Fiction > Book editions > London, 1886 - Kidnapped

IN   BALQUIDDER.                                 259
an end, the last signs of his anger died from him, and
he had no thought but for the music.
"Robin Oig," he said, when it was done, "ye are a
great piper. I am not fit to blow in the same kingdom
with ye. Body of me! ye have mair music in your
sporran than I have in my head! And though it still
sticks in my mind that I could maybe show ye another
of it with the cold steel, I warn ye before hand�it'll
no be fair! It would go against my heart to haggle a
man that can blow the pipes as you can!"
Thereupon that quarrel was made up; all night long
the brose was going and the pipes changing hands; and
the day had come pretty bright, and the three men were
none the better for what they had been taking, before
Robin as much as thought upon the road.
It was the last I saw of him, for I was in the Low
Countries at the University of Leyden, when he stood
his trial, and was hanged in the Grassmarket. And I
have told this at so great length, partly because it was
the last incident of any note that befell me on the
wrong side of the Highland Line, and partly because (as
the man came to be hanged) it's in a manner history.
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