmannan Pool.  This done, and the boat riding by her stone anchor, we lay down to sleep under the sail.

We were in the Pool the next day long ere two; and there was nothing left for me but sit and wait.  I felt little alacrity upon my errand.  I would have been glad of any passable excuse to lay it down; but none being to be found, my uneasiness was no less great than if I had been running to some desired pleasure.  By shortly after one the horse was at the waterside, and I could see a man walking it to and fro till I should land, which vastly swelled my impatience.  Andie ran the moment of my liberation very fine, showing himself a man of his bare word, but scarce serving his employers with a heaped measure; and by about fifty seconds after two I was in the saddle and on the full stretch for Stirling.  In a little more than an hour I had passed that town, and was already mounting Alan Water side, when the weather broke in a small tempest.  The rain blinded me, the wind had nearly beat me from the saddle, and the first darkness of the night surprised me in a wilderness still some way east of Balwhidder, not very sure of my direction and mounted on a horse that began already to be weary.

In the press of my hurry, and to be spared the delay and annoyance of a guide, I had followed (so far as it was possible for any horseman) the line of my journey with Alan.  This I did with open eyes, foreseeing a great risk in it, which the tempest had now brought to a reality.  The last that I knew of where I was, I think it must have been about Uam Var; the hour perhaps six at night.  I must still think it great good fortune that I got about eleven to my destination, the house of Duncan Dhu.  Where I had wandered in the interval perhaps the horse could tell.  I know we were twice down, and once over the saddle and for a moment carried away in a roaring burn.  Steed and rider were bemired up to the eyes.