The Scotch Twins

to the door, and the three boys came in together,-Jock from the garden, where he had been pulling weeds in the potato-patch,

u got there?"

rock. Come on; let's go as soon as we can, for it looks like rain

ck, eyeing the basket with intere

her told her to stuff me while I'm here, and if I take the food off to the woo

rying the provisions and wearing proudly in their bonnets the sprig of pine, the insignia of the Clan.

ed Sandy. "It's no such fine thi

head," said the Chi

lf darted up the secret stairway with the rope. From the top he let down the rope and Jean fastened it through the handles of the bas

e noise of the waterfall. They had gathered and sent up six basketfuls, when the rain came splashing down in earnest, and the Clan scrambled up the se

" commanded the Chief, seat

l put it out,

the cave,"

will put us ou

can't have lunch without a fire,

ckground of the cave. Jock ran to the fall and filled the pan with water, and soon the mealy puddings were bobbing merrily about in the boiling water, while the boys, snug and safe in the shelter of the cave, watched the boughs of the pine trees swaying in the

to the fire, when he could eat no more, "I th

g a little book from his pocke

poetry, Chief!" he said with ala

bout Roderick Dhu and Clan Alpine, and hunting dee

m. "Go ahead," he said with resignation.

the dishes while y

, who loved books as mu

y of the Lake,

hought it was about fighting and robbers, and things like that, and here it's

about "Beauty's matchless eye," Sandy snored insultingly an

t eve had d

the moon on M

l. Jean had finished the dishes by this time and sat cross-legged with her chin in h

ed leader p

eamed frontl

azed adown

uffed the t

t exactly like the stag we saw Angus Nie

far away to the south from our house," interrup

ght of the fire, and so absorbed were they all in the story of the region they knew and loved so dearly that a shaft of sunlight from

in the west, and Father and Tam will be coming ba

eft it in the corner of the cave behind the wood-pile, put out every spark o

raway in the distance there was the frantic

e sound. They had been having such a good time they had not once thought of Angus Niel, but as they reached the edge of the forest, there he was, standing behind a tree with his gun pointing toward the little gray house! They

him before. If that old thief kills Tam, I'll-I'll-" Jock could think of no fit punishment for such a crime, and in his rage and excitement would have run right

h excitement with Alan still clinging to his coat. "Good old dog! good old Tam!" He was watching the dog so intently that he did not see Angus take careful aim, but the moment Tam reached the rab

cked up the dead rabbit and ran with it back into the woods. The children watched him as he fled, and, the moment

pen by the bullet. Jean ransacked the kist for bandages, and Alan held up the injured paw and tried to see if any bones were broken, while Sandy helplessly stroked Tam's tail, murmuring, "Good dog! good old Tam!" as he did so. By d

id not surprise him, but when Alan rose from his knees and said, "To-morrow the Rob Roy Clan will begin to make Angus Niel wish he'd never been born," Robin Campbell's co