And Shargar--had he any soul for such things? Doubtless; but how could he be other than lives behind Robert? For the latter had ancestors--that is, he came of people with a mental and spiritual history; while the former had been born the birth of an animal; of a noble sire, whose family had for generations filled the earth with fire, famine, slaughter, and licentiousness; and of a wandering outcast mother, who blindly loved the fields and woods, but retained her affection for her offspring scarcely beyond the period while she suckled them. The love of freedom and of wild animals that she had given him, however, was far more precious than any share his male ancestor had borne in his mental constitution. After his fashion he as well as Robert enjoyed the sun and the wind and the water and the sky; but he had sympathies with the salmon and the rooks and the wild rabbits even stronger than those of Robert. CHAPTER XIX. ROBERT STEALS HIS OWN. The period of the hairst-play, that is, of the harvest holiday time, drew near, and over the north of Scotland thousands of half-grown hearts were beating with glad anticipation. Of the usual devices of boys to cheat themselves into the half-belief of expediting a blessed approach by marking its rate, Robert knew nothing: even the notching of sticks was unknown at Rothieden; but he had a mode notwithstanding. Although indifferent to the games of his school-fellows, there was one amusement, a solitary one nearly, and therein not so good as most amusements, into which he entered with the whole energy of his nature: it was kite-flying. The moment that the hairst-play approached near enough to strike its image through the eyes of his mind, Robert proceeded to make his kite, or draigon, as he called it. Of how many pleasures does pocket-money deprive the unfortunate possessor! What is the going into a shop and buying what you want, compared with the gentle delight of hours and days filled with gaining effort after the attainment of your end? Never boy that bought his kite, even if the adornment thereafter lay in his own hands, and the pictures were gorgeous with colour and gilding, could have half the enjoyment of Robert from the moment he went to the cooper's to ask for an old gird or hoop, to the moment when he said 'Noo, Shargar!' and the kite rose slowly from the depth of the aërial flood. The hoop was carefully examined, the best portion cut away from it, that pared to a light strength, its ends confined to the proper curve by a string, and then away went Robert to the wright's shop. There a slip of wood, of proper length and thickness, was readily granted to his request, free as the daisies of the field. Oh! those horrid town conditions, where nothing is given for the asking, but all sold for money! In Robert's kite the only thing that cost money was the string to fly it with, and that the grandmother willingly provided, for not even her ingenuity could discover any evil, direct or implicated, in