Other times the path, that allowed two to walk abreast if they wished very much and kept close together, would skirt the face of the high river bank, and if you peeped down through the foliage of the clinging trees you could see the Tochty running swiftly, and the overhanging branches dipping in their leaves.

Then the river would make a sweep and forsake its bank, leaving a peninsula of alluvial land between, where the geranium and the hyacinth and the iris grew in deep, moist soil.

One of these was almost clear of wood and carpeted with thick, soft turf, and the river beside it was broad and shining.
"We shall go down here," said the General, "and I will show you something that I count the finest monument in Perthshire, or maybe in broad Scotland." In the centre of the sward, with trees just touching it with the tips of their branches, was a little square, with a simple weather-beaten railing.

And the General led Kate to the spot, and stood for a while in silence.
"Two young Scottish lassies, Kate, who died two hundred years ago, and were buried here, and this is the ballad-- "'Bessie Bell and Mary Grey They were twa bonnie lassies, They biggit a hoose on yonder brae And theikit it ower wi' rashes.'" Then the General and Kate sat down by the river edge, and he told her the deathless story,--how in the plague of 1666 they fled to this district to escape infection; how a lover came to visit one of them and brought death in his kiss; how they sickened and died; how they were laid to rest beside the Tochty water; and generations have made their pilgrimage to the place, so wonderful and beautiful is love.

They loved, and their memory is immortal.
Kate rested her chin on her hand and gazed at the running water, which continued while men and women live and love and die.
"He ought not to have come; it was a cowardly, selfish act, but I suppose," added the General, "he could not keep away." "Be sure she thought none the less of him for his coming, and I think a woman will count life itself a small sacrifice for love," and Kate went over to the grave.
A thrush was singing as they turned to go, and nothing was said on the way home till they came near the Lodge.
"Who can that be going in, Kate?
He seems a padre." "I do not know, unless it be our fellow traveller from Muirtown; but he has been redressing himself, and is not improved.
"Father," and Kate stayed the General, as they crossed the threshold of their home, "we have seen many beautiful things to-day, for which I thank you; but the greatest was love.".