CHAPTER XXV.
EVENTS ON THE HILL-SIDE.
My body was too sore to suffer me to sleep dreamlessly, but my dreams were pleasant.

I thought I was in a sunny place with Elspeth, and that she had braided a coronet of wild flowers for her hair.

They were simple flowers, such as I had known in childhood and had not found in Virginia--yarrow, and queen of the meadow, and bluebells, and the little eyebright.

A great peace filled me, and Ringan came presently to us and spoke in his old happy speech.

'Twas to the accompaniment of Elspeth's merry laughter that I wakened, to find myself in a dark, strange-smelling place, with a buffalo robe laid over me, and no stitch of clothing on my frame.
That wakening was bitter indeed.