For a boy of sixteen he was slightly built, but lithe and wiry as a hill-fox. His hair was longer than is customary to-day, and covered by a broad blue bonnet. His features were regular and clean-cut, the eyes dark and sombre, his cheeks and neck tanned by wind and wild weather. In his rough jacket and faded kilt, with his torn and patched stockings and his soaking brogues, he made a queer enough spectacle--not one would say the ideal picture of a hero of romance. He wore no sporran, such luxuries were not for him, and his kilt was but a roll of tartan belted about his middle, but he carried himself with all the dignity of his race. He was a schoolboy, but out of school he was a Fraser, and were the Frasers not in the field with the Master of Lovat? Those were days when schoolboys had small time for lessons. Only the night before Lauchlain Macintosh had eluded the sentinels and given warning of the plan to capture Prince Charlie at Moy Hall. There was no speaking to Lauchlain at the Grammar School for months after. Indeed, things were too critical for sums and tags of grammar. Already the Prince was threatening Inverness. At any moment there might be a battle at the very gates of the town, and who could say what might happen then? Meanwhile the two horsemen had pulled up their steaming beasts in the market place, and the one who had lost his hat raised himself in his stirrups and shouted for silence. Rob, worming his way through the people, arrived in time to hear his opening words. "We have ridden hot-foot," the man cried, speaking in Gaelic, "for the Pretender's army is even now marching on your town." At that there was a sudden clamour of voices, some cheering, and not a little hooting, for the name "Pretender" was not pleasant in Jacobite ears. But Inverness was in Hanoverian hands, and so the noise died away, and all eyes were turned again upon the man on the horse. He was a great, red-faced fellow, very pompous and self sufficient, and had his hair not looked so laughable through the loss of his hat, might have impressed his auditors enormously. The news he had brought sent a strange stir through the town. People began to talk in little clusters in the roadway, taverns quickly filled with gossipers, shutters began to rattle together, and anxious faces peered round the corners of windows. Suddenly down the street sounded the tramp of feet, and a score of excited eyes were turned in the hope of seeing the Highland army march into the town. But no--it was the Hanoverian garrison some two thousand strong, commanded by Lord Loudon, about to evacuate. At that the confusion grew more intense, and ardent Jacobites could scarce refrain from donning the white cockade, while less ardent Hanoverians did not know whether to cheer or take to flight, and honest tradesfolk wore long faces thinking of their goods, for who could protect them against wild, Highland caterans, hungry from long marching?