After his ration of beef had been broiled on the embers, eaten without salt off the end of a ramrod, and washed down with a canteen-full of that rich cider, for the production of which the district around Elizondo is so famous, after listening to the merry bells of the town which were ringing in honour of the British, and after watching until he grew weary the varying effects of light and shade, as the red blaze of a dozen picquet-fires glared on the beetling crags, deep seams and gorges, or green sides of the hills, he found it almost impossible to resist the invasion of sleep. Even the miniature of his dark-haired Alice failed to enliven him, and he envied the privates of his party, who, having neither command nor responsibility, slept soundly by the fire, with their knapsacks beneath their heads and their arms piled beside them. On consulting his watch to see how the time went, he found that it was midnight, and that an hour had elapsed since his last visit. As it was necessary to be attended by some one, he awoke Evan,[*] and desiring him to take his arms, moved towards his sentinels, whom he had considerable trouble in discovering, as the night was intensely dark. All was right, every soldier was on the alert, and Ronald was returning with his follower through the winding and rocky path towards the fire, which served as a beacon to guide them to their post, and which they beheld glimmering through the gloom some hundred yards off, when a piercing cry rang through the still air, at a short distance from the place where they were. [*] An officer’s servant is always on duty with his master. "Hey, sir!" exclaimed Evan, beginning to unbuckle his pouch; "what can that be, in sic a wild place as this?" "A woman’s voice, I think." "It cam frae the hill on the left o’ the road,—I’m sure o’t. Hech! it was an unco’ cry." "Follow me," said his master, beginning quickly to ascend the hill. "Hech, sir! dinna venture up the bank till we hear something mair," said Evan cautiously, following promptly nevertheless. "My certie! we kenna what folk may bide amang the holmes and howes hereabout. At hame I have heard tell o’ sic cries ringing at this time, between the nicht and morning, and they were ay for ill, and never for gude. Sae be advised, sir, and wait awee." "Evan!" said Stuart angrily, "are you afraid of men?" "Ye ken I am no, sir!" replied the Highlandman sharply. "I would scorn to turn heel on sax o’ the best that ever trod on heather. Mair would, may be, be venturesome." "Of bogles, then,—or spunkies, or what?" The soldier was silent. "Campaigning might have taught you to laugh at such ideas, Evan."