They had not proceeded far, until they were challenged by voices among the rocks, showing that his host's place of retreat was protected by sentinels in all quarters. His guide answered the challenge, and they then went on without molestation. After about an hour's walk over very rugged ground, during which they wound over the mountain, and threaded their way through various bogs and woods, that completely bewildered Inverawe, his guide suddenly brought him out upon a road which he well knew, and then shaking hands with him, and bidding him farewell, he dived again into the wood, and disappeared. Inverawe rejoined his company at their night's quarters. They had spent an anxious time, regarding him, during his absence, and they were clamorous in their enquiries as to what had become of him. He gave them an account of the circumstance of his losing his way; but he told them not a syllable of his adventure with the stranger, resolving that it should be for ever buried in his own bosom. There, however, it produced many a thought; and often did he earnestly hope, that chance might again bring him into contact with the man who had taken so noble a revenge of him--to whom he felt as an honest bankrupt might do towards his generous and forgiving creditor; and whose person and features he had engraven so deeply on his recollection, to be embalmed there amidst the warmest and kindliest affections of his heart. It was soon after the disbanding of his company, that Campbell of Inverawe returned to his own romantic territory, and to his ancient castle, standing in the midst of beautiful natural lawns, surrounded by wooded banks and knolls, lying at the north-western base of the mighty Ben-Cruachan. Speaking in a general way, the country around was thickly covered with oak and birch woods, giving double value, both in point of beauty and utility, to the rich, glady pastures, which were seen to spread their verdant surface to the sun, along the course of the river Awe. Behind the grey towers of the building, broken rocks arose here and there, in bare masses, in the direction of the mountain,--whilst the blue expanse of Loch Etive stretched away from the eye towards the north-east, as well as to the west. To the south-west, the groves, and grassy slopes, were abruptly broken off by the perpendicular crags of the romantic ravine through which the river makes its way, to pour itself across the open haughs of Bunawe, and into Loch Etive. To sketch out the remainder of the neighbourhood, so that you may be fully aware of the nature of the country, which was the scene, where one of the most important circumstances of my tale took place, I may add, that about a mile above the ravine, the river has its origin from a long narrow arm of Loch Awe, which presents one of the most romantic ranges of scenery in Scotland. The lake in the bottom, is there every where about eighty or an hundred yards wide only; and whilst a bare, rocky mountain front, furrowed by many a