And are you going away--_Rose-leaf_--_Rose-leaf_--are you sailing away from me on the smooth waters to the South? I put out my hand to you; but you are afraid of the hard hands of the Northern people, and you shrink from me. Do you think we would harm you, then, that you tremble so? The savage days are gone. Come--we will show you the beautiful islands in the summer-time; and you will take high courage, and become yourself a Macleod; and all the people will be proud to hear of Fionaghal, the Fair Stranger, who has come to make her home among us. Oh, our hands are gentle enough when it is a Rose-leaf they have to touch. There was blood on them in the old days; we have washed it off now: see--this beautiful red rose you have given me is not afraid of rough hands! We have no beautiful roses to give you, but we will give you a piece of white heather, and that will secure to you peace and rest and a happy heart all your days. You will not touch it, sweetheart? Do not be afraid! There is no adder in it. But if you were to find, now, a white adder, would you know what to do with it? There was a sweetheart in an old song knew what to do with an adder. Do you know the song? The young man goes back to his home, and he says to his mother, "Oh make my bed soon; for I'm weary, weary hunting, and fain would lie doon." Why do you turn so pale, sweetheart? There is the whiteness of a white adder in your cheeks; and your eyes--there is death in your eyes! "Donald!--Hamish! help! help!--her foot is coming near to my grave!--my heart--!" * * * * * And so, in a paroxysm of wild terror and pain, he awoke again; and behold, the ghastly white daylight was in the room--the cold glare of a day he would fain have never seen! It was all in a sort of dream that this haggard-faced man dressed, and drank a cup of tea, and got outside into the rain. The rain, and the noise of the cabs, and the gloom of London skies; these harsh and commonplace things were easier to bear than the dreams of the sick brain. And then, somehow or other, he got his way down to Aldershot, and sought out Norman Ogilvie. "Macleod!" Ogilvie cried--startled beyond measure by his appearance. "I--I wanted to shake hands with you, Ogilvie, before I am going," said this hollow-eyed man, who seemed to have grown old. Ogilvie hesitated for a second or two; and then he said, vehemently,-- "Well, Macleod, I am not a sentimental chap--but--but--hang it! it is too bad. And again and again I have thought of writing to you, as your friend, just within the last week or so; and then I said to myself that tale-bearing never came to any good. But she won't darken Mrs. Ross's door again--that I know. Mrs. Ross went straight to her the other day. There is no nonsense about that woman. And when she got to understand that the story was true, she let Miss White know that she considered you to be a friend of hers, and that--well, you know how women give hints--"