When Malcolm lifted his head, the sun had gone down. He rose and wandered along the sand towards the moon--at length blooming out of the darkening sky, where she had hung all day like a washed-out rag of light, to revive as the sunlight faded. He watched the banished life of her day-swoon returning, until, gathering courage, she that had been no one, shone out fair and clear, in conscious queendom of the night. Then, in the friendly infolding of her dreamlight and the dreamland it created, Malcolm’s soul revived as in the comfort of the lesser, the mitigated glory, and, as the moon into radiance from the darkened air, and the nightingale into music from the sleep-stilled world of birds, blossomed from the speechlessness of thought and feeling into a strange kind of brooding song. If the words were half nonsense, the feeling was not the less real. Such as they were, they came almost of themselves, and the tune came with them. Rose o’ my hert, Open yer leaves to the lampin’ mune; Into the curls lat her keek an’ dert; She’ll tak the colour but gi’e ye tune. Buik o’ my brain, Open yer neuks to the starry signs; Lat the een o’ the holy luik an’ strain An’ glimmer an’ score atween the lines. Cup o’ my sowl, Gowd an’ diamond an’ ruby cup, Ye’re noucht ava but a toom dry bowl, Till the wine o’ the kingdom fill ye up, Conscience-glass, Mirror the infinite all in thee; Melt the bounded and make it pass Into the tideless, shoreless sea. World of my life, Swing thee round thy sunny track; Fire and wind and water and strife-- Carry them all to the glory back. Ever as he halted for a word, the moonlight, and the low sweet waves on the sands, filled up the pauses to his ear; and there he lay, looking up to the sky and the moon and the rose-diamond stars, his thoughts half-dissolved in feeling, and his feeling half-crystallised to thought. Out of the dim wood came two lovely forms into the moonlight, and softly approached him--so softly that he knew nothing of their nearness until Florimel spoke. “Is that MacPhail?” she said. “Yes, my lady,” answered Malcolm, and bounded to his feet “What were you singing?” “You could hardly call it singing, my lady. We should call it crooning in Scotland.” “Croon it again then.” “I couldn’t, my lady. It’s gone.” “You don’t mean to pretend that you were extemporising?” “I was crooning what came--like the birds, my lady. I couldn’t have done it if I had thought anyone was near.” Then, half ashamed, and anxious to turn the talk from the threshold of his secret chamber, he said, “Did you ever see a lovelier night, ladies?” “Not often, certainly,” answered Clementina.