his chair without ceremony. "On the contrary, you have arrived at
the best of all possible times--the time when our suspense is at
an end. The doctor has just told us that his poor little patient
is out of danger. You may imagine how happy we are."

"And how grateful to God!" The Captain said those words in tones
that trembled--speaking to himself.

Randal was conscious of feeling a momentary embarrassment. The
character of his visitor had presented itself in a new light.
Captain Bennydeck looked at him--understood him--and returned to
the subject of his travels.

"Do you remember your holiday-time when you were a boy, and when
you had to go back to school?" he asked with a smile. "My mind is
in much the same state at leaving Scotland, and going back to my
work in London. I hardly know which I admire most--your beautiful
country or the people who inhabit it. I have had some pleasant
talk with your poorer neighbors; the one improvement I could wish
for among them is a keener sense of their religious duties."

This was an objection new in Randal's experience of travelers in
general.

"Our Highlanders have noble qualities," he said. "If you knew
them as well as I do, you would find a true sense of religion
among them; not presenting itself, however, to strangers as
strongly--I had almost said as aggressively--as the devotional
feeling of the Lowland Scotch. Different races, different
temperaments."