So is life to me, a world without a sun-cold, cold, and charmless!" The countess vainly believed that some sensibility advantageous to her new passion had caused the agitation with which she saw him depart from her side; and, intoxicated with the idea, she ran through many a melodious descant, till toughing on the first strains of Thusa ha measg na reultan mor, she saw Wallace start from his contemplative position, and with a pale countenance leave the room.

There was something in this abruptness which excited the alarm of the Earl of Lennox, who had also been listening to the songs; he rose instantly, and overtaking the chief at the threshold, inquired what was the matter?
"Nothing," answered Wallace, forcing a smile, in which the agony of his mind was too truly imprinted; "but music displeased me." With this reply he disappeared.

The excuse seemed strange but it was true; for she whose notes were to him sweeter than the thrush--whose angel strains used to greet his morning and evening hours--was silent in the grave! He should no more see her white hand upon the lute; he should no more behold that bosom, brighter than foam upon the wave, to him?
A soulless sound, or a direful knell, to recall the remembrance of all he had lost.
Such were his thoughts when the words of Thusa ha measg rung from Lady Mar's voice.

Those were the strains which Halbert used to breathe from his heart to call Marion to her nightly slumbers--those were the strains with which that faithful servant had announced that she slept to wake no more! What wonder, then, that Wallace fled from the apartment, and buried himself, and his aroused grief, amid the distant solitudes of the beacon-hill! While looking over the shoulder of his uncle, on the station which Stirling held amid the Ochil hills, Edwin had at intervals cast a side-long glance upon the changing complexion of his commander; and no sooner did he see him hurry from the room, than fearful of some disaster having befallen the garrison (which Wallace did not choose immediately to mention), he also stole out of the apartment.
After seeking the object of his anxiety for a long time, without avail, he was returning on his steps, when, attracted by the splendor of the moon silvering the beacon-hill, he ascended, to once at least tread that acclivity in light which he had so miraculously passed in darkness.

Scarce a zephyr fanned the sleeping air.