“´Tis ever wise to confess your weakness in the ear of a friend--keep your bold looks and your wooden guns for the enemy. My dear lad, thou art but pickling a rod for thine own whipping, and that to serve no good or wise purpose. Thank Heaven, I am stout of limb, and nought can tire me; but for you, your bones are still soft, and I would not have you again a burden on my hands. There is no need for immediate haste, for we can accomplish to-morrow all that we might do to-day. Then mount, and let us proceed leisurely.” That day they made good progress, and by nightfall were a considerable distance on their journey. By the next evening they hoped to reach the ford of the Finn. But in the meantime it was necessary to pass the night under the open sky, for the country was completely deserted, and nowhere within sight was there trace of a human dwelling-place--only broad tracts of rough uncultivated land, and rolling hills of wild heath and tangled wood. A few houses they had passed, but the roofless walls afforded neither shelter nor protection. Every dwelling had been given up to fire and destruction, and the inmates had fled elsewhere for refuge. A great curse seemed to have fallen on the devoted land; all was silence and desolation. That night they passed under a thorn hedge, which proved, as Gervase found, a cold and uncomfortable lodging, and afforded little protection from the night dews and the wind that blew across the open with a shrewd and penetrating keenness. To Macpherson it mattered not at all, for, rolled in his cloak, he slept the sleep of the just, and did not awake till the morning was some way up. But Gervase could not sleep. Above his head the jewels in the sword-belt of Orion flashed with a bright and still a brighter lustre, and the wind seemed to call with almost a human articulateness from the distant hills. The lonely night with its mystery and silence, was instinct with life. In such a presence his own fate seemed to dwindle into infinitely little importance, and all human endeavour appeared of no greater moment than that of the ant or the mole in the ditch hard by. Gervase was not given to talking sermons nor to much introspection, but he felt these things in his own way. He was glad when he saw the morning coming up; and when he arose from his damp uncomfortable couch, felt little inclination for a day´s hard work. But when he had bathed his face and hands in the neighbouring rivulet, and partaken of the breakfast Macpherson insisted on their making before they started, life assumed a somewhat brighter outlook, and his flagging spirits revived a little. Macpherson´s spirits were keen and high. The prospect of danger ever acted upon him like wine, and Gervase saw his eyes kindle, now and again, under his rugged brows, with that sudden flashing light he had seen in them before, in the time of peril. He had loaded his pistol afresh and carefully looked to its priming.