Yet often enough he brightened up, and began carolling some wild song; or else darted off the road after a hare or other game which he rarely failed to bring down with his arrow; or else rallied me for my silence, and bade me talk to him.
At these times I asked him about his own country, and his father, and then his face lit up.

For though he had not seen either since he was a child, it was clear he longed to be back.
"What prevents your returning now ?" said I.
He looked at me in his strange wondering way.
"Know you not that McDonnell is an exile, and that the hated Sassenach holds his castle ?" demanded he.
I confessed I did not; for a London 'prentice hears little of the news outside.

Besides, though I durst not tell him as much, I did not know who McDonnell, his father, might be; or what he meant by Sassenach.
"But he will feast in Dunluce once more," cried he, "and I shall be there too.

And the usurper woman Elizabeth shall--" Here I sprang at him, and felled him to the ground! The blood left my heart as I saw what I had done.

As he lay there, I could hardly believe it was I who had done it; for I loved him as my own brother, and never more so than when he leapt to his feet, and with white lips and heaving chest stood and faced me.
I was so sure he would fly at me, that I did not even wait for him to begin, but flung myself blindly on him.