Lamh Laudher felt considerably puzzled to know what object Ellen could have had in sending the servant maid for his staff.  Of one thing, however, he was certain, that her motive must have had regard to his own safety; but how, or in what manner, he could not conjecture.  It is certainly true some misgivings shot lightly across his imagination, on reflecting that he had parted with the very weapon which he usually brought with him to repel the violence of Ellen’s friends, should he be detected in an interview with her.  He remembered, too, that he had met unlucky Nell M’Collum, and that the person who deprived him of his principal means of defence was her niece.  He had little time, however, to think upon the subject, for in a few minutes after Nanse’s departure, he recognized the light quick step of her whom he expected.

The figure of Ellen Neil was tall, and her motions full of untaught elegance and natural grace.  Her countenance was a fine oval; her features, though not strictly symmetrical, were replete with animation, and her eyes sparkled with a brilliancy indicative of a warm heart and a quick apprehension.  Flaxen hair, long and luxuriant, decided, even at a distant glance, the loveliness of her skin, than which the unsunned snow could not be whiter.  If you add to this a delightful temper, buoyant spirits, and extreme candor, her character, in its strongest points, is before you.

On reaching the bottom of the Grassy Quarry, as it was called, she peered under the little beetling cliff that overhung the well-known ledge on which Lamh Laudher sat.

“I declare, John,” said she, on seeing him, “I thought at first you weren’t here.”

“Did you ever know me to be late!—­” said John, taking her by the hand, and placing her beside him; “and what would you a’ done, Ellen, if I hadn’t been here?”

“Why, run home as if the life was lavin’ me, for fear of seein’ something.”

“You needn’t be afeard, Ellen, dear; nothing could harm you, at all events.  However, puttin’ that aside, have you any betther tidin’s than you had when we met last?”

“I wish to heaven I had, John! but indeed I have far worse; ay, a thousand times worse.  They have all joined against me, an’ I’m not to see or speak to you at all.”

“That’s hard,” replied Lamh Laudher, drawing his breath tightly; “but I know where it comes from.  I think your father might be softened a little, ay, a great deal, if it wasn’t for your brother Meehaul.”

“Indeed, Lamh Laudher, you’re wrong in that; my father’s as bitther against you as he is.  It was only on Tuesday evenin’ last that they told me, one an’ all they would rather see me a corpse than your wife.  Indeed an’ deed, John, I doubt it never can be.”

“There,” replied John, “I see plain enough that they’ll gain you over at last.  That will be the end of it:  but if you choose to break the vows and promises that passed between us, you may do so.”