"There, now, that _is_ one point I can't understand about her," said Lavender eagerly. "How can a girl of her shrewdness and good sense have such a belief in that humbugging old idiot of a father of hers, who fancies me a political emissary, and plays small tricks to look like diplomacy? It is always 'My papa can do this,' and 'My papa can do that,' and 'There is no one at all like my papa.' And she is continually fondling him, and giving little demonstrations of affection, of which he takes no more notice than if he were an Arctic bear." Ingram looked up with some surprise in his face. "You don't mean to say, Lavender," he said slowly, "that you are already jealous of the girl's own father?" He could not answer, for at this moment Sheila, her father and the big greyhound came up the hill. And again it was Lavender's good fortune to walk with Sheila across the moorland path they had traversed some little time before. And now the moon was still higher in the heavens, and the yellow lane of light that crossed the violet waters of Loch Roag quivered in a deeper gold. The night-air was scented with the Dutch clover growing down by the shore. They could hear the curlew whistling and the plover calling amid that monotonous plash of the waves that murmured all around the coast. When they returned to the house the darker waters of the Atlantic and the purple clouds of the west were shut out from sight, and before them there was only the liquid plain of Loch Roag, with its pathway of yellow fire, and far away on the other side the shoulders and peaks of the southern mountains, that had grown gray and clear and sharp in the beautiful twilight. And this was Sheila's home. [To be continued.] FOOTNOTES: [G] "My black-haired girl, my pretty girl, my black-haired girl, don't leave me." _Nighean dubh_ is pronounced _Nyean du_. [H] Literally, _Gearaidh-na'h-Aimhne_--"the cutting of the river." [I] Another name given by the islanders to these stones is _Fir-bhreige_, "false men." Both names, False Men and the Mourners, should be of some interest to antiquarians, for they will suit pretty nearly any theory. WINTER. The golden sunshine has fled away, The clouds o'erhead hang heavy and gray, The world is woefully sad to-day; And I am thinking of you, dear, you. The cold clay hides from the rain and dew The tenderest heart that the world e'er knew. Why should I think of you when the rain Smiteth so sharply the window-pane, And the wild winds round the old house 'plain? You were so sweet and sunny and bright, Ever your presence brought life and light, And I recall you in storm and night. When snow-shrouds hang on the corpse-cold trees, When sharp frosts sting and the north winds freeze, What has your mem'ry to do with these? O fair lost love! O love that is dead! The pleasant days from my life are fled, The rosy morns and the sunsets red.