The Highland monthly - National Library of Scotland

Scenes oj Long Ago. 423
fatigued by the won-)' and exertion of the preccdini,^ day.
Having bidden adieu to liis kind host, he rode slowly
along, congratulating^ himself upon the escape which he
had made from robbery. It was only after seeing
Finlay Don that Glenbeltanc tliought it wise to take
those further measures immediately to secure his money,
which involved his hurried ride to the bank. He
often spoke of what had happened, from first to
last, in this expedition, as showing a special
Providential intervention for his protection. He
had never heard of any dealer from the North who had
lodged money after a tryst in the way he himself had done
With such thoughts running through his mind, he was in
much better spirits than on the previous day. As he rode
past Teith Muir, which, although entirely deserted, still had
many traces of the recent tryst, he glanced over it and said
as he rode on
—
" Ah, Gillespie, many a wildly throbbing heart has been
on that field. There is scarce a spot of its surface upon
which some ruined, sorrow-stricken man has not stood-
Many had gone there expecting the smiles of prosperity,
whom I have seen leave it penniless, and ashamed to
meet the glance of friends and old neighbours ; nay, almost
shrinking from returning home to explain to their wives
and families how the earnings of a lifetime have been swept
away ; and, still worse, how they are totally unable to meet
all claims against them. Oftentimes have I been saddened
to observe the compressed lip, and the hands nervously
wrung, telling the same disastrous tale. But here, too, have
been those who, by a long course of successful enterprise,
amassed riches. I have seen topsmen and friends
crowding around them, as though they were congratulating
a hero upon newly-acquired laurels. The successful man
has a wondrous fascination. Others less fortunate seek his
company even as though some rays of his prosperity might
emanate upon those near. I have seen, O poor human
nature ! I have seen ruined men try to laugh and joke with
those who gained by their loss, and to swell the volume of