It may never have happened, in the years since Auld Jock died and the farmer of Cauldbrae gave up trying to keep him on the hills, that Bobby, had gone so far back on this once familiar road; and he may not have recognized it at first, for the highways around Edinburgh were everywhere much alike.  This one alone began to climb again.  Up, up it toiled, for two weary miles, to the hilltop toll-bar of Fairmilehead, and there the sounds and smells that made it different from other roads began.

Five miles out of the city the halt was called, and the soldiers flung themselves on the slope.  Many experiences of route-marching had taught Bobby that there was an interval of rest before the return, so, with his nose to the ground, he started up the brae on a pilgrimage to old shrines, just as in his puppyhood days, at Auld Jock’s heels, there was much shouting of men, barking of collies, and bleating of sheep all the way up.  Once he had to leave the road until a driven flock had passed.  Behind the sheep walked an old laborer in hodden-gray, woolen bonnet, and shepherd’s two-fold plaid, with a lamb in the pouch of it.  Bobby trembled at the apparition, sniffed at the hob-nailed boots, and then, with drooped head and tail, trotted on up the slope.

Men and dogs were all out on the billowy pastures, and the farm-house of Cauldbrae lay on the level terrace, seemingly deserted and steeped in memories.  A few moments before, a tall lassie had come out to listen to the military music.  A couple of hundred feet below, the coats of the soldiers looked to her like poppies scattered on the heather.  At the top of the brae the wind was blowing a cold gale, so the maidie went up again, and around to a bit of tangled garden on the sheltered side of the house.  The “wee lassie Elsie” was still a bairn in short skirts and braids, who lavished her soft heart, as yet, on briar bushes and daisies.

Bobby made a tour of the sheepfold, the cowyard and byre, and he lingered behind the byre, where Auld Jock had played with him on Sabbath afternoons.  He inspected the dairy, and the poultry-house where hens were sitting on their nests.  By and by he trotted around the house and came upon the lassie, busily clearing winter rubbish from her posie bed.  A dog changes very little in appearance, but in eight and a half years a child grows into a different person altogether.  Bobby barked politely to let this strange lassie know that he was there.  In the next instant he knew her, for she whirled about and, in a kind of glad wonder, cried out: 

“Oh, Bobby! hae ye come hame?  Mither, here’s ma ain wee Bobby!” For she had never given up the hope that this adored little pet would some day return to her.

“Havers, lassie, ye’re aye seein’ Bobby i’ ilka Hielan’ terrier, an’ there’s mony o’ them aboot.”

The gude-wife looked from an attic window in the steep gable, and then hurried down.  “Weel, noo, ye’re richt, Elsie.  He wad be comin’ wi’ the regiment frae the Castle.  Bittie doggies an’ laddies are fair daft aboot the soldiers.  Ay, he’s bonny, an’ weel cared for, by the ordinar’.  I wonder gin he’s still leevin’ i’ the grand auld kirkyaird.”