hand, to whom he did not dare say "Lord save
you!" or when a housewife rocking her cradle
of a winter's night, crossed herself as a gust of
storm thundered over her cabin-roof, with the
exclamation, "Oh, then, it's Coll Dhu that has
enough o' the fresh air about his head up there
this night, the crature!"

Coll Dhu had lived thus in his solitude for some
years, when it became known that Colonel
Blake, the new lord of the soil, was coming to
visit the country. By climbing one of the peaks
encircling his eyrie, Coll could look sheer down a
mountain-side, and see in miniature beneath him,
a grey old dwelling with ivied chimneys and
weather-slated walls, standing amongst straggling
trees and grim warlike rocks, that gave it the
look of a fortress, gazing out to the Atlantic
for ever with the eager eyes of all its windows,
as if demanding perpetually, "What tidings from
the New World?"

He could see now masons and carpenters
crawling about below, like ants in the sun,
overrunning the old house from base to chimney,
daubing here and knocking there, tumbling down
walls that looked to Coll, up among the clouds,
like a handful of jackstones, and building up
others that looked like the toy fences in a
child's Farm. Throughout several months he
must have watched the busy ants at their task
of breaking and mending again, disfiguring and
beautifying; but when all was done he had not
the curiosity to stride down and admire the
handsome paneling of the new billiard-room,
nor yet the fine view which the enlarged
bay-window in the drawing-room commanded of the
watery highway to Newfoundland.

Deep summer was melting into autumn, and
the amber streaks of decay were beginning
to creep out and trail over the ripe purple of
moor and mountain, when Colonel Blake, his
only daughter, and a party of friends, arrived in
the country. The grey house below was alive
with gaiety, but Coll Dhu no longer found an
interest in observing it from his eyrie. When
he watched the sun rise or set, he chose to ascend
some crag that looked on no human habitation.
When he sallied forth on his excursions,
gun in hand, he set his face towards the most
isolated wastes, dipping into the loneliest valleys,
and scaling the nakedest ridges. When he
came by chance within call of other excursionists,
gun in hand he plunged into the shade of
some hollow, and avoided an encounter. Yet it
was fated, for all that, that he and Colonel Blake
should meet.

Towards the evening of one bright September
day, the wind changed, and in half an hour the
mountains were wrapped in a thick blinding mist.
Coll Dhu was far from his den, but so well had he
searched these mountains, and inured himself to
their climate, that neither storm, rain, nor fog,
had power to disturb him. But while he stalked
on his way, a faint and agonised cry from a
human voice reached him through the smothering
mist. He quickly tracked the sound, and gained
the side of a man who was stumbling along in
danger of death at every step.

"Follow me!" said Coll Dhu to this man,
and, in an hour's time, brought him safely to the
lowlands, and up to the walls of the eager-eyed
mansion.

"I am Colonel Blake," said the frank soldier,
when, having left the fog behind him, they stood
in the starlight under the lighted windows.
"Pray tell me quickly to whom I owe my
life."

As he spoke, he glanced up at his benefactor,
a large man with a sombre sun-burned
face.

"Colonel Blake," said Coll Dhu, after a strange
pause, "your father suggested to my father to
stake his estates at the gaming table. They
were staked, and the tempter won. Both are
dead; but you and I live, and I have sworn to
injure you."

The colonel laughed good humouredly at the
uneasy face above him.

"And you began to keep your oath to-night
by saving my life?" said he. "Come! I am a
soldier, and know how to meet an enemy; but I
had far rather meet a friend. I shall not be happy
till you have eaten my salt. We have merrymaking
to-night in honour of my daughter's
birthday. Come in and join us?"

Coll Dhu looked at the earth doggedly.

"I have told you," he said, "who and what
I am, and I will not cross your threshold."

But at this moment (so runs my story) a
French window opened among the flower-beds
by which they were standing, and a vision
appeared which stayed the words on Coll's tongue.
A stately girl, clad in white satin, stood framed
in the ivied window, with the warm light from
within streaming around her richly-moulded
figure into the night. Her face was as pale as
her gown, her eyes were swimming in tears, but a
firm smile sat on her lips as she held out both
hands to her father. The light behind her,
touched the glistening folds of her dress—the
lustrous pearls round her throat—the coronet of
blood-red roses which encircled the knotted
braids at the back of her head. Satin, pearls,
and roses—had Coll Dhu, of the Devil's Inn,
never set eyes upon such things before?

Evleen Blake was no nervous tearful miss.
A few quick words—"Thank God! you're safe;
the rest have been home an hour"—and a tight
pressure of her father's fingers between her own
jewelled hands, were all that betrayed the
uneasiness she had suffered.

"Faith, my love, I owe my life to this brave
gentleman!" said the blithe colonel. "Press
him to come in and be our guest, Evleen. He
wants to retreat to his mountains, and lose himself
again in the fog where I found him; or,
rather, where he found me! Come, sir" (to
Coll), "you must surrender to this fair besieger."

An introduction followed. "Coll Dhu!"
murmured Evleen Blake, for she had heard the
common tales of him; but with a frank welcome
she invited her father's preserver to taste the
hospitality of that father's house.

"I beg you to come in, sir," she said; "but