THE GOLD OF FAIRNILEE. 261

 

carried you many a time in weary arms when
you were a babe?”

-Can’t people come back again?” .asked
Randal.

‘Some say ‘ Yes,’ and some say ‘No.’ There
was Tam Hislop, that vanished away the day
before all the lads and your own father went
forth to that weary war at Flodden, and the
English, for once, by guile, won the day. Well,
Tam Hislop, when the news came that all must
arm and mount and ride, he could nowhere be
found. It was as if the wind had carried him
away. High-and low they sought him, but
there was his clothes and his jack,* and his
sword and his spear, but no Tam Hislop.
Well, no man heard more of him for seven
whole years, not till last year, and then he
came back: sore tired he looked, ay, and older
than when he was lost. And I met him by the
well, and I was frightened; and ‘Tam,’ I said,
‘where have ye been this weary time?’ ‘I
have been with them that I will not speak the
name of, says he. ‘Ye mean the good folk,’
said I. ‘Ye have said it,’ says he. Then I
went up to the house, with my heart in my
mouth, and I met Simon Grieve. ‘Simon,’ I
says, ‘here’s Tam Hislop come home from the
good folk.’ ‘I'll soon send him back to them,’
says he. And he takes.a great rungt and lays
it about Tam’s shoulders, calling him coward

* Jack, a kind of breastplate. + Rung, a staff.