a lifetime of regret to all who advised the step,"
responded Miss Caldera; ''and you know, Mina,
as well as I, a period was when your happiness
hung just suspended by a thread: iate touched
the fortunate scale, however, and you are what

you are; but had it been otherwise . Ah!"

she added, rising, '' I can scarcely bear to con-
template that chance, even now ; and it was a
likely enough one then, far more likely, I con-
fess, than this."



Under the shadow of the Glenfiord roof-tree
a home was made for a white-haired man, whom
Mina Ivraine loved as the sole tie which connected
the past and the present, as the last survivor of old
times.
It was a lovely sight to see how her children
were wont to nestle around ** good Colin," as they
styled the old Highlander, who, leaning on his
staff, surveyed the noisy group with a proud,
satisfied expression, as if the last wish of his soul
were gratified in seeing the wild, happy, beautiful,
kind-hearted descendants of his dear Captain Allan,
giving to that glorious scene all it wanted to make
it perfect, — ^life> animation, the hum and stir and




CONCLUSION. 807

joy and excitement of careless, thoughtless, happy,
youthful existence.
But, at length, he went to his long home also.
After he had been ailing for a considerable period,
one evening a message came to inform Mina he was
dying. She sprang up from the dining-table where
the tidings reached her, and, with the impetuosity
of other days, with the unchecked sorrow of her
childhood's vehement mom, rushed to his bedside.
