The aching and faintness of my body, the labouring of my heart, the soreness of my hands, and the smarting of my throat and eyes in the continual smoke of dust and ashes, had soon grown to be so unbearable that I would gladly have given up.  Nothing but the fear of Alan lent me enough of a false kind of courage to continue.  As for himself (and you are to bear in mind that he was cumbered with a great-coat) he had first turned crimson, but as time went on the redness began to be mingled with patches of white; his breath cried and whistled as it came; and his voice, when he whispered his observations in my ear during our halts, sounded like nothing human.  Yet he seemed in no way dashed in spirits, nor did he at all abate in his activity, so that I was driven, to marvel at the man’s endurance.

At length, in the first gloaming of the night, we heard a trumpet sound, and looking back from among the heather, saw the troop beginning to collect.  A little after, they had built a fire and camped for the night, about the middle of the waste.

At this I begged and besought that we might lie down and sleep.

“There shall be no sleep the night!” said Alan.  “From now on, these weary dragoons of yours will keep the crown of the muirland, and none will get out of Appin but winged fowls.  We got through in the nick of time, and shall we jeopard what we’ve gained?  Na, na, when the day comes, it shall find you and me in a fast place on Ben Alder.”

“Alan,” I said, “it’s not the want of will:  it’s the strength that I want.  If I could, I would; but as sure as I’m alive I cannot.”

“Very well, then,” said Alan.  “I’ll carry ye.”

I looked to see if he were jesting; but no, the little man was in dead earnest; and the sight of so much resolution shamed me.

“Lead away!” said I.  “I’ll follow.”

He gave me one look as much as to say, “Well done, David!” and off he set again at his top speed.

It grew cooler and even a little darker (but not much) with the coming of the night.  The sky was cloudless; it was still early in July, and pretty far north; in the darkest part of that night, you would have needed pretty good eyes to read, but for all that, I have often seen it darker in a winter mid-day.  Heavy dew fell and drenched the moor like rain; and this refreshed me for a while.  When we stopped to breathe, and I had time to see all about me, the clearness and sweetness of the night, the shapes of the hills like things asleep, and the fire dwindling away behind us, like a bright spot in the midst of the moor, anger would come upon me in a clap that I must still drag myself in agony and eat the dust like a worm.