“You think that the outlaw’s life is hazardous; but I have only to sound this,” and he lightly touched his bugle, “and a score of stout arms are around me.” There was something so fascinating in the stranger’s manner that, despite her better judgment, Margaret felt chained to the spot. Nor did Ruth show any greater disposition to depart. Before five minutes had elapsed, Margaret found herself conversing with the gallant outlaw as freely as if she had known him for months. If, for a moment, she would think such conduct improper, the next reflection would be had he not saved her life? Besides was not Ruth at hand? Is it a wonder, therefore, that the grateful girl suffered the stranger to linger by her side for nearly an hour, or that after they had parted, she thought of him oftener than she would have been willing a week before to admit she could ever think of any one except her father? Is it a wonder that she often strolled into the forest with Ruth, and that she never returned without having seen the outlaw? In a word is it any wonder that she loved? Chapter III. Never met, or never parted, They had ne’er been broken-hearted. _Burns._ There is nothing in this care-worn world so sweet and innocent as a young girl’s first love. Then—when the heart is fresh, when every thought is pure, when the poetry of life has not yet been crushed out of the soul, when as we are nearer to our childhood we are nearer to heaven—then it is that we love with an intensity such as we never love with again. And thus Margaret loved. She knew it not until it was impossible for her to drive away her passion. It had crept on her, slowly but surely, and oh! how sweetly, until it became a part of her being, and the day in which she did not see her lover, passed tediously and mournfully to her. Yet though loving as few love, even in the fervor of a first passion, Margaret was still ignorant of her lover’s name. Often would she be tortured by fears lest he might have already forfeited his life in the career of an outlaw, but as often would she quiet her alarm by reflecting how impossible that a mere freebooter should be so courteous and even refined. In all this there was a mystery which did but feed the love of her highly imaginative mind, and though, day after day, would she resolve to question her lover so closely respecting himself that he could not evade her inquiries, yet, day after day, would she be diverted from, and forget it.