Oh, those winter nights! when the wind swept down through the glen, and they could hear the starving deer stamping outside in the snow and dragging at the wood stack. On these occasions, Mrs. Gowdy knitted stockings, and did curious sums in mental arithmetic; the lads read the paper and such books as they had borrowed from the minister. Jock's shock-haired red head was bent over Adam Smith's "Wealth of Nations." He was clever and ambitious, and had long resolved that _he_ was not going to waste his life in herding sheep, milking cows, and dragging up and down the weary road to the town for coal and groceries. No! Jock had heard the history of his uncle Jamie, and he was educating himself with painful, but continuous, effort, in order that he might also go out into the world and do something--something that would bring him in money and applause. To begin with, he was going to the University of Glasgow, and was reading for a bursary. His family tacitly acquiesced; they respected his ambition and agreed that Jock was to be somebody--some day. He was, therefore, allowed the largest share of lamplight and first claim on the ink bottle. His sister had also her dreams, as she sat with a collie at her feet. Maggie Gowdy hated the hard rough life. It was aye fine for her grandmother, or even her mother; but times were changed; there was no fun or stir beyond a rare jaunt to Stirling or Glasgow. All the other girls in the glen were a thousand times better off than she was. It was easy for her mother to say "bide a wee"; she might bide at Ardnashiel till she was old and toothless. Young Campbell of Lussie used to come up the valley, by way of fishing, and spier for her, and have a crack, but her mother found it out, and made an awful row, and threatened to lock her in her room. The kirk was full six miles away, and a desperate rough walk, and there was no one there foreby some old shepherds, their wives, and a few farming folk. Aye, when she read beautiful stories in the paper penny books she bought with her knitting profits, she felt wild to be away in the big world, to see people--and be seen. She had overheard Mistress Murray tell her mother that it was an awful pity such a bonnie lass should be shut away up the glen. Maggie was a tall, broad-shouldered young woman, with a pair of fine bold eyes, a fresh complexion and ropes of coarse dark hair, and felt perfectly confident that, if she only had a bit of money, she would get a match.