“By the hand of my father, my dear friend,” answered M’Aulay, “if you leave the beast in my keeping, you may rely on his being fed and sorted according to his worth and quality, and that upon your happy return, you will find him as sleek as an onion boiled in butter.”

“Or,” said Sir Miles Musgrave, “if this worthy cavalier chooses to part with his charger for a reasonable sum, I have some part of the silver candlesticks still dancing the heys in my purse, which I shall be very willing to transfer to his.”

“In brief, mine honourable friends,” said Captain Dalgetty, again eyeing them both with an air of comic penetration, “I find it would not be altogether unacceptable to either of you, to have some token to remember the old soldier by, in case it shall please M’Callum More to hang him up at the gate of his own castle.  And doubtless it would be no small satisfaction to me, in such an event, that a noble and loyal cavalier like Sir Miles Musgrave, or a worthy and hospitable chieftain like our excellent landlord, should act as my executor.”

Both hastened to protest that they had no such object, and insisted again upon the impassable character of the Highland paths.  Angus M’Aulay mumbled over a number of hard Gaellic names, descriptive of the difficult passes, precipices, corries, and beals, through which he said the road lay to Inverary, when old Donald, who had now entered, sanctioned his master’s account of these difficulties, by holding up his hands, and elevating his eyes, and shaking his head, at every gruttural which M’Aulay pronounced.  But all this did not move the inflexible Captain.

“My worthy friends,” said he, “Gustavus is not new to the dangers of travelling, and the mountains of Bohemia; and (no disparagement to the beals and corries Mr. Angus is pleased to mention, and of which Sir Miles, who never saw them, confirms the horrors,) these mountains may compete with the vilest roads in Europe.  In fact, my horse hath a most excellent and social quality; for although he cannot pledge in my cup, yet we share our loaf between us, and it will be hard if he suffers famine where cakes or bannocks are to be found.  And, to cut this matter short, I beseech you, my good friends, to observe the state of Sir Duncan Campbell’s palfrey, which stands in that stall before us, fat and fair; and, in return for your anxiety an my account, I give you my honest asseveration, that while we travel the same road, both that palfrey and his rider shall lack for food before either Gustavus or I.”

Having said this he filled a large measure with corn, and walked up with it to his charger, who, by his low whinnying neigh, his pricked ears, and his pawing, showed how close the alliance was betwixt him and his rider.  Nor did he taste his corn until he had returned his master’s caresses, by licking his hands and face.  After this interchange of greeting, the steed began to his provender with an eager dispatch, which showed old military habits; and the master, after looking on the animal with great complacency for about five minutes, said,—­“Much good may it do your honest heart, Gustavus;—­now must I go and lay in provant myself for the campaign.”