"Your rent is ready, Sir--the maist of us are ready with your rent; but oh! if there is a heart of flesh within ye, spare us our hames! Gentlemen, we have a' been born here. Yon auld man," and Duncan pointed to the venerable white head of a trembling old man, wrapped in a plaid, who leaned against the lintel of the nearest cottage--"and he's past a century--is the only ane amang us that was a living soul at the flitting. For pity's sake, Sir, think o't! Gie us time to make up the siller. We'll pay the next half-year in advance, if better mayna be; but do not bid us leave the glen." "That's all very well," said Fitzherbert, "very pretty. A set of Scotch cheats, who only want to deceive Lord Gillravidge." "I want to deceive no man," said the humble chief of Oranmore, indignantly. "I wouldna set my face to a lee for a' his revenues. I am a head of a family, and a decent man, in God's providence, Sir; and I gie ye my word, that if ye'll just give us time, we'll make up the next half-year's rent in advance. His Lordship is a stranger, and maybe, doesna ken whether he can trust us or no. Mr. Ferguson will bear us witness, Sir--the Laird himsel will bear us witness. Mr. Lumsden--Guid be thankit he is here himsel!--the minister will bear us witness!" Mr. Lumsden entered the circle, hailed by various salutations. "Blessings on him! He never fails when he's needed." "He'll bear witness to us that we're honest folk." And one indignant outcry from Duncan's sister: "Ye'll believe the minister!" "What is the matter, Duncan?" said Mr. Lumsden. "The gentlemen have come for our rent, Sir; we're ahin' hand. I make nae wonder that folk new to the countryside mayna trust us; but oh! if they would but pit us on trial. I promise, in the name of all in the glen--ye're a' hearing me?--that, though it should take our haill substance, we'll pay the siller just and faithfully, as we have aye dune, if we only can bide upon our ain land." "You own land!" echoed Fitzherbert. "Fellow! the land is Lord Gillravidge's." Big Duncan Macalpine's honest face flushed deeply. "I am nae fellow, Sir; and the land belangs to us by an aulder tenure than can give it to ony foreign lord. We are clansmen of the Laird's. Langsyne our chief sold our land further north--instead of it we got this glen. I say, Sir, that the land is ours.--We were born and bred in it; our fathers fought for it langsyne. We hold it on an auld tenure--aulder than ony lordship in thae pairts. Our forebears were content to follow their chief when he threw his ain hills into the hands of strangers. We got this instead of our auld inheritance. I say, Sir, that the land is ours--that no man has a right to take it from us. Mr. Whittret, ye're a lawyer--am I no speaking true?" "Bah! You're a cheat!" exclaimed Fitzherbert. Big Duncan's muscular arm shook nervously. He restrained himself with an effort. Not so his vehement sister Jean.