Kings of Carrick

AUCHENDRANE INSPIRES TO VENGEANCE. 39
They walked together by the banks of the Doon, the Earl
of Cassillis and Sir Thomas Kennedy. On the rising ground
above towered the Castle, at their feet danced the river, the
sun lighting up its wavelets as it swept along in its bed. The
winter snows were all melted on the hills above Loch Doon,
and the heavy floods which a few weeks before had roared
adown the tortuous pebbly channel, had ceased. The dule-
tree was becoming gay in its light foliage, and everywhere
around nature breathed of the vernal influences. The sun
shone on the grey walls of the keep, and lighted them up
until they shook off their baldness and their grimness, and
looked as soft and reposeful as a pleasant dream.
It was a day — if days had anything to do with it — to
banish heartburnings and thoughts of revenge ; but the times
were out of joint for the cultivation of the finer feelings, and
the Earl of Cassillis was not the man to seek his ends other-
wise than by the approved methods. For more than three
centuries his fathers had wielded the sword ; by the sword
they had maintained their position, and kept their acres —
why should he lay it down ? Sir Thomas Kennedy was other-
wise minded. By nature he was not a man of strife, though
he never fled from it, or behaved himself otherwise than
nobly in the fray. He would fain have seen the swords of
Cassillis hung up to gleam, or to rust, in the armoury, and
the muskets applied to no other purpose than the chase ; and
many a time, as opportunity offered, he sought to implant in
his kinsman the same motives by which he endeavoured to
control his own actions, and regulate his own conduct.
"Why should there be this ceaseless strife?" he asked of
the Earl as they strode along the narrow footpath by the
river's brink. " It was, indeed, an ill-omened day when you
rode forth from Maybole Castle to meet Bargany. Had you
let him pass to his home in peace, instead of slaying him,
there would have been no need for these ceaseless precautions.
Your horses might have stood unharnessed in their stalls, and