"would that it could be so. I cannot leave my father until all other hope is gone, and yet I fear if I do not we are fated to be parted. Even this may be the last time we may meet. I warn thee, Hugh, I am well watched, and I beg you will be careful. Hush! was that a footfall in the grove below the crag?" and she pointed to a clump of trees at some distance under where they were standing, and on the path by which he would return.

"By my troth it may be so," said he. "Better, dear May, retire to your chamber and I shall remain here till you bid me good night from your window."

Again they listened, and again the rustling met their ears distinctly. It ceased, and the maiden bidding her mountain lover a fond good night, ascended to her chamber, while he disdaining to be frightened away by sound, moved to his former position below the alder tree. Seating himself at its root, with his eyes fixed on the window, in a voice low but distinct, he sang to one of the sweet sad lays of long ago, a ditty to his mistress, of which the following paraphrase will convey an idea:—

The moment the song ceased the fair form of May MacLeod appeared at the casement overhead, she waved a fond farewell to her mountain minstrel and closed the window; but the light deprived of her fair face had no charm for him—he gazed once more at the pane through which it beamed like a solitary star, amid the masses of foliage, and was turning away when he found a heavy hand laid on his shoulder.

"Stay," exclaimed the intruder in a deep stern voice, whose tone the young chief knew but too well. "Thou hast a small reckoning to discharge ere thou go, my good boy. I am Macrae."

"And I," answered the other, "am Hugh Munro, what seek'st thou from me?"

"That thou shalt soon know, thou skulking hill cat," answered Macrae throwing his unbuckled sword belt and scabbard on the ground and advancing with extended weapon.

"Indeed! then beware of the wild cat's spring," Munro promptly replied, giving a sudden bound which placed him inside the guard of his antagonist, whose waist he instantly encircled within his sinewy arms with the design of hurling him over the crag on which they stood. The struggle was momentary. Munro, struck to the heart with Macrae's dagger, fell with May's loved name on his lips, while Macrae, staggering over the height in the act of falling, so wounded himself by his own weapon as to render his future life one of helpless manhood and bitter mental regret.

MacLeod was soon after slain in one of the many quarrels of the time, while his daughter May, the sorrowing heiress of the broad lands of Cadboll, lived on for fifty years one long unrelieved day of suffering.

Fifty years! Alas for the mourner—spring succeeded winter, and summer spring, but no change of season lightened May MacLeod's burden! Fifty years! year by year passing away only brought changes to those who lived under her gentle sway, and among the dependents of her home; youth passed into age, young men and maidens filled the places of the valued attendants of her girlhood; but the Lady—solitary—still a mourner, in her feudal tower grew old and bent, thin and wan, and still in her heart the love of her youth bloomed fresh for her betrothed.

And then disease laid hold of her limbs—paralyzed—unable to move, she would fain have died, but the spell of Cadboll was on her—death could not enter within its walls.

Sickness and pain, care and grief, disappointment, trust betrayed, treachery and all the ills which life is heir to, all might and did enter there. Death alone was barred without.

Sadly her maidens listened to her heart breaking appeals, to the spirit of Munro, her unwed husband, the murdered bridegroom of her young life, to come to her aid from the land of shadows and of silence. They knew her story of the fifty years of long ago, and they pitied and grieved with her, wondering at the constancy of her woman's heart.

Still more sadly did they listen to her appeals to be carried out from the castle to the edge of the precipice where the power of the spell ceased, there to look for, meet and welcome death; but they knew not the story of the spell, and they deemed her mad with grief.

Terrified at last by her appeals to the dead, with whom she seemed to hold continual conversation, and who seemed to be present in the chamber with them, though unseen, and partly, at length, worn out with her unceasing importunities, and partly to gratify the whim, as they considered it, of the sufferer, tremblingly they agreed to obey her requests and to carry her forth to the edge of the cliff. A frightened band, they bore the Lady May, lying on her couch, smiling with hope and blessing them for thus consenting. Over the threshold, over the drawbridge, her eyes fixed on the heavens, brightened as they proceeded. Hope flushed with hectic glow upon her pale suffering face, grateful thanks broke from her lips. Hastening their steps they passed through the gate, wound along the hill side, and as the broad expanse of ocean with the fresh wind curling it into wavelets burst upon the sight, a flash of rapture beamed on her countenance; a cry of joy rushed from her pallid lips—their feeble burden grew heavier. A murmur of welcoming delight was uttered to some glorious presence, unseen by the maidens, and all became hushed eternally. The Lady May lay on her couch a stiffening corpse. The spell of Cadboll had been broken at last. A MacLeod inhabited it no more, and decay and ruin seized on the hoary pile of which now scarcely a vestige remains to tell of the former extent and feudal strength of Castle Cadboll.

(To be continued.)

THE OLD CLAYMORE.