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The sound of hoofs in the avenue brought a number of domestics to welcome him home in the kindly old Scottish way, and he had to shake hands with all, especially with Gavin Runlet, the white-haired butler, Elspat Gorm, the old Highland housekeeper, who had donned her best black silk, with the whitest of "mutches," in honour of the occasion: and then, too, came, though last, certainly not the least in his own estimation, with eyes keen as those of an eagle, and massive red beard, a thick-set sturdy figure, and bare limbs brown and hairy as those of a mountain deer, the family piper, Aulay Macaulay, whose boast it was that he came of the Macaulays of Ardencaple, and was a worthier scion of the clan than the historian of the same name.

Aulay had his pipes under his left arm, but no note of triumph or salute could come from them, when the Laird was in his dire extremity, and a great hush seemed over all the household. He had been a piper of the Royal Scots during the campaign in Burmah, and, like Bob Buckle and several others of the grand old regiment, had found a home with their loved Colonel at Ardgowrie.