_And all the year she came and went,_ _And wandered wild frae sea to sea;_ _’O neighbours, is he ne’er come back,_ _My love that went to Germanie?’_ _Port Ellen saw her many a time;_ _Round by Port Askaig wandered she:_ _’Where is the ship that’s sailing in_ _With my dear love frae Germanie?’_ _But when the darkened winter fell:_ _’It’s cold for baith my bairn and me;_ _Let me lie down and rest awhile:_ _My love’s away frae Germanie._ _O far away and away he dwells;_ _High Heaven is now his fair countrie;_ _And there he stands—with arms outstretched—_ _To welcome hame my bairn and me!’_ And if Meenie’s eyes were filled with tears when she had re-read the familiar lines, her heart was proud enough; and all her kinsmen of Glengask and Orosay had no terrors for her; and her mother’s taunts no sting. Of course, all this that she hoped for was far away in the future; but even as regarded the immediate years before her she refused to be harassed by any doubt. Perhaps she would not have asserted in set terms that a knack of stringing verses together proved that the writer had also the capacity and knowledge and judgment necessary to drain and fence and plant and stock a Highland estate; abstract questions of the kind had little interest for her; what she did know—what formed the first article of her creed, and the last, and the intervening thirty-seven—was that Ronald could do anything he put his mind to. And this was a highly useful and comfortable belief, considering all her circumstances. And so she sped away down the mountain-side again—glad to have discovered Ronald’s retreat; and so light and swift was her step that when she at length reached the inn she found herself just ahead of the mail coming in from the south. Of course she waited for letters; and when Mrs. Murray had opened the bags, it was found there were three for the Doctor’s cottage. The first was from Ronald; that Meenie whipped into her pocket. The second was for Mrs. Douglas, and clearly in Agatha’s handwriting. The third, addressed to Meenie, had an American stamp on it; and this was the one that she opened and read as she quietly walked homeward.