prompt:
Chapter: The Ross of Mull, which I had now got upon, was rugged and trackless,
like the isle I had just left; being all bog, and brier, and big stone.
There may be roads for them that know that country well; but for my part
I had no better guide than my own nose, and no other landmark than Ben
More.

I aimed as well as I could for the smoke I had seen so often from the
island; and with all my great weariness and the difficulty of the way
came upon the house in the bottom of a little hollow about five or
six at night. It was low and longish, roofed with turf and built of
unmortared stones; and on a mound in front of it, an old gentleman sat
smoking his pipe in the sun.

With what little English he had, he gave me to understand that my
shipmates had got safe ashore, and had broken bread in that very house
on the day after.

"Was there one," I asked, "dressed like a gentleman?"

He said they all wore rough great-coats; but to be sure, the first of
them, the one that came alone, wore breeches and stockings, while the
rest had sailors' trousers.

"Ah," said I, "and he would have a feathered hat?"

He told me, no, that he was bareheaded like myself.

At first I thought Alan might have lost his hat; and then the rain came
in my mind, and I judged it more likely he had it out of harm's way
under his great-coat. This set me smiling, partly because my friend was
safe, partly to think of his vanity in dress.

And then the old gentleman clapped his hand to his brow, and cried out
that I must be the lad with the silver button.

"Why, yes!" said I, in some wonder.

"Well, then," said the old gentleman, "I have a word for you, that you
are to follow your friend to his country, by Torosay."

He then asked me how I had fared, and I told him my tale. A
south-country man would certainly have laughed; but this old gentleman
(I call him so because of his manners, for his clothes were dropping off
his back) heard me all through with nothing but gravity and pity. When I
had done, he took me by the hand, led me into his hut (it was no better)
and presented me before his wife, as if she had been the Queen and I a
duke.

The good woman set oat-bread before me and a cold grouse, patting my
shoulder and smiling to me all the time, for she had no English; and the
old gentleman (not to be behind) brewed me a strong punch out of their
country spirit. All the while I was eating, and after that when I was
drinking the punch, I could scarce come to believe in my good fortune;
and the house, though it was thick with the peat-smoke and as full of
holes as a colander, seemed like a palace.

The punch threw me in a strong sweat and a deep slumber; the good people
let me lie; and it was near noon of the next day before I took the road,
my throat already easier and my spirits quite restored by good fare and
good news. The old gentleman, although I pressed him hard, would take no
money, and gave me an old bonnet for my head; though I am free to own I
was no sooner out of view of the house than I very jealously washed this
gift of his in a wayside fountain.

Thought I to myself: "If these are the wild Highlanders, I could wish my
own folk wilder."

I not only started late, but I must have wandered nearly half the time.
True, I met plenty of people, grubbing in little miserable fields that
would not keep a cat, or herding little kine about the bigness of asses.
The Highland dress being forbidden by law since the rebellion, and the
people condemned to the Lowland habit, which they much disliked, it was
strange to see the variety of their array. Some went bare, only for a
hanging cloak or great-coat, and carried their trousers on their backs
like a useless burthen: some had made an imitation of the tartan with
little parti-coloured stripes patched together like an old wife's quilt;
others, again, still wore the Highland philabeg, but by putting a few
stitches between the legs transformed it into a pair of trousers like
a Dutchman's. All those makeshifts were condemned and punished, for the
law was harshly applied, in hopes to break up the clan spirit; but in
that out-of-the-way, sea-bound isle, there were few to make remarks and
fewer to tell tales.

They seemed in great poverty; which was no doubt natural, now that
rapine was put down, and the chiefs kept no longer an open house;
and the roads (even such a wandering, country by-track as the one
I followed) were infested with beggars. And here again I marked
a difference from my own part of the country. For our Lowland
beggars--even the gownsmen themselves, who beg by patent--had a louting,
flattering way with them, and if you gave them a plaek and asked change,
would very civilly return you a boddle. But these Highland beggars stood
on their dignity, asked alms only to buy snuff (by their account) and
would give no change.

To be sure, this was no concern of mine, except in so far as it
entertained me by the way. What was much more to the purpose, few had
any English, and these few (unless they were of the brotherhood of
beggars) not very anxious to place it at my service. I knew Torosay
to be my destination, and repeated the name to them and pointed; but
instead of simply pointing in reply, they would give me a screed of the
Gaelic that set me foolish; so it was small wonder if I went out of my
road as often as I stayed in it.

At last, about eight at night, and already very weary, I came to a lone
house, where I asked admittance, and was refused, until I bethought
me of the power of money in so poor a country, and held up one of my
guineas in my finger and thumb. Thereupon, the man of the house, who had
hitherto pretended to have no English, and driven me from his door by
signals, suddenly began to speak as clearly as was needful, and agreed
for five shillings to give me a night's lodging and guide me the next
day to Torosay.

I slept uneasily that night, fearing I should be robbed; but I might
have spared myself the pain; for my host was no robber, only miserably
poor and a great cheat. He was not alone in his poverty; for the next
morning, we must go five miles about to the house of what he called a
rich man to have one of my guineas changed. This was perhaps a rich man
for Mull; he would have scarce been thought so in the south; for it
took all he had--the whole house was turned upside down, and a neighbour
brought under contribution, before he could scrape together twenty
shillings in silver. The odd shilling he kept for himself, protesting he
could ill afford to have so great a sum of money lying "locked up." For
all that he was very courteous and well spoken, made us both sit down
with his family to dinner, and brewed punch in a fine china bowl, over
which my rascal guide grew so merry that he refused to start.

I was for getting angry, and appealed to the rich man (Hector Maclean
was his name), who had been a witness to our bargain and to my payment
of the five shillings. But Maclean had taken his share of the punch,
and vowed that no gentleman should leave his table after the bowl was
brewed; so there was nothing for it but to sit and hear Jacobite toasts
and Gaelic songs, till all were tipsy and staggered off to the bed or
the barn for their night's rest.

Next day (the fourth of my travels) we were up before five upon the
clock; but my rascal guide got to the bottle at once, and it was three
hours before I had him clear of the house, and then (as you shall hear)
only for a worse disappointment.

As long as we went down a heathery valley that lay before Mr. Maclean's
house, all went well; only my guide looked constantly over his shoulder,
and when I asked him the cause, only grinned at me. No sooner, however,
had we crossed the back of a hill, and got out of sight of the house
windows, than he told me Torosay lay right in front, and that a hill-top
(which he pointed out) was my best landmark.

"I care very little for that," said I, "since you are going with me."

The impudent cheat answered me in the Gaelic that he had no English.

"My fine fellow," I said, "I know very well your English comes and goes.
Tell me what will bring it back? Is it more money you wish?"

"Five shillings mair," said he, "and hersel' will bring ye there."

I reflected awhile and then offered him two, which he accepted greedily,
and insisted on having in his hands at once "for luck," as he said, but
I think it was rather for my misfortune.

The two shillings carried him not quite as many miles; at the end of
which distance, he sat down upon the wayside and took off his brogues
from his feet, like a man about to rest.

I was now red-hot. "Ha!" said I, "have you no more English?"

He said impudently, "No."

At that I boiled over, and lifted my hand to strike him; and he, drawing
a knife from his rags, squatted back and grinned at me like a wildcat.
At that, forgetting everything but my anger, I ran in upon him, put
aside his knife with my left, and struck him in the mouth with the
right. I was a strong lad and very angry, and he but a little man; and
he went down before me heavily. By good luck, his knife flew out of his
hand as he fell.

I picked up both that and his brogues, wished him a good morning, and
set off upon my way, leaving him barefoot and disarmed. I chuckled to
myself as I went, being sure I was done with that rogue, for a variety
of reasons. First, he knew he could have no more of my money; next, the
brogues were worth in that country only a few pence; and, lastly, the
knife, which was really a dagger, it was against the law for him to
carry.

In about half an hour of walk, I overtook a great, ragged man, moving
pretty fast but feeling before him with a staff. He was quite blind, and
told me he was a catechist, which should have put me at my ease. But
his face went against me; it seemed dark and dangerous and secret; and
presently, as we began to go on alongside, I saw the steel butt of a
pistol sticking from under the flap of his coat-pocket. To carry such a
thing meant a fine of fifteen pounds sterling upon a first offence, and
transportation to the colonies upon a second. Nor could I quite see why
a religious teacher should go armed, or what a blind man could be doing
with a pistol.

I told him about my guide, for I was proud of what I had done, and my
vanity for once got the heels of my prudence. At the mention of the
five shillings he cried out so loud that I made up my mind I should say
nothing of the other two, and was glad he could not see my blushes.

"Was it too much?" I asked, a little faltering.

"Too much!" cries he. "Why, I will guide you to Torosay myself for a
dram of brandy. And give you the great pleasure of my company (me that
is a man of some learning) in the bargain."

I said I did not see how a blind man could be a guide; but at that he
laughed aloud, and said his stick was eyes enough for an eagle.

"In the Isle of Mull, at least," says he, "where I know every stone and
heather-bush by mark of head. See, now," he said, striking right and
left, as if to make sure, "down there a burn is running; and at the head
of it there stands a bit of a small hill with a stone cocked upon the
top of that; and it's hard at the foot of the hill, that the way runs by
to Torosay; and the way here, being for droves, is plainly trodden, and
will show grassy through the heather."

I had to own he was right in every feature, and told my wonder.

"Ha!" says he, "that's nothing. Would ye believe me now, that before
the Act came out, and when there were weepons in this country, I could
shoot? Ay, could I!" cries he, and then with a leer: "If ye had such a
thing as a pistol here to try with, I would show ye how it's done."

I told him I had nothing of the sort, and gave him a wider berth. If
he had known, his pistol stuck at that time quite plainly out of his
pocket, and I could see the sun twinkle on the steel of the butt. But
by the better luck for me, he knew nothing, thought all was covered, and
lied on in the dark.

He then began to question me cunningly, where I came from, whether I
was rich, whether I could change a five-shilling piece for him (which
he declared he had that moment in his sporran), and all the time he kept
edging up to me and I avoiding him. We were now upon a sort of green
cattle-track which crossed the hills towards Torosay, and we kept
changing sides upon that like dancers in a reel. I had so plainly the
upper-hand that my spirits rose, and indeed I took a pleasure in this
game of blindman's buff; but the catechist grew angrier and angrier,
and at last began to swear in Gaelic and to strike for my legs with his
staff.

Then I told him that, sure enough, I had a pistol in my pocket as well
as he, and if he did not strike across the hill due south I would even
blow his brains out.

He became at once very polite, and after trying to soften me for some
time, but quite in vain, he cursed me once more in Gaelic and took
himself off. I watched him striding along, through bog and brier,
tapping with his stick, until he turned the end of a hill and
disappeared in the next hollow. Then I struck on again for Torosay, much
better pleased to be alone than to travel with that man of learning.
This was an unlucky day; and these two, of whom I had just rid myself,
one after the other, were the two worst men I met with in the Highlands.

At Torosay, on the Sound of Mull and looking over to the mainland
of Morven, there was an inn with an innkeeper, who was a Maclean, it
appeared, of a very high family; for to keep an inn is thought even more
genteel in the Highlands than it is with us, perhaps as partaking of
hospitality, or perhaps because the trade is idle and drunken. He spoke
good English, and finding me to be something of a scholar, tried me
first in French, where he easily beat me, and then in the Latin, in
which I don't know which of us did best. This pleasant rivalry put us at
once upon friendly terms; and I sat up and drank punch with him (or to
be more correct, sat up and watched him drink it), until he was so tipsy
that he wept upon my shoulder.

I tried him, as if by accident, with a sight of Alan's button; but it
was plain he had never seen or heard of it. Indeed, he bore some grudge
against the family and friends of Ardshiel, and before he was drunk
he read me a lampoon, in very good Latin, but with a very ill meaning,
which he had made in elegiac verses upon a person of that house.

When I told him of my catechist, he shook his head, and said I was lucky
to have got clear off. "That is a very dangerous man," he said; "Duncan
Mackiegh is his name; he can shoot by the ear at several yards, and has
been often accused of highway robberies, and once of murder."

"The cream of it is," says I, "that he called himself a catechist."

"And why should he not?" says he, "when that is what he is. It was
Maclean of Duart gave it to him because he was blind. But perhaps it was
a peety," says my host, "for he is always on the road, going from
one place to another to hear the young folk say their religion; and,
doubtless, that is a great temptation to the poor man."

At last, when my landlord could drink no more, he showed me to a bed,
and I lay down in very good spirits; having travelled the greater part
of that big and crooked Island of Mull, from Earraid to Torosay, fifty
miles as the crow flies, and (with my wanderings) much nearer a hundred,
in four days and with little fatigue. Indeed I was by far in better
heart and health of body at the end of that long tramp than I had been
at the beginning.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: David wades across the creek to the mainland, called the Ross of Mull, and aims for a house from which he had seen smoke rising during his time on the island. An old man is sitting outside the house, and tells David that his shipmates have come safely ashore and eaten a meal in his house the day before. Alan is one of them, and he has told the old man to expect "the lad with the silver button" - David. Alan has left a message for David to follow him to his own country, near Torosay. The old man and his wife feed David well and give him a bed for the night. Next day, David leaves with a good impression of these "wild Highlanders. As he walks through the countryside, he is struck by the poverty of the Highlanders. As they have been forbidden by law since the Jacobite rebellion to wear their Highland dress of tartan, they have improvised with whatever clothes they can lay hands on. That evening, David has to give a householder five shillings in return for a bed for the night and to be guided to Torosay the next day. The following morning, the man takes David to a "rich" man in order to get change for one of David's guineas. The first man, David's guide, gets drunk and refuses to start out until the next day. Along the road, the man refuses to go any further unless David gives him more money. Not two miles further, the man again wants more money before he will go further. David gets angry and moves to strike the man, who pulls a knife on him. David deflects the knife, knocks the man down, and continues on his way alone. David overtakes a blind man who claims to be a catechist, or religious instructor. David notices that he is illegally carrying a pistol in his coat. He keeps edging closer to David, who is suspicious of him. David tells him that he is carrying a pistol, too, and threatens to shoot him if he does not leave him alone. The man walks off. David reaches Torosay and speaks to an innkeeper, who tells him that the blind man is a well-known robber and murderer


prompt:
Chapter: There is a regular ferry from Torosay to Kinlochaline on the mainland.
Both shores of the Sound are in the country of the strong clan of the
Macleans, and the people that passed the ferry with me were almost all
of that clan. The skipper of the boat, on the other hand, was called
Neil Roy Macrob; and since Macrob was one of the names of Alan's
clansmen, and Alan himself had sent me to that ferry, I was eager to
come to private speech of Neil Roy.

In the crowded boat this was of course impossible, and the passage was
a very slow affair. There was no wind, and as the boat was wretchedly
equipped, we could pull but two oars on one side, and one on the other.
The men gave way, however, with a good will, the passengers taking
spells to help them, and the whole company giving the time in
Gaelic boat-songs. And what with the songs, and the sea-air, and the
good-nature and spirit of all concerned, and the bright weather, the
passage was a pretty thing to have seen.

But there was one melancholy part. In the mouth of Loch Aline we found
a great sea-going ship at anchor; and this I supposed at first to be one
of the King's cruisers which were kept along that coast, both summer
and winter, to prevent communication with the French. As we got a little
nearer, it became plain she was a ship of merchandise; and what still
more puzzled me, not only her decks, but the sea-beach also, were quite
black with people, and skiffs were continually plying to and fro between
them. Yet nearer, and there began to come to our ears a great sound
of mourning, the people on board and those on the shore crying and
lamenting one to another so as to pierce the heart.

Then I understood this was an emigrant ship bound for the American
colonies.

We put the ferry-boat alongside, and the exiles leaned over the
bulwarks, weeping and reaching out their hands to my fellow-passengers,
among whom they counted some near friends. How long this might have gone
on I do not know, for they seemed to have no sense of time: but at last
the captain of the ship, who seemed near beside himself (and no great
wonder) in the midst of this crying and confusion, came to the side and
begged us to depart.

Thereupon Neil sheered off; and the chief singer in our boat struck into
a melancholy air, which was presently taken up both by the emigrants and
their friends upon the beach, so that it sounded from all sides like a
lament for the dying. I saw the tears run down the cheeks of the men and
women in the boat, even as they bent at the oars; and the circumstances
and the music of the song (which is one called "Lochaber no more") were
highly affecting even to myself.

At Kinlochaline I got Neil Roy upon one side on the beach, and said I
made sure he was one of Appin's men.

"And what for no?" said he.

"I am seeking somebody," said I; "and it comes in my mind that you will
have news of him. Alan Breck Stewart is his name." And very foolishly,
instead of showing him the button, I sought to pass a shilling in his
hand.

At this he drew back. "I am very much affronted," he said; "and this is
not the way that one shentleman should behave to another at all. The man
you ask for is in France; but if he was in my sporran," says he, "and
your belly full of shillings, I would not hurt a hair upon his body."

I saw I had gone the wrong way to work, and without wasting time upon
apologies, showed him the button lying in the hollow of my palm.

"Aweel, aweel," said Neil; "and I think ye might have begun with that
end of the stick, whatever! But if ye are the lad with the silver
button, all is well, and I have the word to see that ye come safe. But
if ye will pardon me to speak plainly," says he, "there is a name that
you should never take into your mouth, and that is the name of Alan
Breck; and there is a thing that ye would never do, and that is to offer
your dirty money to a Hieland shentleman."

It was not very easy to apologise; for I could scarce tell him (what was
the truth) that I had never dreamed he would set up to be a gentleman
until he told me so. Neil on his part had no wish to prolong his
dealings with me, only to fulfil his orders and be done with it; and
he made haste to give me my route. This was to lie the night in
Kinlochaline in the public inn; to cross Morven the next day to Ardgour,
and lie the night in the house of one John of the Claymore, who was
warned that I might come; the third day, to be set across one loch at
Corran and another at Balachulish, and then ask my way to the house of
James of the Glens, at Aucharn in Duror of Appin. There was a good deal
of ferrying, as you hear; the sea in all this part running deep into the
mountains and winding about their roots. It makes the country strong to
hold and difficult to travel, but full of prodigious wild and dreadful
prospects.

I had some other advice from Neil: to speak with no one by the way, to
avoid Whigs, Campbells, and the "red-soldiers;" to leave the road and
lie in a bush if I saw any of the latter coming, "for it was never
chancy to meet in with them;" and in brief, to conduct myself like a
robber or a Jacobite agent, as perhaps Neil thought me.

The inn at Kinlochaline was the most beggarly vile place that ever pigs
were styed in, full of smoke, vermin, and silent Highlanders. I was not
only discontented with my lodging, but with myself for my mismanagement
of Neil, and thought I could hardly be worse off. But very wrongly, as I
was soon to see; for I had not been half an hour at the inn (standing in
the door most of the time, to ease my eyes from the peat smoke) when a
thunderstorm came close by, the springs broke in a little hill on which
the inn stood, and one end of the house became a running water. Places
of public entertainment were bad enough all over Scotland in those days;
yet it was a wonder to myself, when I had to go from the fireside to the
bed in which I slept, wading over the shoes.

Early in my next day's journey I overtook a little, stout, solemn man,
walking very slowly with his toes turned out, sometimes reading in
a book and sometimes marking the place with his finger, and dressed
decently and plainly in something of a clerical style.

This I found to be another catechist, but of a different order from the
blind man of Mull: being indeed one of those sent out by the Edinburgh
Society for Propagating Christian Knowledge, to evangelise the more
savage places of the Highlands. His name was Henderland; he spoke with
the broad south-country tongue, which I was beginning to weary for the
sound of; and besides common countryship, we soon found we had a
more particular bond of interest. For my good friend, the minister of
Essendean, had translated into the Gaelic in his by-time a number of
hymns and pious books which Henderland used in his work, and held in
great esteem. Indeed, it was one of these he was carrying and reading
when we met.

We fell in company at once, our ways lying together as far as to
Kingairloch. As we went, he stopped and spoke with all the wayfarers
and workers that we met or passed; and though of course I could not tell
what they discoursed about, yet I judged Mr. Henderland must be well
liked in the countryside, for I observed many of them to bring out their
mulls and share a pinch of snuff with him.

I told him as far in my affairs as I judged wise; as far, that is,
as they were none of Alan's; and gave Balachulish as the place I was
travelling to, to meet a friend; for I thought Aucharn, or even Duror,
would be too particular, and might put him on the scent.

On his part, he told me much of his work and the people he worked among,
the hiding priests and Jacobites, the Disarming Act, the dress, and many
other curiosities of the time and place. He seemed moderate; blaming
Parliament in several points, and especially because they had framed the
Act more severely against those who wore the dress than against those
who carried weapons.

This moderation put it in my mind to question him of the Red Fox and the
Appin tenants; questions which, I thought, would seem natural enough in
the mouth of one travelling to that country.

He said it was a bad business. "It's wonderful," said he, "where the
tenants find the money, for their life is mere starvation. (Ye don't
carry such a thing as snuff, do ye, Mr. Balfour? No. Well, I'm better
wanting it.) But these tenants (as I was saying) are doubtless partly
driven to it. James Stewart in Duror (that's him they call James of the
Glens) is half-brother to Ardshiel, the captain of the clan; and he is
a man much looked up to, and drives very hard. And then there's one they
call Alan Breck--"

"Ah!" I cried, "what of him?"

"What of the wind that bloweth where it listeth?" said Henderland. "He's
here and awa; here to-day and gone to-morrow: a fair heather-cat. He
might be glowering at the two of us out of yon whin-bush, and I wouldnae
wonder! Ye'll no carry such a thing as snuff, will ye?"

I told him no, and that he had asked the same thing more than once.

"It's highly possible," said he, sighing. "But it seems strange ye
shouldnae carry it. However, as I was saying, this Alan Breck is a bold,
desperate customer, and well kent to be James's right hand. His life
is forfeit already; he would boggle at naething; and maybe, if a
tenant-body was to hang back he would get a dirk in his wame."

"You make a poor story of it all, Mr. Henderland," said I. "If it is all
fear upon both sides, I care to hear no more of it."

"Na," said Mr. Henderland, "but there's love too, and self-denial that
should put the like of you and me to shame. There's something fine about
it; no perhaps Christian, but humanly fine. Even Alan Breck, by all that
I hear, is a chield to be respected. There's many a lying sneck-draw
sits close in kirk in our own part of the country, and stands well in
the world's eye, and maybe is a far worse man, Mr. Balfour, than yon
misguided shedder of man's blood. Ay, ay, we might take a lesson by
them.--Ye'll perhaps think I've been too long in the Hielands?" he
added, smiling to me.

I told him not at all; that I had seen much to admire among the
Highlanders; and if he came to that, Mr. Campbell himself was a
Highlander.

"Ay," said he, "that's true. It's a fine blood."

"And what is the King's agent about?" I asked.

"Colin Campbell?" says Henderland. "Putting his head in a bees' byke!"

"He is to turn the tenants out by force, I hear?" said I.

"Yes," says he, "but the business has gone back and forth, as folk say.
First, James of the Glens rode to Edinburgh, and got some lawyer (a
Stewart, nae doubt--they all hing together like bats in a steeple) and
had the proceedings stayed. And then Colin Campbell cam' in again, and
had the upper-hand before the Barons of Exchequer. And now they tell me
the first of the tenants are to flit to-morrow. It's to begin at Duror
under James's very windows, which doesnae seem wise by my humble way of
it."

"Do you think they'll fight?" I asked.

"Well," says Henderland, "they're disarmed--or supposed to be--for
there's still a good deal of cold iron lying by in quiet places. And
then Colin Campbell has the sogers coming. But for all that, if I was
his lady wife, I wouldnae be well pleased till I got him home again.
They're queer customers, the Appin Stewarts."

I asked if they were worse than their neighbours.

"No they," said he. "And that's the worst part of it. For if Colin Roy
can get his business done in Appin, he has it all to begin again in the
next country, which they call Mamore, and which is one of the countries
of the Camerons. He's King's Factor upon both, and from both he has to
drive out the tenants; and indeed, Mr. Balfour (to be open with ye),
it's my belief that if he escapes the one lot, he'll get his death by
the other."

So we continued talking and walking the great part of the day; until
at last, Mr. Henderland after expressing his delight in my company, and
satisfaction at meeting with a friend of Mr. Campbell's ("whom," says
he, "I will make bold to call that sweet singer of our covenanted
Zion"), proposed that I should make a short stage, and lie the night in
his house a little beyond Kingairloch. To say truth, I was overjoyed;
for I had no great desire for John of the Claymore, and since my double
misadventure, first with the guide and next with the gentleman skipper,
I stood in some fear of any Highland stranger. Accordingly we shook
hands upon the bargain, and came in the afternoon to a small house,
standing alone by the shore of the Linnhe Loch. The sun was already gone
from the desert mountains of Ardgour upon the hither side, but shone on
those of Appin on the farther; the loch lay as still as a lake, only
the gulls were crying round the sides of it; and the whole place seemed
solemn and uncouth.

We had no sooner come to the door of Mr. Henderland's dwelling, than to
my great surprise (for I was now used to the politeness of Highlanders)
he burst rudely past me, dashed into the room, caught up a jar and
a small horn-spoon, and began ladling snuff into his nose in most
excessive quantities. Then he had a hearty fit of sneezing, and looked
round upon me with a rather silly smile.

"It's a vow I took," says he. "I took a vow upon me that I wouldnae
carry it. Doubtless it's a great privation; but when I think upon
the martyrs, not only to the Scottish Covenant but to other points of
Christianity, I think shame to mind it."

As soon as we had eaten (and porridge and whey was the best of the good
man's diet) he took a grave face and said he had a duty to perform by
Mr. Campbell, and that was to inquire into my state of mind towards God.
I was inclined to smile at him since the business of the snuff; but he
had not spoken long before he brought the tears into my eyes. There are
two things that men should never weary of, goodness and humility; we get
none too much of them in this rough world among cold, proud people; but
Mr. Henderland had their very speech upon his tongue. And though I was a
good deal puffed up with my adventures and with having come off, as the
saying is, with flying colours; yet he soon had me on my knees beside a
simple, poor old man, and both proud and glad to be there.

Before we went to bed he offered me sixpence to help me on my way, out
of a scanty store he kept in the turf wall of his house; at which excess
of goodness I knew not what to do. But at last he was so earnest with me
that I thought it the more mannerly part to let him have his way, and so
left him poorer than myself.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: David crosses from Torosay to the Scottish mainland on the ferry. On the way, he sees an emigrant ship bound for the American colonies. Those left on the shore are crying at the loss of their loved ones. David speaks to the skipper of the ferry, a fellow clansman of Alan's, who has orders from Alan to keep David safe. David is able to show him Alan's silver button to prove who he is. David is to sleep that night in an inn, and the next night at a house of a man called John of the Claymore. He is then to make for the house of James of the Glens. The next day, David overtakes a catechist called Henderland. They fall into conversation. Henderland has some respect for the Highlanders and for Alan. He says that Colin Campbell is about to evict Stewart tenants. Henderland invites David to stay the night at his house, and David accepts. Before they retire to bed, Henderland catechizes David


prompt:
Chapter: The next day Mr. Henderland found for me a man who had a boat of his own
and was to cross the Linnhe Loch that afternoon into Appin, fishing. Him
he prevailed on to take me, for he was one of his flock; and in this way
I saved a long day's travel and the price of the two public ferries I
must otherwise have passed.

It was near noon before we set out; a dark day with clouds, and the sun
shining upon little patches. The sea was here very deep and still,
and had scarce a wave upon it; so that I must put the water to my lips
before I could believe it to be truly salt. The mountains on either side
were high, rough and barren, very black and gloomy in the shadow of
the clouds, but all silver-laced with little watercourses where the sun
shone upon them. It seemed a hard country, this of Appin, for people to
care as much about as Alan did.

There was but one thing to mention. A little after we had started,
the sun shone upon a little moving clump of scarlet close in along the
water-side to the north. It was much of the same red as soldiers' coats;
every now and then, too, there came little sparks and lightnings, as
though the sun had struck upon bright steel.

I asked my boatman what it should be, and he answered he supposed it was
some of the red soldiers coming from Fort William into Appin, against
the poor tenantry of the country. Well, it was a sad sight to me;
and whether it was because of my thoughts of Alan, or from something
prophetic in my bosom, although this was but the second time I had seen
King George's troops, I had no good will to them.

At last we came so near the point of land at the entering in of Loch
Leven that I begged to be set on shore. My boatman (who was an honest
fellow and mindful of his promise to the catechist) would fain have
carried me on to Balachulish; but as this was to take me farther from my
secret destination, I insisted, and was set on shore at last under the
wood of Lettermore (or Lettervore, for I have heard it both ways) in
Alan's country of Appin.

This was a wood of birches, growing on a steep, craggy side of a
mountain that overhung the loch. It had many openings and ferny howes;
and a road or bridle track ran north and south through the midst of
it, by the edge of which, where was a spring, I sat down to eat some
oat-bread of Mr. Henderland's and think upon my situation.

Here I was not only troubled by a cloud of stinging midges, but far more
by the doubts of my mind. What I ought to do, why I was going to join
myself with an outlaw and a would-be murderer like Alan, whether I
should not be acting more like a man of sense to tramp back to the south
country direct, by my own guidance and at my own charges, and what Mr.
Campbell or even Mr. Henderland would think of me if they should ever
learn my folly and presumption: these were the doubts that now began to
come in on me stronger than ever.

As I was so sitting and thinking, a sound of men and horses came to me
through the wood; and presently after, at a turning of the road, I saw
four travellers come into view. The way was in this part so rough and
narrow that they came single and led their horses by the reins. The
first was a great, red-headed gentleman, of an imperious and flushed
face, who carried his hat in his hand and fanned himself, for he was in
a breathing heat. The second, by his decent black garb and white wig,
I correctly took to be a lawyer. The third was a servant, and wore some
part of his clothes in tartan, which showed that his master was of a
Highland family, and either an outlaw or else in singular good odour
with the Government, since the wearing of tartan was against the Act. If
I had been better versed in these things, I would have known the tartan
to be of the Argyle (or Campbell) colours. This servant had a good-sized
portmanteau strapped on his horse, and a net of lemons (to brew punch
with) hanging at the saddle-bow; as was often enough the custom with
luxurious travellers in that part of the country.

As for the fourth, who brought up the tail, I had seen his like before,
and knew him at once to be a sheriff's officer.

I had no sooner seen these people coming than I made up my mind (for no
reason that I can tell) to go through with my adventure; and when the
first came alongside of me, I rose up from the bracken and asked him the
way to Aucharn.

He stopped and looked at me, as I thought, a little oddly; and then,
turning to the lawyer, "Mungo," said he, "there's many a man would think
this more of a warning than two pyats. Here am I on my road to Duror on
the job ye ken; and here is a young lad starts up out of the bracken,
and speers if I am on the way to Aucharn."

"Glenure," said the other, "this is an ill subject for jesting."

These two had now drawn close up and were gazing at me, while the two
followers had halted about a stone-cast in the rear.

"And what seek ye in Aucharn?" said Colin Roy Campbell of Glenure, him
they called the Red Fox; for he it was that I had stopped.

"The man that lives there," said I.

"James of the Glens," says Glenure, musingly; and then to the lawyer:
"Is he gathering his people, think ye?"

"Anyway," says the lawyer, "we shall do better to bide where we are, and
let the soldiers rally us."

"If you are concerned for me," said I, "I am neither of his people nor
yours, but an honest subject of King George, owing no man and fearing no
man."

"Why, very well said," replies the Factor. "But if I may make so bold as
ask, what does this honest man so far from his country? and why does
he come seeking the brother of Ardshiel? I have power here, I must tell
you. I am King's Factor upon several of these estates, and have twelve
files of soldiers at my back."

"I have heard a waif word in the country," said I, a little nettled,
"that you were a hard man to drive."

He still kept looking at me, as if in doubt.

"Well," said he, at last, "your tongue is bold; but I am no unfriend to
plainness. If ye had asked me the way to the door of James Stewart on
any other day but this, I would have set ye right and bidden ye God
speed. But to-day--eh, Mungo?" And he turned again to look at the
lawyer.

But just as he turned there came the shot of a firelock from higher up
the hill; and with the very sound of it Glenure fell upon the road.

"O, I am dead!" he cried, several times over.

The lawyer had caught him up and held him in his arms, the servant
standing over and clasping his hands. And now the wounded man looked
from one to another with scared eyes, and there was a change in his
voice, that went to the heart.

"Take care of yourselves," says he. "I am dead."

He tried to open his clothes as if to look for the wound, but his
fingers slipped on the buttons. With that he gave a great sigh, his head
rolled on his shoulder, and he passed away.

The lawyer said never a word, but his face was as sharp as a pen and
as white as the dead man's; the servant broke out into a great noise of
crying and weeping, like a child; and I, on my side, stood staring at
them in a kind of horror. The sheriff's officer had run back at the
first sound of the shot, to hasten the coming of the soldiers.

At last the lawyer laid down the dead man in his blood upon the road,
and got to his own feet with a kind of stagger.

I believe it was his movement that brought me to my senses; for he had
no sooner done so than I began to scramble up the hill, crying out, "The
murderer! the murderer!"

So little a time had elapsed, that when I got to the top of the first
steepness, and could see some part of the open mountain, the murderer
was still moving away at no great distance. He was a big man, in a black
coat, with metal buttons, and carried a long fowling-piece.

"Here!" I cried. "I see him!"

At that the murderer gave a little, quick look over his shoulder, and
began to run. The next moment he was lost in a fringe of birches; then
he came out again on the upper side, where I could see him climbing like
a jackanapes, for that part was again very steep; and then he dipped
behind a shoulder, and I saw him no more.

All this time I had been running on my side, and had got a good way up,
when a voice cried upon me to stand.

I was at the edge of the upper wood, and so now, when I halted and
looked back, I saw all the open part of the hill below me.

The lawyer and the sheriff's officer were standing just above the road,
crying and waving on me to come back; and on their left, the red-coats,
musket in hand, were beginning to struggle singly out of the lower wood.

"Why should I come back?" I cried. "Come you on!"

"Ten pounds if ye take that lad!" cried the lawyer. "He's an accomplice.
He was posted here to hold us in talk."

At that word (which I could hear quite plainly, though it was to the
soldiers and not to me that he was crying it) my heart came in my mouth
with quite a new kind of terror. Indeed, it is one thing to stand the
danger of your life, and quite another to run the peril of both life and
character. The thing, besides, had come so suddenly, like thunder out of
a clear sky, that I was all amazed and helpless.

The soldiers began to spread, some of them to run, and others to put up
their pieces and cover me; and still I stood.

"Jock* in here among the trees," said a voice close by.

     * Duck.

Indeed, I scarce knew what I was doing, but I obeyed; and as I did so, I
heard the firelocks bang and the balls whistle in the birches.

Just inside the shelter of the trees I found Alan Breck standing, with
a fishing-rod. He gave me no salutation; indeed it was no time for
civilities; only "Come!" says he, and set off running along the side of
the mountain towards Balachulish; and I, like a sheep, to follow him.

Now we ran among the birches; now stooping behind low humps upon the
mountain-side; now crawling on all fours among the heather. The pace was
deadly: my heart seemed bursting against my ribs; and I had neither time
to think nor breath to speak with. Only I remember seeing with wonder,
that Alan every now and then would straighten himself to his full height
and look back; and every time he did so, there came a great far-away
cheering and crying of the soldiers.

Quarter of an hour later, Alan stopped, clapped down flat in the
heather, and turned to me.

"Now," said he, "it's earnest. Do as I do, for your life."

And at the same speed, but now with infinitely more precaution, we
traced back again across the mountain-side by the same way that we had
come, only perhaps higher; till at last Alan threw himself down in the
upper wood of Lettermore, where I had found him at the first, and lay,
with his face in the bracken, panting like a dog.

My own sides so ached, my head so swam, my tongue so hung out of my
mouth with heat and dryness, that I lay beside him like one dead.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: The next day, Henderland finds a man to take David across the Linnhe Loch to Appin in his boat. On the way, David sees a group of red-coated soldiers of King George. The boatman says that he thinks they are coming to evict the poor Stewart tenants. The boatman sets David ashore near the wood of Lettermore, in Alan's country of Appin. David wonders why he is taking the risk of joining up with Alan when he could head home alone. As David walks through the wood, four men on horseback appear. David asks them for directions to Aucharn. One of the travelers turns out to be Colin Campbell, the "Red Fox"; another is his lawyer, and a third is a sheriff's officer. Campbell guesses that David is seeking out James of the Glens. David tells him that he is an honest subject of King George, and takes neither the side of the King's army or of James of the Glens. Suddenly, a shot rings out, and Campbell falls dead on the road. David runs after the murderer, a big man in a black coat, but he escapes. The lawyer and sheriff's officer shout at David to come back. The lawyer accuses David of being an accomplice to the murder, posted in the wood to hold Campbell in conversation. They tell a group of soldiers to pursue David. As David stands terrified, he hears a voice telling him to hide in the trees. It is Alan. Alan tells David to follow him, and sets off at a run; when not under cover of trees, they crawl on all fours. Thus begins David and Alan's flight through the "heather," the Scottish wilderness. From time to time, Alan straightens up to ensure that the soldiers see him. Then he doubles back the same way they came, this time keeping out of sight. Finally, the two men collapse, exhausted, in the wood of Lettermore


prompt:
Chapter: Alan was the first to come round. He rose, went to the border of the
wood, peered out a little, and then returned and sat down.

"Well," said he, "yon was a hot burst, David."

I said nothing, nor so much as lifted my face. I had seen murder done,
and a great, ruddy, jovial gentleman struck out of life in a moment; the
pity of that sight was still sore within me, and yet that was but a part
of my concern. Here was murder done upon the man Alan hated; here was
Alan skulking in the trees and running from the troops; and whether his
was the hand that fired or only the head that ordered, signified
but little. By my way of it, my only friend in that wild country was
blood-guilty in the first degree; I held him in horror; I could not look
upon his face; I would have rather lain alone in the rain on my cold
isle, than in that warm wood beside a murderer.

"Are ye still wearied?" he asked again.

"No," said I, still with my face in the bracken; "no, I am not wearied
now, and I can speak. You and me must twine,"* I said. "I liked you very
well, Alan, but your ways are not mine, and they're not God's: and the
short and the long of it is just that we must twine."

     * Part.

"I will hardly twine from ye, David, without some kind of reason for
the same," said Alan, mighty gravely. "If ye ken anything against
my reputation, it's the least thing that ye should do, for old
acquaintance' sake, to let me hear the name of it; and if ye have only
taken a distaste to my society, it will be proper for me to judge if I'm
insulted."

"Alan," said I, "what is the sense of this? Ye ken very well yon
Campbell-man lies in his blood upon the road."

He was silent for a little; then says he, "Did ever ye hear tell of the
story of the Man and the Good People?"--by which he meant the fairies.

"No," said I, "nor do I want to hear it."

"With your permission, Mr. Balfour, I will tell it you, whatever," says
Alan. "The man, ye should ken, was cast upon a rock in the sea, where
it appears the Good People were in use to come and rest as they went
through to Ireland. The name of this rock is called the Skerryvore, and
it's not far from where we suffered ship-wreck. Well, it seems the man
cried so sore, if he could just see his little bairn before he died!
that at last the king of the Good People took peety upon him, and sent
one flying that brought back the bairn in a poke* and laid it down
beside the man where he lay sleeping. So when the man woke, there was a
poke beside him and something into the inside of it that moved. Well, it
seems he was one of these gentry that think aye the worst of things; and
for greater security, he stuck his dirk throughout that poke before he
opened it, and there was his bairn dead. I am thinking to myself, Mr.
Balfour, that you and the man are very much alike."

     * Bag.

"Do you mean you had no hand in it?" cried I, sitting up.

"I will tell you first of all, Mr. Balfour of Shaws, as one friend to
another," said Alan, "that if I were going to kill a gentleman, it would
not be in my own country, to bring trouble on my clan; and I would not
go wanting sword and gun, and with a long fishing-rod upon my back."

"Well," said I, "that's true!"

"And now," continued Alan, taking out his dirk and laying his hand upon
it in a certain manner, "I swear upon the Holy Iron I had neither art
nor part, act nor thought in it."

"I thank God for that!" cried I, and offered him my hand.

He did not appear to see it.

"And here is a great deal of work about a Campbell!" said he. "They are
not so scarce, that I ken!"

"At least," said I, "you cannot justly blame me, for you know very
well what you told me in the brig. But the temptation and the act are
different, I thank God again for that. We may all be tempted; but
to take a life in cold blood, Alan!" And I could say no more for the
moment. "And do you know who did it?" I added. "Do you know that man in
the black coat?"

"I have nae clear mind about his coat," said Alan cunningly, "but it
sticks in my head that it was blue."

"Blue or black, did ye know him?" said I.

"I couldnae just conscientiously swear to him," says Alan. "He gaed very
close by me, to be sure, but it's a strange thing that I should just
have been tying my brogues."

"Can you swear that you don't know him, Alan?" I cried, half angered,
half in a mind to laugh at his evasions.

"Not yet," says he; "but I've a grand memory for forgetting, David."

"And yet there was one thing I saw clearly," said I; "and that was, that
you exposed yourself and me to draw the soldiers."

"It's very likely," said Alan; "and so would any gentleman. You and me
were innocent of that transaction."

"The better reason, since we were falsely suspected, that we should get
clear," I cried. "The innocent should surely come before the guilty."

"Why, David," said he, "the innocent have aye a chance to get assoiled
in court; but for the lad that shot the bullet, I think the best place
for him will be the heather. Them that havenae dipped their hands in any
little difficulty, should be very mindful of the case of them that have.
And that is the good Christianity. For if it was the other way round
about, and the lad whom I couldnae just clearly see had been in our
shoes, and we in his (as might very well have been), I think we would be
a good deal obliged to him oursel's if he would draw the soldiers."

When it came to this, I gave Alan up. But he looked so innocent all the
time, and was in such clear good faith in what he said, and so ready to
sacrifice himself for what he deemed his duty, that my mouth was closed.
Mr. Henderland's words came back to me: that we ourselves might take a
lesson by these wild Highlanders. Well, here I had taken mine. Alan's
morals were all tail-first; but he was ready to give his life for them,
such as they were.

"Alan," said I, "I'll not say it's the good Christianity as I understand
it, but it's good enough. And here I offer ye my hand for the second
time."

Whereupon he gave me both of his, saying surely I had cast a spell upon
him, for he could forgive me anything. Then he grew very grave, and said
we had not much time to throw away, but must both flee that country: he,
because he was a deserter, and the whole of Appin would now be searched
like a chamber, and every one obliged to give a good account of himself;
and I, because I was certainly involved in the murder.

"O!" says I, willing to give him a little lesson, "I have no fear of the
justice of my country."

"As if this was your country!" said he. "Or as if ye would be tried
here, in a country of Stewarts!"

"It's all Scotland," said I.

"Man, I whiles wonder at ye," said Alan. "This is a Campbell that's been
killed. Well, it'll be tried in Inverara, the Campbells' head place;
with fifteen Campbells in the jury-box and the biggest Campbell of all
(and that's the Duke) sitting cocking on the bench. Justice, David?
The same justice, by all the world, as Glenure found awhile ago at the
roadside."

This frightened me a little, I confess, and would have frightened me
more if I had known how nearly exact were Alan's predictions; indeed
it was but in one point that he exaggerated, there being but eleven
Campbells on the jury; though as the other four were equally in the
Duke's dependence, it mattered less than might appear. Still, I cried
out that he was unjust to the Duke of Argyle, who (for all he was a
Whig) was yet a wise and honest nobleman.

"Hoot!" said Alan, "the man's a Whig, nae doubt; but I would never deny
he was a good chieftain to his clan. And what would the clan think if
there was a Campbell shot, and naebody hanged, and their own chief
the Justice General? But I have often observed," says Alan, "that you
Low-country bodies have no clear idea of what's right and wrong."

At this I did at last laugh out aloud, when to my surprise, Alan joined
in, and laughed as merrily as myself.

"Na, na," said he, "we're in the Hielands, David; and when I tell ye
to run, take my word and run. Nae doubt it's a hard thing to skulk and
starve in the Heather, but it's harder yet to lie shackled in a red-coat
prison."

I asked him whither we should flee; and as he told me "to the Lowlands,"
I was a little better inclined to go with him; for, indeed, I was
growing impatient to get back and have the upper-hand of my uncle.
Besides, Alan made so sure there would be no question of justice in the
matter, that I began to be afraid he might be right. Of all deaths, I
would truly like least to die by the gallows; and the picture of that
uncanny instrument came into my head with extraordinary clearness (as I
had once seen it engraved at the top of a pedlar's ballad) and took away
my appetite for courts of justice.

"I'll chance it, Alan," said I. "I'll go with you."

"But mind you," said Alan, "it's no small thing. Ye maun lie bare and
hard, and brook many an empty belly. Your bed shall be the moorcock's,
and your life shall be like the hunted deer's, and ye shall sleep with
your hand upon your weapons. Ay, man, ye shall taigle many a weary foot,
or we get clear! I tell ye this at the start, for it's a life that I ken
well. But if ye ask what other chance ye have, I answer: Nane. Either
take to the heather with me, or else hang."

"And that's a choice very easily made," said I; and we shook hands upon
it.

"And now let's take another keek at the red-coats," says Alan, and he
led me to the north-eastern fringe of the wood.

Looking out between the trees, we could see a great side of mountain,
running down exceeding steep into the waters of the loch. It was a rough
part, all hanging stone, and heather, and big scrogs of birchwood; and
away at the far end towards Balachulish, little wee red soldiers were
dipping up and down over hill and howe, and growing smaller every
minute. There was no cheering now, for I think they had other uses
for what breath was left them; but they still stuck to the trail, and
doubtless thought that we were close in front of them.

Alan watched them, smiling to himself.

"Ay," said he, "they'll be gey weary before they've got to the end of
that employ! And so you and me, David, can sit down and eat a bite, and
breathe a bit longer, and take a dram from my bottle. Then we'll strike
for Aucharn, the house of my kinsman, James of the Glens, where I must
get my clothes, and my arms, and money to carry us along; and then,
David, we'll cry, 'Forth, Fortune!' and take a cast among the heather."

So we sat again and ate and drank, in a place whence we could see the
sun going down into a field of great, wild, and houseless mountains,
such as I was now condemned to wander in with my companion. Partly as
we so sat, and partly afterwards, on the way to Aucharn, each of us
narrated his adventures; and I shall here set down so much of Alan's as
seems either curious or needful.

It appears he ran to the bulwarks as soon as the wave was passed; saw
me, and lost me, and saw me again, as I tumbled in the roost; and at
last had one glimpse of me clinging on the yard. It was this that put
him in some hope I would maybe get to land after all, and made him leave
those clues and messages which had brought me (for my sins) to that
unlucky country of Appin.

In the meanwhile, those still on the brig had got the skiff launched,
and one or two were on board of her already, when there came a second
wave greater than the first, and heaved the brig out of her place, and
would certainly have sent her to the bottom, had she not struck and
caught on some projection of the reef. When she had struck first, it had
been bows-on, so that the stern had hitherto been lowest. But now her
stern was thrown in the air, and the bows plunged under the sea; and
with that, the water began to pour into the fore-scuttle like the
pouring of a mill-dam.

It took the colour out of Alan's face, even to tell what followed.
For there were still two men lying impotent in their bunks; and these,
seeing the water pour in and thinking the ship had foundered, began to
cry out aloud, and that with such harrowing cries that all who were on
deck tumbled one after another into the skiff and fell to their oars.
They were not two hundred yards away, when there came a third great sea;
and at that the brig lifted clean over the reef; her canvas filled for
a moment, and she seemed to sail in chase of them, but settling all the
while; and presently she drew down and down, as if a hand was drawing
her; and the sea closed over the Covenant of Dysart.

Never a word they spoke as they pulled ashore, being stunned with the
horror of that screaming; but they had scarce set foot upon the beach
when Hoseason woke up, as if out of a muse, and bade them lay hands upon
Alan. They hung back indeed, having little taste for the employment;
but Hoseason was like a fiend, crying that Alan was alone, that he had
a great sum about him, that he had been the means of losing the brig and
drowning all their comrades, and that here was both revenge and wealth
upon a single cast. It was seven against one; in that part of the shore
there was no rock that Alan could set his back to; and the sailors began
to spread out and come behind him.

"And then," said Alan, "the little man with the red head--I havenae mind
of the name that he is called."

"Riach," said I.

"Ay" said Alan, "Riach! Well, it was him that took up the clubs for me,
asked the men if they werenae feared of a judgment, and, says he 'Dod,
I'll put my back to the Hielandman's mysel'.' That's none such an
entirely bad little man, yon little man with the red head," said Alan.
"He has some spunks of decency."

"Well," said I, "he was kind to me in his way."

"And so he was to Alan," said he; "and by my troth, I found his way a
very good one! But ye see, David, the loss of the ship and the cries of
these poor lads sat very ill upon the man; and I'm thinking that would
be the cause of it."

"Well, I would think so," says I; "for he was as keen as any of the rest
at the beginning. But how did Hoseason take it?"

"It sticks in my mind that he would take it very ill," says Alan. "But
the little man cried to me to run, and indeed I thought it was a good
observe, and ran. The last that I saw they were all in a knot upon the
beach, like folk that were not agreeing very well together."

"What do you mean by that?" said I.

"Well, the fists were going," said Alan; "and I saw one man go down like
a pair of breeks. But I thought it would be better no to wait. Ye see
there's a strip of Campbells in that end of Mull, which is no good
company for a gentleman like me. If it hadnae been for that I would have
waited and looked for ye mysel', let alone giving a hand to the little
man." (It was droll how Alan dwelt on Mr. Riach's stature, for, to say
the truth, the one was not much smaller than the other.) "So," says he,
continuing, "I set my best foot forward, and whenever I met in with any
one I cried out there was a wreck ashore. Man, they didnae stop to fash
with me! Ye should have seen them linking for the beach! And when they
got there they found they had had the pleasure of a run, which is aye
good for a Campbell. I'm thinking it was a judgment on the clan that the
brig went down in the lump and didnae break. But it was a very unlucky
thing for you, that same; for if any wreck had come ashore they would
have hunted high and low, and would soon have found ye."

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: When David and Alan awake next morning, David is angry with Alan and wants to part from him. He believes that Alan is responsible for the murder of Campbell, whether by pulling the trigger himself or ordering someone else to do it. But Alan insists that he had nothing to do with it: if he had planned to kill Campbell, he would not be without a sword and gun, with only a fishing rod. Alan swears upon his dagger  that he had no hand in the murder. Believing that Alan may have been a conspirator in the killing, David asks Alan if he knows the man in the black coat, whom David saw running away. Alan tries to confuse David's memory of the man, suggesting that his coat may have been blue. He says that he would rather forget anything that he did see. David then accuses Alan of deliberately showing himself to the soldiers in order to draw them away from the real killer. Alan agrees that this is "likely," as he considers it the job of a "gentleman" to do so. David cannot understand why an innocent man should expose himself to suspicion. Alan reasons that the innocent have a chance of clearing their name in court, whereas the man who shot Campbell should be given a chance to escape. And that," says Alan, "is the good Christianity. David says nothing, but respects Alan's readiness to sacrifice himself, albeit he thinks his morals are "tail-first. David forgives Alan, and they shake hands. Alan says they must flee, as he is a wanted deserter, and David is a suspected accomplice to the murder. David protests that he has faith in the justice system, but Alan points out that the case would be tried in Campbell country, with a jury stacked with Campbells, presided over by a Campbell judge. Alan suggests going to the Lowlands, and David agrees, as he wants to go home and confront Ebenezer. Alan warns David that their life on the run will be hard, but the alternative is to be hanged. Alan tells David what happened after they fell overboard from the Covenant. He, Hoseason, and Riach were among the sailors who made it to shore. Hoseason ordered his men to capture Alan and take his money, but Riach refused, allowing Alan to escape.


prompt:
Chapter: Night fell as we were walking, and the clouds, which had broken up in
the afternoon, settled in and thickened, so that it fell, for the
season of the year, extremely dark. The way we went was over rough
mountainsides; and though Alan pushed on with an assured manner, I could
by no means see how he directed himself.

At last, about half-past ten of the clock, we came to the top of a brae,
and saw lights below us. It seemed a house door stood open and let out a
beam of fire and candle-light; and all round the house and steading
five or six persons were moving hurriedly about, each carrying a lighted
brand.

"James must have tint his wits," said Alan. "If this was the soldiers
instead of you and me, he would be in a bonny mess. But I dare say he'll
have a sentry on the road, and he would ken well enough no soldiers
would find the way that we came."

Hereupon he whistled three times, in a particular manner. It was strange
to see how, at the first sound of it, all the moving torches came to
a stand, as if the bearers were affrighted; and how, at the third, the
bustle began again as before.

Having thus set folks' minds at rest, we came down the brae, and were
met at the yard gate (for this place was like a well-doing farm) by
a tall, handsome man of more than fifty, who cried out to Alan in the
Gaelic.

"James Stewart," said Alan, "I will ask ye to speak in Scotch, for here
is a young gentleman with me that has nane of the other. This is him,"
he added, putting his arm through mine, "a young gentleman of the
Lowlands, and a laird in his country too, but I am thinking it will be
the better for his health if we give his name the go-by."

James of the Glens turned to me for a moment, and greeted me courteously
enough; the next he had turned to Alan.

"This has been a dreadful accident," he cried. "It will bring trouble on
the country." And he wrung his hands.

"Hoots!" said Alan, "ye must take the sour with the sweet, man. Colin
Roy is dead, and be thankful for that!"

"Ay" said James, "and by my troth, I wish he was alive again! It's all
very fine to blow and boast beforehand; but now it's done, Alan; and
who's to bear the wyte* of it? The accident fell out in Appin--mind ye
that, Alan; it's Appin that must pay; and I am a man that has a family."

     * Blame.

While this was going on I looked about me at the servants. Some were on
ladders, digging in the thatch of the house or the farm buildings,
from which they brought out guns, swords, and different weapons of
war; others carried them away; and by the sound of mattock blows from
somewhere farther down the brae, I suppose they buried them. Though they
were all so busy, there prevailed no kind of order in their efforts; men
struggled together for the same gun and ran into each other with their
burning torches; and James was continually turning about from his talk
with Alan, to cry out orders which were apparently never understood. The
faces in the torchlight were like those of people overborne with hurry
and panic; and though none spoke above his breath, their speech sounded
both anxious and angry.

It was about this time that a lassie came out of the house carrying
a pack or bundle; and it has often made me smile to think how Alan's
instinct awoke at the mere sight of it.

"What's that the lassie has?" he asked.

"We're just setting the house in order, Alan," said James, in his
frightened and somewhat fawning way. "They'll search Appin with candles,
and we must have all things straight. We're digging the bit guns and
swords into the moss, ye see; and these, I am thinking, will be your ain
French clothes. We'll be to bury them, I believe."

"Bury my French clothes!" cried Alan. "Troth, no!" And he laid hold upon
the packet and retired into the barn to shift himself, recommending me
in the meanwhile to his kinsman.

James carried me accordingly into the kitchen, and sat down with me at
table, smiling and talking at first in a very hospitable manner. But
presently the gloom returned upon him; he sat frowning and biting his
fingers; only remembered me from time to time; and then gave me but a
word or two and a poor smile, and back into his private terrors. His
wife sat by the fire and wept, with her face in her hands; his eldest
son was crouched upon the floor, running over a great mass of papers and
now and again setting one alight and burning it to the bitter end; all
the while a servant lass with a red face was rummaging about the room,
in a blind hurry of fear, and whimpering as she went; and every now and
again one of the men would thrust in his face from the yard, and cry for
orders.

At last James could keep his seat no longer, and begged my permission to
be so unmannerly as walk about. "I am but poor company altogether, sir,"
says he, "but I can think of nothing but this dreadful accident, and the
trouble it is like to bring upon quite innocent persons."

A little after he observed his son burning a paper which he thought
should have been kept; and at that his excitement burst out so that it
was painful to witness. He struck the lad repeatedly.

"Are you gone gyte?"* he cried. "Do you wish to hang your father?" and
forgetful of my presence, carried on at him a long time together in the
Gaelic, the young man answering nothing; only the wife, at the name of
hanging, throwing her apron over her face and sobbing out louder than
before.

     * Mad.

This was all wretched for a stranger like myself to hear and see; and
I was right glad when Alan returned, looking like himself in his fine
French clothes, though (to be sure) they were now grown almost too
battered and withered to deserve the name of fine. I was then taken out
in my turn by another of the sons, and given that change of clothing of
which I had stood so long in need, and a pair of Highland brogues made
of deer-leather, rather strange at first, but after a little practice
very easy to the feet.

By the time I came back Alan must have told his story; for it seemed
understood that I was to fly with him, and they were all busy upon our
equipment. They gave us each a sword and pistols, though I professed my
inability to use the former; and with these, and some ammunition, a bag
of oatmeal, an iron pan, and a bottle of right French brandy, we were
ready for the heather. Money, indeed, was lacking. I had about two
guineas left; Alan's belt having been despatched by another hand, that
trusty messenger had no more than seventeen-pence to his whole fortune;
and as for James, it appears he had brought himself so low with journeys
to Edinburgh and legal expenses on behalf of the tenants, that he could
only scrape together three-and-five-pence-halfpenny, the most of it in
coppers.

"This'll no do," said Alan.

"Ye must find a safe bit somewhere near by," said James, "and get word
sent to me. Ye see, ye'll have to get this business prettily off, Alan.
This is no time to be stayed for a guinea or two. They're sure to get
wind of ye, sure to seek ye, and by my way of it, sure to lay on ye the
wyte of this day's accident. If it falls on you, it falls on me that am
your near kinsman and harboured ye while ye were in the country. And if
it comes on me----" he paused, and bit his fingers, with a white face.
"It would be a painful thing for our friends if I was to hang," said he.

"It would be an ill day for Appin," says Alan.

"It's a day that sticks in my throat," said James. "O man, man, man--man
Alan! you and me have spoken like two fools!" he cried, striking his
hand upon the wall so that the house rang again.

"Well, and that's true, too," said Alan; "and my friend from the
Lowlands here" (nodding at me) "gave me a good word upon that head, if I
would only have listened to him."

"But see here," said James, returning to his former manner, "if they lay
me by the heels, Alan, it's then that you'll be needing the money. For
with all that I have said and that you have said, it will look very
black against the two of us; do ye mark that? Well, follow me out, and
ye'll, I'll see that I'll have to get a paper out against ye mysel';
have to offer a reward for ye; ay, will I! It's a sore thing to do
between such near friends; but if I get the dirdum* of this dreadful
accident, I'll have to fend for myself, man. Do ye see that?"

     * Blame.

He spoke with a pleading earnestness, taking Alan by the breast of the
coat.

"Ay" said Alan, "I see that."

"And ye'll have to be clear of the country, Alan--ay, and clear of
Scotland--you and your friend from the Lowlands, too. For I'll have to
paper your friend from the Lowlands. Ye see that, Alan--say that ye see
that!"

I thought Alan flushed a bit. "This is unco hard on me that brought him
here, James," said he, throwing his head back. "It's like making me a
traitor!"

"Now, Alan, man!" cried James. "Look things in the face! He'll be
papered anyway; Mungo Campbell'll be sure to paper him; what matters
if I paper him too? And then, Alan, I am a man that has a family." And
then, after a little pause on both sides, "And, Alan, it'll be a jury of
Campbells," said he.

"There's one thing," said Alan, musingly, "that naebody kens his name."

"Nor yet they shallnae, Alan! There's my hand on that," cried James, for
all the world as if he had really known my name and was foregoing some
advantage. "But just the habit he was in, and what he looked like, and
his age, and the like? I couldnae well do less."

"I wonder at your father's son," cried Alan, sternly. "Would ye sell the
lad with a gift? Would ye change his clothes and then betray him?"

"No, no, Alan," said James. "No, no: the habit he took off--the habit
Mungo saw him in." But I thought he seemed crestfallen; indeed, he was
clutching at every straw, and all the time, I dare say, saw the faces of
his hereditary foes on the bench, and in the jury-box, and the gallows
in the background.

"Well, sir," says Alan, turning to me, "what say ye to that? Ye are here
under the safeguard of my honour; and it's my part to see nothing done
but what shall please you."

"I have but one word to say," said I; "for to all this dispute I am a
perfect stranger. But the plain common-sense is to set the blame where
it belongs, and that is on the man who fired the shot. Paper him, as ye
call it, set the hunt on him; and let honest, innocent folk show their
faces in safety." But at this both Alan and James cried out in horror;
bidding me hold my tongue, for that was not to be thought of; and asking
me what the Camerons would think? (which confirmed me, it must have been
a Cameron from Mamore that did the act) and if I did not see that the
lad might be caught? "Ye havenae surely thought of that?" said they,
with such innocent earnestness, that my hands dropped at my side and I
despaired of argument.

"Very well, then," said I, "paper me, if you please, paper Alan, paper
King George! We're all three innocent, and that seems to be what's
wanted. But at least, sir," said I to James, recovering from my little
fit of annoyance, "I am Alan's friend, and if I can be helpful to
friends of his, I will not stumble at the risk."

I thought it best to put a fair face on my consent, for I saw Alan
troubled; and, besides (thinks I to myself), as soon as my back is
turned, they will paper me, as they call it, whether I consent or not.
But in this I saw I was wrong; for I had no sooner said the words, than
Mrs. Stewart leaped out of her chair, came running over to us, and wept
first upon my neck and then on Alan's, blessing God for our goodness to
her family.

"As for you, Alan, it was no more than your bounden duty," she said.
"But for this lad that has come here and seen us at our worst, and seen
the goodman fleeching like a suitor, him that by rights should give his
commands like any king--as for you, my lad," she says, "my heart is wae
not to have your name, but I have your face; and as long as my heart
beats under my bosom, I will keep it, and think of it, and bless it."
And with that she kissed me, and burst once more into such sobbing, that
I stood abashed.

"Hoot, hoot," said Alan, looking mighty silly. "The day comes unco soon
in this month of July; and to-morrow there'll be a fine to-do in Appin,
a fine riding of dragoons, and crying of 'Cruachan!'* and running of
red-coats; and it behoves you and me to the sooner be gone."

     * The rallying-word of the Campbells.

Thereupon we said farewell, and set out again, bending somewhat
eastwards, in a fine mild dark night, and over much the same broken
country as before.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Night falls. Alan and David arrive at the house of James of the Glens, where members of the Stewart clan are busy hiding weapons by digging them into the moss, in anticipation of a raid by King George's forces seeking the culprit of Campbell's murder. James is angry and worried because he thinks that the Appin Stewarts will be blamed. As head of the remaining clan in Scotland, he himself may be blamed. He fears what might happen to his family if he is arrested and charged. James gives Alan and David a sword and pistols, and David a new set of clothes to help him evade capture. Neither Alan nor David has much money, as Alan has given his money belt with the Appin rents to another messenger to take to France. James wants Alan and David to leave quickly, as if they are blamed for the murder, King George's forces will also blame James for harboring them. James feels he has no choice but to "paper" Alan and David, in order to make it appear that he is not a co-conspirator in the murder. James says that if the soldiers come looking for Alan and David, he will have to give them a description of David. Alan is shocked that James would help David to a new set of clothes only to betray him by describing them to his pursuers. But James says he would only describe David's old, now discarded clothes. David indignantly says he cannot understand why the true culprit should not be "papered," rather than himself and Alan, two innocent men. But Alan and James are horrified by David's suggestion, as such an action would endanger the member of the Cameron clan who, they appear to believe, did the murder. David is bewildered at what he thinks is illogical reasoning. David reluctantly agrees to be "papered," telling James that he would risk himself to be helpful to any friend of Alan. James's wife is overcome with gratitude to David. Alan and David leave James of the Glens's house and continue on their flight through "the heather"


prompt:
Chapter: Sometimes we walked, sometimes ran; and as it drew on to morning, walked
ever the less and ran the more. Though, upon its face, that country
appeared to be a desert, yet there were huts and houses of the people,
of which we must have passed more than twenty, hidden in quiet places of
the hills. When we came to one of these, Alan would leave me in the way,
and go himself and rap upon the side of the house and speak awhile at
the window with some sleeper awakened. This was to pass the news; which,
in that country, was so much of a duty that Alan must pause to attend to
it even while fleeing for his life; and so well attended to by others,
that in more than half of the houses where we called they had heard
already of the murder. In the others, as well as I could make out
(standing back at a distance and hearing a strange tongue), the news was
received with more of consternation than surprise.

For all our hurry, day began to come in while we were still far from any
shelter. It found us in a prodigious valley, strewn with rocks and where
ran a foaming river. Wild mountains stood around it; there grew there
neither grass nor trees; and I have sometimes thought since then, that
it may have been the valley called Glencoe, where the massacre was in
the time of King William. But for the details of our itinerary, I am all
to seek; our way lying now by short cuts, now by great detours; our pace
being so hurried, our time of journeying usually by night; and the names
of such places as I asked and heard being in the Gaelic tongue and the
more easily forgotten.

The first peep of morning, then, showed us this horrible place, and I
could see Alan knit his brow.

"This is no fit place for you and me," he said. "This is a place they're
bound to watch."

And with that he ran harder than ever down to the water-side, in a part
where the river was split in two among three rocks. It went through with
a horrid thundering that made my belly quake; and there hung over the
lynn a little mist of spray. Alan looked neither to the right nor to the
left, but jumped clean upon the middle rock and fell there on his hands
and knees to check himself, for that rock was small and he might have
pitched over on the far side. I had scarce time to measure the distance
or to understand the peril before I had followed him, and he had caught
and stopped me.

So there we stood, side by side upon a small rock slippery with spray,
a far broader leap in front of us, and the river dinning upon all sides.
When I saw where I was, there came on me a deadly sickness of fear,
and I put my hand over my eyes. Alan took me and shook me; I saw he
was speaking, but the roaring of the falls and the trouble of my mind
prevented me from hearing; only I saw his face was red with anger, and
that he stamped upon the rock. The same look showed me the water raging
by, and the mist hanging in the air: and with that I covered my eyes
again and shuddered.

The next minute Alan had set the brandy bottle to my lips, and forced
me to drink about a gill, which sent the blood into my head again. Then,
putting his hands to his mouth, and his mouth to my ear, he shouted,
"Hang or drown!" and turning his back upon me, leaped over the farther
branch of the stream, and landed safe.

I was now alone upon the rock, which gave me the more room; the brandy
was singing in my ears; I had this good example fresh before me, and
just wit enough to see that if I did not leap at once, I should never
leap at all. I bent low on my knees and flung myself forth, with
that kind of anger of despair that has sometimes stood me in stead of
courage. Sure enough, it was but my hands that reached the full length;
these slipped, caught again, slipped again; and I was sliddering back
into the lynn, when Alan seized me, first by the hair, then by the
collar, and with a great strain dragged me into safety.

Never a word he said, but set off running again for his life, and I must
stagger to my feet and run after him. I had been weary before, but now
I was sick and bruised, and partly drunken with the brandy; I kept
stumbling as I ran, I had a stitch that came near to overmaster me; and
when at last Alan paused under a great rock that stood there among a
number of others, it was none too soon for David Balfour.

A great rock I have said; but by rights it was two rocks leaning
together at the top, both some twenty feet high, and at the first sight
inaccessible. Even Alan (though you may say he had as good as four
hands) failed twice in an attempt to climb them; and it was only at the
third trial, and then by standing on my shoulders and leaping up with
such force as I thought must have broken my collar-bone, that he secured
a lodgment. Once there, he let down his leathern girdle; and with the
aid of that and a pair of shallow footholds in the rock, I scrambled up
beside him.

Then I saw why we had come there; for the two rocks, being both somewhat
hollow on the top and sloping one to the other, made a kind of dish or
saucer, where as many as three or four men might have lain hidden.

All this while Alan had not said a word, and had run and climbed with
such a savage, silent frenzy of hurry, that I knew that he was in mortal
fear of some miscarriage. Even now we were on the rock he said nothing,
nor so much as relaxed the frowning look upon his face; but clapped flat
down, and keeping only one eye above the edge of our place of shelter
scouted all round the compass. The dawn had come quite clear; we could
see the stony sides of the valley, and its bottom, which was bestrewed
with rocks, and the river, which went from one side to another, and made
white falls; but nowhere the smoke of a house, nor any living creature
but some eagles screaming round a cliff.

Then at last Alan smiled.

"Ay" said he, "now we have a chance;" and then looking at me with some
amusement, "Ye're no very gleg* at the jumping," said he.

     * Brisk.

At this I suppose I coloured with mortification, for he added at once,
"Hoots! small blame to ye! To be feared of a thing and yet to do it, is
what makes the prettiest kind of a man. And then there was water there,
and water's a thing that dauntons even me. No, no," said Alan, "it's no
you that's to blame, it's me."

I asked him why.

"Why," said he, "I have proved myself a gomeral this night. For first
of all I take a wrong road, and that in my own country of Appin; so that
the day has caught us where we should never have been; and thanks to
that, we lie here in some danger and mair discomfort. And next (which is
the worst of the two, for a man that has been so much among the heather
as myself) I have come wanting a water-bottle, and here we lie for a
long summer's day with naething but neat spirit. Ye may think that a
small matter; but before it comes night, David, ye'll give me news of
it."

I was anxious to redeem my character, and offered, if he would pour out
the brandy, to run down and fill the bottle at the river.

"I wouldnae waste the good spirit either," says he. "It's been a good
friend to you this night; or in my poor opinion, ye would still be
cocking on yon stone. And what's mair," says he, "ye may have observed
(you that's a man of so much penetration) that Alan Breck Stewart was
perhaps walking quicker than his ordinar'."

"You!" I cried, "you were running fit to burst."

"Was I so?" said he. "Well, then, ye may depend upon it, there was nae
time to be lost. And now here is enough said; gang you to your sleep,
lad, and I'll watch."

Accordingly, I lay down to sleep; a little peaty earth had drifted in
between the top of the two rocks, and some bracken grew there, to be a
bed to me; the last thing I heard was still the crying of the eagles.

I dare say it would be nine in the morning when I was roughly awakened,
and found Alan's hand pressed upon my mouth.

"Wheesht!" he whispered. "Ye were snoring."

"Well," said I, surprised at his anxious and dark face, "and why not?"

He peered over the edge of the rock, and signed to me to do the like.

It was now high day, cloudless, and very hot. The valley was as clear as
in a picture. About half a mile up the water was a camp of red-coats; a
big fire blazed in their midst, at which some were cooking; and near by,
on the top of a rock about as high as ours, there stood a sentry, with
the sun sparkling on his arms. All the way down along the river-side
were posted other sentries; here near together, there widelier
scattered; some planted like the first, on places of command, some
on the ground level and marching and counter-marching, so as to meet
half-way. Higher up the glen, where the ground was more open, the chain
of posts was continued by horse-soldiers, whom we could see in the
distance riding to and fro. Lower down, the infantry continued; but
as the stream was suddenly swelled by the confluence of a considerable
burn, they were more widely set, and only watched the fords and
stepping-stones.

I took but one look at them, and ducked again into my place. It was
strange indeed to see this valley, which had lain so solitary in the
hour of dawn, bristling with arms and dotted with the red coats and
breeches.

"Ye see," said Alan, "this was what I was afraid of, Davie: that they
would watch the burn-side. They began to come in about two hours ago,
and, man! but ye're a grand hand at the sleeping! We're in a narrow
place. If they get up the sides of the hill, they could easy spy us with
a glass; but if they'll only keep in the foot of the valley, we'll do
yet. The posts are thinner down the water; and, come night, we'll try
our hand at getting by them."

"And what are we to do till night?" I asked.

"Lie here," says he, "and birstle."

That one good Scotch word, "birstle," was indeed the most of the story
of the day that we had now to pass. You are to remember that we lay on
the bare top of a rock, like scones upon a girdle; the sun beat upon us
cruelly; the rock grew so heated, a man could scarce endure the touch of
it; and the little patch of earth and fern, which kept cooler, was only
large enough for one at a time. We took turn about to lie on the naked
rock, which was indeed like the position of that saint that was martyred
on a gridiron; and it ran in my mind how strange it was, that in the
same climate and at only a few days' distance, I should have suffered
so cruelly, first from cold upon my island and now from heat upon this
rock.

All the while we had no water, only raw brandy for a drink, which was
worse than nothing; but we kept the bottle as cool as we could, burying
it in the earth, and got some relief by bathing our breasts and temples.

The soldiers kept stirring all day in the bottom of the valley, now
changing guard, now in patrolling parties hunting among the rocks. These
lay round in so great a number, that to look for men among them was like
looking for a needle in a bottle of hay; and being so hopeless a task,
it was gone about with the less care. Yet we could see the soldiers
pike their bayonets among the heather, which sent a cold thrill into my
vitals; and they would sometimes hang about our rock, so that we scarce
dared to breathe.

It was in this way that I first heard the right English speech; one
fellow as he went by actually clapping his hand upon the sunny face of
the rock on which we lay, and plucking it off again with an oath. "I
tell you it's 'ot," says he; and I was amazed at the clipping tones and
the odd sing-song in which he spoke, and no less at that strange trick
of dropping out the letter "h." To be sure, I had heard Ransome; but he
had taken his ways from all sorts of people, and spoke so imperfectly
at the best, that I set down the most of it to childishness. My surprise
was all the greater to hear that manner of speaking in the mouth of a
grown man; and indeed I have never grown used to it; nor yet altogether
with the English grammar, as perhaps a very critical eye might here and
there spy out even in these memoirs.

The tediousness and pain of these hours upon the rock grew only the
greater as the day went on; the rock getting still the hotter and the
sun fiercer. There were giddiness, and sickness, and sharp pangs like
rheumatism, to be supported. I minded then, and have often minded since,
on the lines in our Scotch psalm:--

     "The moon by night thee shall not smite,
     Nor yet the sun by day;"

and indeed it was only by God's blessing that we were neither of us
sun-smitten.

At last, about two, it was beyond men's bearing, and there was now
temptation to resist, as well as pain to thole. For the sun being now
got a little into the west, there came a patch of shade on the east side
of our rock, which was the side sheltered from the soldiers.

"As well one death as another," said Alan, and slipped over the edge and
dropped on the ground on the shadowy side.

I followed him at once, and instantly fell all my length, so weak was I
and so giddy with that long exposure. Here, then, we lay for an hour or
two, aching from head to foot, as weak as water, and lying quite naked
to the eye of any soldier who should have strolled that way. None came,
however, all passing by on the other side; so that our rock continued to
be our shield even in this new position.

Presently we began again to get a little strength; and as the soldiers
were now lying closer along the river-side, Alan proposed that we should
try a start. I was by this time afraid of but one thing in the world;
and that was to be set back upon the rock; anything else was welcome
to me; so we got ourselves at once in marching order, and began to slip
from rock to rock one after the other, now crawling flat on our bellies
in the shade, now making a run for it, heart in mouth.

The soldiers, having searched this side of the valley after a fashion,
and being perhaps somewhat sleepy with the sultriness of the afternoon,
had now laid by much of their vigilance, and stood dozing at their posts
or only kept a look-out along the banks of the river; so that in this
way, keeping down the valley and at the same time towards the mountains,
we drew steadily away from their neighbourhood. But the business was the
most wearing I had ever taken part in. A man had need of a hundred
eyes in every part of him, to keep concealed in that uneven country and
within cry of so many and scattered sentries. When we must pass an open
place, quickness was not all, but a swift judgment not only of the lie
of the whole country, but of the solidity of every stone on which we
must set foot; for the afternoon was now fallen so breathless that the
rolling of a pebble sounded abroad like a pistol shot, and would start
the echo calling among the hills and cliffs.

By sundown we had made some distance, even by our slow rate of progress,
though to be sure the sentry on the rock was still plainly in our view.
But now we came on something that put all fears out of season; and that
was a deep rushing burn, that tore down, in that part, to join the glen
river. At the sight of this we cast ourselves on the ground and plunged
head and shoulders in the water; and I cannot tell which was the more
pleasant, the great shock as the cool stream went over us, or the greed
with which we drank of it.

We lay there (for the banks hid us), drank again and again, bathed our
chests, let our wrists trail in the running water till they ached
with the chill; and at last, being wonderfully renewed, we got out the
meal-bag and made drammach in the iron pan. This, though it is but cold
water mingled with oatmeal, yet makes a good enough dish for a hungry
man; and where there are no means of making fire, or (as in our case)
good reason for not making one, it is the chief stand-by of those who
have taken to the heather.

As soon as the shadow of the night had fallen, we set forth again, at
first with the same caution, but presently with more boldness, standing
our full height and stepping out at a good pace of walking. The way
was very intricate, lying up the steep sides of mountains and along the
brows of cliffs; clouds had come in with the sunset, and the night was
dark and cool; so that I walked without much fatigue, but in continual
fear of falling and rolling down the mountains, and with no guess at our
direction.

The moon rose at last and found us still on the road; it was in its last
quarter, and was long beset with clouds; but after awhile shone out and
showed me many dark heads of mountains, and was reflected far underneath
us on the narrow arm of a sea-loch.

At this sight we both paused: I struck with wonder to find myself so
high and walking (as it seemed to me) upon clouds; Alan to make sure of
his direction.

Seemingly he was well pleased, and he must certainly have judged us
out of ear-shot of all our enemies; for throughout the rest of our
night-march he beguiled the way with whistling of many tunes, warlike,
merry, plaintive; reel tunes that made the foot go faster; tunes of my
own south country that made me fain to be home from my adventures; and
all these, on the great, dark, desert mountains, making company upon the
way.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Alan leads David on an exhausting flight through "the heather. They climb onto some tall rocks with a dish-shaped hollow at the top, and hide by lying in the hollow. Alan admits to two mistakes: he took the wrong road, and so has arrived in dangerous country in daylight; and he has forgotten to bring water. Alan tells David to sleep first. When Alan wakes him, David sees a camp of soldiers just half a mile away. The soldiers are watching the stream in case Alan and David should try to cross it. Trapped on the rock, Alan and David are baked by the sun. David grows giddy with thirst and sunstroke. Eventually, Alan and David take a risk, dropping down from the rock and escaping the soldiers' detection by running from rock to rock and crawling on their bellies. They jump into a river and cool themselves before continuing on their way