"John, come kiss me now, John, come kiss me now, John, come kiss me by and by And mak' nae mair adow." One of the guests at our later, different dance, in Corgarff Castle, must have remembered this, for suddenly there was a sort of "soughing" of the song, then a singing of it, and it was positively roared out by the assembly when the music stopped and the dance ended. I understood the application and the invitation which were intended, and I caught a look in Marget's flushed face, as if she also understood. Her mother glanced at the roystering singers, then at the Black Colonel and, with an apology for leaving me, went and stood beside her daughter, the mothering instinct of protection called into action. "Thank you, Mistress Marget," I heard Jock Farquharson say, in his most melodious tone, "you have been kind to me, and I will hope to thank you again. And thank you, Madame," he said, bowing low to her mother, "for letting me lift my head to-night, as it has not been lifted for long. I shall not forget to be grateful and, I hope, to deserve your good-will." Then he made me, the official host, a last, low bow with a mockery, subtle but noticeable, in it, walked down the room, saluting and being saluted on every side, and was gone. Our friendly ball, from which I had expected so much, died away to the clink of Mack's galloping hoofs, an unsettling rhythm. _IX.--'Twixt Night and Morn_ They declare that if you are drowning, or otherwise at the crack o' doom, your whole life's record leaps through your mind in an instant. It may be so, Providence giving a man, however his balance-sheet stands, a last chance to square it fair and well. Everybody being gone home, and I being alone, after our dizzy ball, I felt that I had to count up the position. It needed no effort to understand that the Black Colonel's purpose in invading me had been to meet Marget and her mother, to impress himself upon them, all in the interest of his designs. He had relied for safety upon the temporary state of neutrality which the ball carried with it, and he had come, he had seen, he had--what? So far my thoughts convoyed me. But my little room in the castle with its cell-like windows, its low ceiling, even, I would add, its sense of plain refinement, worried me, and I went out into the night and the spaciousness of earth and heaven. Oh, for freedom to breathe and think, and oh for it at that witching time when night and day hold their bridal of mating among the Highland hills.