A soldier approached. He was a white-haired veteran, who had looked on many a battle-field, and speaking kindly to the desolate child, he gently stirred the dead woman with his halberd. "Is this thy mother, my puir bairn?" said he. The child answered only by his tears, and hid his face in the grass. "Come away with me, my little mannikin," continued the soldier, "for thy mother hath gone to a better and bonnier place than this." "Take me there too," sobbed the child, clinging to the soldier's hand; "oh, take me there too." "By my faith, little one, 'tis a march I am not prepared for yet--but our parson will tell you all about it. Tush! I know the flams of the drum better than how to expound the text; so come away, my puir bairn; thy mother, God rest her, is in good hands, I warrant. Come away; and rot me, if thou shalt want while old Willie Wemyss of the Scots' Musqueteers, hath a bodle in his pouch, or a bannock in his havresack." By the good-hearted soldier he was carried away in a paroxysm of childish grief and terror; and he saw his mother no more. By the beauty of her person, the exceeding whiteness of her hands, and a very valuable ring found with her, she was supposed to be of higher rank than her peasant's attire indicated; and those apparent proofs of a superior birth, the soldiers never omitted an opportunity of impressing upon Walter as he grew older; and cited innumerable Low Country legends and old Scottish traditions, wherein certain heroes just so circumstanced, had become great personages in the end; and Walter was taught to consider that there was no reason why he should be an exception. But _who_ his mother was, had unfortunately remained locked in her own breast; whether from excessive debility and broken spirit she lacked strength to communicate with the other captives, or whether she feared to do so, could not be known now; her secret was buried with her, and thus a mystery was thrown over the fortune of the little boy, which through life caused him to be somewhat of a moody and reflective nature.