Many others affirmed that he was a hypocrite and a villain, addicted to drinking, gambling, and other vices and even cited times, places, and occasions of his sinning.
There never lived a man of whom so much good and so much evil was said as of the young Marquis of Arondelle.

A stranger coming into the neighborhood of Lone, would hear these opposite reports and never be able to decide whether the absent and self-exiled young nobleman was a model of virtue or a monster of vice.
But there was one whose faith in him was firm as her faith in Heaven.
Rose Cameron was the daughter of a Highland shepherd, living about ten miles north of Ben Lone.

No court lady in the land was fairer than this rustic Highland beauty.

Her form was tall, fine, and commanding.

Her step was stately and graceful as the step of an antelope.