11 The Druid's" Endurance. 331 



it is worthy to be selected for a final quota- 

 tion : — 



" On the occasion of my second visit to 

 Scotland there was nothing for it but to steel 

 myself against all bed-regrets, and to face the 

 muirs at night. I wended my way by a 

 series of zig-zags from Barrock to the high 

 road between Thurso and Lybster, and then 

 struck straight for the coast. The sun went 

 down, and the rain took no half-measures 

 with those exposed to it. Soon every door 

 was barred, and every light put out in the 

 few cabins along the road. ; but one family 

 at last responded to my hail with biscuit, 

 cheese and milk, besides offering a bed and 

 abundance of tares. There are many dreary 

 passages in a man's life ; but wiping down a 

 mare very short of condition in your shirt 

 sleeves in a cow-house, on a wild muir, by a 

 dim spluttering dip, at midnight, with the 

 wind sighing through the broken panes, the 

 heavy rain-drops pattering on the door sill, 

 and a forty miles' ride before you, has very 

 few to match it. Still it had to be done ; 

 and I said to myself, ' If I mun doy, I mun 

 doy.' 



