Murray was exact in his calculations. He was not greatly moved by the bagpipes, for his own part, but he knew that they were as necessary as food and drink to the Highlanders, who were the nerve and soul of this army following the forlornest hope. He turned his horse and galloped back. And presently the footmen’s march grew brisker; jaded riders felt their nags move less dispiritedly under them. The pipes were singing, low at first, as if a mother crooned to her child up yonder in the misty Highlands. And then the music and the magic grew, till it seemed that windy March was striding, long and sinewy of limb, across the land of lengthening days and rising sap and mating beasts and birds. And then, again, there was a warmth and haste in the music, a sudden wildness and a tender pity, that seemed like April ushering in her broods along the nestling hedgerows, the fields where lambs were playing, the banks that were gold with primroses, and budding speedwell, and strong, young growth of greenstuff. And then, again, from the rear of this tattered army that marched south to win a kingdom for the Stuart, full June was playing round about this wet and dismal Stafford country. The Prince knew it; Sir Jasper knew it. Even Lord Murray, riding far behind was aware that life held more than strategy and halfpennies. “Dear God, the pipes!” said the Prince, turning suddenly. “D’ye hear them, Sir Jasper?” “I’m hill-bred, too, your Highness. Could I miss their note?” And they fell silent, for there is something in this hill music that touches the soul of a man. It finds out his need of battle, his instinct to be up and doing along the wide, human thoroughfares of life. And then it stifles him with pity, with homesickness and longing for the wife and bairns who, for all that, would not approve him if he failed to take the road. And then, again, it sounds the fighting note, till every fibre responds to the call for instant action. No action met them. They rode forward through the driving wind, the Prince and Sir Jasper; and now the pipes, hurried and unwearied, played only mockery about them, rousing their strength while denying it an outlet. It was then Sir Jasper heard the first and last bitter word from the leader who had summoned him to this drear adventure. “The pity of it!” said the Prince. “I ask only a free hand, and they’ll not give it me. Sir Jasper, what is amiss with Lord Murray? There was something left out of him at birth, I think--soul, or heart--or what you choose to name it. This march of ours--he will not listen when I tell him it is bigger than the strict rules of warfare.”